In spite of the
heaviest snowstorm of the Winter, which made the streets impassable and
stopped the tramway cars, the Nevski Prospekt rang all the afternoon and
evening with the sound of voices raised in patriotic song.
Przemysl is admitted to be the first spectacular success of the war on
the side of the Allies. It is not surprising that the nation is proud
and delighted, yet so generous is the Russian mind that there mingle
with its triumph admiration and sympathy for the garrison which was
compelled to surrender after a long, brave resistance. Popular
imagination has been thrilled by the story of the last desperate sortie,
which will take a high place in the history of modern war.
When toward the end of the week the hope of relief, which had so long
buoyed up the defenders, was with heavy, resolved hearts abandoned,
General Kousmanek resolved to try to save at all events some portion of
his best troops by sending them to fight a way out. From the ranks,
thinned terribly by casualties and also by typhus and other diseases
caused through hunger and the unhealthy state of the town, he selected
20,000 men and served out to them five days' reduced rations, which were
all he had left.
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