The true Democrat., 1854-10-11
The Horrors of War.

The Horrors of War.
 The present war is carried on in an obscure and barbarous corner of the world, whence the sound of its horrors reaches us only by fitful guests. Bella naatrsbus detestata, said old Ho- race, and in saying that he said all The cry Seyrezvos rangs," is we'll enough upon the bat tie field, where there are thousands behind to fill upthespaces amongst the thousands in front; but, at the domestic hearth, this is not so easy, the ranks not so full, and the gaps are not so soon closed up.
 From the commencement to the close of the last general war in Europe, the levies of sol diers in France exceeded four millions, and not less than three millions of these, on the lowest calculation, perished in the field, the hospital and bivouac. If to these we add, as we un- queStionably must, an equal number out of the ranks of their antagonists, 1t is clear that not less than six millions of human beings perished in warfare in the course of twenty years in the very heart of civilized Europe We must add the thousands who pershed from want. out rage and exposure, and the hundreds of thou sands who were swept away by the horrors of that pestilence which took its rise amid the retreat from Russia and the crowded gar risons of the campaign of 1913, and for seve ral years afterwards devastated in succession every country of Europe.
 The following from the war correspondents are specimens of many similar descriptions:
 "I mentioned in former despatch the sad mortality of the zouaves in the Drebudscha who were led on under hot sun, a forced and most tatigulng march in parsuit of the Russian cavalry. The plain, it is said, was literally heaped with the dead bodies of the Russians spreading pestilence and destruction all around. The wells were blocked up with mangled re- mains, an absolute mass of putrefaction, not a drop of pure water was to be found to moisten the parched lips of those fine troops-disap- continent and despair at having utterly failed Tn the object of their expedition was too much for the men: so that under these circumstances 1t Is not at all surprising that such numbers fell victims to the varied noxious influences which at once assailed them.'
 Of the English and French troops, writer 1t Constantinople informs us that
 "The soldiers have suffered so much from sickness and long waiting that they are hardly 1le sam. men as when they arrvel, full of T salta and spirits, four or five months ago. They much worn, and the rela king nature ,f the climate has produced its effects upon them. E:el among the officers the nerves of mlny are shaken by he sight of the men car rlel past, vomiting and blue and such sights lave more effect than the carnage of a general action.''
 Another eyewitness thus sketches the suff.r- ing and decentralization of the army:
 "As an instance of the caprclous action of the disease, may mention what was told me by one of our principal surgeons here. He had been to visit the camp of the 5th Dragoon Guards of the Euniskillens, which was pitched in a very looking healthy site. There how ever, sickness found them, and in few days these skeleton reg iments, (for all our cavalry regi- ments are mere skeletons of regiments and mo- thing more, as few colonies could bring 25O sa- bres into the field in the healthest state of their troops,) were reduced considerably--in fact they lost about 26 men. During the doctors inspec- ton there was heavy thunder storm, and as he sheltered in one of the tents he expressed his satisfaction at an occurrence which, in &C., cordance with vulgar notions, and even with philosophical investigation, is supposed to pro- duce the beneficial operation of called clear ing the ar'', but after the thunder storm the disease became worse, and when the surgeon went down to his own quarters he found that in the very height of the electrical discharges five men of the ambulance corps--a body of men heretofore singularly free from illness-had been seized with cholera, and of those five men four were dead in less than six hours. The conduct of many the men, French and English, seems characterized by recklessness which verges on insanity. You find them lying drunk in the kennels, or in the ditches by the roadside, un- der the blazing rays of the sun, covered with swarms of tiies You see them in stupid so- briety gravely pairing the rind off cucumbers of portentous dimensions, and eating the deadly cylinders one after another, to the number of six or eight, till there is no more room for more all the while sitting in groups in the fields or on the flags by the shops in the open streets, and looking as if they thought they were adopt ing highly sanitary measures for their health's sake; or frequently three or four of them will make happy bargain with Greek for large basketball of apricots, killjohns," scarlet pumpkins, water-melons, wooden pears, and green "gages" and plums, and then they re- tire beneath te shade of tree, where they divide and eat the lucious food till nought re- mains but heap of peal, rnd and stones.- They dilute the mass of fruit with raki, or peach brandy, and then struggle home or go to sleep as best they can"