not wholly cut off from it; they were ardent and jovial; but beyond the
Oder, in Poland, where the soil, productions, inhabitants, costumes,
manners, in short every thing, to the very habitations, wore a foreign
aspect; where nothing, in short, resembled a country which they
regretted; they began to be dismayed at the distance they had traversed,
and their faces already bore the stamp of fatigue and lassitude.

"By what an extraordinary distance must they then be separated from
France, since they had already reached unknown regions, where every
thing presented to them an aspect of such gloomy novelty! how many steps
they had taken, and how many more they had yet to take! The very idea of
return was disheartening; and yet they were obliged to march on, to keep
constantly marching! and they complained that ever since they left
France, their fatigues had been gradually increasing, and the means of
supporting them continually diminishing."

The truth is, that wine first failed them, then beer, even spirits; and,
lastly, they were reduced to water, which in its turn was frequently
wanting. The same was the case with dry provisions, and also with every
necessary of life; and in this gradual destitution, depression of mind
kept pace with the successive debilitation of the body. Agitated by a
vague inquietude, they marched on amid the dull uniformity of the vast
and silent forests of dark pines. They crept along these large trees,
bare and stripped to their very tops, and were affrighted at their
weakness amid this immensity. They then conceived gloomy and absurd
notions respecting the geography of these unknown regions; and, overcome
by a secret horror, they hesitated to penetrate farther into such vast
deserts.

From these sufferings, physical and moral, from these privations, from
these continual bivouacs, as dangerous near the pole as under the
equator, and from the infection of the air by the putrified carcases of
men and horses that strewed the roads, sprang two dreadful
epidemics--the dysentery and the typhus fever. The Germans first felt
their ravages; they are less nervous and less sober than the French; and
they were less interested in a cause which they regarded as foreign to
them. Out of 22,000 Bavarians who had crossed the Oder, 11,000 only
reached the Düna; and yet they had never been in action. This military
march cost the French one-fourth, and the allies half of their army.

Every morning the regiments started in order from their bivouacs; but
scarcely had they proceeded a few steps, before their widening ranks
became lengthened out into small and broken files; the weakest, being
unable to follow, dropped behind: these unfortunate wretches beheld
their comrades and their eagles getting farther and farther from them:
they still strove to overtake, but at length lost sight of them, and
then sank disheartened. The roads and the margins of the woods were
studded with them: some were seen plucking the ears of rye to devour the
grain; and they would then attempt, frequently in vain, to reach the
hospital, or the nearest village. Great numbers thus perished.

But it was not the sick only that separated from the army: many
soldiers, disgusted and dispirited on the one hand, and impelled by a
love of independence and plunder on the other, voluntarily deserted
their colours; and these were not the least resolute: their numbers soon
increased, as evil begets evil by example. They formed bands, and fixed
their quarters in the mansions and villages adjacent to the military
road. There they lived in abundance. Among them there were fewer French
than Germans; but it was remarked, that the leader of each of these
little independent bodies, composed of men of several nations, was
invariably a Frenchman.

Rapp had witnessed all these disorders: on his arrival, his blunt
honesty kept back none of these details from his chief; but the emperor
merely replied, "I am going to strike a great blow, and all the
stragglers will then rally."

With Sebastiani he was more explicit. The latter reminded him of his own
words, when he had declared to him, at Wilna, that "he would not cross
the Düna, for to proceed farther this year, would be hurrying to
infallible destruction."

Sebastiani, like the others, laid great stress on the state of the army.
"It is dreadful, I know," replied the emperor: "from Wilna, half of it
consisted of stragglers; now they form two-thirds; there is, therefore,
no time to be lost: we must extort peace; it is at Moscow. Besides, this
army cannot now stop: with its composition, and in its disorganization,
motion alone keeps it together. One may advance at the head of it, but
not stop or go back. It is an army of attack, not of defence; an army of
operation, not of position."

It was thus that he spoke to those immediately about him; but to the
generals commanding his divisions, he held a different language. Before
the former, he manifested the motives which urged him forward, from the
latter he carefully concealed them, and seemed to agree with them as to
the necessity of stopping. This may serve to explain the contradictions
which were remarked in his own language.

Thus, the very same day, in the streets of Smolensk, surrounded by
Davoust and his generals, whose corps had suffered most in the assault
of the preceding day, he said, that in the capture of Smolensk he was
indebted to them for an important success, and that he considered that
city as an excellent head of cantonments.

"Now," continued he, "my line is well covered; we will stop here: behind
this rampart, I can rally my troops, let them rest, receive
reinforcements, and our supplies from Dantzic. Thus the whole of Poland
is conquered and defended; this is a sufficient result; it is gathering,
in two months, the fruit that might be expected only from two years of
war: it is therefore sufficient. Betwixt this and the spring, we must
organize Lithuania, and recompose an invincible army; then, if peace
should not come to seek us in our winter quarters, we will go and
conquer it at Moscow."

He then told the marshal in confidence, that his motive for ordering him
to proceed beyond Smolensk, was only to drive off the Russians to the
distance of a few marches; but he strictly forbade him to involve
himself in any serious affair. At the same time, it is true, he
committed the vanguard to Murat and to Ney, the two rashest of his
officers; and, unknown to Davoust, he placed that prudent and
methodical marshal under the command of the impetuous king of Naples.
Thus his mind seemed to be wavering between two great resolutions, and
the contradictions in his words were communicated to his actions. In
this internal conflict, however, it was remarked, what an ascendence his
enterprising genius had over his prudence, and how the former so
disposed matters as to give birth to circumstances which must
necessarily hurry him away.

CHAP. VII.

Meanwhile the Russians still defended the suburb on the right bank of
the Dnieper. On our side, the 18th, and the night of the 19th, were
employed in rebuilding the bridges. On the 19th of August, before day,
Ney crossed the river by the light of the suburb, which was on fire. At
first, he saw there no enemies but the flames, and he began to climb the
long and rugged declivity on which it stands. His troops proceeded
slowly and with caution, making a thousand circuits to avoid the fire.
The Russians had managed it with skill: it met our men at every point,
and obstructed the principal avenues.

Ney, and the foremost of his soldiers, advanced in silence into this
labyrinth of flames, with anxious eye and attentive ear, not knowing but
that the Russians might be waiting on the summit of the steep, to pour
suddenly upon them, to overthrow and drive them back into the flames and
the river. But they breathed more freely, relieved from the weight of a
great apprehension, when they perceived on the crest of the ravine, at
the branching-off of the roads to Petersburgh and Moscow, nothing but a
band of cossacks, who immediately fled by those two roads. Having
neither prisoners nor inhabitants, nor spies, the ground was, as at
Witepsk, the only thing they could interrogate. But the enemy had left
as many traces in one direction as in the other, so that the marshal
paused in uncertainty between the two until mid-day.

During this interval, a passage had been effected across the Boristhenes
at several points; the roads to the two hostile capitals were
reconnoitred to the distance of a league, and the Russian infantry was
discovered in that leading to Moscow. Ney would soon have overtaken it;
but as that road skirted the Dnieper, he had to cross the streams which
fall into it. Each of them having scooped out its own bed, marked the
bottom of a valley, the opposite side of which was a position where the
enemy posted himself, and which it was necessary to carry: the first,
that of the Stubna, did not detain him long; but the hill of Valoutina,
at the foot of which runs the Kolowdnia, became the scene of an
obstinate conflict.

The cause of this resistance has been attributed to an ancient tradition
of national glory, which represented this field of battle as ground
consecrated by victory. But this superstition, worthy even still of the
Russian soldier, is far from the more enlightened patriotism of their
generals. It was necessity that here compelled them to fight: we have
seen that the Moscow road, on leaving Smolensk, skirted the Dnieper, and
that the French artillery, on the other bank, traversed it with its
fire. Barclay durst not take this road at night, for fear of risking his
artillery, baggage, and the waggons with the wounded, the rolling of
which would have betrayed his retreat.

The Petersburgh road quitted the river more abruptly: two marshy
cross-roads branched off from it on the right, one at the distance of
two leagues from Smolensk, the other at four; they ran through woods,
and rejoined the high-road to Moscow, after a long circuit; the one at
Bredichino, two leagues beyond Valoutina, the other farther off at
Slobpnewa.

Into these defiles Barclay was bold enough to commit himself with so
many horses and vehicles; so that this long and heavy column had thus to
traverse two large arcs of a circle, of which the high-road from
Smolensk to Moscow, which Ney soon attacked, was the chord. Every
moment, as always happens in such cases, the overturning of a carriage,
the sticking fast of a wheel, or of a single horse, in the mud, or the
breaking of a trace, stopped the whole. The sound of the French cannon,
meanwhile, drew nearer, and seemed to have already got before the
Russian column, and to be on the point of reaching and closing the
outlet which it was striving to gain.

At length, after an arduous march, the head of the enemy's convoy came
in sight of the high-road at the moment when the French had only to
force the height of Valoutina and the passage of Kolowdnia, in order to
reach that outlet. Ney had furiously carried that of the Stubna; but
Korf, driven back upon Valoutina, had summoned to his aid the column
which preceded him. It is asserted that the latter, without order, and
badly officered, hesitated to comply; but that Woronzof, aware of the
importance of that position, prevailed upon its commander to turn back.

The Russians defended themselves to defend every thing, cannon, wounded,
baggage: the French attacked in order to take every thing. Napoleon had
halted a league and a half behind Ney. Conceiving that it was but an
affair between his advanced guard and the rear of the enemy, he sent
Gudin to the assistance of the marshal, rallied the other divisions, and
returned to Smolensk. But this fight became a serious battle; 30,000 men
were successively engaged in it on both sides: soldiers, officers,
generals, encountered each other; the action was long, the struggle
terrible; even night did not suspend it. At length, in possession of the
plateau, exhausted by the loss of strength and blood, Ney finding
himself surrounded only by dead, dying, and obscurity, became fatigued;
he ordered his troops to cease firing, to keep silence, and present
bayonets. The Russians hearing nothing more, were silent also, and
availed themselves of the darkness to effect their retreat.

There was almost as much glory in their defeat as in our victory: the
two chiefs carried their point, the one in conquering, the other in not
being conquered till he had saved the Russian artillery, baggage, and
wounded. One of the enemy's generals, the only one left unhurt on this
field of carnage, endeavoured to escape from among our soldiers, by
repeating the French word of command; he was recognized by the flashes
of their fire-arms, and secured. Other Russian generals had perished,
but the grand army sustained a still greater loss.

At the passage of the bridge over the Kolowdnia, which had been badly
repaired, General Gudin, whose well-regulated valour loved to confront
none but useful dangers, and who besides was not a bold rider, had
alighted from his horse to cross the stream, when, at that moment, a
cannon-ball skimming the surface of the ground, broke both his legs.
When the tidings of this misfortune reached the emperor, they put a stop
to every thing--to discussion and action. Every one was thunderstruck;
the victory of Valoutina seemed no longer to be a success.

Gudin was conveyed to Smolensk, and there received the unavailing
attentions of the emperor; but he soon expired. His remains were
interred in the citadel of the city, which they honour: a worthy tomb
for a soldier, who was a good citizen, a good husband, a good father, an
intrepid general, just and mild, a man both of principle and talent; a
rare assemblage of qualities in an age when virtuous men are too
frequently devoid of abilities, and men of abilities without virtue. It
was a fortunate chance that he was worthily replaced; Gérard, the oldest
general of brigade of the division, took the command of it, and the
enemy, who knew nothing of our loss, gained nothing by the dreadful blow
he had dealt us.

The Russians, astonished at having been attacked only in front,
conceived that all the military combinations of Murat were confined to
following them on the high-road. They therefore styled him in derision,
"_the general of the high roads_," characterizing him thus from the
event, which tends more commonly to deceive than to enlighten.

In fact, while Ney was attacking, Murat scoured his flanks with his
cavalry, without being able to bring it into action; woods on the left,
and morasses on the right, obstructed his movements. But while they were
fighting in front, both were anticipating the effect of a flanking march
of the Westphalians, commanded by Junot.

From the Stubna, the high-road, in order to avoid the marshes formed by
the various tributary streams of the Dnieper, turned off to the left,
ascended the heights, and went farther from the basin of the river, to
which it afterwards returned in a more favourable situation. It had been
remarked that a by-road, bolder and shorter, as they all are, ran
straight across these low marshy grounds, between the Dnieper and the
high-road, which it rejoined behind the plateau of Valoutina.

It was this cross-road which Junot pursued after crossing the river at
Prudiszy. It soon led him into the rear of the left of the Russians,
upon the flank of the columns which were returning to the assistance of
their rear-guard. His attack was all that was wanted to render the
victory decisive. Those who were engaged in front with Marshal Ney would
have been daunted at hearing an attack in their rear; while the
uncertainty and disorder into which, in the midst of an action, it would
have thrown the multitude of men, horses, and carriages, crowded
together in one road, would have been irreparable; but Junot, though
personally brave, was irresolute as a general. His responsibility
alarmed him.

Meanwhile Murat, judging that he must have come up, was astonished at
not hearing his attack. The firmness of the Russians opposed to Ney led
him to suspect the truth. He left his cavalry, and crossing the woods
and marshes almost alone, he hastened to Junot, and upbraided him with
his inaction. Junot alleged in excuse, that "He had no orders to attack;
his Wurtemberg cavalry was shy, its efforts feigned, and it would never
be brought to charge the enemy's battalions."

These words Murat answered by actions. He rushed on at the head of that
cavalry, which, with a different leader, were quite different troops; he
urged them on, launched them against the Russians, overthrew their
tirailleurs, returned to Junot and said to him, "Now finish the
business: your glory and your marshal's staff are still before you!" He
then left him to rejoin his own troops, and Junot, confounded, remained
motionless. Too long about Napoleon, whose active genius directed every
thing, both the plan and the details, he had learned only to obey: he
wanted experience in command; besides, fatigue and wounds had made him
an old man before his time.

That such a general should have been selected for so important a
movement, was not at all surprising; it was well known that the emperor
was attached to him both from habit, (for he was his oldest aid-de-camp)
and from a secret foible, for as the presence of that officer was mixed
up with all the recollections of his victories and his glory, he
disliked to part from him. It is also reasonable to suppose that it
flattered his vanity, to see men who were his pupils commanding his
armies; and it was moreover natural that he should have a firmer
alliance on their attachment, than on that of any others.

When, however, on the following day he inspected the places themselves,
and, at the sight of the bridge where Gudin fell, made the remark, that
it was not there he ought to have debouched; when afterwards gazing,
with an angry look, on the position which Junot had occupied, he
exclaimed: "It was there, no doubt, that the Westphalians should have
attacked! all the battle was there! what was Junot about?" his
irritation became so violent, that nothing could at first allay it. He
called Rapp, and told him to take the command from the Duke of
Abrantes:--he would dismiss him from the army! he had lost his
marshal's staff without retrieve! this blunder would probably block the
road to Moscow against them; that to him, Rapp, he should intrust the
Westphalians; that he would speak to them in their own language, and he
would know how to make them fight. But Rapp refused the place of his
old companion in arms; he appeased the emperor, whose anger always
subsided quickly, as soon as it had vented itself in words.

But it was not merely on his left that the enemy had a narrow escape
from being conquered; on his right he had run a still greater risk.
Morand, one of Davoust's generals, had been despatched from that side
through the forests; he marched along woody heights, and was, from the
commencement of the action, on the flank of the Russians. A few paces
more, and he would have debouched in the rear of their right. His sudden
appearance would have infallibly decided the victory, and rendered it
complete; but Napoleon, unacquainted with the localities, ordered him to
be recalled to the spot where Davoust and himself had stopped.

In the army, we could not help asking ourselves, why the emperor, in
making three officers, independent of one another, combine for the same
object, had not made a point of being on the spot, to give their
movements the unity indispensable, and without him impossible. He, on
the contrary, had returned to Smolensk, either from fatigue, or chiefly
from not expecting so serious an affair; or finally, because, from the
necessity of attending to every thing at once, he could not be in time,
or completely any where. In fact, the business of his empire and of
Europe, having been suspended by the preceding days of activity, had
accumulated. It was necessary to clear out his portfolios, and to give
circulation to both civil and political affairs, which began to clog; it
was, besides, urgent and glorious to date from Smolensk.

When, therefore, Borelli, second in command of Murat's staff, came to
inform him of the battle of Valoutina, he hesitated about receiving him;
and so deeply was he engaged in the business before him, that a minister
had to interfere to procure that officer admittance. The report of this
officer agitated Napoleon. "What say you?" he exclaimed: "what! you are
not enough! the enemy shows 60,000 men! Then it is a battle!" and he
began storming at the disobedience and inactivity of Junot. When Borelli
informed him of Gudin's mortal wound, Napoleon's grief was violent; he
gave vent to it in repeated questions and expressions of regret; then
with that strength of mind which was peculiar to him, he subdued his
uneasiness, postponed his anger, suspended his chagrin, and giving
himself up wholly to his occupation, he deferred until the morrow the
charge of battles, for night had come on; but afterwards the hopes of a
battle roused him, and he appeared next morning with the day on the
fields of Valoutina.

CHAP. VIII.

Ney's troops, and those of Gudin's division, deprived of their general,
had drawn up there on the corses of their companions and of the
Russians, amidst the stumps of broken trees, on ground trampled by the
feet of the combatants, furrowed with balls, strewed with the fragments
of weapons, tattered garments, military utensils, carriages overthrown,
and scattered limbs; for such are the trophies of war, such the beauties
of a field of victory!

Gudin's battalions appeared to be melted down to platoons; the more they
were reduced, the prouder they seemed to be: close to them, one still
breathed the smell of burnt cartridges and gunpowder, with which the
ground and their apparel were impregnated, and their faces yet quite
begrimed. The emperor could not pass along their front without having to
avoid, to step over, or to tread upon carcases, and bayonets twisted by
the violence of the shock. But over all these horrors he threw a veil of
glory. His gratitude transformed this field of death into a field of
triumph, where, for some hours, satisfied honour and ambition held
exclusive sway.

He was sensible that it was high time to encourage his soldiers by
commendations and rewards. Never, therefore, were his looks more kind;
and as to his language, "this battle was the most glorious achievement
in our military history; the soldiers who heard him were men with whom
one might conquer the world; the slain, warriors who had died an
immortal death." He spoke thus, well aware that it is more especially
amid such destruction that men think of immortality.

He was profuse in his rewards; on the 12th, 21st, 127th of the line, and
the 17th light, he conferred eighty-seven decorations and promotions;
these were Gudin's regiments. The 127th had, before this, marched
without an eagle; for at that time it was necessary for a regiment to
earn its colours in a field of battle, to prove, that in the sequel it
would know how to preserve them there.

The emperor delivered the eagle to it with his own hands; he also
satisfied Ney's corps. His favours were as great in themselves as they
were in their form. The value of the gift was enhanced by the manner in
which he bestowed it. He was successively surrounded by each regiment as
by a family. There he appealed in a loud voice to the officers,
subalterns, and privates, inquiring who were the bravest of all those
brave men, or the most successful, and recompensing them on the spot.
The officers named, the soldiers confirmed, the emperor approved: thus,
as he himself observed, the elections were made instantaneously, in a
circle, in his presence, and confirmed with acclamations by the troops.

These paternal manners, which made the private soldier the military
comrade of the ruler of Europe; these forms, which revived the
still-regretted usages of the republic, delighted the troops. He was a
monarch, but the monarch of the Revolution; and they could not but love
a fortunate sovereign who led them on to fortune; in him there was every
thing to excite, and nothing to reproach them.

Never did field of victory exhibit a spectacle more capable of exalting;
the presentation of that eagle so richly merited, the pomp of these
promotions, the shouts of joy, the glory of those warriors, recompensed
on the very spot where it had just been acquired; their valour
proclaimed by a voice, every accent of which rung throughout attentive
Europe; by that great captain whose bulletins would carry their names
over the whole world, and more especially among their countrymen, and
into the bosoms of their families, which they would at once cheer and
make proud: how many favours at once! they were absolutely intoxicated
with them: he himself seemed at first to allow himself to share their
transports.

But when he was out of sight of his troops, the attitude of Ney and
Murat, and the words of Poniatowski, who was as frank and judicious in
council as he was intrepid in the field, tranquillized him; and when the
close heat of the day began to overpower him, and he learned from the
reports that his men had proceeded eight leagues without overtaking the
enemy, the spell was entirely dissolved. On his return to Smolensk, the
jolting of his carriage over the relics of the fight, the stoppages
caused on the road by the long file of the wounded who were crawling or
being carried back, and in Smolensk itself by the tumbrels of amputated
limbs about to be thrown away at a distance; in a word, all that is
horrible and odious out of fields of battle, completely disarmed him.
Smolensk was but one vast hospital, and the loud groans which issued
from it drowned the shout of glory which had just been raised on the
fields of Valoutina.

The reports of the surgeons were frightful: in that country a spirit
distilled from grain is used instead of wine and brandy made from
grapes. Narcotic plants are mixed with it. Our young soldiers, exhausted
with hunger and fatigue, conceived that this liquor would cheer them;
but its perfidious heat caused them to throw out at once all the fire
that was yet left in them, after which they sank exhausted, and became
the victims of disease.

Others, less sober, or more debilitated, were seized with dizziness,
stupefaction, and torpor; they squatted into the ditches and on the
roads. Their half-open, watery, and lack-lustre eyes seemed to watch,
with insensibility, death gradually seizing their whole frame; they
expired sullenly and without a groan.

At Wilna, it had not been possible to establish hospitals for more than
six thousand sick: convents, churches, synagogues, and barns, served to
receive the suffering multitude. In these dismal places, which were
sometimes unhealthy, but still too few, and too crowded, the sick were
frequently without food, without beds, without covering, and without
even straw and medicines. The surgeons were inadequate to the duty, so
that every thing, even to the very hospitals, contributed to create
disease, and nothing to cure.

At Witepsk, 400 wounded Russians were left on the field of battle: 300
more were abandoned in the town by their army; and as the inhabitants
had been taken away, these unfortunate wretches remained three days
before they were discovered, without assistance, huddled together
pell-mell, dead and dying, amidst the most horrible filth and infection:
they were at length collected together and mixed with our own wounded,
who, like those of the Russians, amounted to 700. Our surgeons tore up
their very shirts, and those of these poor creatures, to dress them; for
there already began to be a scarcity of linen.

When at length the wounds of these unfortunate men were healed, and they
required nothing but wholesome food to complete their cure, they
perished for want of sustenance: few either of the French or Russians
escaped. Those who were prevented from going in quest of food by the
loss of a limb, or by debility, were the first to sink. These disasters
occurred wherever the emperor was not in person; his presence bringing,
and his departure carrying, every thing along with it; and his orders,
in fact, not being scrupulously obeyed but within the circle of his own
observation.

At Smolensk, there was no want of hospitals; fifteen spacious brick
buildings were rescued from the flames: there were even found some wine,
brandy, and a few medical stores; and our reserve waggons for the
wounded at length rejoined us: but every thing ran short. The surgeons
were at work night and day, but the very second night, all the materials
for dressing the wounded were exhausted: there was no more linen, and
they were forced to use paper, found in the archives, in its stead.
Parchment served for splinters, and coarse cloth for compresses; and
they had no other substitute for lint than tow and birch down (_coton du
bouleau_).

Our surgeons were overwhelmed with dismay: for three days an hospital of
a hundred wounded had been forgotten; an accident led to its discovery:
Rapp penetrated into that abode of despair. I will spare my reader the
horror of a description. Wherefore communicate those terrible
impressions which harrow up the soul? Rapp did not spare them to
Napoleon, who instantly caused his own wine, and a sum of money, to be
distributed among such of those unfortunate men as a tenacious life
still animated, or whom a disgusting food had supported.

But to the vehement emotion which these reports excited in the bosom of
the emperor, was superadded an alarming consideration. The conflagration
of Smolensk was no longer, he saw, the effect of a fatal and unforeseen
accident of war, nor even the result of an act of despair: it was the
result of cool determination. The Russians had studied the time and
means, and taken as great pains to destroy, as are usually taken to
preserve.

The same day the courageous answers of one of their popes (the only one
found in Smolensk,) enlightened him still more in regard to the blind
fury which had been excited in the whole Russian nation. His
interpreter, alarmed by this animosity, conducted the pope to the
emperor. The venerable priest first reproached him, with firmness, for
his alleged sacrilegious acts: he knew not that it was the Russian
general himself who had caused the storehouses and churches to be set on
fire, and who had accused us of these outrages, in order that the
mercantile class and the peasantry might not separate their cause from
that of the nobility.

The emperor listened attentively. "But," said he to him at last, "has
your church been burned?"--"No, sire," replied the pope; "God will be
more powerful than you; he will protect it, for I have opened it to all
the unfortunate people whom the destruction of the city has deprived of
a home!"--"You are right," rejoined Napoleon, with emotion, "yes, God
will watch over the innocent victims of war; he will reward you for your
courage. Go, worthy priest, return to your post. Had all your popes
followed your example, they had not basely betrayed the mission of peace
which they received from heaven; if they had not abandoned the temples
which their presence alone renders sacred, my soldiers would have spared
your holy edifices; for we are all Christians, and your God is our God."

With these words, Napoleon sent back the priest to his temple with an
escort and some succours. A heart-rending shriek arose at the sight of
the soldiers penetrating into this asylum. A crowd of terrified women
and children thronged about the altar; but the pope, raising his voice,
cried; "be of good cheer: I have seen Napoleon; I have spoken to him.
Oh! how have we been deceived, my children! the emperor of France is not
the man that he has been represented to you. Learn that he and his
soldiers worship the same God as we do. The war which he wages is not
religious, it is a political quarrel with our emperor. His soldiers
fight only our soldiers. They do not slaughter, as we have been assured,
old men, women, and children. Cheer up, then, and let us thank God for
being relieved from the painful duty of hating them as heathen, impious
wretches, and incendiaries!" The pope then commenced a hymn of thanks,
in which they all joined with tearful eyes.

But these very words demonstrated how much the nation had been deceived.
The rest of the inhabitants had fled. Henceforward, then, it was not
their army alone, it was the population, it was all Russia, that fled
before us. The emperor felt that, with this population, one of his most
powerful engines of conquest was escaping from his hands.

CHAP. IX.

Ever since our arrival at Witepsk, Napoleon had in fact employed two of
his officers to sound the sentiments of these people. The object was,
to instil into them notions of liberty, and to compromise them in our
cause by an insurrection more or less general. But there had been
nothing to work upon excepting a few straggling savage boors, whom the
Russians had perhaps left as spies amongst us. This attempt had only
served to betray his plan, and to put the Russians on their guard
against it.

This expedient, moreover, was repugnant to Napoleon, whose nature
inclined him much more to the cause of kings than to that of nations. He
employed it but carelessly. Subsequently, at Moscow, he received several
addresses from different heads of families. They complained that they
were treated by the nobility like herds of cattle, which they might sell
or barter away at pleasure. They solicited Napoleon to proclaim the
abolition of slavery, and in the event of his doing so, they offered to
head partial insurrections, which they promised speedily to render
general.

These offers were rejected. We should have seen, among a barbarous
people, a barbarous liberty, an ungovernable, a horrible licentiousness:
a few partial revolts had formerly furnished the standard of them. The
Russian nobles, like the planters of St. Domingo, would have been
ruined. The fear of this prevailed in the mind of Napoleon, and was
confessed by him; it induced him to give up, for a time, all attempts to
excite a movement which he could not have regulated.

Besides, these masters had conceived a distrust of their slaves. Amidst
so many dangers, they distinguished this as the most urgent. They first
wrought upon the minds of their unfortunate serfs, debased by all sorts
of servitude. Their priests, whom they are accustomed to believe,
imposed upon them by delusive language; they persuaded these peasants
that we were legions of devils, commanded by Antichrist, infernal
spirits, whose very look would excite horror, and whose touch would
contaminate. Such of our prisoners as fell into their hands, remarked
that these poor creatures would not again make use of the vessels which
they had used, and that they reserved them for the most filthy animals.

As we advanced, however, our presence would have refuted all these
clumsy fables. But behold! these nobles fell back with their serfs into
the interior of the country, as at the approach of a dire contagion.
Property, habitations, all that could detain them, and be serviceable to
us, were sacrificed. They interposed famine, fire, and the desert,
between them and us; for it was as much against their serfs as against
Napoleon that this mighty resolution was executed. It was no longer,
therefore, a war of kings that was to be prosecuted, but a war of class,
a war of party, a war of religion, a national war, a combination of all
sorts of war.

The emperor then first perceived the enormous magnitude of his
enterprise; the farther he advanced, the more it became magnified. So
long as he only encountered kings, to him, who was greater than all of
them, their defeats were but sport; but the kings being conquered, he
had now to do with people; and it was another Spain, but remote, barren,
infinite, that he had found at the opposite extremity of Europe. He was
daunted, hesitated, and paused.

At Witepsk, whatever resolution he might have taken, he wanted Smolensk,
and till he should be at Smolensk, he seemed to have deferred coming to
any determination. For this reason he was again seized with the same
perplexity: it was now more embarrassing, as the flames, the prevalent
epidemic, and the victims which surrounded him, had aggravated every
thing; a fever of hesitation attacked him; his eyes turned towards Kief,
Petersburgh, and Moscow.

At Kief he should envelop Tchitchakof and his army; he should rid the
right flank and the rear of the grand army, of annoyance; he should
cover the Polish provinces most productive of men, provisions, and
horses; while fortified cantonments at Mohilef, Smolensk, Witepsk,
Polotsk, Dünabourg, and Riga, would defend the rest. Behind this line,
and during the winter, he might raise and organize all ancient Poland,
and hurl it in the spring upon Russia, oppose nation to nation, and
render the war equal.

At Smolensk, however, he was at the point where the Petersburgh and
Moscow roads meet, 29 marches from the first of these capitals, and 15
from the other. In Petersburgh, the centre of the government, the knot
to which all the threads of the administration were united, the brain of
Russia, were her military and naval arsenals; in short, it was the only
point of communication between Russia and England, of which he should
possess himself. The victory of Polotsk, of which he had just received
intelligence, seemed to urge him in that direction. By marching in
concert with Saint-Cyr upon Petersburgh, he should envelop Wittgenstein,
and cause Riga to fall before Macdonald.

On the other hand, in Moscow, it was the nobility, as well as the
nation, that he should attack in its property, in its ancient honour;
the road to that capital was shorter; it presented fewer obstacles and
more resources; the Russian main army, which he could not neglect, and
which he must destroy, was there, together with the chances of a battle,
and the hope of giving a shock to the nation, by striking at its heart
in this national war.

Of these three plans the latter appeared to him the only one
practicable, in spite of the advancing season. The history of Charles
XII. was, nevertheless, before his eyes; not that of Voltaire, which he
had just thrown aside with impatience, judging it to be romantic and
inaccurate, but the journal of Adlerfield, which he read, but which did
not stop him. On comparing that expedition with his own, he found a
thousand differences between them, on which he laid great stress; for
who can be a judge in his own cause? and of what use is the example of
the past, in a world where there never were two men, two things, or two
situations exactly alike?

At any rate, about this period the name of Charles XII. was frequently
heard to drop from his lips.

CHAP. X.

But the news which arrived from all quarters excited his ardour quite as
much as it had been at Witepsk. His lieutenants seemed to have done more
than himself: the actions of Mohilef, Molodeczna, and Valoutina, were
regular battles, in which Davoust, Schwartzenberg, and Ney, were
conquerors; on his right, his line of operation seemed to be covered;
the enemy's army was flying before him; on his left, the Duke of Reggio,
after drawing Wittgenstein upon Polotsk, was attacked at Slowna, on the
17th of August. The attack of Wittgenstein was furious and obstinate; it
failed; but he retained his offensive position, and Marshal Oudinot had
been wounded. Saint-Cyr succeeded him in the command of that army,
composed of about 30,000 French, Swiss, and Bavarians. The very next day
this general, who disliked any command unless when he exercised it alone
and in chief, availed himself of it, to give his measure to his own
troops and to the enemy; but coolly, according to his character, and
combining every thing.

From daybreak till five in the evening, he contrived to amuse the enemy
by the proposal of an agreement to withdraw the wounded, and more
especially by demonstrations of retreat. At the same time he silently
rallied all his combatants, drew them up into three columns of attack,
and concealed them behind the village of Spas and rising grounds.

At five o'clock, all being ready, and Wittgenstein's vigilance asleep,
Saint-Cyr gave the signal: his artillery immediately began firing, and
his columns rushed forward. The Russians, being taken by surprise,
resisted in vain; their right was first broken, and their centre soon
fled in disorder: they abandoned 1000 prisoners, 20 pieces of cannon, a
field of battle covered with slain, and the offensive, which Saint-Cyr,
being too weak, could only affect to resume, for the purpose of better
defending himself.

In this short but severe and sanguinary conflict, the right wing of the
Russians, which was supported by the Düna, made an obstinate resistance.
It was necessary to charge it with the bayonet, amidst a thick fire of
grape-shot; every thing succeeded, but when it was supposed that there
was no more to do but to pursue, all was nearly lost; some Russian
dragoons, according to some, and horse-guards, according to others,
risked a charge on a battery of Saint-Cyr's; a French brigade placed to
support it advanced, then suddenly turned its back and fled through the
midst of our cannon, which it prevented from being fired. The Russians
reached them pell-mell with our men; they sabred the gunners, upset the
pieces, and pursued our horse so closely, that the latter, more and more
terrified, ran in disorder upon their commander-in-chief and his staff,
whom they overthrew. General Saint-Cyr was obliged to fly on foot. He
threw himself into the bottom of a ravine, which sheltered him from the
squall. The Russian dragoons were already close to Polotsk, when a
prompt and skilful manoeuvre of Berkheim and the 4th French
cuirassiers put an end to this warm affair. The Russians betook
themselves to the woods.

The following day Saint-Cyr sent a body of men in pursuit of them, but
merely to observe their retreat, to mark the victory, and to reap some
more of its fruits. During the two succeeding months, up to the 18th of
October, Wittgenstein kept at a respectful distance. The French general,
on his part, confined his attention to observing the enemy, keeping up
his communications with Macdonald, with Witepsk, and Smolensk,
fortifying himself in his position of Polotsk, and, above all, finding
there means of subsistence.

In this action of the 18th, four generals, four colonels, and many
officers, were wounded. Among them the army remarked the Bavarian
Generals Deroy and Liben. They expired on the 22d of August. These
generals were of the same age; they had belonged to the same regiment,
had made the same campaigns, proceeded at nearly an equal pace in their
perilous career, which was gloriously terminated by the same death, and
in the same battle. It was thought right not to separate in the tomb
these warriors, whom neither life nor death had been able to part; one
grave received the remains of both.

On the news of this victory, the emperor sent to General Saint-Cyr the
staff of Marshal of the empire. He placed a great number of crosses at
his disposal, and subsequently approved most of the promotions which
were applied for.

Notwithstanding this success, the determination to proceed beyond
Smolensk was too perilous for Napoleon to decide on it alone: it was
requisite that he should contrive to be drawn into it. Beyond Valoutina,
Ney's corps, which was fatigued, had been replaced by that of Davoust.
Murat as king, as brother-in-law to the emperor, and agreeably to his
order, was to command it. Ney had submitted to this, less from
condescension than from conformity of disposition. They agreed in their
ardour.

But Davoust, whose methodical and tenacious genius was a complete
contrast to the fiery impetuosity of Murat, and who was rendered proud
by the remembrance of, and the titles derived from two great victories,
was piqued at being placed in this dependence. These haughty chiefs, who
were about the same age, had been companions in war, and had mutually
witnessed each other's elevation; they were both spoiled by the habit of
having obeyed only a great man, and were by no means fit to command one
another; Murat, in particular, who was too often unable to command
himself.

Davoust nevertheless obeyed, but with an ill grace, and imperfectly, as
wounded pride generally does. He affected immediately to break off all
direct correspondence with the emperor. The latter, surprised at this,
ordered him to renew it, alleging his distrust of the reports of Murat.
Davoust made a handle of this avowal, and again asserted his
independence. Henceforward the vanguard had two leaders. Thus the
emperor, fatigued, distressed, overloaded with business of every kind,
and forced to show indulgence to his lieutenants, divided his power as
well as his armies, in spite of his precepts and his former examples.
Circumstances, which he had so often controlled, became stronger than
him, and controlled him in their turn.

Meanwhile Barclay, having fallen back without resistance nearly as far
as Dorogobouje, Murat had no need of Davoust, and no occasion presented
itself for misunderstanding; but about eleven in the forenoon of the 23d
of August, a thick wood, a few wersts from that town, which the king
wished to reconnoitre, was warmly disputed with him: he was obliged to
carry it twice.

Murat, surprised at such a resistance at that early hour, pushed on, and
piercing through this curtain, beheld the whole Russian army drawn up in
order of battle. The narrow ravine of the Luja separated him from it: it
was noon; the extent of the Russian lines, especially towards our right,
the preparations, the hour, the place, which was that where Barclay had
just rejoined Bagration; the choice of the ground, well suited for a
general engagement; all gave him reason to anticipate a battle; and he
sent a dispatch to the emperor to apprise him of it.

At the same time he ordered Montbrun to pass the ravine on his right
with his cavalry, in order to reconnoitre and get upon the left of the
enemy. Davoust, and his five divisions of infantry, extended themselves
on that side; he protected Montbrun: the king recalled them to his left,
on the high-road, designing, it is said, to support Montbrun's flank
movement by some demonstrations in front.

Davoust replied, that "This would be sacrificing our right wing, through
which the enemy would get behind us on the high-road, our only means of
retreat; that thus he would force us to a battle, which he, Davoust, had
orders to avoid, and which he would avoid, his force being insufficient,
the position bad, and he being moreover under the command of a leader in
whom he had but little confidence." He then wrote immediately to
Napoleon, urging him to come up without loss of time, if he would not
have Murat engage without him.

On this intelligence, which he received in the night of the 24th of
August, Napoleon joyfully threw aside his indecision, which to this
enterprising and decisive genius was absolute torture: he hurried
forward with his guard, and proceeded twelve leagues without halting;
but on the evening of the preceding day, the enemy's army had again
disappeared.

On our side, his retreat was attributed to the movement of Montbrun; on
the part of the Russians to Barclay, and to a bad position chosen by the
chief of his staff, who had taken up ground in his own disfavour,
instead of making it serve to his advantage. Bagration was the first who
perceived it; his rage knew no bounds, and he proclaimed it treason.

Discord reigned in the Russian camp as well as in our advanced guard.
Confidence in their commander, that strength of armies, was wanting; his
every step seemed a blunder; each resolution that was taken the very
worst. The loss of Smolensk had soured all; the junction of the two
_corps d'armée_ increased the evil; the stronger the Russian force felt
itself, the weaker did its general seem to it. The outcry became
general; another leader was loudly called for. A few prudent men,
however, interposed: Kutusof was announced, and the humbled pride of the
Russians awaited him in order to fight.

The emperor, on his part, already at Dorogobouje, no longer hesitated;
he knew that he carried every where with him the fate of Europe; that
wherever he might be, that would always be the place where the destiny
of nations would be decided; that he might therefore advance, fearless
of the threatening consequences of the defection of the Swedes and
Turks. Thus he neglected the hostile armies of Essen at Riga, of
Wittgenstein before Polotsk, of Ertell before Bobruisk, and of
Tchitchakof in Volhynia. They consisted of 120,000 men, whose number
could not but keep gradually augmenting; he passed them, and suffered
himself to be surrounded by them with indifference, assured that all
these vain obstacles of war and policy would be swept away by the very
first thunderbolt which he should launch.

And yet, his column of attack, which was 185,000 strong at his departure
from Witepsk, was already reduced to 157,000; it was diminished by
28,000 men, half of whom occupied Witepsk, Orcha, Mohilef, and Smolensk.
The rest had been killed or wounded, or were straggling, and plundering
in his rear our allies and the French themselves.

But 157,000 men were sufficient to destroy the Russian army by a
complete victory, and to take Moscow. As to his base of operation,
notwithstanding the 120,000 Russians by whom it was threatened, it
appeared to be secure. Lithuania, the Düna, the Dnieper, and lastly
Smolensk, were or would soon be covered towards Riga and Dünabourg by
Macdonald and 32,000 men; towards Polotsk, by Saint-Cyr, with 30,000; at
Witepsk, Smolensk, and Mohilef, by Victor and 40,000; before Bobruisk,
by Dombrowski and 12,000; and on the Bug by Schwartzenberg and Regnier,
at the head of 45,000 men. Napoleon reckoned besides on the divisions of
Loison and Durutte, 22,000 strong, which were already approaching
Königsberg and Warsaw; and on reinforcements to the amount of 80,000,
all of which would enter Russia before the middle of November.

He should thus have 280,000 men, including the Lithuanian and Polish
levies, to support him, while, with 155,000 more, he made an incursion
of 93 leagues; for such was the distance between Smolensk and Moscow.

But these 280,000 men were commanded by six different leaders, all
independent of each other, and the most elevated of them, he who
occupied the centre, and who seemed to be appointed to act as an
intermediate link, to give some unity to the operations of the other
five, was a minister of peace, and not of war.

Besides, the same causes which had already diminished, by one-third, the
French forces which first entered Russia, could not fail to disperse or
to destroy a still greater proportion of all these reinforcements. Most
of them were coming by detachments, formed provisionally into marching
battalions under officers new to them, whom they were to leave the first
day, without the incentive of discipline, _esprit de corps_, or glory,
and traversing an exhausted country, which the season and the climate
would be rendering daily more bare and more rude.

Meanwhile Napoleon beheld Dorogobouje in ashes, like Smolensk,
especially the quarter of the merchants, those who had most to lose,
whom their riches might have detained or brought back amongst us, and
who, from their situation, formed a kind of intermediate class, a
commencement of the third estate, which liberty was likely to seduce.

He was perfectly aware that he was quitting Smolensk, as he had come
thither, with the hope of a battle, which the indecision and discord of
the Russian generals had as yet deferred; but his resolution was taken;
he would hear of nothing but what was calculated to support him in it.
He persisted in pursuing the track of the enemy; his hardihood increased
with their prudence; their circumspection he called pusillanimity, their
retreat flight; he despised, that he might hope.

BOOK VII.

CHAP. I.

The emperor had proceeded with such expedition to Dorogobouje, that he
was obliged to halt there, in order to wait for his army, and to leave
Murat to pursue the enemy. He set out again on the 26th of August; the
army marched in three columns abreast; the Emperor, Murat, Davoust, and
Ney in the centre, on the high-road to Moscow; Poniatowski on the right;
and the army of Italy on the left.

The principal column, that of the centre, found nothing on a road where
its advanced guard itself had to subsist entirely on the leavings of the
Russians; it could not digress from its direction, for want of time, in
so rapid a march. Besides, the columns on the right and left consumed
every thing on either side of it. In order to live better, it ought to
have set out later every day, halted earlier, and then extended itself
more on its flanks during the night; which could be done without
imprudence when the enemy was so near at hand.

At Smolensk orders had been issued, as at Witepsk, to take, at starting,
provisions for several days. The emperor was aware of the difficulty of
collecting them, but he reckoned upon the diligence of the officers and
the troops; they had warning,--that was sufficient; they would contrive
to provide themselves with necessaries. They had acquired the habit of
doing so; and it was really a curious sight to observe the voluntary and
continual efforts of so many men to follow a single individual to such
great distances. The existence of the army was a prodigy that was daily
renewed, by the active, industrious, and intelligent spirit of the
French and Polish troops, by their habit of surmounting all
difficulties, and by their fondness for the hazards and irregularities
of this dreadful game of an adventurous life.

In the train of each regiment there were a multitude of those diminutive
horses with which Poland swarms, a great number of carts of the country,
which required to be incessantly replaced with fresh ones, and a drove
of cattle. The baggage-waggons were driven by soldiers, for they turned
their hands to every trade. They were missed in the ranks, it is true;
but here the want of provisions, the necessity for transporting every
thing with them, excused this prodigious train: it required a second
army, as it were, to carry or draw what was indispensable for the first.

In this prompt organization, adopted while marching, the army had
accommodated itself to all the local customs and difficulties; the
genius of the soldiers had admirably made the most of the scanty
resources of the country. As to the officers, as the general orders
always took for granted regular distributions which were never made,
each of them, according to the degree of his zeal, intelligence, and
firmness, appropriated to himself more or less of this spoil, and had
converted individual pillage into regular contributions.

For it was only by excursions on the flanks and into an unknown country
that any provisions could be procured. Every evening, when the army
halted, and the bivouacs were established, detachments, rarely commanded
by divisions, sometimes by brigades, and most commonly by regiments,
went in quest of necessaries, and penetrated into the country; a few
wersts from the road they found all the villages inhabited, and were not
very hostilely received; but as they could not make themselves
understood, and besides wanted every thing, and that instantaneously,
the peasants were soon seized with a panic and fled into the woods,
whence they issued again as no very formidable partizans.

The detachments meanwhile plentifully regaled themselves, and rejoined
their corps next day or some days afterwards, laden with all that they
had collected; and it frequently happened that they were plundered in
their turn by their comrades belonging to the other corps whom they
chanced to fall in with. Hence animosities, which would have infallibly
led to most sanguinary intestine conflicts, had not all been
subsequently overtaken by the same misfortune, and involved in the
horrors of a common disaster.

Till the return of their detachments, the soldiers who remained with
their eagles lived on what they could find on the military route; in
general it consisted of new rye, which they bruised and boiled. Owing to
the cattle which followed, there was less want of meat than of bread;
but the length, and especially the rapidity of the marches, occasioned
the loss of many of these animals: they were suffocated by the heat and
dust; when, therefore, they came to water, they ran into it with such
fury, that many of them were drowned, while others drank so
immoderately, as to swell themselves out till they were unable to walk.

It was remarked, as before we reached Smolensk, that the divisions of
the first corps continued to be the most numerous; their detachments,
better disciplined, brought back more, and did less injury to the
inhabitants. Those who remained with their colours lived on the contents
of their knapsacks, the regular appearance of which relieved the eye,
fatigued with a disorder that was nearly universal.

Each of these knapsacks, reduced to what was strictly necessary in point
of apparel, contained two shirts, two pair of shoes with nails, and a
pair of extra soles, a pair of pantaloons and half-gaiters of cloth; a
few articles requisite to cleanliness, a bandage, and a quantity of
lint, and sixty cartridges.

In the two sides were placed four biscuits of sixteen ounces each; under
these, and at the bottom, was a long, narrow, linen bag, filled with ten
pounds of flour. The whole knapsack and its contents, together with the
straps and the hood, rolled up and fastened at top, weighed
thirty-three pounds twelve ounces.

Each soldier carried also a linen bag, slung in form of a shoulder-belt,
containing two loaves of three pounds each. Thus with his sabre, his
loaded knapsack, three flints, his turn-screw, his belt and musket, he
had to carry fifty-eight pounds weight, and was provided with bread for
four days, biscuit for four, flour for seven, and sixty rounds of
ammunition.

Behind it were carriages laden with provisions for six more days; but it
was impossible to reckon with confidence on these vehicles, picked up on
the spot, which would have been so convenient in any other country with
a smaller army, and in a more regular war.

When the flour-bag was emptied, it was filled with any corn that could
be found, and which was ground at the first mill, if any chanced to be
met with; if not, by the hand-mills which followed the regiments, or
which were found in the villages, for the Russians are scarcely
acquainted with any others. It took sixteen men twelve hours to grind in
one of them the corn necessary for one hundred and thirty men for one
day.

As every house in this country has an oven, little want was felt on that
score; bakers abounded; for the regiments of the first corps contained
men of all trades, so that articles of food and clothing were all made
or repaired by them during the march. They were colonies uniting the
character of civilized and nomadic. The emperor had first conceived the
idea, which the genius of the prince of Eckmühl had appropriated; he had
every thing he wanted, time, place, and men to carry it into execution;
but these three elements of success were less at the disposal of the
other chiefs. Besides, their characters being more impetuous and less
methodical, would scarcely have derived the same advantages from it;
with a less organizing genius, they would therefore have had more
obstacles to surmount; the emperor had not paid sufficient attention to
these differences, which were productive of baneful effects.

CHAP. II.

It was from Slawkowo, a few leagues beyond Dorogobouje, that Napoleon
sent orders, on the 27th of August, to marshal Victor, who was then on
the Niemen, to advance to Smolensk. This marshal's left was to occupy
Witepsk, his right Mohilef, and his centre Smolensk. There he would
succour Saint-Cyr, in case of need, serve for a point of support to the
army of Moscow, and keep up his communications with Lithuania.

It was also from the same imperial head-quarters that he published the
details of his review at Valoutina, with the intention of proclaiming to
the present and future ages the names even of the private soldiers who
had there distinguished themselves. But he added, that at Smolensk "the
conduct of the Poles had astonished the Russians, who had been
accustomed to despise them." These words drew from the Poles an outcry
of indignation, and the emperor smiled at an anger which he had
foreseen, and the effects of which were designed to fall exclusively on
the Russians.

On this march he took delight in dating from the heart of Old Russia a
number of decrees, which would be circulated in the meanest hamlets of
France; from the desire of appearing to be present every where at once,
and filling the earth more and more with his power: the offspring of
that inconceiveable and expanding greatness of soul, whose ambition was
at first a mere plaything, but finally coveted the empire of the world.

It is true that at the same time there was so little order about him at
Slawkowo, that his guard burned, during the night, to warm themselves,
the bridge which they were ordered to guard, and the only one by which
he could, the next day, leave his imperial quarters. This disorder,
however, like many others, proceeded not from insubordination, but from
thoughtlessness; it was corrected as soon as it was perceived.

The very same day Murat drove the enemy beyond the Osma, a narrow river,
but enclosed with high banks, and of great depth, like most of the
rivers of this country, the effect of the snow, and which, at the period
of its general melting, prevents inundations. The Russian rear-guard,
covered by this obstacle, faced about and established itself on the
heights of the opposite bank. Murat ordered the ravine to be examined,
and a ford was discovered. It was through this narrow and insecure
defile that he dared to march against the Russians, to venture between
the river and their position; thus cutting off from himself all retreat,
and turning a skirmish into a desperate action. In fact, the enemy
descended in force from their height, and drove him back to the very
brink of the ravine, into which they had well-nigh precipitated him. But
Murat persisted in his error; he braved it out, and converted it into a
success. The 4th lancers carried the position, and the Russians went to
pass the night not far off; content with having made us purchase at a
dear rate a quarter of a league of ground, which they would have given
up to us for nothing during the night.

At the moment of the most imminent danger, a battery of the prince of
Eckmühl twice refused to fire. Its commanding officer pleaded his
instructions, which forbade him, upon pain of being broke, to fight
without orders from Davoust. These orders arrived, in time, according to
some, but too late according to others. I relate this incident, because,
on the following day, it was the occasion of a violent quarrel between
Murat and Davoust, in presence of the emperor, at Semlewo.

The king reproached the prince with his tardy circumspection, and more
especially with an enmity which dated from the expedition to Egypt. In
the vehemence of his passion he told him, that if there was any quarrel
between them they ought to settle it by themselves, but that the army
ought not to be made the sufferers for it.

Davoust, irritated in his turn, accused the king of temerity; according
to him "his thoughtless ardour was incessantly compromising his troops,
and wasting to no purpose, their lives, their strength, and their
stores. It was right that the emperor should at last know what was daily
occurring in his advanced guard. Every morning the enemy had disappeared
before it; but this experience led to no alteration whatever in the
march: the troops, therefore, set out late, all keeping the high-road,
and forming a single column, and in this manner they advanced in the
void till about noon.

"The enemy's rear-guard, ready to fight, was then discovered behind some
marshy ravine, the bridges over which had been broken down, and which
was commanded from the opposite bank. The light troops were instantly
brought into action, then the first regiments of cavalry that were at
hand, and then the artillery; but in general out of reach, or against
straggling cossacks, who were not worth the trouble. At length, after
vain and sanguinary attempts made in front, the king took it into his
head to reconnoitre the force and position of the enemy more accurately,
and to manoeuvre; and he sent for the infantry.

"Then after having long waited in this endless column, the ravine was
crossed on the left or on the right of the Russians, who retired under a
fire of their small arms to a new position; where the same resistance,
and the same mode of march and attack, exposed us to the same losses and
the same delays.

"In this manner the king went on from position to position, till he came
to one which was stronger or better defended. It was usually about five
in the evening, sometimes later, rarely earlier; but in this case the
tenacity of the Russians, and the hour, plainly indicated that their
whole army was there, and was determined to pass the night on the spot.

"For it could not be denied that this retreat of the Russians was
conducted with admirable order. The ground alone dictated it to them and
not Murat. Their positions were so well chosen, taken so seasonably, and
each defended so exactly in proportion to its strength, and the time
which their general wished to gain, that in truth their movements seemed
to form part of a plan which had been long determined on, carefully
traced, and executed with scrupulous exactness.

"They never abandoned a post till the moment before they were likely to
be driven from it.

"In the evening they established themselves early in a good position,
leaving under arms no more troops than were absolutely necessary to
defend it, while the remainder rested and refreshed themselves."

Davoust added that, "so far from profiting by this example, the king
paid no regard either to the hour, the strength of the situation, or the
resistance; that he dashed on among his tirailleurs, dancing about in
front of the enemy's line, feeling it in every part; putting himself in
a passion, giving his orders with loud shouts, and making himself hoarse
with repeating them; exhausting every thing, cartouch-boxes,
ammunition-waggons, men and horses, combatants and non-combatants, and
keeping all the troops under arms till night had set in.

"Then, indeed, it was found necessary to desist, and to take up their
quarters where they were; but they no longer knew where to find
necessaries. It was really pitiful to hear the soldiers wandering in the
dark, groping about, as it were, for forage, water, wood, straw, and
provisions, and then, unable to find their bivouacs again, calling out
to one another lest they should lose themselves, during the whole night.
Scarcely had they time, not to sleep, but to prepare their food.
Overwhelmed with fatigue, they cursed the hardships they had to endure,
till daylight and the enemy came to rouse them again.

"It was not the advanced guard alone that suffered in this manner, but
the whole of the cavalry. Every evening Murat had left behind him 20,000
men on horseback and under arms, on the high-road. This long column had
remained all day without eating or drinking, amidst a cloud of dust,
under a burning sky; ignorant of what was passing before it, advancing a
few paces from one quarter of an hour to another, then halting to deploy
among fields of rye, but without daring to take off the bridles and to
allow their famished horses to feed, because the king kept them
incessantly on the alert. It was to advance five or six leagues that
they thus passed sixteen tedious hours--particularly arduous for the
cuirassier horses, which had more to carry than the others, though
weaker, as the largest horses in general are, and which required more
food; hence their great carcasses were worn down to skeletons, their
flanks collapsed, they crawled rather than walked, and every moment one
was seen staggering, and another falling under his rider, who left him
to his fate."

Davoust concluded with saying, that "in this manner the whole of the
cavalry would perish; Murat, however, might dispose of that as he
pleased, but as for the infantry of the first corps, so long as he had
the command of it, he would not suffer it to be thrown away in that
manner."

The king was not backward in replying. While the emperor was listening
to them, he was at the same time playing with a Russian ball, which he
kicked about with his foot. It seemed as if there was something in the
misunderstanding between these chiefs which did not displease him. He
attributed their animosity entirely to their ardour, well aware that of
all passions glory is the most jealous.

The impatient ardour of Murat gratified his own. As the troops had
nothing to live upon but what they found, every thing was consumed at
the moment; for this reason it was necessary to make short work with the
enemy, and to proceed rapidly. Besides, the general crisis in Europe was
too strong, his situation too critical to remain there, and himself too
impatient; he wished to bring matters to a close at any rate, in order
to extricate himself.

The impetuosity of the king, therefore, seemed to suit his anxiety
better than the methodical prudence of the Prince of Eckmühl.
Accordingly, when he dismissed them, he said mildly to Davoust, that
"one person could not possess every species of merit; that he knew
better how to fight a battle than to push a rear-guard; and that if
Murat had pursued Bagration in Lithuania, he would probably not have
allowed him to escape." It is even asserted that he reproached the
marshal with a restless disposition, an anxiety to appropriate to
himself all the commands; less, indeed, from ambition than zeal, and
that all might go on better; but yet this zeal had its inconveniences.
He then sent them away with an injunction to agree better in future.

The two chiefs returned to their commands, and to their animosity. As
the war was confined to the head of the column, that also was the scene
of their disputes.

CHAP. III.

On the 28th of August, the army crossed the vast plains of the
government of Wiazma: it marched in all haste, the whole together,
through fields, and several regiments abreast, each forming a short,
close column. The high-road was left for the artillery, its waggons, and
those carrying the sick and wounded. The emperor, on horseback, was seen
every where: Murat's letters, and the approach to Wiazma, deceived him
once more with the hope of a battle: he was heard calculating on the
march the thousands of cannon-balls which he would require to crush the
hostile army.

Napoleon had assigned its place to the baggage: he published an order
for burning all vehicles which should be seen among the troops, not
excepting carts loaded with provisions, for they might embarrass the
movements of the columns, and compromise their safety in case of attack.
Having met in his way with the carriage of General Narbonne, his
aid-de-camp, he himself caused it to be set on fire, before the face of
that general, and that instantaneously, without suffering it to be
emptied; an order which was only severe, although it appeared harsh,
because he himself began by enforcing its execution, which, however, was
not followed up.

The baggage of all the corps was therefore assembled in the rear of the
army: there was, from Dorogobouje, a long train of bat-horses and
kibitks, harnessed with ropes; these vehicles were laden with booty,
provisions, military effects, men appointed to take care of them;
lastly, sick soldiers, and the arms of both, which were rusting in them.
In this column were seen many of the tall dismounted cuirassiers,
bestriding horses no bigger than our asses, because they could not
follow on foot for want of practice and of boots. On this confused and
disorderly multitude, as well as on most of the marauders on our flanks,
the cossacks might have made successful _coups de main_. They would
thereby have harassed the army, and retarded its march, but Barclay
seemed fearful of discouraging us: he put out his strength only against
our advanced guard, and that but just sufficiently to slacken without
stopping our progress.

This determination of Barclay's, the declining strength of the army, the
quarrels between its chiefs, the approach of the decisive moment, gave
uneasiness to Napoleon. At Dresden, at Witepsk, and even at Smolensk, he
had hoped in vain for a communication from Alexander. At Ribky, on the
28th of August, he appeared to solicit one: a letter from Berthier to
Barclay, in no other respect worthy of notice, concluded with these
words: "The emperor directs me to request you to present his compliments
to the emperor Alexander; tell him that neither the vicissitudes of war,
nor any other circumstance, can diminish the friendship which he feels
for him."

The same day, the 28th of August, the advanced-guard drove back the
Russians as far as Wiazma; the army, thirsty from the march, the heat
and the dust, was in want of water; the troops disputed the possession
of a few muddy pools, and fought near the springs, which were soon
rendered turbid and exhausted; the emperor himself was forced to put up
with this muddy beverage.

During the night, the enemy destroyed the bridges over the Wiazma,
plundered that town, and set it on fire. Murat and Davoust precipitately
advanced to extinguish the flames. The enemy defended his conflagration,
but the Wiazma was fordable near the ruins of the bridges: one part of
the advanced-guard then attacked the incendiaries, and the other the
fire, which they speedily subdued.

On this occasion some chosen men were sent to the advanced-guard, with
orders to watch the enemy closely at Wiazma, and ascertain whether they,
or our soldiers, were the real incendiaries. Their report entirely
dissipated the doubts which the emperor might still have entertained as
to the fatal resolution of the Russians. They found in this town some
resources, which pillage would soon have wasted. In passing through the
city, the emperor observed this disorder: he was exceedingly incensed,
rode into the midst of the groups of soldiers, caused a suttler to be
seized, and ordered him to be instantly tried and shot. But the meaning
of the phrase from his lips was well known; it was known, also that the
more vehement his paroxysms of anger, the sooner they were followed by
indulgence. A moment afterwards, they, therefore, merely placed in his
way the unfortunate man on his knees, with a woman and several children
beside him, whom they passed off for his family. The emperor, who had
already cooled, inquired what they wanted, and caused the man to be set
at liberty.

He was still on horseback, when he saw Belliard, for fifteen years the
companion in war of Murat, and then the chief of his staff, coming
towards him. Surprised at seeing him, the emperor fancied some
misfortune had happened. Belliard first relieved his apprehensions, and
then added, that "Beyond the Wiazma, behind a ravine, on an advantageous
position, the enemy had shown himself in force and ready for battle;
that the cavalry on both sides immediately engaged, and as the infantry
became necessary, the king in person put himself at the head of one of
Davoust's divisions, and drew it out to lead it against the enemy; but
that the marshal hastened up, calling to his men to halt, loudly
censuring that manoeuvre, harshly reproaching the king for it, and
forbidding his generals to obey him: that Murat then appealed to his
dignity, to his military rank, to the exigency of the occasion, but in
vain; that, finally, he had sent to declare to the emperor his disgust
for a command so contested, and to tell him that he must choose between
him and Davoust."

This intelligence threw Napoleon into a passion: he exclaimed, that
"Davoust was unmindful of all subordination; that he forgot the respect
due to his brother-in-law, to him whom he had appointed his lieutenant;"
and he sent Berthier with orders that Compans's division, the same which
had been the subject of the altercation, should be thenceforward under
the command of the king. Davoust did not defend the manner, but merely
the motive of his act, either from prejudice against the habitual
temerity of the king, from spleen, or that he was a better judge of the
ground, and the manoeuvre adapted to it, which is very possible.

Meanwhile the combat had finished, and Murat, whose attention was no
longer diverted by the enemy, was wholly occupied with the thoughts of
his quarrel. Shut up with Belliard, and hiding himself in a manner in
his tent, as his memory recalled the expressions of the marshal, his
blood became more and more inflamed with shame and rage. "He had been
set at defiance, and publicly insulted, and Davoust still lived! What
did he care for the anger of the emperor, and for his decision? it was
for him to revenge his own wrong! What signified his rank? it was his
sword alone that had made him a king, and it was to that alone he should
appeal!" He was already snatching up his arms to go and attack Davoust,
when Belliard stopped him, by urging existing circumstances, the example
he ought to set to the army, the enemy to be pursued, and that it would
be wrong to distress his friends and delight the foe by so desperate a
proceeding.

The general says, that he then saw the king curse his crown, and strive
to swallow the affront; but that tears of spite rolled down his cheeks
and fell upon his clothes. Whilst he was thus tormenting himself,
Davoust, obstinately persisting in his opinion, said that the emperor
was misinformed, and remained quietly in his head-quarters.

Napoleon returned to Wiazma, where he was obliged to stop to ascertain
the advantages that he might derive from his new conquest. The accounts
which he received from the interior of Russia, represented the hostile
government as appropriating to itself our successes, and inculcating the
belief that the loss of so many provinces was the effect of a general
plan of retreat, adopted beforehand. Papers seized at Wiazma stated that
_Te Deum_ had been sung at Petersburgh for pretended victories at
Witepsk or Smolensk. "What!" he exclaimed in astonishment, "_Te Deum!_
Dare they then lie to God as well as to men?"

For the rest, most of the intercepted Russian letters expressed the same
astonishment. "While our villages are blazing," said they, "we hear
nothing here but the ringing of bells, hymns of thanksgiving, and
triumphant reports. It seems as if they would make us thank God for the
victories of the French. Thus there is lying in the air, lying on earth,
lying in words and in writing, lying to Heaven and earth, lying in every
thing. Our great men treat Russia like a child, but there is no small
degree of credulity in believing us to be so credulous."

Very just reflections, if means so gross had been employed to deceive
those who were capable of writing such letters. At any rate, though
these political falsehoods are generally resorted to, it was plain that
when carried to such excess, they were a satire either on the governors
or the governed, and, perhaps, on both.

During this time the advanced-guard pushed the Russians as far as Gjatz,
exchanging a few balls with them,--an exchange which was almost always
to the disadvantage of the French, the Russians taking care to employ
only their long pieces, which would carry much farther than ours.
Another remark which we made was, that from Smolensk the Russians had
neglected to burn the villages and the mansions. As they are of a
character which aims at effect, this obscure evil probably appeared to
them to be a useless one. They were satisfied with the more signal
conflagrations of their cities.

This defect, if that negligence proceeded from it, turned, as is
frequently the case with all other defects, to the advantage of their
enemies. In these villages, the French army found forage, corn, ovens
for baking, and shelter. Others observed on this point, that all these
devastations were allotted to cossacks, to barbarians; and that these
hordes, either from hatred or contempt of civilization, seemed to take a
savage and particular pleasure in the destruction of the towns.

CHAP. IV.

On the 1st of September, about noon, there was only a copse of fir-trees
between Murat and Gjatz. The appearance of cossacks obliged him to
deploy his first regiments, but in his impatience he soon sent for some
horse, and having himself driven the Russians from the wood which they
occupied, he crossed it and found himself at the gates of Gjatz. This
sight animated the French, and they instantly made themselves masters of
the town as far as the river which parts it into two, and the bridges of
which had been already set on fire.

There, as at Smolensk and Wiazma, whether by chance, or from the relic
of a Tartar custom, the bazaar was on the Asiatic side, on the bank
opposite to us. The Russian rear-guard, secured by the river, had time,
therefore, to burn that whole quarter. Nothing but the promptitude of
Murat saved the rest.

The troops crossed the Gjatz as they could, on planks, in a few boats,
and by fording. The Russians disappeared behind the flames, whither our
foremost riflemen followed them,--when they saw an inhabitant come
forth, approach them, and cry out that he was a Frenchman. His joy and
his accent confirmed his assertion. They conducted him to Davoust, who
interrogated him.

According to the account of this man, there had been a great change in
the Russian army. A violent clamour had been raised from its ranks
against Barclay. It had been re-echoed by the nobility, by the
merchants, by all Moscow. "That general, that minister, was a traitor;
he caused all their divisions to be destroyed piece-meal; he was
dishonouring the army by an interminable flight; yet, at the same time,
they were labouring under the disgrace of an invasion, and their towns
were in flames. If it was necessary to determine upon this ruin, they
might as well sacrifice themselves at once; then, there would be at
least some honour, whereas, to suffer themselves to be sacrificed by a
stranger, was losing every thing, the honour of the sacrifice not
excepted.

"But why employ this stranger? Was not the contemporary, the comrade,
the rival of Suwarrow yet living? A Russian was wanted to save Russia!"
And they all called for, all were anxious for Kutusof and a battle. The
Frenchman added, that Alexander had yielded; that the insubordination of
Bagration, and the universal outcry, had obtained from him that general
and a battle; and that, moreover, after drawing the invading army so
far, the Russian emperor had himself judged a general engagement
unavoidable.

Finally, he related, that the arrival of Kutusof on the 29th of August
at Tzarewo-zaimizcze, between Wiazma and Gjatz, and the announcement of
a speedy battle, had intoxicated the enemy with two-fold joy; that all
had immediately marched towards Borodino,--not to continue their flight,
but to fix themselves on this frontier of the government of Moscow, to
root themselves to the soil, and defend it; in short, to conquer there
or die.

An incident, otherwise not worthy of notice, seemed to confirm this
intelligence; this was the arrival of a Russian officer with a flag of
truce. He had so little to say, that it was evident from the first that
he came only to observe. His manner was particularly displeasing to
Davoust, who read in it something more than assurance. A French general
having inconsiderately asked this stranger what we should find between
Wiazma and Moscow, the Russian proudly replied, "Pultowa." This answer
bespoke a battle; it pleased the French, who are fond of a smart
repartee, and delight to meet with enemies worthy of themselves.

This officer was conducted back without precaution, as he had been
brought. He saw that there was no obstacle to prevent access to our very
head-quarters; he traversed our advanced posts without meeting with a
single vidette; every where the same negligence was perceptible, and the
temerity so natural to Frenchmen and to conquerors. Every one was
asleep; there was no watchword, no patroles; our soldiers seemed to
despise these details, as too trivial. Wherefore so many precautions?
They attacked--they were victorious: it was for the Russians to defend
themselves! This officer has since said, that he was tempted to take
advantage that very night of our imprudence, but that he did not find
any Russian corps within his reach.

The enemy, in his haste to burn the bridges over the Gjatz, left behind
some of his cossacks; they were taken and conducted to the emperor, who
was approaching on horseback. Napoleon wished to question them himself.
He sent for his interpreter, and caused two of these Scythians, whose
strange dress and wild look were remarkable, to be placed by his side.
In this manner he entered Gjatz, and passed through that town. The
answers of these barbarians corresponded with the account of the
Frenchman; and during the night of the 1st of September, all the reports
from the advanced posts confirmed their accuracy.

Thus Barclay had, singly against all, supported till the very last
moment that plan of retreat, which in 1807 he had vaunted to one of our
generals as the only expedient for saving Russia. Among us, he was
commended for having persisted in this prudent defensive system, in
spite of the clamours of a proud nation irritated by misfortune, and
before so aggressive an enemy.

He had, no doubt, failed in suffering himself to be surprised at Wilna,
and for not considering the marshy course of the Berezina as the proper
frontier of Lithuania; but it was remarked that, subsequently, at Witepsk
and Smolensk, he had forestalled Napoleon; that on the Loutcheza, on the
Dnieper, and at Valoutina, his resistance had been proportionate to time
and place; that this petty warfare, and the losses occasioned by it, had
been but too much in his favour; every retrograde step of his drawing us
to a greater distance from our reinforcements, and carrying him nearer to
his: in short, all that he had done, he had done judiciously, whether he
had hazarded, defended, or abandoned.

And yet he had drawn upon himself general animadversion! But this was,
in our opinion, his highest panegyric. We thought the better of him for
despising public opinion, when it had gone astray; for having contented
himself with watching our motions in order to profit by them, and for
having proved that, most frequently, nations are saved in spite of
themselves.

Barclay showed himself still greater during the rest of the campaign.
This commander in chief, and minister at war, who had been deprived of
the command, that it might be given to Kutusof, voluntarily served under
him, and was seen to obey with as much zeal as he had commanded.

CHAP. V.

The Russian army at length halted. Miloradowitch, with sixteen thousand
recruits, and a host of peasants, bearing the cross and shouting, "_'Tis
the will of God!_" hastened to join its ranks. We were informed that the
enemy were turning up the whole plain of Borodino, and covering it with
entrenchments, apparently with the determination of rooting themselves
there, and not falling back any further.

Napoleon announced a battle to his army; he allowed it two days to rest,
to prepare its arms, and to collect subsistence. He merely warned the
detachments sent out in quest of provisions, that "if they did not
return the following day, they would deprive themselves of the honour of
fighting."

The emperor then endeavoured to obtain some information concerning his
new adversary. Kutusof was described to him as an old man, the
groundwork of whose reputation had been formerly laid by a singular
wound. He had since skilfully profited by circumstances. The very defeat
of Austerlitz, which he had foreseen, added to his renown, which was
further increased by his late campaigns against the Turks. His valour
was incontestable, but he was charged with regulating its vehemence
according to his private interest; for he calculated every thing. His
genius was slow, vindictive, and, above all, crafty--the true Tartar
character!--knowing the art of preparing an implacable war with a
fawning, supple, and patient policy.

In other respects, he was more an adroit courtier than an able general:
but formidable by his renown, by his address in augmenting it, and in
making others concur in this object. He had contrived to flatter the
whole nation, and every individual of it, from the general to the
private soldier.

It was added, that there was in his person, in his language, nay, even
in his very dress, his superstitious practices and his age, a remnant of
Suwarrow,--the stamp of an ancient Muscovite, an air of nationality,
which rendered him dear to the Russians: at Moscow the joy at his
appointment had been carried to intoxication; people embraced one
another in the streets, and considered themselves as saved.

When Napoleon had learned these particulars, and given his orders, he
awaited the event with that tranquillity of mind peculiar to
extraordinary men. He quietly employed himself in exploring the environs
of his head-quarters. He remarked the progress of agriculture; but at
the sight of the Gjatz, which pours its waters into the Wolga, he who
had conquered so many rivers, felt anew the first emotions of his glory:
he was heard to boast of being the master of those waves destined to
visit Asia,--as if they were proceeding to announce his approach, and to
open for him the way to that quarter of the globe.

[Illustration: Portrait of Murat, King of Naples]

On the 4th of September, the army, still divided into three columns, set
out from Gjatz and its environs. Murat had gone on a few leagues before.
Ever since the arrival of Kutusof, troops of cossacks had been
incessantly hovering about the heads of our columns. Murat was
exasperated at seeing his cavalry forced to deploy against so feeble an
obstacle. We are assured that on that day, from one of those first
impulses worthy of the ages of chivalry, he dashed suddenly and alone
towards their line, stopped short a few paces from them, and there,
sword in hand, made a sign for them to retire, with an air and gesture
so commanding, that these barbarians obeyed, and fell back in amazement.

This circumstance, which was related to us immediately, was received
without incredulity. The martial air of that monarch, the brilliancy of
his chivalrous dress, his reputation, and the novelty of such an action,
caused this momentary ascendancy to appear true, in spite of its
improbability; for such was Murat, a theatrical monarch by the splendor
of his dress, and truly a king by his extraordinary valour and his
inexhaustible activity; bold as the attack, and always armed with that
air of superiority, that threatening audacity, which is the most
dangerous of offensive weapons.

He had not marched long, however, before he was forced to halt. At
Griednewa, between Gjatz and Borodino, the high-road suddenly descends
into a deep ravine, whence it again rises as suddenly to a spacious
height, which Kutusof had ordered Konownitzin to defend. That general at
first made a vigorous resistance against the foremost troops of Murat;
but as the army closely followed the latter, every moment gave increased
energy to the attack, and diminished that of the defence; presently the
advanced-guard of the viceroy engaged on the right of the Russians,
where a charge by the Italian chasseurs was withstood for a moment by
the cossacks, which excited astonishment; they became intermixed.

Platof himself admitted that in this affair an officer was wounded near
him, at which he was by no means surprised; but that he nevertheless
caused the sorcerer who accompanied him to be flogged before all his
cossacks, loudly charging him with laziness for neglecting to turn aside
the balls by his conjurations, as he had been expressly directed to do.

Konownitzin was vanquished and retired; on the 5th his bloody track was
followed to the vast convent of Kolotskoi,--fortified as habitations
were of old in those too highly vaunted Gothic ages, when civil wars
were so frequent; when every place, not excepting even these sacred
abodes of peace, was transformed into a military post.

Konownitzin, threatened on the right and left, made no other stand
either at Kolotskoi or at Golowino; but when the advanced-guard
debouched from that village, it beheld the whole plain and the woods
infested with cossacks, the rye crops spoiled, the villages sacked; in
short, a general destruction. By these signs it recognized the field of
battle, which Kutusof was preparing for the grand army. Behind these
clouds of Scythians were perceived three villages; they presented a line
of a league. The intervals between them, intersected by ravines and
wood, were covered with the enemy's riflemen. In the first moment of
ardour, some French horse ventured into the midst of these Russians, and
were cut off.

Napoleon then appeared on a height, from which he surveyed the whole
country, with that eye of a conqueror which sees every thing at once and
without confusion; which penetrates through obstacles, sets aside
accessaries, discovers the capital point, and fixes it with the look of
an eagle, like prey on which he is about to dart with all his might and
all his impetuosity.

He knew that, a league before him, at Borodino, the Kologha, a river
running in a ravine, along the margin of which he proceeded a few
wersts, turned abruptly to the left, and discharged itself into the
Moskwa. He guessed that a chain of considerable heights alone could
have opposed its course, and so suddenly changed its direction. These
were, no doubt, occupied by the enemy's army, and on this side it could
not be easily attacked. But the Kologha, both banks of which he
followed, while it covered the right of the position, left their left
exposed.

The maps of the country were insufficient; at any rate, as the ground
necessarily sloped towards the principal stream, which was the most
considerable merely from being the lowest, it followed, that the ravines
which ran into it must rise, become shallower, and be at length lost, as
they receded from the Kologha. Besides, the old road to Smolensk, which
ran on its right, sufficiently marked their commencement; why should it
have been formerly carried to a distance from the principal stream of
water, and consequently from the most habitable places, if not to avoid
the ravines and the hills which bordered them?

The demonstrations of the enemy agreed with these inductions of his
experience,--no precautions, no resistance in front of their right and
their centre; but before their left a great number of troops, a marked
solicitude to profit by the slightest accidents of the ground, in order
to dispute it, and finally, a formidable redoubt; this was, of course,
their weak side, since they covered it with such care. Nay, more; it was
on the flank of the high-road, and on that of the grand army, that this
redoubt was situated; it was therefore of the utmost importance to
carry it, if he would advance: Napoleon gave orders to that effect.

How much the historian is at a loss for words to express the _coup
d'oeil_ of a man of genius!

The villages and the woods were immediately occupied; on the left and in
the centre were the army of Italy, Compans's division, and Murat; on the
right, Poniatowski. The attack was general; for the army of Italy and
the Polish army appeared at once on the two wings of the grand imperial
column. These three masses drove back the Russian rear-guards upon
Borodino, and the whole war was concentrated on a single point.

This curtain being withdrawn, the first Russian redoubt was discovered;
too much detached in advance of their position, which it defended
without being defended by it. The nature of the ground had compelled the
choice of this insulated situation.

Compans skilfully availed himself of the undulations of the ground; its
elevations served as platforms to his guns for battering the redoubt,
and screened his infantry while drawing up into columns of attack. The
61st marched foremost; the redoubt was taken by a single effort, and
with the bayonet; but Bagration sent reinforcements, by which it was
retaken. Three times did the 61st recover it from the Russians, and
three times was it driven out again; but at length it maintained itself
in it, covered with blood and half destroyed.

Next day, when the emperor reviewed that regiment, he inquired where
was its third battalion? "In the redoubt," was the reply of the colonel.
But the affair did not stop there; a neighbouring wood still swarmed
with Russian light troops, who sallied every moment from this retreat to
renew their attacks, which were supported by three divisions: at length
the attack of Schewardino by Morand, and of the woods of Elnia by
Poniatowski, completely disheartened the troops of Bagration, and
Murat's cavalry cleared the plain. It was chiefly the firmness of a
Spanish regiment that foiled the enemy; they at last gave way, and that
redoubt, which had been their advanced post, became ours.

At the same time the emperor assigned its place to each corps; the rest
of the army formed in line, and a general discharge of musketry,
accompanied at intervals with that of a few cannon, ensued. It continued
till each party had fixed its limit, and darkness had rendered their
fire uncertain.

One of Davoust's regiments then sought to take its rank in the first
line. Owing to the darkness, it passed beyond it, and got into the midst
of the Russian cuirassiers, who attacked it, threw it into disorder,
took from it three pieces of cannon, and killed or took three hundred
men. The rest immediately fell into platoons, forming a shapeless mass,
but making so formidable a resistance, that the enemy could not again
break it; and this regiment, with diminished numbers, finally regained
its place in the line of battle.

CHAPTER VI.

The emperor encamped behind the army of Italy, on the left of the
high-road; the old guard formed in square around his tents. As soon as
the fire of small arms had ceased, the fires were kindled. Those of the
Russians burned brightly, in an immense semicircle; ours gave a pale,
unequal, and irregular light,--the troops arriving late and in haste, on
an unknown ground, where nothing was prepared for them, and where there
was a want of wood, especially in the centre and on the left.

The emperor slept little. On General Caulaincourt's return from the
conquered redoubt, as no prisoners had fallen into our hands, Napoleon
surprised, kept asking him repeatedly, "Had not his cavalry then charged
apropos? Were the Russians determined to conquer or die?"--The answer
was, that "being fanaticised by their leaders, and accustomed to fight
with the Turks, who gave no quarter, they would be killed sooner than
surrender." The emperor then fell into a deep meditation; and judging
that a battle of artillery would be the most certain, he multiplied his
orders to bring up, with all speed, the parks which had not yet joined
him.

That very same night, a cold mizzling rain began to fall, and the autumn
set in with a violent wind. This was an additional enemy, which it was
necessary to take into account; for this period of the year
corresponded with the age on which Napoleon was entering, and every one
knows the influence of the seasons of the year on the like seasons of
life.

During that night how many different agitations! The soldiers and the
officers had to prepare their arms, to repair their clothing, and to
combat cold and hunger; for their life was a continual combat. The
generals, and the emperor himself, were uneasy, lest their defeat of the
preceding day should have disheartened the Russians, and they should
escape us in the dark. Murat had anticipated this; we imagined several
times that we saw their fires burn more faintly, and that we heard the
noise of their departure; but day alone eclipsed the light of the
enemy's bivouacs.

This time there was no need to go far in quest of them. The sun of the
6th found the two armies again, and displayed them to each other, on the
same ground where it had left them the evening before. There was a
general feeling of exultation.

The emperor took advantage of the first rays of dawn, to advance between
the two lines, and to go from height to height along the whole front of
the hostile army. He saw the Russians crowning all the eminences, in a
vast semicircle, two leagues in extent, from the Moskwa to the old
Moscow road. Their right bordered the Kologha, from its influx into the
Moskwa to Borodino; their centre, from Gorcka to Semenowska, was the
saliant part of their line. Their right and left receded. The Kologha
rendered their right inaccessible.

The emperor perceived this immediately, and as, from its distance, this
wing was not more threatening than vulnerable, he took no account of it.
For him then the Russian army commenced at Gorcka, a village situated on
the high-road, and at the point of an elevated plain which overlooks
Borodino and the Kologha. This sharp projection is surrounded by the
Kologha, and by a deep and marshy ravine; its lofty crest, to which the
high-road ascends on leaving Borodino, was strongly entrenched, and
formed a separate work on the right of the Russian centre, of which it
was the extremity.

On its left, and within reach of its fire, rose a detached hill,
commanding the whole plain; it was crowned by a formidable redoubt,
provided with twenty-one pieces of cannon. In front and on its right it
was encompassed by the Kologha and by ravines; its left inclined to and
supported itself upon a long and wide plateau, the foot of which
descended to a muddy ravine, a branch of the Kologha. The crest of this
plateau, which was lined by the Russians, declined and receded as it ran
towards the left, in front of the grand army; it then kept rising as far
as the yet smoking ruins of the village of Semenowska. This saliant
point terminated Barclay's command and the centre of the enemy: it was
armed with a strong battery, covered by an entrenchment.

Here began the left wing of the Russians under Bagration. The less
elevated crest which it occupied undulated as it gradually receded to
Utitza, a village on the old Moscow road, where the field of battle
ended. Two hills, armed with redoubts, and bearing diagonally upon the
entrenchment of Semenowska, which flanked them, marked the front of
Bagration.

From Semenowska to the wood of Utitza there was an interval of about
twelve hundred paces. It was the nature of the ground which had decided
Kutusof thus to refuse this wing; for here the ravine, which was under
the plateau in the centre, just commenced. It was scarcely an obstacle;
the slopes of its banks were very gentle, and the summits suitable for
artillery were at some distance from its margin. This side was evidently
the most accessible, since the redoubt of the 61st, which that regiment
had taken the preceding day, no longer defended the approach: this was
even favoured by a wood of large pines, extending from the redoubt just
mentioned to that which appeared to terminate the line of the Russians.

But their left wing did not end there. The emperor knew that behind this
wood was the old Moscow road; that it turned round the left wing of the
Russians, and passing behind their army, ran again into the new Moscow
road in front of Mojaisk. He judged that it must be occupied; and, in
fact, Tutchkof, with his _corps d'armée_, had placed himself across it
at the entrance of a wood; he had covered himself by two heights, on
which he had planted artillery.

But this was of little consequence, because, between this detached corps
and the last Russian redoubt, there was a space of five or six hundred
fathoms and a covered ground. If we did not begin with overwhelming
Tutchkof, we might therefore occupy it, pass between him and the last of
Bagration's redoubts, and take the left wing of the enemy in flank; but
the emperor could not satisfy himself on this point, as the Russian
advanced posts and the woods forbade his farther advance, and
intercepted his view.

Having finished his reconnoissance, he formed his plan. "Eugene shall be
the pivot!" he exclaimed: "it is the right that must commence. As soon
as, under cover of the wood, it has taken the redoubt opposite to it, it
must make a movement to the left, and march on the Russian flank,
sweeping and driving back their whole army upon their right and into the
Kologha."

The general plan thus conceived, he applied himself to the details.
During the night, three batteries, of sixty guns each, must be opposed
to the Russian redoubts; two facing their left, the third before their
centre. At daybreak, Poniatowski and his army, reduced to five thousand
men, must advance on the old Smolensk road, turning the wood on which
the French right wing and the Russian left were supported. He would
flank the one and annoy the other; the army would wait for the report of
his first shots.

Instantly, the whole of the artillery should commence upon the left of
the Russians, its fire would open their ranks and redoubts, and Davoust
and Ney should rush upon them; they should be supported by Junot and his
Westphalians, by Murat and his cavalry, and lastly, by the emperor
himself, with 20,000 guards. It was against these two redoubts that the
first efforts should be made; it was by them that he would penetrate
into the hostile army, thenceforth mutilated, and whose centre and right
would then be uncovered, and almost enveloped.

Meanwhile, as the Russians showed themselves in redoubled masses on
their centre and their right, threatening the Moscow road, the only line
of operation of the grand army; as in throwing his chief force and
himself on their left, Napoleon was about to place the Kologha between
him and that road, his only retreat, he resolved to strengthen the army
of Italy which occupied it, and joined with it two of Davoust's
divisions and Grouchy's cavalry. As to his left, he judged that one
Italian division, the Bavarian cavalry, and that of Ornano, about 10,000
men, would suffice to cover it. Such were the plans of Napoleon.

CHAP. VII.

He was on the heights of Borodino, taking a last survey of the whole
field of battle, and confirming himself in his plan, when Davoust
hastened up. This marshal had just examined the left of the Russians
with so much the more care, as it was the ground on which he was to
act, and he mistrusted his own eyes.

He begged the emperor "to place at his disposal his five divisions,
35,000 strong, and to unite with them Poniatowski, whose force was too
weak to turn the enemy by itself. Next day he would set this force in
motion; he would cover its march with the last shades of night, and with
the wood on which the Russian left wing was supported, and beyond which
he would pass by following the old road from Smolensk to Moscow; then,
all at once, by a precipitate manoeuvre, he would deploy 40,000 French
and Poles on the flank and in the rear of that wing. There, while the
emperor would occupy the front of the Muscovites by a general attack, he
would march impetuously from redoubt to redoubt, from reserve to
reserve, driving every thing from left to right on the high-road of
Mojaisk, where they should put an end at once to the Russian army, the
battle, and the war."

The emperor listened attentively to the marshal; but after meditating in
silence for some minutes, he replied, "No! it is too great a movement;
it would remove me too far from my object, and make me lose too much
time."

The Prince of Eckmühl, however, from conviction, persisted in his point;
he undertook to accomplish his manoeuvre before six in the morning; he
protested that in another hour the greatest part of its effect would be
produced. Napoleon, impatient of contradiction, sharply replied with
this exclamation, "Ah! you are always for turning the enemy; it is too
dangerous a manoeuvre!" The marshal, after this rebuff, said no more:
he then returned to his post, murmuring against a prudence which he
thought unseasonable, and to which he was not accustomed; and he knew
not to what cause to attribute it, unless the looks of so many allies,
who were not to be relied on, an army so reduced, a position so remote,
and age, had rendered Napoleon less enterprising than he was.

The emperor, having decided, had returned to his camp, when Murat, whom
the Russians had so often deceived, persuaded him that they were going
to run away once more without fighting. In vain did Rapp, who was sent
to observe their attitude, return and say, that he had seen them
entrenching themselves more and more; that they were numerous,
judiciously disposed, and appeared determined much rather to attack, if
they were not anticipated, than to retreat: Murat persisted in his
opinion, and the emperor, uneasy, returned to the heights of Borodino.

He there perceived long black columns of troops covering the high-road,
and spreading over the plain; then large convoys of waggons, provisions,
and ammunition, in short all the dispositions indicative of a stay and a
battle. At that very moment, though he had taken with him but few
attendants, that he might not attract the notice and the fire of the
enemy, he was recognized by the Russian batteries, and a cannon-shot
suddenly interrupted the silence of that day.

For, as it frequently happens, nothing was so calm as the day preceding
that great battle. It was like a thing mutually agreed upon! Wherefore
do each other useless injury? was not the next day to decide every
thing? Besides, each had to prepare itself; the different corps, their
arms, their force, their ammunition; they had to resume all their unity,
which on a march is always more or less deranged. The generals had to
observe their reciprocal dispositions of attack, defence, and retreat,
in order to adapt them to each other and the ground, and to leave as
little as possible to chance.

Thus these two colossal foes, on the point of commencing their terrible
contest, watched each other attentively, measured one another with their
eyes, and silently prepared for a tremendous conflict.

The emperor, who could no longer entertain doubts of a battle, returned
to his tent to dictate the order of it. There he meditated on his awful
situation. He had seen that the two armies were equal; about 120,000
men, and 600 pieces of cannon on either side. The Russians had the
advantage of ground, of speaking but one language, of one uniform, of
being a single nation, fighting for the same cause, but a great number
of irregular troops and recruits. The French had as many men, but more
soldiers; for the state of his corps had just been submitted to him: he
had before his eyes an account of the strength of his divisions, and as
it was neither a review, nor a distribution, but a battle that was in
prospect, this time the statements were not exaggerated. His army was
reduced indeed, but sound, supple, nervous,--like those manly bodies,
which, having just lost the plumpness of youth, display forms more
masculine and strongly marked.

Still, during the last few days that he had marched in the midst of it,
he had found it silent, from that silence which is imposed by great
expectation or great astonishment; like nature, the moment before a
violent tempest, or crowds at the instant of an extraordinary danger.

He felt that it wanted rest of some kind or other, but that there was no
rest for it but in death or victory; for he had brought it into such a
necessity of conquering, that it must triumph at any rate. The temerity
of the situation into which he had urged it was evident, but he knew
that of all faults that was the one which the French most willingly
forgave; that in short they doubted neither of themselves nor of him,
nor of the general result, whatever might be their individual hardships.

He reckoned, moreover, on their habit and thirst of glory, and even on
their curiosity; no doubt they wished to see Moscow, to be able to say
that they had been there, to receive there the promised reward, perhaps
to plunder, and, above all, there to find repose. He did not observe in
them enthusiasm, but something more firm: an entire confidence in his
star, in his genius, the consciousness of their superiority, and the
proud assurance of conquerors, in the presence of the vanquished.

Full of these sentiments, he dictated a proclamation, simple, grave,
and frank, as befitted such circumstances, and men who were not just
commencing their career, and whom, after so many sufferings, it would
have been idle to pretend to exalt.

Accordingly he addressed himself solely to the reason of all, or what is
the same thing, to the real interest of each; he finished with glory,
the only passion to which he could appeal in these deserts, the last of
the noble motives by which it was possible to act upon soldiers always
victorious, enlightened by an advanced civilization and long experience;
in short, of all the generous illusions, the only one that could have
carried them so far. This harangue will some day be deemed admirable: it
was worthy of the commander and of the army; it did honour to both.

"Soldiers!" said he, "here is the battle which you have so ardently
desired. Victory will now depend upon yourselves; it is necessary for
us; it will give us abundance, good winter-quarters, and a speedy return
home! Behave as you did at Austerlitz, at Friedland, at Witepsk, and at
Smolensk, and afford to remotest posterity occasion to cite your conduct
on that day: let it be said of you, 'He was in that great battle under
the walls of Moscow.'"

CHAP. VIII.

About the middle of the day, Napoleon remarked an extraordinary movement
in the enemy's camp; in fact, the whole Russian army was drawn up and
under arms, and Kutusof, surrounded with every species of religious and
military pomp, took his station in the middle of it. He had made his
popes and his archimandrites dress themselves in those splendid and
majestic insignia, which they have inherited from the Greeks. They
marched before him, carrying the venerated symbols of their religion,
and particularly that divine image, formerly the protectress of
Smolensk, which, by their account, had been miraculously saved from the
profanation of the sacrilegious French.

When the Russian saw that his soldiers were sufficiently excited by this
extraordinary spectacle, he raised his voice, and began by putting them
in mind of heaven, the only country which remains to the slave. In the
name of the religion of equality, he endeavoured to animate these serfs
to defend the property of their masters; but it was principally by
exhibiting to them that holy image which had taken refuge in their
ranks, that he appealed to their courage, and raised their indignation.

Napoleon, in his mouth, "was a universal despot! the tyrannical
disturber of the world! a poor worm! an arch-rebel, who had overturned
their altars, and polluted them with blood; who had exposed the true
ark of the Lord, represented by the holy image, to the profanation of
men, and the inclemency of the seasons." He then told them of their
cities reduced to ashes; reminded them that they were about to fight for
their wives and children; added a few words respecting the emperor, and
concluded by appealing to their piety and their patriotism. These were
the virtues of instinct with this rude and simple people, who had not
yet advanced beyond sensations, but who, for that very reason, were so
much more formidable as soldiers; less diverted from obedience by
reasoning; confined by slavery to a narrow circle, in which they are
reduced to a small number of sensations, which are the only sources of
their wants, wishes, and ideas.

As to other characteristics, proud for want of comparison, and credulous
as they are proud, from ignorance--worshippers of images, idolaters as
much as Christians can be; for they had converted that religion of the
soul, which is wholly intellectual and moral, into one entirely physical
and material, to bring it to the level of their brute and short
capacity.

This solemn spectacle, however, their general's address, the
exhortations of their officers, and the benedictions of their priests,
served to give a thorough tincture of fanaticism to their courage. All,
even to the meanest soldier, fancied themselves devoted by God himself
to the defence of Heaven and their consecrated soil.

With the French there was no solemnity, either religious or military,
no review, no means of excitation: even the address of the emperor was
not distributed till very late, and read the next morning so near the
time of action, that several corps were actually engaged before they
could hear it. The Russians, however, whom so many powerful motives
should have inflamed, added to their invocations the sword of St.
Michael, thus seeking to borrow aid from all the powers of heaven; while
the French sought for it only within themselves, persuaded that real
strength exists only in the heart, and that _there_ is to be found the
"celestial host."

Chance so ordered it, that on that very day the emperor received from
Paris the portrait of the King of Rome, that infant whose birth had been
hailed by the empire with the same transports of joy and hope as it had
been by the emperor. Every day since that happy event, the emperor, in
the interior of his palace, had given loose when near his child, to the
expression of the most tender feelings; when, therefore, in the midst of
these distant fields, and all these menacing preparations, he saw once
more that sweet countenance, how his warlike soul melted! With his own
hand he exhibited this picture outside his tent; he then called his
officers, and even some of the soldiers of his old guard, desirous of
sharing his pleasure with these veteran grenadiers, of showing his
private family to his military family, and making it shine as a symbol
of hope in the midst of imminent peril.

In the evening, an aid-de-camp of Marmont, who had been despatched from
the field of battle near Salamanca, arrived at that of the Moskwa. This
was the same Fabvier, who has since made such a figure in our civil
dissensions. The emperor received graciously the aid-de-camp of the
vanquished general. On the eve of a battle, the fate of which was so
uncertain, he felt disposed to be indulgent to a defeat; he listened to
all that was said to him respecting the scattered state of his forces in
Spain, and the number of commanders-in-chief, and admitted the justice
of it all; but he explained his reasons, which it enters not into our
province to mention here.

With the return of night also returned the apprehension, that under
cover of its shades, the Russian army might escape from the field of
battle. Napoleon's anxiety was so great as to prevent him from sleeping.
He kept calling incessantly to know the hour, inquiring if any noise was
heard, and sending persons to ascertain if the enemy was still before
him. His doubts on this subject were so strong, that he had given orders
that his proclamation should not be read to his troops until the next
morning, and then only in case of the certainty of a battle.

Tranquillized for a few moments, anxiety of an opposite description
again seized him. He became frightened at the destitute state of the
soldiers. Weak and famished as they were, how could they support a long
and terrible shock? In this danger he looked upon his guard as his sole
resource; it seemed to be his security for both armies. He sent for
Bessières, that one of his marshals in whom he had the greatest
confidence for commanding it; he wished to know if this chosen reserve
wanted nothing;--he called him back several times, and repeated his
pressing questions. He desired that these old soldiers should have three
days' biscuit and rice distributed among them from their waggons of
reserve; finally, dreading that his orders had not been obeyed, he got
up once more, and questioned the grenadiers on guard at the entrance of
his tent, if they had received these provisions. Satisfied by their
answer, he went in, and soon fell into a doze.

Shortly after, he called once more. His aid-de-camp found him now
supporting his head with both hands; he seemed, by what was heard, to be
meditating on the vanities of glory. "What is war? A trade of
barbarians, the whole art of which consists in being the strongest on a
given point!" He then complained of the fickleness of fortune, which he
said, he began to experience. Seeming to revert to more encouraging
ideas, he recollected what had been told him of the tardiness and
carelessness of Kutusof, and expressed his surprise that Beningsen had
not been preferred to him. He thought of the critical situation into
which he had brought himself, and added, "that a great day was at hand,
that there would be a terrible battle." He asked Rapp if he thought we
should gain the victory? "No doubt;" was the reply, "but it will be
sanguinary." "I know it," resumed Napoleon, "but I have 80,000 men; I
shall lose 20,000, I shall enter Moscow with 60,000; the stragglers
will there rejoin us, and afterwards the battalions on the march, and we
shall be stronger than we were before the battle." In this estimate he
seemed to include neither his guard nor the cavalry.

Again assailed by his first anxiety, he sent once more to examine the
attitude of the Russians; he was informed that their fires burned with
equal brightness, and that by the number of these, and the moving
shadows surrounding them, it was supposed that it was not merely a
rear-guard, but a whole army that kept feeding them. The certainty of
their presence at last quieted the emperor, and he tried to take some
rest.

But the marches which he had just made with the array, the fatigues of
the preceding days and nights, so many cares, and his intense and
anxious expectation, had worn him out; the chillness of the atmosphere
had struck to him; an irritating fever, a dry cough, and excessive
thirst consumed him. During the remainder of the night, he made vain
attempts to quench the burning thirst which consumed him. This fresh
disorder was complicated with an old complaint; he had been struggling
since the day before with a painful attack of that cruel disorder[18],
which had been long threatening him.

[Footnote 18: A retention of urine.]

At last, just at five o'clock, one of Ney's officers came to inform him
that the marshal was still in sight of the Russians, and wished to begin
the attack. This news seemed to restore the strength of which the fever
had deprived him. He arose, called his officers, and sallied out,
exclaiming, "We have them at last! Forward! Let us go and open the gates
of Moscow!"

CHAP. IX.

It was half-past five in the morning, when Napoleon arrived near the
redoubt which had been conquered on the 5th of September. There he
waited for the first dawn of day, and for the first fire of
Poniatowski's infantry. The sun rose. The emperor, showing it to his
officers, exclaimed, "Behold the sun of Austerlitz!" But it was opposite
to us. It rose on the Russian side, made us conspicuous to their fire,
and dazzled us. We then first perceived, that owing to the darkness, our
batteries had been placed out of reach of the enemy, and it was
necessary to push them more forward. The enemy allowed this to be done:
he seemed to hesitate in being the first to break the awful silence.

The emperor's attention was then directed towards his right, when, all
at once, near seven o'clock, the battle began upon his left. Shortly
after, he was informed, that one of the regiments of Prince Eugene, the
106th, had got possession of the village of Borodino, and its bridge,
which it should have destroyed; but that being carried away by the
ardour of success, it had crossed that passage, in spite of the cries of
its general, in order to attack the heights of Gorcka, where it was
overwhelmed by the front and flank fires of the Russians. It was added,
that the general who commanded that brigade had been already killed, and
that the 106th regiment would have been entirely destroyed had it not
been for the 92d, which voluntarily ran up to its assistance, and
collected and brought back its survivors.

It was Napoleon himself who had just ordered his left wing to make a
violent attack. Probably, he had only reckoned on a partial execution of
his orders, and wished to keep the enemy's attention directed to that
side. But he multiplied his orders, used the most violent excitations,
and engaged a battle in front, the plan of which he had conceived in an
oblique order.

During this action, the emperor judging that Poniatowski was closing
with the enemy on the old Moscow road, gave him the signal to attack.
Suddenly, from that peaceful plain, and the silent hills, volumes of
fire and smoke were seen spouting out, followed by a multitude of
explosions, and the whistling of bullets, tearing the air in every
direction. In the midst of this noise, Davoust, with the divisions
Compans and Dessaix, and thirty pieces of cannon in front, advanced
rapidly to the first Russian redoubt.

The enemy's musketry began, and was answered only by the French cannon.
The French infantry marched without firing: it was hurrying on to get
within reach of and extinguish that of the enemy, when Compans, the
general of that column, and his bravest soldiers, were wounded and fell:
the rest, disconcerted, halted under the shower of balls, in order to
return it, when Rapp, rushing to replace Compans, again led his soldiers
on, with fixed bayonets, and at a running pace against the enemy's
redoubt.

He was himself just on the point of reaching it, when he was, in his
turn, hit; it was his twenty-second wound. A third general, who
succeeded him, also fell. Davoust himself was wounded. Rapp was carried
to the emperor, who said to him, "What, Rapp, always hit! What are they
doing above, then?" The aid-de-camp answered, that it would require the
guard to finish. "No!" replied Napoleon, "I shall take good care of
that; I have no wish to see it destroyed; I shall gain the battle
without it."

Ney, then, with his three divisions, reduced to 10,000 men, hastened
into the plain to the assistance of Davoust. The enemy divided his fire.
Ney rushed forward. The 57th regiment of Compans's division, finding
itself supported, took fresh courage; by a last effort it succeeded in
reaching the enemy's entrenchments, scaled them, mingled with the
Russians, put them to the bayonet, overthrew and killed the most
obstinate of them. The rest fled, and the 57th maintained itself in its
conquest. At the same time Ney made so furious an attack on the two
other redoubts, that he wrested them from the enemy.

It was now mid-day; the left Russian line being thus forced, and the
plain cleared, the emperor ordered Murat to proceed with his cavalry,
and complete the victory. An instant was sufficient for that prince to
show himself on the heights and in the midst of the enemy, who again
made his appearance there; for the second Russian line and the
reinforcements, led on by Bagawout and sent by Tutchkof, had come to the
assistance of the first line. They all rushed forward, resting upon