RUSSIAN REINFORCEMENTS.

Colonist, Volume XIX, Issue 2283, 13 September 1877, Page 4

RUSSIAN REINFORCEMENTS.

A St. Petersburg letter states that 40,000 fresh troops are already on their way by railroad to the seat of war. The Guards follow in ten days. The force includes 8000 cavalry, 56,000 infantry, and 250 cannon. Only picked regiments go to Bulgaria.

The Russian reinforcements to the Asiatic and Caucasian armies are stated to be 90,000. 15,000 crossed the frontier and occupied a strong position north of Aui, threatening the right flank of the centre of the Ottoman army. Tl.e Russian centre is divided into three columns at Ani, Gilverna, Eurukdara. The numbers in all are 68 battalions of infantry, 16 batteries of artillery, and 8500 cavalry.,

FEARFUL OUTRAGES BY EACH PARTY.

The Times correspondent at Karabunar writes : — " Appalling accounts continue to come in of the misery of the fugitives from the districts devastated by the Bashi Bazouks and Bulgarians. Thousands of women and children are homeless and perishing for want of shelter, medical attendance, and food, and immediate help is sorely needed. The Pasha proposes to distribute the fugitives about Constantinople, Adrianople, and Fhilippopolia. Correspondents suggest the formation of a city of refuge on the island near Constantinople, under the protection of a neutral flag, and a neutral guarantee from the belligerents. The crops are rotting in the ground^ and no provision is being made for the coming ■winter." The same correspondent speaks favorably of the conduct of the Turkish regulars, but blames the Government for employing, or not controlling, the irregulars, who commit all the worst excesses. " Even the fugitive women and children, who come' for protection to the Turks, have to be guarded by the regular troops lest they should be further injured by those savage Bulgarians, who ore behaving muoh in the same way as the Bashi Bazouks. It will be impossible for the Christiana and Mahommedanß ever to live together again in the disturbed districts. Even thePhilo-Russians severely condemn Russia's conduct in first instigating the Bulgarians to revolt, and then leaving them to the meroy of the Turks, whose right to treat them as rebels it is hard to question."

At Batak, a village in the exclusively Mahommedan district of Sistova, 100 houses were burned, and 100 men and 300 women perished. It is believed that but seven inhabitants survived. Afc Batovan, a Mussulman village in the district, of Tirnova, 250 houses were burned, 700 men and 1200 women perished, and only one peraon is believed to have escaped. Al Kataboulas 100 houses were burned, 200 men and 300 women perished; two persons only escaped. At Kestambal 150 houses were burned, and 300 men and 600 women perished. At Chems, a mixed village, 60 'of the Mussulmans' houses were destroyed, and 120 men and 200 women perished ; one person only escaped. At Lundja, another mixed village, 100 houses were destroyed, and 250 men and 400 women perished; three persons only survived. Villages abandoned upon approach of Russians were given to the flames, and nearly 5000 houses destroyed. The Legation concludes from information received, that the Russians have adopted one uniform system —to seize defenceless villages, and after destroying them with cannon shot, to massacre the unarmed inhabitants, and to carry off the women for the Durpose of outraging their persons, when they arenot tilled at first. The Russians threaten the Christian Tillages with the same fate if they do not surrender, or if the inhabitants refuse to be enrolled.