In exceptional cases, when the military chest happened to be well filled, the provisions acquired might be paid for, but as a rule armies upon the march lived by foraging.

The cavalry swept in the flocks and herds from the country round.

Flour, forage, and everything else required was seized wherever found, and the unhappy peasants and villagers thought themselves lucky if they escaped with the loss of all they possessed, without violence, insult, and ill treatment.

The slightest resistance to the exactions of the lawless foragers excited their fury, and indiscriminate slaughter took place.

The march of an army could be followed by burned villages, demolished houses, crops destroyed, and general ruin, havoc, and desolation.
In the cases of towns these generally escaped indiscriminate plunder by sending deputies forward to meet advancing armies, when an offer would be made to the general to supply so much food and to pay so much money on condition that private property was respected.