Nicholas looked at her face with surprise. It was the same face he had

seen before, there was the same general expression of refined, inner,

spiritual labor, but now it was quite differently lit up. There was a

pathetic expression of sorrow, prayer, and hope in it. As had occurred

before when she was present, Nicholas went up to her without waiting to

be prompted by the governor’s wife and not asking himself whether or not

it was right and proper to address her here in church, and told her he

had heard of her trouble and sympathized with his whole soul. As soon as

she heard his voice a vivid glow kindled in her face, lighting up both

her sorrow and her joy.

“There is one thing I wanted to tell you, Princess,” said Rostóv. “It

is that if your brother, Prince Andrew Nikoláevich, were not living, it

would have been at once announced in the Gazette, as he is a colonel.”

The princess looked at him, not grasping what he was saying, but cheered

by the expression of regretful sympathy on his face.

“And I have known so many cases of a splinter wound” (the Gazette said

it was a shell) “either proving fatal at once or being very slight,”

continued Nicholas. “We must hope for the best, and I am sure...”

Princess Mary interrupted him.

“Oh, that would be so dread...” she began and, prevented by agitation

from finishing, she bent her head with a movement as graceful as

everything she did in his presence and, looking up at him gratefully,

went out, following her aunt.

That evening Nicholas did not go out, but stayed at home to settle some

accounts with the horse dealers. When he had finished that business it

was already too late to go anywhere but still too early to go to bed,

and for a long time he paced up and down the room, reflecting on his

life, a thing he rarely did.

Princess Mary had made an agreeable impression on him when he had met

her in Smolénsk province. His having encountered her in such exceptional

circumstances, and his mother having at one time mentioned her to him as

a good match, had drawn his particular attention to her. When he met her

again in Vorónezh the impression she made on him was not merely pleasing

but powerful. Nicholas had been struck by the peculiar moral beauty he

observed in her at this time. He was, however, preparing to go away and

it had not entered his head to regret that he was thus depriving himself

of chances of meeting her. But that day’s encounter in church had, he

felt, sunk deeper than was desirable for his peace of mind. That pale,

sad, refined face, that radiant look, those gentle graceful gestures,

and especially the deep and tender sorrow expressed in all her features

agitated him and evoked his sympathy. In men Rostóv could not bear to

see the expression of a higher spiritual life (that was why he did not

like Prince Andrew) and he referred to it contemptuously as philosophy

and dreaminess, but in Princess Mary that very sorrow which revealed

the depth of a whole spiritual world foreign to him was an irresistible

attraction.

“She must be a wonderful woman. A real angel!” he said to himself.

“Why am I not free? Why was I in such a hurry with Sónya?” And he

involuntarily compared the two: the lack of spirituality in the one and

the abundance of it in the other—a spirituality he himself lacked and

therefore valued most highly. He tried to picture what would happen were

he free. How he would propose to her and how she would become his wife.

But no, he could not imagine that. He felt awed, and no clear picture

presented itself to his mind. He had long ago pictured to himself a

future with Sónya, and that was all clear and simple just because it

had all been thought out and he knew all there was in Sónya, but it was

impossible to picture a future with Princess Mary, because he did not

understand her but simply loved her.

Reveries about Sónya had had something merry and playful in them, but to

dream of Princess Mary was always difficult and a little frightening.

“How she prayed!” he thought. “It was plain that her whole soul was in

her prayer. Yes, that was the prayer that moves mountains, and I am

sure her prayer will be answered. Why don’t I pray for what I want?” he

suddenly thought. “What do I want? To be free, released from Sónya...

She was right,” he thought, remembering what the governor’s wife had

said: “Nothing but misfortune can come of marrying Sónya. Muddles,

grief for Mamma... business difficulties... muddles, terrible muddles!

Besides, I don’t love her—not as I should. O, God! release me from

this dreadful, inextricable position!” he suddenly began to pray. “Yes,

prayer can move mountains, but one must have faith and not pray as

Natásha and I used to as children, that the snow might turn into

sugar—and then run out into the yard to see whether it had done so. No,

but I am not praying for trifles now,” he thought as he put his pipe

down in a corner, and folding his hands placed himself before the icon.

Softened by memories of Princess Mary he began to pray as he had not

done for a long time. Tears were in his eyes and in his throat when the

door opened and Lavrúshka came in with some papers.

“Blockhead! Why do you come in without being called?” cried Nicholas,

quickly changing his attitude.

“From the governor,” said Lavrúshka in a sleepy voice. “A courier has

arrived and there’s a letter for you.”

“Well, all right, thanks. You can go!”

Nicholas took the two letters, one of which was from his mother and

the other from Sónya. He recognized them by the handwriting and opened

Sónya’s first. He had read only a few lines when he turned pale and his

eyes opened wide with fear and joy.

“No, it’s not possible!” he cried aloud.

Unable to sit still he paced up and down the room holding the letter and

reading it. He glanced through it, then read it again, and then again,

and standing still in the middle of the room he raised his shoulders,

stretching out his hands, with his mouth wide open and his eyes fixed.

What he had just been praying for with confidence that God would hear

him had come to pass; but Nicholas was as much astonished as if it were

something extraordinary and unexpected, and as if the very fact that it

had happened so quickly proved that it had not come from God to whom he

had prayed, but by some ordinary coincidence.

This unexpected and, as it seemed to Nicholas, quite voluntary letter

from Sónya freed him from the knot that fettered him and from which

there had seemed no escape. She wrote that the last unfortunate

events—the loss of almost the whole of the Rostóvs’ Moscow property—and

the countess’ repeatedly expressed wish that Nicholas should marry

Princess Bolkónskaya, together with his silence and coldness of late,

had all combined to make her decide to release him from his promise and

set him completely free.

It would be too painful to me to think that I might be a cause of sorrow

or discord in the family that has been so good to me (she wrote), and my

love has no aim but the happiness of those I love; so, Nicholas, I

beg you to consider yourself free, and to be assured that, in spite of

everything, no one can love you more than does

Your Sónya

Both letters were written from Tróitsa. The other, from the countess,

described their last days in Moscow, their departure, the fire, and

the destruction of all their property. In this letter the countess also

mentioned that Prince Andrew was among the wounded traveling with them;

his state was very critical, but the doctor said there was now more

hope. Sónya and Natásha were nursing him.

Next day Nicholas took his mother’s letter and went to see Princess

Mary. Neither he nor she said a word about what “Natásha nursing him”

might mean, but thanks to this letter Nicholas suddenly became almost as

intimate with the princess as if they were relations.

The following day he saw Princess Mary off on her journey to Yaroslávl,

and a few days later left to rejoin his regiment.

CHAPTER VIII

Sónya’s letter written from Tróitsa, which had come as an answer to

Nicholas’ prayer, was prompted by this: the thought of getting Nicholas

married to an heiress occupied the old countess’ mind more and more. She

knew that Sónya was the chief obstacle to this happening, and Sónya’s

life in the countess’ house had grown harder and harder, especially

after they had received a letter from Nicholas telling of his meeting

with Princess Mary in Boguchárovo. The countess let no occasion slip of

making humiliating or cruel allusions to Sónya.

But a few days before they left Moscow, moved and excited by all that

was going on, she called Sónya to her and, instead of reproaching and

making demands on her, tearfully implored her to sacrifice herself

and repay all that the family had done for her by breaking off her

engagement with Nicholas.

“I shall not be at peace till you promise me this.”

Sónya burst into hysterical tears and replied through her sobs that

she would do anything and was prepared for anything, but gave no actual

promise and could not bring herself to decide to do what was demanded

of her. She must sacrifice herself for the family that had reared and

brought her up. To sacrifice herself for others was Sónya’s habit. Her

position in the house was such that only by sacrifice could she show her

worth, and she was accustomed to this and loved doing it. But in all her

former acts of self-sacrifice she had been happily conscious that they

raised her in her own esteem and in that of others, and so made her more

worthy of Nicholas whom she loved more than anything in the world. But

now they wanted her to sacrifice the very thing that constituted the

whole reward for her self-sacrifice and the whole meaning of her life.

And for the first time she felt bitterness against those who had been

her benefactors only to torture her the more painfully; she felt jealous

of Natásha who had never experienced anything of this sort, had never

needed to sacrifice herself, but made others sacrifice themselves for

her and yet was beloved by everybody. And for the first time Sónya felt

that out of her pure, quiet love for Nicholas a passionate feeling

was beginning to grow up which was stronger than principle, virtue,

or religion. Under the influence of this feeling Sónya, whose life of

dependence had taught her involuntarily to be secretive, having answered

the countess in vague general terms, avoided talking with her and

resolved to wait till she should see Nicholas, not in order to set him

free but on the contrary at that meeting to bind him to her forever.

The bustle and terror of the Rostóvs’ last days in Moscow stifled the

gloomy thoughts that oppressed Sónya. She was glad to find escape

from them in practical activity. But when she heard of Prince Andrew’s

presence in their house, despite her sincere pity for him and for

Natásha, she was seized by a joyful and superstitious feeling that God

did not intend her to be separated from Nicholas. She knew that Natásha

loved no one but Prince Andrew and had never ceased to love him. She

knew that being thrown together again under such terrible circumstances

they would again fall in love with one another, and that Nicholas would

then not be able to marry Princess Mary as they would be within the

prohibited degrees of affinity. Despite all the terror of what had

happened during those last days and during the first days of their

journey, this feeling that Providence was intervening in her personal

affairs cheered Sónya.

At the Tróitsa monastery the Rostóvs first broke their journey for a

whole day.

Three large rooms were assigned to them in the monastery hostelry, one

of which was occupied by Prince Andrew. The wounded man was much better

that day and Natásha was sitting with him. In the next room sat the

count and countess respectfully conversing with the prior, who was

calling on them as old acquaintances and benefactors of the monastery.

Sónya was there too, tormented by curiosity as to what Prince Andrew and

Natásha were talking about. She heard the sound of their voices through

the door. That door opened and Natásha came out, looking excited. Not

noticing the monk, who had risen to greet her and was drawing back the

wide sleeve on his right arm, she went up to Sónya and took her hand.

“Natásha, what are you about? Come here!” said the countess.

Natásha went up to the monk for his blessing, and he advised her to pray

for aid to God and His saint.

As soon as the prior withdrew, Natásha took her friend by the hand and

went with her into the unoccupied room.

“Sónya, will he live?” she asked. “Sónya, how happy I am, and how

unhappy!... Sónya, dovey, everything is as it used to be. If only he

lives! He cannot... because... because... of...” and Natásha burst into

tears.

“Yes! I knew it! Thank God!” murmured Sónya. “He will live.”

Sónya was not less agitated than her friend by the latter’s fear and

grief and by her own personal feelings which she shared with no one.

Sobbing, she kissed and comforted Natásha. “If only he lives!” she

thought. Having wept, talked, and wiped away their tears, the two

friends went together to Prince Andrew’s door. Natásha opened it

cautiously and glanced into the room, Sónya standing beside her at the

half-open door.

Prince Andrew was lying raised high on three pillows. His pale face was

calm, his eyes closed, and they could see his regular breathing.

“O, Natásha!” Sónya suddenly almost screamed, catching her companion’s

arm and stepping back from the door.

“What? What is it?” asked Natásha.

“It’s that, that...” said Sónya, with a white face and trembling lips.

Natásha softly closed the door and went with Sónya to the window, not

yet understanding what the latter was telling her.

“You remember,” said Sónya with a solemn and frightened expression.

“You remember when I looked in the mirror for you... at Otrádnoe at

Christmas? Do you remember what I saw?”

“Yes, yes!” cried Natásha opening her eyes wide, and vaguely recalling

that Sónya had told her something about Prince Andrew whom she had seen

lying down.

“You remember?” Sónya went on. “I saw it then and told everybody, you

and Dunyásha. I saw him lying on a bed,” said she, making a gesture with

her hand and a lifted finger at each detail, “and that he had his eyes

closed and was covered just with a pink quilt, and that his hands were

folded,” she concluded, convincing herself that the details she had just

seen were exactly what she had seen in the mirror.

She had in fact seen nothing then but had mentioned the first thing that

came into her head, but what she had invented then seemed to her now

as real as any other recollection. She not only remembered what she had

then said—that he turned to look at her and smiled and was covered with

something red—but was firmly convinced that she had then seen and said

that he was covered with a pink quilt and that his eyes were closed.

“Yes, yes, it really was pink!” cried Natásha, who now thought she

too remembered the word pink being used, and saw in this the most

extraordinary and mysterious part of the prediction.

“But what does it mean?” she added meditatively.

“Oh, I don’t know, it is all so strange,” replied Sónya, clutching at

her head.

A few minutes later Prince Andrew rang and Natásha went to him, but

Sónya, feeling unusually excited and touched, remained at the window

thinking about the strangeness of what had occurred.

They had an opportunity that day to send letters to the army, and the

countess was writing to her son.

“Sónya!” said the countess, raising her eyes from her letter as her

niece passed, “Sónya, won’t you write to Nicholas?” She spoke in a soft,

tremulous voice, and in the weary eyes that looked over her spectacles

Sónya read all that the countess meant to convey with these words. Those

eyes expressed entreaty, shame at having to ask, fear of a refusal, and

readiness for relentless hatred in case of such refusal.

Sónya went up to the countess and, kneeling down, kissed her hand.

“Yes, Mamma, I will write,” said she.

Sónya was softened, excited, and touched by all that had occurred that

day, especially by the mysterious fulfillment she had just seen of her

vision. Now that she knew that the renewal of Natásha’s relations with

Prince Andrew would prevent Nicholas from marrying Princess Mary, she

was joyfully conscious of a return of that self-sacrificing spirit in

which she was accustomed to live and loved to live. So with a joyful

consciousness of performing a magnanimous deed—interrupted several times

by the tears that dimmed her velvety black eyes—she wrote that touching

letter the arrival of which had so amazed Nicholas.

CHAPTER IX

The officer and soldiers who had arrested Pierre treated him with

hostility but yet with respect, in the guardhouse to which he was taken.

In their attitude toward him could still be felt both uncertainty as

to who he might be—perhaps a very important person—and hostility as a

result of their recent personal conflict with him.

But when the guard was relieved next morning, Pierre felt that for the

new guard—both officers and men—he was not as interesting as he had

been to his captors; and in fact the guard of the second day did not

recognize in this big, stout man in a peasant coat the vigorous person

who had fought so desperately with the marauder and the convoy and had

uttered those solemn words about saving a child; they saw in him only

No. 17 of the captured Russians, arrested and detained for some reason

by order of the Higher Command. If they noticed anything remarkable

about Pierre, it was only his unabashed, meditative concentration

and thoughtfulness, and the way he spoke French, which struck them as

surprisingly good. In spite of this he was placed that day with the

other arrested suspects, as the separate room he had occupied was

required by an officer.

All the Russians confined with Pierre were men of the lowest class and,

recognizing him as a gentleman, they all avoided him, more especially as

he spoke French. Pierre felt sad at hearing them making fun of him.

That evening he learned that all these prisoners (he, probably, among

them) were to be tried for incendiarism. On the third day he was taken

with the others to a house where a French general with a white mustache

sat with two colonels and other Frenchmen with scarves on their arms.

With the precision and definiteness customary in addressing prisoners,

and which is supposed to preclude human frailty, Pierre like the others

was questioned as to who he was, where he had been, with what object,

and so on.

These questions, like questions put at trials generally, left the

essence of the matter aside, shut out the possibility of that essence’s

being revealed, and were designed only to form a channel through which

the judges wished the answers of the accused to flow so as to lead to

the desired result, namely a conviction. As soon as Pierre began to say

anything that did not fit in with that aim, the channel was removed and

the water could flow to waste. Pierre felt, moreover, what the accused

always feel at their trial, perplexity as to why these questions were

put to him. He had a feeling that it was only out of condescension or a

kind of civility that this device of placing a channel was employed. He

knew he was in these men’s power, that only by force had they brought

him there, that force alone gave them the right to demand answers

to their questions, and that the sole object of that assembly was to

inculpate him. And so, as they had the power and wish to inculpate

him, this expedient of an inquiry and trial seemed unnecessary. It was

evident that any answer would lead to conviction. When asked what he

was doing when he was arrested, Pierre replied in a rather tragic manner

that he was restoring to its parents a child he had saved from the

flames. Why had he fought the marauder? Pierre answered that he “was

protecting a woman,” and that “to protect a woman who was being insulted

was the duty of every man; that...” They interrupted him, for this

was not to the point. Why was he in the yard of a burning house where

witnesses had seen him? He replied that he had gone out to see what

was happening in Moscow. Again they interrupted him: they had not asked

where he was going, but why he was found near the fire? Who was he? they

asked, repeating their first question, which he had declined to answer.

Again he replied that he could not answer it.

“Put that down, that’s bad... very bad,” sternly remarked the general

with the white mustache and red flushed face.

On the fourth day fires broke out on the Zúbovski rampart.

Pierre and thirteen others were moved to the coach house of a merchant’s

house near the Crimean bridge. On his way through the streets Pierre

felt stifled by the smoke which seemed to hang over the whole

city. Fires were visible on all sides. He did not then realize the

significance of the burning of Moscow, and looked at the fires with

horror.

He passed four days in the coach house near the Crimean bridge and

during that time learned, from the talk of the French soldiers, that all

those confined there were awaiting a decision which might come any day

from the marshal. What marshal this was, Pierre could not learn from the

soldiers. Evidently for them “the marshal” represented a very high and

rather mysterious power.

These first days, before the eighth of September when the prisoners were

had up for a second examination, were the hardest of all for Pierre.

CHAPTER X

On the eighth of September an officer—a very important one judging by

the respect the guards showed him—entered the coach house where the

prisoners were. This officer, probably someone on the staff, was holding

a paper in his hand, and called over all the Russians there, naming

Pierre as “the man who does not give his name.” Glancing indolently and

indifferently at all the prisoners, he ordered the officer in charge

to have them decently dressed and tidied up before taking them to the

marshal. An hour later a squad of soldiers arrived and Pierre with

thirteen others was led to the Virgin’s Field. It was a fine day, sunny

after rain, and the air was unusually pure. The smoke did not hang low

as on the day when Pierre had been taken from the guardhouse on the

Zúbovski rampart, but rose through the pure air in columns. No flames

were seen, but columns of smoke rose on all sides, and all Moscow as far

as Pierre could see was one vast charred ruin. On all sides there were

waste spaces with only stoves and chimney stacks still standing, and

here and there the blackened walls of some brick houses. Pierre gazed

at the ruins and did not recognize districts he had known well. Here and

there he could see churches that had not been burned. The Krémlin, which

was not destroyed, gleamed white in the distance with its towers and

the belfry of Iván the Great. The domes of the New Convent of the Virgin

glittered brightly and its bells were ringing particularly clearly.

These bells reminded Pierre that it was Sunday and the feast of the

Nativity of the Virgin. But there seemed to be no one to celebrate this

holiday: everywhere were blackened ruins, and the few Russians to be

seen were tattered and frightened people who tried to hide when they saw

the French.

It was plain that the Russian nest was ruined and destroyed, but in

place of the Russian order of life that had been destroyed, Pierre

unconsciously felt that a quite different, firm, French order had been

established over this ruined nest. He felt this in the looks of

the soldiers who, marching in regular ranks briskly and gaily, were

escorting him and the other criminals; he felt it in the looks of an

important French official in a carriage and pair driven by a soldier,

whom they met on the way. He felt it in the merry sounds of regimental

music he heard from the left side of the field, and felt and realized

it especially from the list of prisoners the French officer had read out

when he came that morning. Pierre had been taken by one set of soldiers

and led first to one and then to another place with dozens of other men,

and it seemed that they might have forgotten him, or confused him with

the others. But no: the answers he had given when questioned had come

back to him in his designation as “the man who does not give his name,”

and under that appellation, which to Pierre seemed terrible, they were

now leading him somewhere with unhesitating assurance on their faces

that he and all the other prisoners were exactly the ones they wanted

and that they were being taken to the proper place. Pierre felt himself

to be an insignificant chip fallen among the wheels of a machine whose

action he did not understand but which was working well.

He and the other prisoners were taken to the right side of the Virgin’s

Field, to a large white house with an immense garden not far from the

convent. This was Prince Shcherbátov’s house, where Pierre had often

been in other days, and which, as he learned from the talk of the

soldiers, was now occupied by the marshal, the Duke of Eckmühl (Davout).

They were taken to the entrance and led into the house one by one.

Pierre was the sixth to enter. He was conducted through a glass gallery,

an anteroom, and a hall, which were familiar to him, into a long low

study at the door of which stood an adjutant.

Davout, spectacles on nose, sat bent over a table at the further end of

the room. Pierre went close up to him, but Davout, evidently consulting

a paper that lay before him, did not look up. Without raising his eyes,

he said in a low voice:

“Who are you?”

Pierre was silent because he was incapable of uttering a word. To him

Davout was not merely a French general, but a man notorious for his

cruelty. Looking at his cold face, as he sat like a stern schoolmaster

who was prepared to wait awhile for an answer, Pierre felt that every

instant of delay might cost him his life; but he did not know what

to say. He did not venture to repeat what he had said at his first

examination, yet to disclose his rank and position was dangerous and

embarrassing. So he was silent. But before he had decided what to do,

Davout raised his head, pushed his spectacles back on his forehead,

screwed up his eyes, and looked intently at him.

“I know that man,” he said in a cold, measured tone, evidently

calculated to frighten Pierre.

The chill that had been running down Pierre’s back now seized his head

as in a vise.

“You cannot know me, General, I have never seen you...”

“He is a Russian spy,” Davout interrupted, addressing another general

who was present, but whom Pierre had not noticed.

Davout turned away. With an unexpected reverberation in his voice Pierre

rapidly began:

“No, monseigneur,” he said, suddenly remembering that Davout was a duke.

“No, monseigneur, you cannot have known me. I am a militia officer and

have not quitted Moscow.”

“Your name?” asked Davout.

“Bezúkhov.”

“What proof have I that you are not lying?”

“Monseigneur!” exclaimed Pierre, not in an offended but in a pleading

voice.

Davout looked up and gazed intently at him. For some seconds they looked

at one another, and that look saved Pierre. Apart from conditions of war

and law, that look established human relations between the two men. At

that moment an immense number of things passed dimly through both their

minds, and they realized that they were both children of humanity and

were brothers.

At the first glance, when Davout had only raised his head from the

papers where human affairs and lives were indicated by numbers, Pierre

was merely a circumstance, and Davout could have shot him without

burdening his conscience with an evil deed, but now he saw in him a

human being. He reflected for a moment.

“How can you show me that you are telling the truth?” said Davout

coldly.

Pierre remembered Ramballe, and named him and his regiment and the

street where the house was.

“You are not what you say,” returned Davout.

In a trembling, faltering voice Pierre began adducing proofs of the

truth of his statements.

But at that moment an adjutant entered and reported something to Davout.

Davout brightened up at the news the adjutant brought, and began

buttoning up his uniform. It seemed that he had quite forgotten Pierre.

When the adjutant reminded him of the prisoner, he jerked his head in

Pierre’s direction with a frown and ordered him to be led away. But

where they were to take him Pierre did not know: back to the coach house

or to the place of execution his companions had pointed out to him as

they crossed the Virgin’s Field.

He turned his head and saw that the adjutant was putting another

question to Davout.

“Yes, of course!” replied Davout, but what this “yes” meant, Pierre did

not know.

Pierre could not afterwards remember how he went, whether it was far, or

in which direction. His faculties were quite numbed, he was stupefied,

and noticing nothing around him went on moving his legs as the others

did till they all stopped and he stopped too. The only thought in his

mind at that time was: who was it that had really sentenced him to

death? Not the men on the commission that had first examined him—not one

of them wished to or, evidently, could have done it. It was not Davout,

who had looked at him in so human a way. In another moment Davout would

have realized that he was doing wrong, but just then the adjutant had

come in and interrupted him. The adjutant, also, had evidently had no

evil intent though he might have refrained from coming in. Then who was

executing him, killing him, depriving him of life—him, Pierre, with all

his memories, aspirations, hopes, and thoughts? Who was doing this? And

Pierre felt that it was no one.

It was a system—a concurrence of circumstances.

A system of some sort was killing him—Pierre—depriving him of life, of

everything, annihilating him.

CHAPTER XI

From Prince Shcherbátov’s house the prisoners were led straight down the

Virgin’s Field, to the left of the nunnery, as far as a kitchen garden

in which a post had been set up. Beyond that post a fresh pit had been

dug in the ground, and near the post and the pit a large crowd stood

in a semicircle. The crowd consisted of a few Russians and many

of Napoleon’s soldiers who were not on duty—Germans, Italians, and

Frenchmen, in a variety of uniforms. To the right and left of the post

stood rows of French troops in blue uniforms with red epaulets and high

boots and shakos.

The prisoners were placed in a certain order, according to the list

(Pierre was sixth), and were led to the post. Several drums suddenly

began to beat on both sides of them, and at that sound Pierre felt as

if part of his soul had been torn away. He lost the power of thinking or

understanding. He could only hear and see. And he had only one wish—that

the frightful thing that had to happen should happen quickly. Pierre

looked round at his fellow prisoners and scrutinized them.

The two first were convicts with shaven heads. One was tall and thin,

the other dark, shaggy, and sinewy, with a flat nose. The third was

a domestic serf, about forty-five years old, with grizzled hair and a

plump, well-nourished body. The fourth was a peasant, a very handsome

man with a broad, light-brown beard and black eyes. The fifth was a

factory hand, a thin, sallow-faced lad of eighteen in a loose coat.

Pierre heard the French consulting whether to shoot them separately or

two at a time. “In couples,” replied the officer in command in a calm

voice. There was a stir in the ranks of the soldiers and it was evident

that they were all hurrying—not as men hurry to do something they

understand, but as people hurry to finish a necessary but unpleasant and

incomprehensible task.

A French official wearing a scarf came up to the right of the row of

prisoners and read out the sentence in Russian and in French.

Then two pairs of Frenchmen approached the criminals and at the

officer’s command took the two convicts who stood first in the row. The

convicts stopped when they reached the post and, while sacks were being

brought, looked dumbly around as a wounded beast looks at an approaching

huntsman. One crossed himself continually, the other scratched his back

and made a movement of the lips resembling a smile. With hurried hands

the soldiers blindfolded them, drawing the sacks over their heads, and

bound them to the post.

Twelve sharpshooters with muskets stepped out of the ranks with a firm

regular tread and halted eight paces from the post. Pierre turned away

to avoid seeing what was going to happen. Suddenly a crackling, rolling

noise was heard which seemed to him louder than the most terrific

thunder, and he looked round. There was some smoke, and the Frenchmen

were doing something near the pit, with pale faces and trembling hands.

Two more prisoners were led up. In the same way and with similar looks,

these two glanced vainly at the onlookers with only a silent appeal for

protection in their eyes, evidently unable to understand or believe

what was going to happen to them. They could not believe it because they

alone knew what their life meant to them, and so they neither understood

nor believed that it could be taken from them.

Again Pierre did not wish to look and again turned away; but again the

sound as of a frightful explosion struck his ear, and at the same moment

he saw smoke, blood, and the pale, scared faces of the Frenchmen who

were again doing something by the post, their trembling hands impeding

one another. Pierre, breathing heavily, looked around as if asking what

it meant. The same question was expressed in all the looks that met his.

On the faces of all the Russians and of the French soldiers and officers

without exception, he read the same dismay, horror, and conflict that

were in his own heart. “But who, after all, is doing this? They are all

suffering as I am. Who then is it? Who?” flashed for an instant through

his mind.

“Sharpshooters of the 86th, forward!” shouted someone. The fifth

prisoner, the one next to Pierre, was led away—alone. Pierre did not

understand that he was saved, that he and the rest had been brought

there only to witness the execution. With ever-growing horror, and no

sense of joy or relief, he gazed at what was taking place. The fifth man

was the factory lad in the loose cloak. The moment they laid hands on

him he sprang aside in terror and clutched at Pierre. (Pierre shuddered

and shook himself free.) The lad was unable to walk. They dragged him

along, holding him up under the arms, and he screamed. When they got

him to the post he grew quiet, as if he suddenly understood something.

Whether he understood that screaming was useless or whether he thought

it incredible that men should kill him, at any rate he took his stand at

the post, waiting to be blindfolded like the others, and like a wounded

animal looked around him with glittering eyes.

Pierre was no longer able to turn away and close his eyes. His curiosity

and agitation, like that of the whole crowd, reached the highest pitch

at this fifth murder. Like the others this fifth man seemed calm; he

wrapped his loose cloak closer and rubbed one bare foot with the other.

When they began to blindfold him he himself adjusted the knot which

hurt the back of his head; then when they propped him against the

bloodstained post, he leaned back and, not being comfortable in that

position, straightened himself, adjusted his feet, and leaned back again

more comfortably. Pierre did not take his eyes from him and did not miss

his slightest movement.

Probably a word of command was given and was followed by the reports of

eight muskets; but try as he would Pierre could not afterwards remember

having heard the slightest sound of the shots. He only saw how the

workman suddenly sank down on the cords that held him, how blood showed

itself in two places, how the ropes slackened under the weight of the

hanging body, and how the workman sat down, his head hanging unnaturally

and one leg bent under him. Pierre ran up to the post. No one hindered

him. Pale, frightened people were doing something around the workman.

The lower jaw of an old Frenchman with a thick mustache trembled as he

untied the ropes. The body collapsed. The soldiers dragged it awkwardly

from the post and began pushing it into the pit.

They all plainly and certainly knew that they were criminals who must

hide the traces of their guilt as quickly as possible.

Pierre glanced into the pit and saw that the factory lad was lying with

his knees close up to his head and one shoulder higher than the other.

That shoulder rose and fell rhythmically and convulsively, but spadefuls

of earth were already being thrown over the whole body. One of the

soldiers, evidently suffering, shouted gruffly and angrily at Pierre to

go back. But Pierre did not understand him and remained near the post,

and no one drove him away.

When the pit had been filled up a command was given. Pierre was taken

back to his place, and the rows of troops on both sides of the post

made a half turn and went past it at a measured pace. The twenty-four

sharpshooters with discharged muskets, standing in the center of the

circle, ran back to their places as the companies passed by.

Pierre gazed now with dazed eyes at these sharpshooters who ran in

couples out of the circle. All but one rejoined their companies. This

one, a young soldier, his face deadly pale, his shako pushed back, and

his musket resting on the ground, still stood near the pit at the spot

from which he had fired. He swayed like a drunken man, taking some steps

forward and back to save himself from falling. An old, noncommissioned

officer ran out of the ranks and taking him by the elbow dragged him to

his company. The crowd of Russians and Frenchmen began to disperse. They

all went away silently and with drooping heads.

“That will teach them to start fires,” said one of the Frenchmen.

Pierre glanced round at the speaker and saw that it was a soldier who

was trying to find some relief after what had been done, but was not

able to do so. Without finishing what he had begun to say he made a

hopeless movement with his arm and went away.

CHAPTER XII

After the execution Pierre was separated from the rest of the prisoners

and placed alone in a small, ruined, and befouled church.

Toward evening a noncommissioned officer entered with two soldiers and

told him that he had been pardoned and would now go to the barracks for

the prisoners of war. Without understanding what was said to him, Pierre

got up and went with the soldiers. They took him to the upper end of the

field, where there were some sheds built of charred planks, beams,

and battens, and led him into one of them. In the darkness some twenty

different men surrounded Pierre. He looked at them without understanding

who they were, why they were there, or what they wanted of him. He heard

what they said, but did not understand the meaning of the words and

made no kind of deduction from or application of them. He replied to

questions they put to him, but did not consider who was listening to his

replies, nor how they would understand them. He looked at their faces

and figures, but they all seemed to him equally meaningless.

From the moment Pierre had witnessed those terrible murders committed by

men who did not wish to commit them, it was as if the mainspring of

his life, on which everything depended and which made everything appear

alive, had suddenly been wrenched out and everything had collapsed

into a heap of meaningless rubbish. Though he did not acknowledge it to

himself, his faith in the right ordering of the universe, in humanity,

in his own soul, and in God, had been destroyed. He had experienced this

before, but never so strongly as now. When similar doubts had assailed

him before, they had been the result of his own wrongdoing, and at the

bottom of his heart he had felt that relief from his despair and from

those doubts was to be found within himself. But now he felt that

the universe had crumbled before his eyes and only meaningless ruins

remained, and this not by any fault of his own. He felt that it was not

in his power to regain faith in the meaning of life.

Around him in the darkness men were standing and evidently something

about him interested them greatly. They were telling him something and

asking him something. Then they led him away somewhere, and at last he

found himself in a corner of the shed among men who were laughing and

talking on all sides.

“Well, then, mates... that very prince who...” some voice at the other

end of the shed was saying, with a strong emphasis on the word who.

Sitting silent and motionless on a heap of straw against the wall,

Pierre sometimes opened and sometimes closed his eyes. But as soon as

he closed them he saw before him the dreadful face of the factory

lad—especially dreadful because of its simplicity—and the faces of the

murderers, even more dreadful because of their disquiet. And he opened

his eyes again and stared vacantly into the darkness around him.

Beside him in a stooping position sat a small man of whose presence he

was first made aware by a strong smell of perspiration which came from

him every time he moved. This man was doing something to his legs in the

darkness, and though Pierre could not see his face he felt that the man

continually glanced at him. On growing used to the darkness Pierre saw

that the man was taking off his leg bands, and the way he did it aroused

Pierre’s interest.

Having unwound the string that tied the band on one leg, he carefully

coiled it up and immediately set to work on the other leg, glancing up

at Pierre. While one hand hung up the first string the other was already

unwinding the band on the second leg. In this way, having carefully

removed the leg bands by deft circular motions of his arm following

one another uninterruptedly, the man hung the leg bands up on some pegs

fixed above his head. Then he took out a knife, cut something, closed

the knife, placed it under the head of his bed, and, seating himself

comfortably, clasped his arms round his lifted knees and fixed his eyes

on Pierre. The latter was conscious of something pleasant, comforting,

and well-rounded in these deft movements, in the man’s well-ordered

arrangements in his corner, and even in his very smell, and he looked at

the man without taking his eyes from him.

“You’ve seen a lot of trouble, sir, eh?” the little man suddenly said.

And there was so much kindliness and simplicity in his singsong voice

that Pierre tried to reply, but his jaw trembled and he felt tears

rising to his eyes. The little fellow, giving Pierre no time to betray

his confusion, instantly continued in the same pleasant tones:

“Eh, lad, don’t fret!” said he, in the tender singsong caressing voice

old Russian peasant women employ. “Don’t fret, friend—‘suffer an hour,

live for an age!’ that’s how it is, my dear fellow. And here we live,

thank heaven, without offense. Among these folk, too, there are good

men as well as bad,” said he, and still speaking, he turned on his knees

with a supple movement, got up, coughed, and went off to another part of

the shed.

“Eh, you rascal!” Pierre heard the same kind voice saying at the other

end of the shed. “So you’ve come, you rascal? She remembers... Now, now,

that’ll do!”

And the soldier, pushing away a little dog that was jumping up at

him, returned to his place and sat down. In his hands he had something

wrapped in a rag.

“Here, eat a bit, sir,” said he, resuming his former respectful tone as

he unwrapped and offered Pierre some baked potatoes. “We had soup for

dinner and the potatoes are grand!”

Pierre had not eaten all day and the smell of the potatoes seemed

extremely pleasant to him. He thanked the soldier and began to eat.

“Well, are they all right?” said the soldier with a smile. “You should

do like this.”

He took a potato, drew out his clasp knife, cut the potato into two

equal halves on the palm of his hand, sprinkled some salt on it from the

rag, and handed it to Pierre.

“The potatoes are grand!” he said once more. “Eat some like that!”

Pierre thought he had never eaten anything that tasted better.

“Oh, I’m all right,” said he, “but why did they shoot those poor

fellows? The last one was hardly twenty.”

“Tss, tt...!” said the little man. “Ah, what a sin... what a sin!” he

added quickly, and as if his words were always waiting ready in his

mouth and flew out involuntarily he went on: “How was it, sir, that you

stayed in Moscow?”

“I didn’t think they would come so soon. I stayed accidentally,” replied

Pierre.

“And how did they arrest you, dear lad? At your house?”

“No, I went to look at the fire, and they arrested me there, and tried

me as an incendiary.”

“Where there’s law there’s injustice,” put in the little man.

“And have you been here long?” Pierre asked as he munched the last of

the potato.

“I? It was last Sunday they took me, out of a hospital in Moscow.”

“Why, are you a soldier then?”

“Yes, we are soldiers of the Ápsheron regiment. I was dying of fever. We

weren’t told anything. There were some twenty of us lying there. We had

no idea, never guessed at all.”

“And do you feel sad here?” Pierre inquired.

“How can one help it, lad? My name is Platón, and the surname is

Karatáev,” he added, evidently wishing to make it easier for Pierre to

address him. “They call me ‘little falcon’ in the regiment. How is one

to help feeling sad? Moscow—she’s the mother of cities. How can one see

all this and not feel sad? But ‘the maggot gnaws the cabbage, yet dies

first’; that’s what the old folks used to tell us,” he added rapidly.

“What? What did you say?” asked Pierre.

“Who? I?” said Karatáev. “I say things happen not as we plan but as God

judges,” he replied, thinking that he was repeating what he had said

before, and immediately continued:

“Well, and you, have you a family estate, sir? And a house? So you have

abundance, then? And a housewife? And your old parents, are they still

living?” he asked.

And though it was too dark for Pierre to see, he felt that a suppressed

smile of kindliness puckered the soldier’s lips as he put these

questions. He seemed grieved that Pierre had no parents, especially that

he had no mother.

“A wife for counsel, a mother-in-law for welcome, but there’s none as

dear as one’s own mother!” said he. “Well, and have you little ones?” he

went on asking.

Again Pierre’s negative answer seemed to distress him, and he hastened

to add:

“Never mind! You’re young folks yet, and please God may still have some.

The great thing is to live in harmony....”

“But it’s all the same now,” Pierre could not help saying.

“Ah, my dear fellow!” rejoined Karatáev, “never decline a prison or a

beggar’s sack!”

He seated himself more comfortably and coughed, evidently preparing to

tell a long story.

“Well, my dear fellow, I was still living at home,” he began. “We had

a well-to-do homestead, plenty of land, we peasants lived well and our

house was one to thank God for. When Father and we went out mowing

there were seven of us. We lived well. We were real peasants. It so

happened...”

And Platón Karatáev told a long story of how he had gone into someone’s

copse to take wood, how he had been caught by the keeper, had been

tried, flogged, and sent to serve as a soldier.

“Well, lad,” and a smile changed the tone of his voice, “we thought it

was a misfortune but it turned out a blessing! If it had not been for

my sin, my brother would have had to go as a soldier. But he, my younger

brother, had five little ones, while I, you see, only left a wife

behind. We had a little girl, but God took her before I went as a

soldier. I come home on leave and I’ll tell you how it was, I look and

see that they are living better than before. The yard full of cattle,

the women at home, two brothers away earning wages, and only Michael the

youngest, at home. Father, he says, ‘All my children are the same to

me: it hurts the same whichever finger gets bitten. But if Platón hadn’t

been shaved for a soldier, Michael would have had to go.’ called us

all to him and, will you believe it, placed us in front of the icons.

‘Michael,’ he says, ‘come here and bow down to his feet; and you, young

woman, you bow down too; and you, grandchildren, also bow down before

him! Do you understand?’ he says. That’s how it is, dear fellow. Fate

looks for a head. But we are always judging, ‘that’s not well—that’s

not right!’ Our luck is like water in a dragnet: you pull at it and it

bulges, but when you’ve drawn it out it’s empty! That’s how it is.”

And Platón shifted his seat on the straw.

After a short silence he rose.

“Well, I think you must be sleepy,” said he, and began rapidly crossing

himself and repeating:

“Lord Jesus Christ, holy Saint Nicholas, Frola and Lavra! Lord Jesus

Christ, holy Saint Nicholas, Frola and Lavra! Lord Jesus Christ, have

mercy on us and save us!” he concluded, then bowed to the ground, got

up, sighed, and sat down again on his heap of straw. “That’s the way.

Lay me down like a stone, O God, and raise me up like a loaf,” he

muttered as he lay down, pulling his coat over him.

“What prayer was that you were saying?” asked Pierre.

“Eh?” murmured Platón, who had almost fallen asleep. “What was I saying?

I was praying. Don’t you pray?”

“Yes, I do,” said Pierre. “But what was that you said: Frola and Lavra?”

“Well, of course,” replied Platón quickly, “the horses’ saints. One must

pity the animals too. Eh, the rascal! Now you’ve curled up and got warm,

you daughter of a bitch!” said Karatáev, touching the dog that lay at

his feet, and again turning over he fell asleep immediately.

Sounds of crying and screaming came from somewhere in the distance

outside, and flames were visible through the cracks of the shed, but

inside it was quiet and dark. For a long time Pierre did not sleep, but

lay with eyes open in the darkness, listening to the regular snoring

of Platón who lay beside him, and he felt that the world that had been

shattered was once more stirring in his soul with a new beauty and on

new and unshakable foundations.

CHAPTER XIII

Twenty-three soldiers, three officers, and two officials were confined

in the shed in which Pierre had been placed and where he remained for

four weeks.

When Pierre remembered them afterwards they all seemed misty figures to

him except Platón Karatáev, who always remained in his mind a most

vivid and precious memory and the personification of everything Russian,

kindly, and round. When Pierre saw his neighbor next morning at dawn

the first impression of him, as of something round, was fully confirmed:

Platón’s whole figure—in a French overcoat girdled with a cord, a

soldier’s cap, and bast shoes—was round. His head was quite round, his

back, chest, shoulders, and even his arms, which he held as if ever

ready to embrace something, were rounded, his pleasant smile and his

large, gentle brown eyes were also round.

Platón Karatáev must have been fifty, judging by his stories of

campaigns he had been in, told as by an old soldier. He did not himself

know his age and was quite unable to determine it. But his brilliantly

white, strong teeth which showed in two unbroken semicircles when he

laughed—as he often did—were all sound and good, there was not a gray

hair in his beard or on his head, and his whole body gave an impression

of suppleness and especially of firmness and endurance.

His face, despite its fine, rounded wrinkles, had an expression of

innocence and youth, his voice was pleasant and musical. But the chief

peculiarity of his speech was its directness and appositeness. It was

evident that he never considered what he had said or was going to say,

and consequently the rapidity and justice of his intonation had an

irresistible persuasiveness.

His physical strength and agility during the first days of his

imprisonment were such that he seemed not to know what fatigue and

sickness meant. Every night before lying down, he said: “Lord, lay me

down as a stone and raise me up as a loaf!” and every morning on getting

up, he said: “I lay down and curled up, I get up and shake myself.” And

indeed he only had to lie down, to fall asleep like a stone, and he

only had to shake himself, to be ready without a moment’s delay for some

work, just as children are ready to play directly they awake. He could

do everything, not very well but not badly. He baked, cooked, sewed,

planed, and mended boots. He was always busy, and only at night allowed

himself conversation—of which he was fond—and songs. He did not sing

like a trained singer who knows he is listened to, but like the birds,

evidently giving vent to the sounds in the same way that one stretches

oneself or walks about to get rid of stiffness, and the sounds were

always high-pitched, mournful, delicate, and almost feminine, and his

face at such times was very serious.

Having been taken prisoner and allowed his beard to grow, he seemed to

have thrown off all that had been forced upon him—everything military

and alien to himself—and had returned to his former peasant habits.

“A soldier on leave—a shirt outside breeches,” he would say.

He did not like talking about his life as a soldier, though he did not

complain, and often mentioned that he had not been flogged once during

the whole of his army service. When he related anything it was generally

some old and evidently precious memory of his “Christian” life, as he

called his peasant existence. The proverbs, of which his talk was full,

were for the most part not the coarse and indecent saws soldiers

employ, but those folk sayings which taken without a context seem so

insignificant, but when used appositely suddenly acquire a significance

of profound wisdom.

He would often say the exact opposite of what he had said on a previous

occasion, yet both would be right. He liked to talk and he talked well,

adorning his speech with terms of endearment and with folk sayings which

Pierre thought he invented himself, but the chief charm of his talk lay

in the fact that the commonest events—sometimes just such as Pierre

had witnessed without taking notice of them—assumed in Karatáev’s a

character of solemn fitness. He liked to hear the folk tales one of the

soldiers used to tell of an evening (they were always the same), but

most of all he liked to hear stories of real life. He would smile

joyfully when listening to such stories, now and then putting in a word

or asking a question to make the moral beauty of what he was told clear

to himself. Karatáev had no attachments, friendships, or love, as Pierre

understood them, but loved and lived affectionately with everything life

brought him in contact with, particularly with man—not any particular

man, but those with whom he happened to be. He loved his dog, his

comrades, the French, and Pierre who was his neighbor, but Pierre felt

that in spite of Karatáev’s affectionate tenderness for him (by which

he unconsciously gave Pierre’s spiritual life its due) he would not have

grieved for a moment at parting from him. And Pierre began to feel in

the same way toward Karatáev.

To all the other prisoners Platón Karatáev seemed a most ordinary

soldier. They called him “little falcon” or “Platósha,” chaffed him

good-naturedly, and sent him on errands. But to Pierre he always

remained what he had seemed that first night: an unfathomable, rounded,

eternal personification of the spirit of simplicity and truth.

Platón Karatáev knew nothing by heart except his prayers. When he began

to speak he seemed not to know how he would conclude.

Sometimes Pierre, struck by the meaning of his words, would ask him to

repeat them, but Platón could never recall what he had said a moment

before, just as he never could repeat to Pierre the words of his

favorite song: native and birch tree and my heart is sick occurred in

it, but when spoken and not sung, no meaning could be got out of it. He

did not, and could not, understand the meaning of words apart from

their context. Every word and action of his was the manifestation of

an activity unknown to him, which was his life. But his life, as he

regarded it, had no meaning as a separate thing. It had meaning only as

part of a whole of which he was always conscious. His words and actions

flowed from him as evenly, inevitably, and spontaneously as fragrance

exhales from a flower. He could not understand the value or significance

of any word or deed taken separately.

CHAPTER XIV

When Princess Mary heard from Nicholas that her brother was with the

Rostóvs at Yaroslávl she at once prepared to go there, in spite of her

aunt’s efforts to dissuade her—and not merely to go herself but to take

her nephew with her. Whether it were difficult or easy, possible or

impossible, she did not ask and did not want to know: it was her duty,

not only to herself, to be near her brother who was perhaps dying, but

to do everything possible to take his son to him, and so she prepared

to set off. That she had not heard from Prince Andrew himself, Princess

Mary attributed to his being too weak to write or to his considering the

long journey too hard and too dangerous for her and his son.

In a few days Princess Mary was ready to start. Her equipages were the

huge family coach in which she had traveled to Vorónezh, a semiopen

trap, and a baggage cart. With her traveled Mademoiselle Bourienne,

little Nicholas and his tutor, her old nurse, three maids, Tíkhon, and a

young footman and courier her aunt had sent to accompany her.

The usual route through Moscow could not be thought of, and the

roundabout way Princess Mary was obliged to take through Lípetsk,

Ryazán, Vladímir, and Shúya was very long and, as post horses were not

everywhere obtainable, very difficult, and near Ryazán where the French

were said to have shown themselves was even dangerous.

During this difficult journey Mademoiselle Bourienne, Dessalles, and

Princess Mary’s servants were astonished at her energy and firmness of

spirit. She went to bed later and rose earlier than any of them, and

no difficulties daunted her. Thanks to her activity and energy, which

infected her fellow travelers, they approached Yaroslávl by the end of

the second week.

The last days of her stay in Vorónezh had been the happiest of her life.

Her love for Rostóv no longer tormented or agitated her. It filled her

whole soul, had become an integral part of herself, and she no longer

struggled against it. Latterly she had become convinced that she loved

and was beloved, though she never said this definitely to herself

in words. She had become convinced of it at her last interview with

Nicholas, when he had come to tell her that her brother was with the

Rostóvs. Not by a single word had Nicholas alluded to the fact that

Prince Andrew’s relations with Natásha might, if he recovered, be

renewed, but Princess Mary saw by his face that he knew and thought of

this.

Yet in spite of that, his relation to her—considerate, delicate, and

loving—not only remained unchanged, but it sometimes seemed to Princess

Mary that he was even glad that the family connection between them

allowed him to express his friendship more freely. She knew that she

loved for the first and only time in her life and felt that she was

beloved, and was happy in regard to it.

But this happiness on one side of her spiritual nature did not prevent

her feeling grief for her brother with full force; on the contrary, that

spiritual tranquility on the one side made it the more possible for her

to give full play to her feeling for her brother. That feeling was so

strong at the moment of leaving Vorónezh that those who saw her off, as

they looked at her careworn, despairing face, felt sure she would fall

ill on the journey. But the very difficulties and preoccupations of the

journey, which she took so actively in hand, saved her for a while from

her grief and gave her strength.

As always happens when traveling, Princess Mary thought only of the

journey itself, forgetting its object. But as she approached Yaroslávl

the thought of what might await her there—not after many days, but that

very evening—again presented itself to her and her agitation increased

to its utmost limit.

The courier who had been sent on in advance to find out where the

Rostóvs were staying in Yaroslávl, and in what condition Prince Andrew

was, when he met the big coach just entering the town gates was appalled

by the terrible pallor of the princess’ face that looked out at him from

the window.

“I have found out everything, your excellency: the Rostóvs are staying

at the merchant Brónnikov’s house, in the Square not far from here,

right above the Vólga,” said the courier.

Princess Mary looked at him with frightened inquiry, not understanding

why he did not reply to what she chiefly wanted to know: how was her

brother? Mademoiselle Bourienne put that question for her.

“How is the prince?” she asked.

“His excellency is staying in the same house with them.”

“Then he is alive,” thought Princess Mary, and asked in a low voice:

“How is he?”

“The servants say he is still the same.”

What “still the same” might mean Princess Mary did not ask, but with an

unnoticed glance at little seven-year-old Nicholas, who was sitting in

front of her looking with pleasure at the town, she bowed her head

and did not raise it again till the heavy coach, rumbling, shaking and

swaying, came to a stop. The carriage steps clattered as they were let

down.

The carriage door was opened. On the left there was water—a great

river—and on the right a porch. There were people at the entrance:

servants, and a rosy girl with a large plait of black hair, smiling as

it seemed to Princess Mary in an unpleasantly affected way. (This was

Sónya.) Princess Mary ran up the steps. “This way, this way!” said the

girl, with the same artificial smile, and the princess found herself in

the hall facing an elderly woman of Oriental type, who came rapidly to

meet her with a look of emotion. This was the countess. She embraced

Princess Mary and kissed her.

“Mon enfant!” she muttered, “je vous aime et vous connais depuis

longtemps.” *

* “My child! I love you and have known you a long time.”

Despite her excitement, Princess Mary realized that this was the

countess and that it was necessary to say something to her. Hardly

knowing how she did it, she contrived to utter a few polite phrases in

French in the same tone as those that had been addressed to her, and

asked: “How is he?”

“The doctor says that he is not in danger,” said the countess, but as

she spoke she raised her eyes with a sigh, and her gesture conveyed a

contradiction of her words.

“Where is he? Can I see him—can I?” asked the princess.

“One moment, Princess, one moment, my dear! Is this his son?” said the

countess, turning to little Nicholas who was coming in with Dessalles.

“There will be room for everybody, this is a big house. Oh, what a

lovely boy!”

The countess took Princess Mary into the drawing room, where Sónya was

talking to Mademoiselle Bourienne. The countess caressed the boy, and

the old count came in and welcomed the princess. He had changed very

much since Princess Mary had last seen him. Then he had been a brisk,

cheerful, self-assured old man; now he seemed a pitiful, bewildered

person. While talking to Princess Mary he continually looked round as

if asking everyone whether he was doing the right thing. After the

destruction of Moscow and of his property, thrown out of his accustomed

groove he seemed to have lost the sense of his own significance and to

feel that there was no longer a place for him in life.

In spite of her one desire to see her brother as soon as possible, and

her vexation that at the moment when all she wanted was to see him they

should be trying to entertain her and pretending to admire her nephew,

the princess noticed all that was going on around her and felt the

necessity of submitting, for a time, to this new order of things which

she had entered. She knew it to be necessary, and though it was hard for

her she was not vexed with these people.

“This is my niece,” said the count, introducing Sónya—“You don’t know

her, Princess?”

Princess Mary turned to Sónya and, trying to stifle the hostile

feeling that arose in her toward the girl, she kissed her. But she felt

oppressed by the fact that the mood of everyone around her was so far

from what was in her own heart.

“Where is he?” she asked again, addressing them all.

“He is downstairs. Natásha is with him,” answered Sónya, flushing. “We

have sent to ask. I think you must be tired, Princess.”

Tears of vexation showed themselves in Princess Mary’s eyes. She turned

away and was about to ask the countess again how to go to him, when

light, impetuous, and seemingly buoyant steps were heard at the door.

The princess looked round and saw Natásha coming in, almost running—that

Natásha whom she had liked so little at their meeting in Moscow long

since.

But hardly had the princess looked at Natásha’s face before she realized

that here was a real comrade in her grief, and consequently a friend.

She ran to meet her, embraced her, and began to cry on her shoulder.

As soon as Natásha, sitting at the head of Prince Andrew’s bed, heard

of Princess Mary’s arrival, she softly left his room and hastened to her

with those swift steps that had sounded buoyant to Princess Mary.

There was only one expression on her agitated face when she ran into the

drawing room—that of love—boundless love for him, for her, and for all

that was near to the man she loved; and of pity, suffering for others,

and passionate desire to give herself entirely to helping them. It was

plain that at that moment there was in Natásha’s heart no thought of

herself or of her own relations with Prince Andrew.

Princess Mary, with her acute sensibility, understood all this at the

first glance at Natásha’s face, and wept on her shoulder with sorrowful

pleasure.

“Come, come to him, Mary,” said Natásha, leading her into the other

room.

Princess Mary raised her head, dried her eyes, and turned to Natásha.

She felt that from her she would be able to understand and learn

everything.

“How...” she began her question but stopped short.

She felt that it was impossible to ask, or to answer, in words.

Natásha’s face and eyes would have to tell her all more clearly and

profoundly.

Natásha was gazing at her, but seemed afraid and in doubt whether to say

all she knew or not; she seemed to feel that before those luminous eyes

which penetrated into the very depths of her heart, it was impossible

not to tell the whole truth which she saw. And suddenly, Natásha’s lips

twitched, ugly wrinkles gathered round her mouth, and covering her face

with her hands she burst into sobs.

Princess Mary understood.

But she still hoped, and asked, in words she herself did not trust:

“But how is his wound? What is his general condition?”

“You, you... will see,” was all Natásha could say.

They sat a little while downstairs near his room till they had left off

crying and were able to go to him with calm faces.

“How has his whole illness gone? Is it long since he grew worse? When

did this happen?” Princess Mary inquired.

Natásha told her that at first there had been danger from his feverish

condition and the pain he suffered, but at Tróitsa that had passed

and the doctor had only been afraid of gangrene. That danger had also

passed. When they reached Yaroslávl the wound had begun to fester

(Natásha knew all about such things as festering) and the doctor had

said that the festering might take a normal course. Then fever set in,

but the doctor had said the fever was not very serious.

“But two days ago this suddenly happened,” said Natásha, struggling with

her sobs. “I don’t know why, but you will see what he is like.”

“Is he weaker? Thinner?” asked the princess.

“No, it’s not that, but worse. You will see. O, Mary, he is too good, he

cannot, cannot live, because...”

CHAPTER XV

When Natásha opened Prince Andrew’s door with a familiar movement and

let Princess Mary pass into the room before her, the princess felt the

sobs in her throat. Hard as she had tried to prepare herself, and now

tried to remain tranquil, she knew that she would be unable to look at

him without tears.

The princess understood what Natásha had meant by the words: “two days

ago this suddenly happened.” She understood those words to mean that he

had suddenly softened and that this softening and gentleness were signs

of approaching death. As she stepped to the door she already saw in

imagination Andrew’s face as she remembered it in childhood, a gentle,

mild, sympathetic face which he had rarely shown, and which therefore

affected her very strongly. She was sure he would speak soft, tender

words to her such as her father had uttered before his death, and

that she would not be able to bear it and would burst into sobs in his

presence. Yet sooner or later it had to be, and she went in. The sobs

rose higher and higher in her throat as she more and more clearly

distinguished his form and her shortsighted eyes tried to make out his

features, and then she saw his face and met his gaze.

He was lying in a squirrel-fur dressing gown on a divan, surrounded by

pillows. He was thin and pale. In one thin, translucently white hand

he held a handkerchief, while with the other he stroked the delicate

mustache he had grown, moving his fingers slowly. His eyes gazed at them

as they entered.

On seeing his face and meeting his eyes Princess Mary’s pace suddenly

slackened, she felt her tears dry up and her sobs ceased. She suddenly

felt guilty and grew timid on catching the expression of his face and

eyes.

“But in what am I to blame?” she asked herself. And his cold, stern look

replied: “Because you are alive and thinking of the living, while I...”

In the deep gaze that seemed to look not outwards but inwards there

was an almost hostile expression as he slowly regarded his sister and

Natásha.

He kissed his sister, holding her hand in his as was their wont.

“How are you, Mary? How did you manage to get here?” said he in a voice

as calm and aloof as his look.

Had he screamed in agony, that scream would not have struck such horror

into Princess Mary’s heart as the tone of his voice.

“And have you brought little Nicholas?” he asked in the same slow, quiet

manner and with an obvious effort to remember.

“How are you now?” said Princess Mary, herself surprised at what she was

saying.

“That, my dear, you must ask the doctor,” he replied, and again making

an evident effort to be affectionate, he said with his lips only (his

words clearly did not correspond to his thoughts):

“Merci, chère amie, d’être venue.” *

* “Thank you for coming, my dear.”

Princess Mary pressed his hand. The pressure made him wince just

perceptibly. He was silent, and she did not know what to say. She now

understood what had happened to him two days before. In his words, his

tone, and especially in that calm, almost antagonistic look could be

felt an estrangement from everything belonging to this world, terrible

in one who is alive. Evidently only with an effort did he understand

anything living; but it was obvious that he failed to understand, not

because he lacked the power to do so but because he understood something

else—something the living did not and could not understand—and which

wholly occupied his mind.

“There, you see how strangely fate has brought us together,” said he,

breaking the silence and pointing to Natásha. “She looks after me all

the time.”

Princess Mary heard him and did not understand how he could say such a

thing. He, the sensitive, tender Prince Andrew, how could he say that,

before her whom he loved and who loved him? Had he expected to live he

could not have said those words in that offensively cold tone. If he had

not known that he was dying, how could he have failed to pity her and

how could he speak like that in her presence? The only explanation was

that he was indifferent, because something else, much more important,

had been revealed to him.

The conversation was cold and disconnected and continually broke off.

“Mary came by way of Ryazán,” said Natásha.

Prince Andrew did not notice that she called his sister Mary, and only

after calling her so in his presence did Natásha notice it herself.

“Really?” he asked.

“They told her that all Moscow has been burned down, and that...”

Natásha stopped. It was impossible to talk. It was plain that he was

making an effort to listen, but could not do so.

“Yes, they say it’s burned,” he said. “It’s a great pity,” and he gazed

straight before him, absently stroking his mustache with his fingers.

“And so you have met Count Nicholas, Mary?” Prince Andrew suddenly said,

evidently wishing to speak pleasantly to them. “He wrote here that he

took a great liking to you,” he went on simply and calmly, evidently

unable to understand all the complex significance his words had for

living people. “If you liked him too, it would be a good thing for you

to get married,” he added rather more quickly, as if pleased at having

found words he had long been seeking.

Princess Mary heard his words but they had no meaning for her, except as

a proof of how far away he now was from everything living.

“Why talk of me?” she said quietly and glanced at Natásha.

Natásha, who felt her glance, did not look at her. All three were again

silent.

“Andrew, would you like...” Princess Mary suddenly said in a trembling

voice, “would you like to see little Nicholas? He is always talking

about you!”

Prince Andrew smiled just perceptibly and for the first time, but

Princess Mary, who knew his face so well, saw with horror that he did

not smile with pleasure or affection for his son, but with quiet, gentle

irony because he thought she was trying what she believed to be the last

means of arousing him.

“Yes, I shall be very glad to see him. Is he quite well?”

When little Nicholas was brought into Prince Andrew’s room he looked at

his father with frightened eyes, but did not cry, because no one else

was crying. Prince Andrew kissed him and evidently did not know what to

say to him.

When Nicholas had been led away, Princess Mary again went up to her

brother, kissed him, and unable to restrain her tears any longer began

to cry.

He looked at her attentively.

“Is it about Nicholas?” he asked.

Princess Mary nodded her head, weeping.

“Mary, you know the Gosp...” but he broke off.

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. You mustn’t cry here,” he said, looking at her with the same

cold expression.

When Princess Mary began to cry, he understood that she was crying at

the thought that little Nicholas would be left without a father. With

a great effort he tried to return to life and to see things from their

point of view.

“Yes, to them it must seem sad!” he thought. “But how simple it is.

“The fowls of the air sow not, neither do they reap, yet your Father

feedeth them,” he said to himself and wished to say to Princess Mary;

“but no, they will take it their own way, they won’t understand! They

can’t understand that all those feelings they prize so—all our feelings,

all those ideas that seem so important to us, are unnecessary. We cannot

understand one another,” and he remained silent.

Prince Andrew’s little son was seven. He could scarcely read, and knew

nothing. After that day he lived through many things, gaining knowledge,

observation, and experience, but had he possessed all the faculties he

afterwards acquired, he could not have had a better or more profound

understanding of the meaning of the scene he had witnessed between

his father, Mary, and Natásha, than he had then. He understood it

completely, and, leaving the room without crying, went silently up

to Natásha who had come out with him and looked shyly at her with his

beautiful, thoughtful eyes, then his uplifted, rosy upper lip trembled

and leaning his head against her he began to cry.

After that he avoided Dessalles and the countess who caressed him and

either sat alone or came timidly to Princess Mary, or to Natásha of whom

he seemed even fonder than of his aunt, and clung to them quietly and

shyly.

When Princess Mary had left Prince Andrew she fully understood what

Natásha’s face had told her. She did not speak any more to Natásha of

hopes of saving his life. She took turns with her beside his sofa, and

did not cry any more, but prayed continually, turning in soul to that

Eternal and Unfathomable, whose presence above the dying man was now so

evident.

CHAPTER XVI

Not only did Prince Andrew know he would die, but he felt that he was

dying and was already half dead. He was conscious of an aloofness from

everything earthly and a strange and joyous lightness of existence.

Without haste or agitation he awaited what was coming. That inexorable,

eternal, distant, and unknown the presence of which he had felt

continually all his life—was now near to him and, by the strange

lightness he experienced, almost comprehensible and palpable....

Formerly he had feared the end. He had twice experienced that terribly

tormenting fear of death—the end—but now he no longer understood that

fear.

He had felt it for the first time when the shell spun like a top before

him, and he looked at the fallow field, the bushes, and the sky, and

knew that he was face to face with death. When he came to himself after

being wounded and the flower of eternal, unfettered love had instantly

unfolded itself in his soul as if freed from the bondage of life that

had restrained it, he no longer feared death and ceased to think about

it.

During the hours of solitude, suffering, and partial delirium he

spent after he was wounded, the more deeply he penetrated into the new

principle of eternal love revealed to him, the more he unconsciously

detached himself from earthly life. To love everything and everybody and

always to sacrifice oneself for love meant not to love anyone, not

to live this earthly life. And the more imbued he became with that

principle of love, the more he renounced life and the more completely he

destroyed that dreadful barrier which—in the absence of such love—stands

between life and death. When during those first days he remembered that

he would have to die, he said to himself: “Well, what of it? So much the

better!”

But after the night in Mytíshchi when, half delirious, he had seen her

for whom he longed appear before him and, having pressed her hand to his

lips, had shed gentle, happy tears, love for a particular woman again

crept unobserved into his heart and once more bound him to life. And

joyful and agitating thoughts began to occupy his mind. Recalling the

moment at the ambulance station when he had seen Kurágin, he could not

now regain the feeling he then had, but was tormented by the question

whether Kurágin was alive. And he dared not inquire.

His illness pursued its normal physical course, but what Natásha

referred to when she said: “This suddenly happened,” had occurred two

days before Princess Mary arrived. It was the last spiritual struggle

between life and death, in which death gained the victory. It was

the unexpected realization of the fact that he still valued life as

presented to him in the form of his love for Natásha, and a last, though

ultimately vanquished, attack of terror before the unknown.

It was evening. As usual after dinner he was slightly feverish, and his

thoughts were preternaturally clear. Sónya was sitting by the table. He

began to doze. Suddenly a feeling of happiness seized him.

“Ah, she has come!” thought he.

And so it was: in Sónya’s place sat Natásha who had just come in

noiselessly.

Since she had begun looking after him, he had always experienced this

physical consciousness of her nearness. She was sitting in an armchair

placed sideways, screening the light of the candle from him, and was

knitting a stocking. She had learned to knit stockings since Prince

Andrew had casually mentioned that no one nursed the sick so well as old

nurses who knit stockings, and that there is something soothing in

the knitting of stockings. The needles clicked lightly in her slender,

rapidly moving hands, and he could clearly see the thoughtful profile

of her drooping face. She moved, and the ball rolled off her knees. She

started, glanced round at him, and screening the candle with her hand

stooped carefully with a supple and exact movement, picked up the ball,

and regained her former position.

He looked at her without moving and saw that she wanted to draw a

deep breath after stooping, but refrained from doing so and breathed

cautiously.

At the Tróitsa monastery they had spoken of the past, and he had told

her that if he lived he would always thank God for his wound which had

brought them together again, but after that they never spoke of the

future.

“Can it or can it not be?” he now thought as he looked at her and

listened to the light click of the steel needles. “Can fate have brought

me to her so strangely only for me to die?... Is it possible that the

truth of life has been revealed to me only to show me that I have spent

my life in falsity? I love her more than anything in the world! But what

am I to do if I love her?” he thought, and he involuntarily groaned,

from a habit acquired during his sufferings.

On hearing that sound Natásha put down the stocking, leaned nearer to

him, and suddenly, noticing his shining eyes, stepped lightly up to him

and bent over him.

“You are not asleep?”

“No, I have been looking at you a long time. I felt you come in. No one

else gives me that sense of soft tranquillity that you do... that light.

I want to weep for joy.”

Natásha drew closer to him. Her face shone with rapturous joy.

“Natásha, I love you too much! More than anything in the world.”

“And I!”—She turned away for an instant. “Why too much?” she asked.

“Why too much?... Well, what do you, what do you feel in your soul, your

whole soul—shall I live? What do you think?”

“I am sure of it, sure!” Natásha almost shouted, taking hold of both his

hands with a passionate movement.

He remained silent awhile.

“How good it would be!” and taking her hand he kissed it.

Natásha felt happy and agitated, but at once remembered that this would

not do and that he had to be quiet.

“But you have not slept,” she said, repressing her joy. “Try to sleep...

please!”

He pressed her hand and released it, and she went back to the candle and

sat down again in her former position. Twice she turned and looked at

him, and her eyes met his beaming at her. She set herself a task on her

stocking and resolved not to turn round till it was finished.

Soon he really shut his eyes and fell asleep. He did not sleep long and

suddenly awoke with a start and in a cold perspiration.

As he fell asleep he had still been thinking of the subject that now

always occupied his mind—about life and death, and chiefly about death.

He felt himself nearer to it.

“Love? What is love?” he thought.

“Love hinders death. Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I

understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only

because I love. Everything is united by it alone. Love is God, and to

die means that I, a particle of love, shall return to the general and

eternal source.” These thoughts seemed to him comforting. But they were

only thoughts. Something was lacking in them, they were not clear, they

were too one-sidedly personal and brain-spun. And there was the former

agitation and obscurity. He fell asleep.

He dreamed that he was lying in the room he really was in, but that

he was quite well and unwounded. Many various, indifferent, and

insignificant people appeared before him. He talked to them and

discussed something trivial. They were preparing to go away somewhere.

Prince Andrew dimly realized that all this was trivial and that he had

more important cares, but he continued to speak, surprising them by

empty witticisms. Gradually, unnoticed, all these persons began to

disappear and a single question, that of the closed door, superseded

all else. He rose and went to the door to bolt and lock it. Everything

depended on whether he was, or was not, in time to lock it. He went, and

tried to hurry, but his legs refused to move and he knew he would not be

in time to lock the door though he painfully strained all his powers. He

was seized by an agonizing fear. And that fear was the fear of death. It

stood behind the door. But just when he was clumsily creeping toward

the door, that dreadful something on the other side was already pressing

against it and forcing its way in. Something not human—death—was

breaking in through that door, and had to be kept out. He seized the

door, making a final effort to hold it back—to lock it was no longer

possible—but his efforts were weak and clumsy and the door, pushed from

behind by that terror, opened and closed again.

Once again it pushed from outside. His last superhuman efforts were vain

and both halves of the door noiselessly opened. It entered, and it was

death, and Prince Andrew died.

But at the instant he died, Prince Andrew remembered that he was asleep,

and at the very instant he died, having made an effort, he awoke.

“Yes, it was death! I died—and woke up. Yes, death is an awakening!” And

all at once it grew light in his soul and the veil that had till then

concealed the unknown was lifted from his spiritual vision. He felt as

if powers till then confined within him had been liberated, and that

strange lightness did not again leave him.

When, waking in a cold perspiration, he moved on the divan, Natásha went

up and asked him what was the matter. He did not answer and looked at

her strangely, not understanding.

That was what had happened to him two days before Princess Mary’s

arrival. From that day, as the doctor expressed it, the wasting fever

assumed a malignant character, but what the doctor said did not interest

Natásha, she saw the terrible moral symptoms which to her were more

convincing.

From that day an awakening from life came to Prince Andrew together with

his awakening from sleep. And compared to the duration of life it did

not seem to him slower than an awakening from sleep compared to the

duration of a dream.

There was nothing terrible or violent in this comparatively slow

awakening.

His last days and hours passed in an ordinary and simple way. Both

Princess Mary and Natásha, who did not leave him, felt this. They did

not weep or shudder and during these last days they themselves felt

that they were not attending on him (he was no longer there, he had left

them) but on what reminded them most closely of him—his body. Both felt

this so strongly that the outward and terrible side of death did not

affect them and they did not feel it necessary to foment their grief.

Neither in his presence nor out of it did they weep, nor did they ever

talk to one another about him. They felt that they could not express in

words what they understood.

They both saw that he was sinking slowly and quietly, deeper and deeper,

away from them, and they both knew that this had to be so and that it

was right.

He confessed, and received communion: everyone came to take leave of

him. When they brought his son to him, he pressed his lips to the boy’s

and turned away, not because he felt it hard and sad (Princess Mary and

Natásha understood that) but simply because he thought it was all that

was required of him, but when they told him to bless the boy, he did

what was demanded and looked round as if asking whether there was

anything else he should do.

When the last convulsions of the body, which the spirit was leaving,

occurred, Princess Mary and Natásha were present.

“Is it over?” said Princess Mary when his body had for a few minutes

lain motionless, growing cold before them. Natásha went up, looked at

the dead eyes, and hastened to close them. She closed them but did not

kiss them, but clung to that which reminded her most nearly of him—his

body.

“Where has he gone? Where is he now?...”

When the body, washed and dressed, lay in the coffin on a table,

everyone came to take leave of him and they all wept.

Little Nicholas cried because his heart was rent by painful perplexity.

The countess and Sónya cried from pity for Natásha and because he was

no more. The old count cried because he felt that before long, he, too,

must take the same terrible step.

Natásha and Princess Mary also wept now, but not because of their own

personal grief; they wept with a reverent and softening emotion which

had taken possession of their souls at the consciousness of the

simple and solemn mystery of death that had been accomplished in their

presence.

BOOK THIRTEEN: 1812

CHAPTER I

Man’s mind cannot grasp the causes of events in their completeness, but

the desire to find those causes is implanted in man’s soul. And without

considering the multiplicity and complexity of the conditions any one

of which taken separately may seem to be the cause, he snatches at the

first approximation to a cause that seems to him intelligible and says:

“This is the cause!” In historical events (where the actions of men are

the subject of observation) the first and most primitive approximation

to present itself was the will of the gods and, after that, the will of

those who stood in the most prominent position—the heroes of history.

But we need only penetrate to the essence of any historic event—which

lies in the activity of the general mass of men who take part in it—to

be convinced that the will of the historic hero does not control the

actions of the mass but is itself continually controlled. It may seem

to be a matter of indifference whether we understand the meaning of

historical events this way or that; yet there is the same difference

between a man who says that the people of the West moved on the East

because Napoleon wished it and a man who says that this happened because

it had to happen, as there is between those who declared that the

earth was stationary and that the planets moved round it and those who

admitted that they did not know what upheld the earth, but knew there

were laws directing its movement and that of the other planets. There

is, and can be, no cause of an historical event except the one cause of

all causes. But there are laws directing events, and some of these laws

are known to us while we are conscious of others we cannot comprehend.

The discovery of these laws is only possible when we have quite

abandoned the attempt to find the cause in the will of some one man,

just as the discovery of the laws of the motion of the planets was

possible only when men abandoned the conception of the fixity of the

earth.

The historians consider that, next to the battle of Borodinó and the

occupation of Moscow by the enemy and its destruction by fire, the most

important episode of the war of 1812 was the movement of the Russian

army from the Ryazána to the Kalúga road and to the Tarútino camp—the

so-called flank march across the Krásnaya Pakhrá River. They ascribe the

glory of that achievement of genius to different men and dispute as to

whom the honor is due. Even foreign historians, including the French,

acknowledge the genius of the Russian commanders when they speak of

that flank march. But it is hard to understand why military writers,

and following them others, consider this flank march to be the profound

conception of some one man who saved Russia and destroyed Napoleon. In

the first place it is hard to understand where the profundity and genius

of this movement lay, for not much mental effort was needed to see that

the best position for an army when it is not being attacked is where

there are most provisions; and even a dull boy of thirteen could have

guessed that the best position for an army after its retreat from Moscow

in 1812 was on the Kalúga road. So it is impossible to understand by

what reasoning the historians reach the conclusion that this maneuver

was a profound one. And it is even more difficult to understand just why

they think that this maneuver was calculated to save Russia and destroy

the French; for this flank march, had it been preceded, accompanied,

or followed by other circumstances, might have proved ruinous to the

Russians and salutary for the French. If the position of the Russian

army really began to improve from the time of that march, it does not at

all follow that the march was the cause of it.

That flank march might not only have failed to give any advantage to

the Russian army, but might in other circumstances have led to its

destruction. What would have happened had Moscow not burned down? If

Murat had not lost sight of the Russians? If Napoleon had not remained

inactive? If the Russian army at Krásnaya Pakhrá had given battle as

Bennigsen and Barclay advised? What would have happened had the French

attacked the Russians while they were marching beyond the Pakhrá? What

would have happened if on approaching Tarútino, Napoleon had attacked

the Russians with but a tenth of the energy he had shown when he

attacked them at Smolénsk? What would have happened had the French moved

on Petersburg?... In any of these eventualities the flank march that

brought salvation might have proved disastrous.

The third and most incomprehensible thing is that people studying

history deliberately avoid seeing that this flank march cannot be

attributed to any one man, that no one ever foresaw it, and that in

reality, like the retreat from Filí, it did not suggest itself to anyone

in its entirety, but resulted—moment by moment, step by step, event by

event—from an endless number of most diverse circumstances and was only

seen in its entirety when it had been accomplished and belonged to the

past.

At the council at Filí the prevailing thought in the minds of the

Russian commanders was the one naturally suggesting itself, namely, a

direct retreat by the Nízhni road. In proof of this there is the fact

that the majority of the council voted for such a retreat, and above

all there is the well-known conversation after the council, between the

commander in chief and Lanskóy, who was in charge of the commissariat

department. Lanskóy informed the commander in chief that the army

supplies were for the most part stored along the Oká in the Túla and

Ryazán provinces, and that if they retreated on Nízhni the army would

be separated from its supplies by the broad river Oká, which cannot be

crossed early in winter. This was the first indication of the necessity

of deviating from what had previously seemed the most natural course—a

direct retreat on Nízhni-Nóvgorod. The army turned more to the south,

along the Ryazán road and nearer to its supplies. Subsequently the

inactivity of the French (who even lost sight of the Russian army),

concern for the safety of the arsenal at Túla, and especially the

advantages of drawing nearer to its supplies caused the army to turn

still further south to the Túla road. Having crossed over, by a forced

march, to the Túla road beyond the Pakhrá, the Russian commanders

intended to remain at Podólsk and had no thought of the Tarútino

position; but innumerable circumstances and the reappearance of French

troops who had for a time lost touch with the Russians, and projects

of giving battle, and above all the abundance of provisions in Kalúga

province, obliged our army to turn still more to the south and to cross

from the Túla to the Kalúga road and go to Tarútino, which was between

the roads along which those supplies lay. Just as it is impossible to

say when it was decided to abandon Moscow, so it is impossible to say

precisely when, or by whom, it was decided to move to Tarútino. Only

when the army had got there, as the result of innumerable and varying

forces, did people begin to assure themselves that they had desired this

movement and long ago foreseen its result.

CHAPTER II

The famous flank movement merely consisted in this: after the advance

of the French had ceased, the Russian army, which had been continually

retreating straight back from the invaders, deviated from that direct

course and, not finding itself pursued, was naturally drawn toward the

district where supplies were abundant.

If instead of imagining to ourselves commanders of genius leading the

Russian army, we picture that army without any leaders, it could not

have done anything but make a return movement toward Moscow, describing

an arc in the direction where most provisions were to be found and where

the country was richest.

That movement from the Nízhni to the Ryazán, Túla, and Kalúga roads was

so natural that even the Russian marauders moved in that direction, and

demands were sent from Petersburg for Kutúzov to take his army that

way. At Tarútino Kutúzov received what was almost a reprimand from

the Emperor for having moved his army along the Ryazán road, and the

Emperor’s letter indicated to him the very position he had already

occupied near Kalúga.

Having rolled like a ball in the direction of the impetus given by the

whole campaign and by the battle of Borodinó, the Russian army—when

the strength of that impetus was exhausted and no fresh push was

received—assumed the position natural to it.

Kutúzov’s merit lay, not in any strategic maneuver of genius, as it is

called, but in the fact that he alone understood the significance of

what had happened. He alone then understood the meaning of the French

army’s inactivity, he alone continued to assert that the battle of

Borodinó had been a victory, he alone—who as commander in chief might

have been expected to be eager to attack—employed his whole strength to

restrain the Russian army from useless engagements.

The beast wounded at Borodinó was lying where the fleeing hunter had

left him; but whether he was still alive, whether he was strong and

merely lying low, the hunter did not know. Suddenly the beast was heard

to moan.

The moan of that wounded beast (the French army) which betrayed its

calamitous condition was the sending of Lauriston to Kutúzov’s camp with

overtures for peace.

Napoleon, with his usual assurance that whatever entered his head was

right, wrote to Kutúzov the first words that occurred to him, though

they were meaningless.

MONSIEUR LE PRINCE KOUTOUZOV: I am sending one of my adjutants-general

to discuss several interesting questions with you. I beg your Highness

to credit what he says to you, especially when he expresses the

sentiment of esteem and special regard I have long entertained for your

person. This letter having no other object, I pray God, monsieur le

prince Koutouzov, to keep you in His holy and gracious protection!

NAPOLEON

MOSCOW, OCTOBER 30, 1812

Kutúzov replied: “I should be cursed by posterity were I looked on as

the initiator of a settlement of any sort. Such is the present spirit

of my nation.” But he continued to exert all his powers to restrain his

troops from attacking.

During the month that the French troops were pillaging in Moscow and

the Russian troops were quietly encamped at Tarútino, a change had taken

place in the relative strength of the two armies—both in spirit and in

number—as a result of which the superiority had passed to the Russian

side. Though the condition and numbers of the French army were unknown

to the Russians, as soon as that change occurred the need of attacking

at once showed itself by countless signs. These signs were: Lauriston’s

mission; the abundance of provisions at Tarútino; the reports coming in

from all sides of the inactivity and disorder of the French; the flow of

recruits to our regiments; the fine weather; the long rest the Russian

soldiers had enjoyed, and the impatience to do what they had been

assembled for, which usually shows itself in an army that has been

resting; curiosity as to what the French army, so long lost sight of,

was doing; the boldness with which our outposts now scouted close up to

the French stationed at Tarútino; the news of easy successes gained by

peasants and guerrilla troops over the French, the envy aroused by this;

the desire for revenge that lay in the heart of every Russian as long as

the French were in Moscow, and (above all) a dim consciousness in every

soldier’s mind that the relative strength of the armies had changed and

that the advantage was now on our side. There was a substantial change

in the relative strength, and an advance had become inevitable. And at

once, as a clock begins to strike and chime as soon as the minute hand

has completed a full circle, this change was shown by an increased

activity, whirring, and chiming in the higher spheres.

CHAPTER III

The Russian army was commanded by Kutúzov and his staff, and also by the

Emperor from Petersburg. Before the news of the abandonment of Moscow

had been received in Petersburg, a detailed plan of the whole campaign

had been drawn up and sent to Kutúzov for his guidance. Though this plan

had been drawn up on the supposition that Moscow was still in our hands,

it was approved by the staff and accepted as a basis for action.

Kutúzov only replied that movements arranged from a distance were always

difficult to execute. So fresh instructions were sent for the solution

of difficulties that might be encountered, as well as fresh people who

were to watch Kutúzov’s actions and report upon them.

Besides this, the whole staff of the Russian army was now reorganized.

The posts left vacant by Bagratión, who had been killed, and by

Barclay, who had gone away in dudgeon, had to be filled. Very serious

consideration was given to the question whether it would be better to

put A in B’s place and B in D’s, or on the contrary to put D in A’s

place, and so on—as if anything more than A’s or B’s satisfaction

depended on this.

As a result of the hostility between Kutúzov and Bennigsen, his Chief of

Staff, the presence of confidential representatives of the Emperor, and

these transfers, a more than usually complicated play of parties

was going on among the staff of the army. A was undermining B, D was

undermining C, and so on in all possible combinations and permutations.

In all these plottings the subject of intrigue was generally the conduct

of the war, which all these men believed they were directing; but this

affair of the war went on independently of them, as it had to go:

that is, never in the way people devised, but flowing always from the

essential attitude of the masses. Only in the highest spheres did

all these schemes, crossings, and interminglings appear to be a true

reflection of what had to happen.

Prince Michael Ilariónovich! (wrote the Emperor on the second of October

in a letter that reached Kutúzov after the battle at Tarútino) Since

September 2 Moscow has been in the hands of the enemy. Your last reports

were written on the twentieth, and during all this time not only has

no action been taken against the enemy or for the relief of the ancient

capital, but according to your last report you have even retreated

farther. Sérpukhov is already occupied by an enemy detachment and Túla

with its famous arsenal, so indispensable to the army, is in danger.

From General Wintzingerode’s reports, I see that an enemy corps of ten

thousand men is moving on the Petersburg road. Another corps of several

thousand men is moving on Dmítrov. A third has advanced along the

Vladímir road, and a fourth, rather considerable detachment is stationed

between Rúza and Mozháysk. Napoleon himself was in Moscow as late as

the twenty-fifth. In view of all this information, when the enemy has

scattered his forces in large detachments, and with Napoleon and his

Guards in Moscow, is it possible that the enemy’s forces confronting you

are so considerable as not to allow of your taking the offensive? On the

contrary, he is probably pursuing you with detachments, or at most with

an army corps much weaker than the army entrusted to you. It would seem

that, availing yourself of these circumstances, you might advantageously

attack a weaker one and annihilate him, or at least oblige him to

retreat, retaining in our hands an important part of the provinces now

occupied by the enemy, and thereby averting danger from Túla and other

towns in the interior. You will be responsible if the enemy is able to

direct a force of any size against Petersburg to threaten this capital

in which it has not been possible to retain many troops; for with the

army entrusted to you, and acting with resolution and energy, you have

ample means to avert this fresh calamity. Remember that you have still

to answer to our offended country for the loss of Moscow. You have

experienced my readiness to reward you. That readiness will not weaken

in me, but I and Russia have a right to expect from you all the zeal,

firmness, and success which your intellect, military talent, and the

courage of the troops you command justify us in expecting.

But by the time this letter, which proved that the real relation of

the forces had already made itself felt in Petersburg, was dispatched,

Kutúzov had found himself unable any longer to restrain the army he

commanded from attacking and a battle had taken place.

On the second of October a Cossack, Shapoválov, who was out scouting,

killed one hare and wounded another. Following the wounded hare he made

his way far into the forest and came upon the left flank of Murat’s

army, encamped there without any precautions. The Cossack laughingly

told his comrades how he had almost fallen into the hands of the French.

A cornet, hearing the story, informed his commander.

The Cossack was sent for and questioned. The Cossack officers wished

to take advantage of this chance to capture some horses, but one of

the superior officers, who was acquainted with the higher authorities,

reported the incident to a general on the staff. The state of things on

the staff had of late been exceedingly strained. Ermólov had been to

see Bennigsen a few days previously and had entreated him to use

his influence with the commander in chief to induce him to take the

offensive.

“If I did not know you I should think you did not want what you are

asking for. I need only advise anything and his Highness is sure to do

the opposite,” replied Bennigsen.

The Cossack’s report, confirmed by horse patrols who were sent out, was

the final proof that events had matured. The tightly coiled spring was

released, the clock began to whirr and the chimes to play. Despite all

his supposed power, his intellect, his experience, and his knowledge

of men, Kutúzov—having taken into consideration the Cossack’s report, a

note from Bennigsen who sent personal reports to the Emperor, the wishes

he supposed the Emperor to hold, and the fact that all the generals

expressed the same wish—could no longer check the inevitable movement,

and gave the order to do what he regarded as useless and harmful—gave

his approval, that is, to the accomplished fact.

CHAPTER IV

Bennigsen’s note and the Cossack’s information that the left flank

of the French was unguarded were merely final indications that it was

necessary to order an attack, and it was fixed for the fifth of October.

On the morning of the fourth of October Kutúzov signed the dispositions.

Toll read them to Ermólov, asking him to attend to the further

arrangements.

“All right—all right. I haven’t time just now,” replied Ermólov, and

left the hut.

The dispositions drawn up by Toll were very good. As in the Austerlitz

dispositions, it was written—though not in German this time:

“The First Column will march here and here,” “the Second Column will

march there and there,” and so on; and on paper, all these columns

arrived at their places at the appointed time and destroyed the enemy.

Everything had been admirably thought out as is usual in dispositions,

and as is always the case, not a single column reached its place at the

appointed time.

When the necessary number of copies of the dispositions had been

prepared, an officer was summoned and sent to deliver them to Ermólov

to deal with. A young officer of the Horse Guards, Kutúzov’s orderly,

pleased at the importance of the mission entrusted to him, went to

Ermólov’s quarters.

“Gone away,” said Ermólov’s orderly.

The officer of the Horse Guards went to a general with whom Ermólov was

often to be found.

“No, and the general’s out too.”

The officer, mounting his horse, rode off to someone else.

“No, he’s gone out.”

“If only they don’t make me responsible for this delay! What a nuisance

it is!” thought the officer, and he rode round the whole camp. One man

said he had seen Ermólov ride past with some other generals, others said

he must have returned home. The officer searched till six o’clock in the

evening without even stopping to eat. Ermólov was nowhere to be found

and no one knew where he was. The officer snatched a little food at

a comrade’s, and rode again to the vanguard to find Milorádovich.

Milorádovich too was away, but here he was told that he had gone to a

ball at General Kíkin’s and that Ermólov was probably there too.

“But where is it?”

“Why, there, over at Échkino,” said a Cossack officer, pointing to a

country house in the far distance.

“What, outside our line?”

“They’ve put two regiments as outposts, and they’re having such a spree

there, it’s awful! Two bands and three sets of singers!”

The officer rode out beyond our lines to Échkino. While still at a

distance he heard as he rode the merry sounds of a soldier’s dance song

proceeding from the house.

“In the meadows... in the meadows!” he heard, accompanied by whistling

and the sound of a torban, drowned every now and then by shouts. These

sounds made his spirits rise, but at the same time he was afraid that

he would be blamed for not having executed sooner the important order

entrusted to him. It was already past eight o’clock. He dismounted

and went up into the porch of a large country house which had remained

intact between the Russian and French forces. In the refreshment room

and the hall, footmen were bustling about with wine and viands. Groups

of singers stood outside the windows. The officer was admitted and

immediately saw all the chief generals of the army together, and among

them Ermólov’s big imposing figure. They all had their coats unbuttoned

and were standing in a semicircle with flushed and animated faces,

laughing loudly. In the middle of the room a short handsome general with

a red face was dancing the trepák with much spirit and agility.

“Ha, ha, ha! Bravo, Nicholas Iványch! Ha, ha, ha!”

The officer felt that by arriving with important orders at such a moment

he was doubly to blame, and he would have preferred to wait; but one of

the generals espied him and, hearing what he had come about, informed

Ermólov.

Ermólov came forward with a frown on his face and, hearing what the

officer had to say, took the papers from him without a word.

“You think he went off just by chance?” said a comrade, who was on the

staff that evening, to the officer of the Horse Guards, referring to

Ermólov. “It was a trick. It was done on purpose to get Konovnítsyn into

trouble. You’ll see what a mess there’ll be tomorrow.”

CHAPTER V

Next day the decrepit Kutúzov, having given orders to be called early,

said his prayers, dressed, and, with an unpleasant consciousness of

having to direct a battle he did not approve of, got into his calèche

and drove from Letashóvka (a village three and a half miles from

Tarútino) to the place where the attacking columns were to meet. He sat

in the calèche, dozing and waking up by turns, and listening for any

sound of firing on the right as an indication that the action had begun.

But all was still quiet. A damp dull autumn morning was just dawning. On

approaching Tarútino Kutúzov noticed cavalrymen leading their horses to

water across the road along which he was driving. Kutúzov looked at

them searchingly, stopped his carriage, and inquired what regiment they

belonged to. They belonged to a column that should have been far in

front and in ambush long before then. “It may be a mistake,” thought

the old commander in chief. But a little further on he saw infantry

regiments with their arms piled and the soldiers, only partly dressed,

eating their rye porridge and carrying fuel. He sent for an officer. The

officer reported that no order to advance had been received.

“How! Not rec...” Kutúzov began, but checked himself immediately and

sent for a senior officer. Getting out of his calèche, he waited with

drooping head and breathing heavily, pacing silently up and down. When

Eýkhen, the officer of the general staff whom he had summoned, appeared,

Kutúzov went purple in the face, not because that officer was to blame

for the mistake, but because he was an object of sufficient importance

for him to vent his wrath on. Trembling and panting the old man fell

into that state of fury in which he sometimes used to roll on the

ground, and he fell upon Eýkhen, threatening him with his hands,

shouting and loading him with gross abuse. Another man, Captain Brózin,

who happened to turn up and who was not at all to blame, suffered the

same fate.

“What sort of another blackguard are you? I’ll have you shot!

Scoundrels!” yelled Kutúzov in a hoarse voice, waving his arms and

reeling.

He was suffering physically. He, the commander in chief, a Serene

Highness who everybody said possessed powers such as no man had ever had

in Russia, to be placed in this position—made the laughingstock of the

whole army! “I needn’t have been in such a hurry to pray about today,

or have kept awake thinking everything over all night,” thought he to

himself. “When I was a chit of an officer no one would have dared to

mock me so... and now!” He was in a state of physical suffering as if

from corporal punishment, and could not avoid expressing it by cries of

anger and distress. But his strength soon began to fail him, and looking

about him, conscious of having said much that was amiss, he again got

into his calèche and drove back in silence.

His wrath, once expended, did not return, and blinking feebly he

listened to excuses and self-justifications (Ermólov did not come to see

him till the next day) and to the insistence of Bennigsen, Konovnítsyn,

and Toll that the movement that had miscarried should be executed next

day. And once more Kutúzov had to consent.

CHAPTER VI

Next day the troops assembled in their appointed places in the evening

and advanced during the night. It was an autumn night with dark purple

clouds, but no rain. The ground was damp but not muddy, and the troops

advanced noiselessly, only occasionally a jingling of the artillery

could be faintly heard. The men were forbidden to talk out loud, to

smoke their pipes, or to strike a light, and they tried to prevent their

horses neighing. The secrecy of the undertaking heightened its charm

and they marched gaily. Some columns, supposing they had reached their

destination, halted, piled arms, and settled down on the cold ground,

but the majority marched all night and arrived at places where they

evidently should not have been.

Only Count Orlóv-Denísov with his Cossacks (the least important

detachment of all) got to his appointed place at the right time. This

detachment halted at the outskirts of a forest, on the path leading from

the village of Stromílova to Dmítrovsk.

Toward dawn, Count Orlóv-Denísov, who had dozed off, was awakened by a

deserter from the French army being brought to him. This was a Polish

sergeant of Poniatowski’s corps, who explained in Polish that he had

come over because he had been slighted in the service: that he ought

long ago to have been made an officer, that he was braver than any of

them, and so he had left them and wished to pay them out. He said that

Murat was spending the night less than a mile from where they were,

and that if they would let him have a convoy of a hundred men he would

capture him alive. Count Orlóv-Denísov consulted his fellow officers.

The offer was too tempting to be refused. Everyone volunteered to go and

everybody advised making the attempt. After much disputing and arguing,

Major-General Grékov with two Cossack regiments decided to go with the

Polish sergeant.

“Now, remember,” said Count Orlóv-Denísov to the sergeant at parting,

“if you have been lying I’ll have you hanged like a dog; but if it’s

true you shall have a hundred gold pieces!”

Without replying, the sergeant, with a resolute air, mounted and rode

away with Grékov whose men had quickly assembled. They disappeared into

the forest, and Count Orlóv-Denísov, having seen Grékov off, returned,

shivering from the freshness of the early dawn and excited by what he

had undertaken on his own responsibility, and began looking at the enemy

camp, now just visible in the deceptive light of dawn and the dying

campfires. Our columns ought to have begun to appear on an open

declivity to his right. He looked in that direction, but though the

columns would have been visible quite far off, they were not to be seen.

It seemed to the count that things were beginning to stir in the French

camp, and his keen-sighted adjutant confirmed this.