And who was this enemy, who, in scorn of all humanity and civilization, tortured the unfortunate and hunted them down?

They were not Russians, nor wild hordes of Cossacks.  They were Austrians and Saxons, who, robbing and plundering, murdering and destroying, violating and burning, rushed through Berlin, filling all the inhabitants with terror and alarm.

General Bachmann kept faithfully the promise he had made to Gotzkowsky, and the Russian army at first not only preserved the strictest discipline, but even protected the inhabitants against the violence of the Austrians and Saxons.

The terrified citizens had one powerful and beneficent friend—­this was John Gotzkowsky.  Yielding to his urgent entreaty, General von Bachmann’s adjutant, Von Brinck, had taken up his quarters in his house, and by his assistance and his own influence with the general, Gotzkowsky was enabled to afford material aid to all Berlin.  For those citizens who were able to pay the soldiers he procured a Russian safeguard, and more than once this latter protected the inhabitants of the houses against the vandalism of the Austrians and Saxons.

Contrary to the wish of the Russians, the Austrians had forced themselves into the city, and, in spite of the terms of the capitulation agreed upon with the Russians, had quartered themselves upon the citizens, from whom, with the most savage cruelty and threats of ingenious torture, they extorted all the gold and jewels they possessed.

Berlin was now the open camping-ground of Croats and Austrian hussars, and Russian Cossacks, and all minds were filled with dread and anxiety.

It is true that even the Cossacks forgot the strict discipline which had been commanded them, and entered the houses, robbing and compelling the inhabitants, by blows of the knout, to give them all they wanted.  But yet they were less cruel than the Saxons, less barbarous than the Austrians, who, with scoffing and derision, committed the greatest atrocities.  Indeed, it was only necessary to complain to the Russian general in order to obtain justice immediately, and have the Cossacks punished.  Eight of them were strung up in one day at the guard-house on the New Market square, as a warning and example to the others, and expiated their robberies by a summary death.  But with the Austrians and Saxons it was the officers themselves who instigated the soldiers to acts of revolting barbarity, and who, forgetful of all humanity, by their laughter and applause excited their subordinates to fresh ill-treatment of the inhabitants.  Disregarding the capitulation, and listening to their national enmity, and their love of plunder, they pressed forward with wild screams into the royal stables, driving away the safeguard of four-and-twenty men, which General von Tottleben had placed there for their protection, and with shameless insolence defiling the Prussian coat-of-arms pictured on the royal carriages.  They then drew them out into the open street, and, after they had stripped them of their ornaments and decorations, piled them up in a great heap and set them on fire, in order to add to the fright and terror of the bewildered citizens by the threatening danger of conflagration.