While fanatic Frenchwomen on the
battlefields cut the noses off wounded Germans, and mutilated them when
they could, and while the Germans were burning villages and killing
their peaceful inhabitants, if one of them had so much as fired a shot,
in all quietness the great societies for the care of the wounded were
doing their work. And in this Switzerland especially bore the palm.
There were two currents then, one inhuman and one humane, and of the
two, the latter will one day prove itself the stronger. Under Louis XIV.
war was still synonymous with unlimited plundering, murder, rape,
thievery and robbery. Under Napoleon I. there were still no such things
as ambulances. The wounded were carted away now and again in waggons,
piled one on the top of each other, if any waggons were to be had; if
not, they were left as they lay, or were flung into a ditch, there to
die in peace. Things were certainly a little better.
XXXIV.
In Geneva, the news reached me that--in spite of a promise Hall, as
Minister, had given to Hauch, when the latter asked for it for me--I was
to receive no allowance from the Educational Department. To a repetition
of the request, Hall had replied: "I have made so many promises and
half-promises, that it has been impossible to remember or to keep them."
This disappointment hit me rather hard; I had in all only about L50
left, and could not remain away more than nine weeks longer without
getting into debt, I, who had calculated upon staying a whole year
abroad.
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