He had not marched long, however, before he was forced to halt. At

Griednewa, between Gjatz and Borodino, the high-road suddenly descends

into a deep ravine, whence it again rises as suddenly to a spacious

height, which Kutusof had ordered Konownitzin to defend. That general at

first made a vigorous resistance against the foremost troops of Murat;

but as the army closely followed the latter, every moment gave increased

energy to the attack, and diminished that of the defence; presently the

advanced-guard of the viceroy engaged on the right of the Russians,

where a charge by the Italian chasseurs was withstood for a moment by

the cossacks, which excited astonishment; they became intermixed.

Platof himself admitted that in this affair an officer was wounded near

him, at which he was by no means surprised; but that he nevertheless

caused the sorcerer who accompanied him to be flogged before all his

cossacks, loudly charging him with laziness for neglecting to turn aside

the balls by his conjurations, as he had been expressly directed to do.

Konownitzin was vanquished and retired; on the 5th his bloody track was

followed to the vast convent of Kolotskoi,--fortified as habitations

were of old in those too highly vaunted Gothic ages, when civil wars

were so frequent; when every place, not excepting even these sacred

abodes of peace, was transformed into a military post.

Konownitzin, threatened on the right and left, made no other stand

either at Kolotskoi or at Golowino; but when the advanced-guard

debouched from that village, it beheld the whole plain and the woods

infested with cossacks, the rye crops spoiled, the villages sacked; in

short, a general destruction. By these signs it recognized the field of

battle, which Kutusof was preparing for the grand army. Behind these

clouds of Scythians were perceived three villages; they presented a line

of a league. The intervals between them, intersected by ravines and

wood, were covered with the enemy's riflemen. In the first moment of

ardour, some French horse ventured into the midst of these Russians, and

were cut off.

Napoleon then appeared on a height, from which he surveyed the whole

country, with that eye of a conqueror which sees every thing at once and

without confusion; which penetrates through obstacles, sets aside

accessaries, discovers the capital point, and fixes it with the look of

an eagle, like prey on which he is about to dart with all his might and

all his impetuosity.

He knew that, a league before him, at Borodino, the Kologha, a river

running in a ravine, along the margin of which he proceeded a few

wersts, turned abruptly to the left, and discharged itself into the

Moskwa. He guessed that a chain of considerable heights alone could

have opposed its course, and so suddenly changed its direction. These

were, no doubt, occupied by the enemy's army, and on this side it could

not be easily attacked. But the Kologha, both banks of which he

followed, while it covered the right of the position, left their left

exposed.

The maps of the country were insufficient; at any rate, as the ground

necessarily sloped towards the principal stream, which was the most

considerable merely from being the lowest, it followed, that the ravines

which ran into it must rise, become shallower, and be at length lost, as

they receded from the Kologha. Besides, the old road to Smolensk, which

ran on its right, sufficiently marked their commencement; why should it

have been formerly carried to a distance from the principal stream of

water, and consequently from the most habitable places, if not to avoid

the ravines and the hills which bordered them?

The demonstrations of the enemy agreed with these inductions of his

experience,--no precautions, no resistance in front of their right and

their centre; but before their left a great number of troops, a marked

solicitude to profit by the slightest accidents of the ground, in order

to dispute it, and finally, a formidable redoubt; this was, of course,

their weak side, since they covered it with such care. Nay, more; it was

on the flank of the high-road, and on that of the grand army, that this

redoubt was situated; it was therefore of the utmost importance to

carry it, if he would advance: Napoleon gave orders to that effect.

How much the historian is at a loss for words to express the _coup

d'oeil_ of a man of genius!

The villages and the woods were immediately occupied; on the left and in

the centre were the army of Italy, Compans's division, and Murat; on the

right, Poniatowski. The attack was general; for the army of Italy and

the Polish army appeared at once on the two wings of the grand imperial

column. These three masses drove back the Russian rear-guards upon

Borodino, and the whole war was concentrated on a single point.

This curtain being withdrawn, the first Russian redoubt was discovered;

too much detached in advance of their position, which it defended

without being defended by it. The nature of the ground had compelled the

choice of this insulated situation.

Compans skilfully availed himself of the undulations of the ground; its

elevations served as platforms to his guns for battering the redoubt,

and screened his infantry while drawing up into columns of attack. The

61st marched foremost; the redoubt was taken by a single effort, and

with the bayonet; but Bagration sent reinforcements, by which it was

retaken. Three times did the 61st recover it from the Russians, and

three times was it driven out again; but at length it maintained itself

in it, covered with blood and half destroyed.

Next day, when the emperor reviewed that regiment, he inquired where

was its third battalion? "In the redoubt," was the reply of the colonel.

But the affair did not stop there; a neighbouring wood still swarmed

with Russian light troops, who sallied every moment from this retreat to

renew their attacks, which were supported by three divisions: at length

the attack of Schewardino by Morand, and of the woods of Elnia by

Poniatowski, completely disheartened the troops of Bagration, and

Murat's cavalry cleared the plain. It was chiefly the firmness of a

Spanish regiment that foiled the enemy; they at last gave way, and that

redoubt, which had been their advanced post, became ours.

At the same time the emperor assigned its place to each corps; the rest

of the army formed in line, and a general discharge of musketry,

accompanied at intervals with that of a few cannon, ensued. It continued

till each party had fixed its limit, and darkness had rendered their

fire uncertain.

One of Davoust's regiments then sought to take its rank in the first

line. Owing to the darkness, it passed beyond it, and got into the midst

of the Russian cuirassiers, who attacked it, threw it into disorder,

took from it three pieces of cannon, and killed or took three hundred

men. The rest immediately fell into platoons, forming a shapeless mass,

but making so formidable a resistance, that the enemy could not again

break it; and this regiment, with diminished numbers, finally regained

its place in the line of battle.

CHAPTER VI.

The emperor encamped behind the army of Italy, on the left of the

high-road; the old guard formed in square around his tents. As soon as

the fire of small arms had ceased, the fires were kindled. Those of the

Russians burned brightly, in an immense semicircle; ours gave a pale,

unequal, and irregular light,--the troops arriving late and in haste, on

an unknown ground, where nothing was prepared for them, and where there

was a want of wood, especially in the centre and on the left.

The emperor slept little. On General Caulaincourt's return from the

conquered redoubt, as no prisoners had fallen into our hands, Napoleon

surprised, kept asking him repeatedly, "Had not his cavalry then charged

apropos? Were the Russians determined to conquer or die?"--The answer

was, that "being fanaticised by their leaders, and accustomed to fight

with the Turks, who gave no quarter, they would be killed sooner than

surrender." The emperor then fell into a deep meditation; and judging

that a battle of artillery would be the most certain, he multiplied his

orders to bring up, with all speed, the parks which had not yet joined

him.

That very same night, a cold mizzling rain began to fall, and the autumn

set in with a violent wind. This was an additional enemy, which it was

necessary to take into account; for this period of the year

corresponded with the age on which Napoleon was entering, and every one

knows the influence of the seasons of the year on the like seasons of

life.

During that night how many different agitations! The soldiers and the

officers had to prepare their arms, to repair their clothing, and to

combat cold and hunger; for their life was a continual combat. The

generals, and the emperor himself, were uneasy, lest their defeat of the

preceding day should have disheartened the Russians, and they should

escape us in the dark. Murat had anticipated this; we imagined several

times that we saw their fires burn more faintly, and that we heard the

noise of their departure; but day alone eclipsed the light of the

enemy's bivouacs.

This time there was no need to go far in quest of them. The sun of the

6th found the two armies again, and displayed them to each other, on the

same ground where it had left them the evening before. There was a

general feeling of exultation.

The emperor took advantage of the first rays of dawn, to advance between

the two lines, and to go from height to height along the whole front of

the hostile army. He saw the Russians crowning all the eminences, in a

vast semicircle, two leagues in extent, from the Moskwa to the old

Moscow road. Their right bordered the Kologha, from its influx into the

Moskwa to Borodino; their centre, from Gorcka to Semenowska, was the

saliant part of their line. Their right and left receded. The Kologha

rendered their right inaccessible.

The emperor perceived this immediately, and as, from its distance, this

wing was not more threatening than vulnerable, he took no account of it.

For him then the Russian army commenced at Gorcka, a village situated on

the high-road, and at the point of an elevated plain which overlooks

Borodino and the Kologha. This sharp projection is surrounded by the

Kologha, and by a deep and marshy ravine; its lofty crest, to which the

high-road ascends on leaving Borodino, was strongly entrenched, and

formed a separate work on the right of the Russian centre, of which it

was the extremity.

On its left, and within reach of its fire, rose a detached hill,

commanding the whole plain; it was crowned by a formidable redoubt,

provided with twenty-one pieces of cannon. In front and on its right it

was encompassed by the Kologha and by ravines; its left inclined to and

supported itself upon a long and wide plateau, the foot of which

descended to a muddy ravine, a branch of the Kologha. The crest of this

plateau, which was lined by the Russians, declined and receded as it ran

towards the left, in front of the grand army; it then kept rising as far

as the yet smoking ruins of the village of Semenowska. This saliant

point terminated Barclay's command and the centre of the enemy: it was

armed with a strong battery, covered by an entrenchment.

Here began the left wing of the Russians under Bagration. The less

elevated crest which it occupied undulated as it gradually receded to

Utitza, a village on the old Moscow road, where the field of battle

ended. Two hills, armed with redoubts, and bearing diagonally upon the

entrenchment of Semenowska, which flanked them, marked the front of

Bagration.

From Semenowska to the wood of Utitza there was an interval of about

twelve hundred paces. It was the nature of the ground which had decided

Kutusof thus to refuse this wing; for here the ravine, which was under

the plateau in the centre, just commenced. It was scarcely an obstacle;

the slopes of its banks were very gentle, and the summits suitable for

artillery were at some distance from its margin. This side was evidently

the most accessible, since the redoubt of the 61st, which that regiment

had taken the preceding day, no longer defended the approach: this was

even favoured by a wood of large pines, extending from the redoubt just

mentioned to that which appeared to terminate the line of the Russians.

But their left wing did not end there. The emperor knew that behind this

wood was the old Moscow road; that it turned round the left wing of the

Russians, and passing behind their army, ran again into the new Moscow

road in front of Mojaisk. He judged that it must be occupied; and, in

fact, Tutchkof, with his _corps d'armée_, had placed himself across it

at the entrance of a wood; he had covered himself by two heights, on

which he had planted artillery.

But this was of little consequence, because, between this detached corps

and the last Russian redoubt, there was a space of five or six hundred

fathoms and a covered ground. If we did not begin with overwhelming

Tutchkof, we might therefore occupy it, pass between him and the last of

Bagration's redoubts, and take the left wing of the enemy in flank; but

the emperor could not satisfy himself on this point, as the Russian

advanced posts and the woods forbade his farther advance, and

intercepted his view.

Having finished his reconnoissance, he formed his plan. "Eugene shall be

the pivot!" he exclaimed: "it is the right that must commence. As soon

as, under cover of the wood, it has taken the redoubt opposite to it, it

must make a movement to the left, and march on the Russian flank,

sweeping and driving back their whole army upon their right and into the

Kologha."

The general plan thus conceived, he applied himself to the details.

During the night, three batteries, of sixty guns each, must be opposed

to the Russian redoubts; two facing their left, the third before their

centre. At daybreak, Poniatowski and his army, reduced to five thousand

men, must advance on the old Smolensk road, turning the wood on which

the French right wing and the Russian left were supported. He would

flank the one and annoy the other; the army would wait for the report of

his first shots.

Instantly, the whole of the artillery should commence upon the left of

the Russians, its fire would open their ranks and redoubts, and Davoust

and Ney should rush upon them; they should be supported by Junot and his

Westphalians, by Murat and his cavalry, and lastly, by the emperor

himself, with 20,000 guards. It was against these two redoubts that the

first efforts should be made; it was by them that he would penetrate

into the hostile army, thenceforth mutilated, and whose centre and right

would then be uncovered, and almost enveloped.

Meanwhile, as the Russians showed themselves in redoubled masses on

their centre and their right, threatening the Moscow road, the only line

of operation of the grand army; as in throwing his chief force and

himself on their left, Napoleon was about to place the Kologha between

him and that road, his only retreat, he resolved to strengthen the army

of Italy which occupied it, and joined with it two of Davoust's

divisions and Grouchy's cavalry. As to his left, he judged that one

Italian division, the Bavarian cavalry, and that of Ornano, about 10,000

men, would suffice to cover it. Such were the plans of Napoleon.

CHAP. VII.

He was on the heights of Borodino, taking a last survey of the whole

field of battle, and confirming himself in his plan, when Davoust

hastened up. This marshal had just examined the left of the Russians

with so much the more care, as it was the ground on which he was to

act, and he mistrusted his own eyes.

He begged the emperor "to place at his disposal his five divisions,

35,000 strong, and to unite with them Poniatowski, whose force was too

weak to turn the enemy by itself. Next day he would set this force in

motion; he would cover its march with the last shades of night, and with

the wood on which the Russian left wing was supported, and beyond which

he would pass by following the old road from Smolensk to Moscow; then,

all at once, by a precipitate manoeuvre, he would deploy 40,000 French

and Poles on the flank and in the rear of that wing. There, while the

emperor would occupy the front of the Muscovites by a general attack, he

would march impetuously from redoubt to redoubt, from reserve to

reserve, driving every thing from left to right on the high-road of

Mojaisk, where they should put an end at once to the Russian army, the

battle, and the war."

The emperor listened attentively to the marshal; but after meditating in

silence for some minutes, he replied, "No! it is too great a movement;

it would remove me too far from my object, and make me lose too much

time."

The Prince of Eckmühl, however, from conviction, persisted in his point;

he undertook to accomplish his manoeuvre before six in the morning; he

protested that in another hour the greatest part of its effect would be

produced. Napoleon, impatient of contradiction, sharply replied with

this exclamation, "Ah! you are always for turning the enemy; it is too

dangerous a manoeuvre!" The marshal, after this rebuff, said no more:

he then returned to his post, murmuring against a prudence which he

thought unseasonable, and to which he was not accustomed; and he knew

not to what cause to attribute it, unless the looks of so many allies,

who were not to be relied on, an army so reduced, a position so remote,

and age, had rendered Napoleon less enterprising than he was.

The emperor, having decided, had returned to his camp, when Murat, whom

the Russians had so often deceived, persuaded him that they were going

to run away once more without fighting. In vain did Rapp, who was sent

to observe their attitude, return and say, that he had seen them

entrenching themselves more and more; that they were numerous,

judiciously disposed, and appeared determined much rather to attack, if

they were not anticipated, than to retreat: Murat persisted in his

opinion, and the emperor, uneasy, returned to the heights of Borodino.

He there perceived long black columns of troops covering the high-road,

and spreading over the plain; then large convoys of waggons, provisions,

and ammunition, in short all the dispositions indicative of a stay and a

battle. At that very moment, though he had taken with him but few

attendants, that he might not attract the notice and the fire of the

enemy, he was recognized by the Russian batteries, and a cannon-shot

suddenly interrupted the silence of that day.

For, as it frequently happens, nothing was so calm as the day preceding

that great battle. It was like a thing mutually agreed upon! Wherefore

do each other useless injury? was not the next day to decide every

thing? Besides, each had to prepare itself; the different corps, their

arms, their force, their ammunition; they had to resume all their unity,

which on a march is always more or less deranged. The generals had to

observe their reciprocal dispositions of attack, defence, and retreat,

in order to adapt them to each other and the ground, and to leave as

little as possible to chance.

Thus these two colossal foes, on the point of commencing their terrible

contest, watched each other attentively, measured one another with their

eyes, and silently prepared for a tremendous conflict.

The emperor, who could no longer entertain doubts of a battle, returned

to his tent to dictate the order of it. There he meditated on his awful

situation. He had seen that the two armies were equal; about 120,000

men, and 600 pieces of cannon on either side. The Russians had the

advantage of ground, of speaking but one language, of one uniform, of

being a single nation, fighting for the same cause, but a great number

of irregular troops and recruits. The French had as many men, but more

soldiers; for the state of his corps had just been submitted to him: he

had before his eyes an account of the strength of his divisions, and as

it was neither a review, nor a distribution, but a battle that was in

prospect, this time the statements were not exaggerated. His army was

reduced indeed, but sound, supple, nervous,--like those manly bodies,

which, having just lost the plumpness of youth, display forms more

masculine and strongly marked.

Still, during the last few days that he had marched in the midst of it,

he had found it silent, from that silence which is imposed by great

expectation or great astonishment; like nature, the moment before a

violent tempest, or crowds at the instant of an extraordinary danger.

He felt that it wanted rest of some kind or other, but that there was no

rest for it but in death or victory; for he had brought it into such a

necessity of conquering, that it must triumph at any rate. The temerity

of the situation into which he had urged it was evident, but he knew

that of all faults that was the one which the French most willingly

forgave; that in short they doubted neither of themselves nor of him,

nor of the general result, whatever might be their individual hardships.

He reckoned, moreover, on their habit and thirst of glory, and even on

their curiosity; no doubt they wished to see Moscow, to be able to say

that they had been there, to receive there the promised reward, perhaps

to plunder, and, above all, there to find repose. He did not observe in

them enthusiasm, but something more firm: an entire confidence in his

star, in his genius, the consciousness of their superiority, and the

proud assurance of conquerors, in the presence of the vanquished.

Full of these sentiments, he dictated a proclamation, simple, grave,

and frank, as befitted such circumstances, and men who were not just

commencing their career, and whom, after so many sufferings, it would

have been idle to pretend to exalt.

Accordingly he addressed himself solely to the reason of all, or what is

the same thing, to the real interest of each; he finished with glory,

the only passion to which he could appeal in these deserts, the last of

the noble motives by which it was possible to act upon soldiers always

victorious, enlightened by an advanced civilization and long experience;

in short, of all the generous illusions, the only one that could have

carried them so far. This harangue will some day be deemed admirable: it

was worthy of the commander and of the army; it did honour to both.

"Soldiers!" said he, "here is the battle which you have so ardently

desired. Victory will now depend upon yourselves; it is necessary for

us; it will give us abundance, good winter-quarters, and a speedy return

home! Behave as you did at Austerlitz, at Friedland, at Witepsk, and at

Smolensk, and afford to remotest posterity occasion to cite your conduct

on that day: let it be said of you, 'He was in that great battle under

the walls of Moscow.'"

CHAP. VIII.

About the middle of the day, Napoleon remarked an extraordinary movement

in the enemy's camp; in fact, the whole Russian army was drawn up and

under arms, and Kutusof, surrounded with every species of religious and

military pomp, took his station in the middle of it. He had made his

popes and his archimandrites dress themselves in those splendid and

majestic insignia, which they have inherited from the Greeks. They

marched before him, carrying the venerated symbols of their religion,

and particularly that divine image, formerly the protectress of

Smolensk, which, by their account, had been miraculously saved from the

profanation of the sacrilegious French.

When the Russian saw that his soldiers were sufficiently excited by this

extraordinary spectacle, he raised his voice, and began by putting them

in mind of heaven, the only country which remains to the slave. In the

name of the religion of equality, he endeavoured to animate these serfs

to defend the property of their masters; but it was principally by

exhibiting to them that holy image which had taken refuge in their

ranks, that he appealed to their courage, and raised their indignation.

Napoleon, in his mouth, "was a universal despot! the tyrannical

disturber of the world! a poor worm! an arch-rebel, who had overturned

their altars, and polluted them with blood; who had exposed the true

ark of the Lord, represented by the holy image, to the profanation of

men, and the inclemency of the seasons." He then told them of their

cities reduced to ashes; reminded them that they were about to fight for

their wives and children; added a few words respecting the emperor, and

concluded by appealing to their piety and their patriotism. These were

the virtues of instinct with this rude and simple people, who had not

yet advanced beyond sensations, but who, for that very reason, were so

much more formidable as soldiers; less diverted from obedience by

reasoning; confined by slavery to a narrow circle, in which they are

reduced to a small number of sensations, which are the only sources of

their wants, wishes, and ideas.

As to other characteristics, proud for want of comparison, and credulous

as they are proud, from ignorance--worshippers of images, idolaters as

much as Christians can be; for they had converted that religion of the

soul, which is wholly intellectual and moral, into one entirely physical

and material, to bring it to the level of their brute and short

capacity.

This solemn spectacle, however, their general's address, the

exhortations of their officers, and the benedictions of their priests,

served to give a thorough tincture of fanaticism to their courage. All,

even to the meanest soldier, fancied themselves devoted by God himself

to the defence of Heaven and their consecrated soil.

With the French there was no solemnity, either religious or military,

no review, no means of excitation: even the address of the emperor was

not distributed till very late, and read the next morning so near the

time of action, that several corps were actually engaged before they

could hear it. The Russians, however, whom so many powerful motives

should have inflamed, added to their invocations the sword of St.

Michael, thus seeking to borrow aid from all the powers of heaven; while

the French sought for it only within themselves, persuaded that real

strength exists only in the heart, and that _there_ is to be found the

"celestial host."

Chance so ordered it, that on that very day the emperor received from

Paris the portrait of the King of Rome, that infant whose birth had been

hailed by the empire with the same transports of joy and hope as it had

been by the emperor. Every day since that happy event, the emperor, in

the interior of his palace, had given loose when near his child, to the

expression of the most tender feelings; when, therefore, in the midst of

these distant fields, and all these menacing preparations, he saw once

more that sweet countenance, how his warlike soul melted! With his own

hand he exhibited this picture outside his tent; he then called his

officers, and even some of the soldiers of his old guard, desirous of

sharing his pleasure with these veteran grenadiers, of showing his

private family to his military family, and making it shine as a symbol

of hope in the midst of imminent peril.

In the evening, an aid-de-camp of Marmont, who had been despatched from

the field of battle near Salamanca, arrived at that of the Moskwa. This

was the same Fabvier, who has since made such a figure in our civil

dissensions. The emperor received graciously the aid-de-camp of the

vanquished general. On the eve of a battle, the fate of which was so

uncertain, he felt disposed to be indulgent to a defeat; he listened to

all that was said to him respecting the scattered state of his forces in

Spain, and the number of commanders-in-chief, and admitted the justice

of it all; but he explained his reasons, which it enters not into our

province to mention here.

With the return of night also returned the apprehension, that under

cover of its shades, the Russian army might escape from the field of

battle. Napoleon's anxiety was so great as to prevent him from sleeping.

He kept calling incessantly to know the hour, inquiring if any noise was

heard, and sending persons to ascertain if the enemy was still before

him. His doubts on this subject were so strong, that he had given orders

that his proclamation should not be read to his troops until the next

morning, and then only in case of the certainty of a battle.

Tranquillized for a few moments, anxiety of an opposite description

again seized him. He became frightened at the destitute state of the

soldiers. Weak and famished as they were, how could they support a long

and terrible shock? In this danger he looked upon his guard as his sole

resource; it seemed to be his security for both armies. He sent for

Bessières, that one of his marshals in whom he had the greatest

confidence for commanding it; he wished to know if this chosen reserve

wanted nothing;--he called him back several times, and repeated his

pressing questions. He desired that these old soldiers should have three

days' biscuit and rice distributed among them from their waggons of

reserve; finally, dreading that his orders had not been obeyed, he got

up once more, and questioned the grenadiers on guard at the entrance of

his tent, if they had received these provisions. Satisfied by their

answer, he went in, and soon fell into a doze.

Shortly after, he called once more. His aid-de-camp found him now

supporting his head with both hands; he seemed, by what was heard, to be

meditating on the vanities of glory. "What is war? A trade of

barbarians, the whole art of which consists in being the strongest on a

given point!" He then complained of the fickleness of fortune, which he

said, he began to experience. Seeming to revert to more encouraging

ideas, he recollected what had been told him of the tardiness and

carelessness of Kutusof, and expressed his surprise that Beningsen had

not been preferred to him. He thought of the critical situation into

which he had brought himself, and added, "that a great day was at hand,

that there would be a terrible battle." He asked Rapp if he thought we

should gain the victory? "No doubt;" was the reply, "but it will be

sanguinary." "I know it," resumed Napoleon, "but I have 80,000 men; I

shall lose 20,000, I shall enter Moscow with 60,000; the stragglers

will there rejoin us, and afterwards the battalions on the march, and we

shall be stronger than we were before the battle." In this estimate he

seemed to include neither his guard nor the cavalry.

Again assailed by his first anxiety, he sent once more to examine the

attitude of the Russians; he was informed that their fires burned with

equal brightness, and that by the number of these, and the moving

shadows surrounding them, it was supposed that it was not merely a

rear-guard, but a whole army that kept feeding them. The certainty of

their presence at last quieted the emperor, and he tried to take some

rest.

But the marches which he had just made with the array, the fatigues of

the preceding days and nights, so many cares, and his intense and

anxious expectation, had worn him out; the chillness of the atmosphere

had struck to him; an irritating fever, a dry cough, and excessive

thirst consumed him. During the remainder of the night, he made vain

attempts to quench the burning thirst which consumed him. This fresh

disorder was complicated with an old complaint; he had been struggling

since the day before with a painful attack of that cruel disorder[18],

which had been long threatening him.

[Footnote 18: A retention of urine.]

At last, just at five o'clock, one of Ney's officers came to inform him

that the marshal was still in sight of the Russians, and wished to begin

the attack. This news seemed to restore the strength of which the fever

had deprived him. He arose, called his officers, and sallied out,

exclaiming, "We have them at last! Forward! Let us go and open the gates

of Moscow!"

CHAP. IX.

It was half-past five in the morning, when Napoleon arrived near the

redoubt which had been conquered on the 5th of September. There he

waited for the first dawn of day, and for the first fire of

Poniatowski's infantry. The sun rose. The emperor, showing it to his

officers, exclaimed, "Behold the sun of Austerlitz!" But it was opposite

to us. It rose on the Russian side, made us conspicuous to their fire,

and dazzled us. We then first perceived, that owing to the darkness, our

batteries had been placed out of reach of the enemy, and it was

necessary to push them more forward. The enemy allowed this to be done:

he seemed to hesitate in being the first to break the awful silence.

The emperor's attention was then directed towards his right, when, all

at once, near seven o'clock, the battle began upon his left. Shortly

after, he was informed, that one of the regiments of Prince Eugene, the

106th, had got possession of the village of Borodino, and its bridge,

which it should have destroyed; but that being carried away by the

ardour of success, it had crossed that passage, in spite of the cries of

its general, in order to attack the heights of Gorcka, where it was

overwhelmed by the front and flank fires of the Russians. It was added,

that the general who commanded that brigade had been already killed, and

that the 106th regiment would have been entirely destroyed had it not

been for the 92d, which voluntarily ran up to its assistance, and

collected and brought back its survivors.

It was Napoleon himself who had just ordered his left wing to make a

violent attack. Probably, he had only reckoned on a partial execution of

his orders, and wished to keep the enemy's attention directed to that

side. But he multiplied his orders, used the most violent excitations,

and engaged a battle in front, the plan of which he had conceived in an

oblique order.

During this action, the emperor judging that Poniatowski was closing

with the enemy on the old Moscow road, gave him the signal to attack.

Suddenly, from that peaceful plain, and the silent hills, volumes of

fire and smoke were seen spouting out, followed by a multitude of

explosions, and the whistling of bullets, tearing the air in every

direction. In the midst of this noise, Davoust, with the divisions

Compans and Dessaix, and thirty pieces of cannon in front, advanced

rapidly to the first Russian redoubt.

The enemy's musketry began, and was answered only by the French cannon.

The French infantry marched without firing: it was hurrying on to get

within reach of and extinguish that of the enemy, when Compans, the

general of that column, and his bravest soldiers, were wounded and fell:

the rest, disconcerted, halted under the shower of balls, in order to

return it, when Rapp, rushing to replace Compans, again led his soldiers

on, with fixed bayonets, and at a running pace against the enemy's

redoubt.

He was himself just on the point of reaching it, when he was, in his

turn, hit; it was his twenty-second wound. A third general, who

succeeded him, also fell. Davoust himself was wounded. Rapp was carried

to the emperor, who said to him, "What, Rapp, always hit! What are they

doing above, then?" The aid-de-camp answered, that it would require the

guard to finish. "No!" replied Napoleon, "I shall take good care of

that; I have no wish to see it destroyed; I shall gain the battle

without it."

Ney, then, with his three divisions, reduced to 10,000 men, hastened

into the plain to the assistance of Davoust. The enemy divided his fire.

Ney rushed forward. The 57th regiment of Compans's division, finding

itself supported, took fresh courage; by a last effort it succeeded in

reaching the enemy's entrenchments, scaled them, mingled with the

Russians, put them to the bayonet, overthrew and killed the most

obstinate of them. The rest fled, and the 57th maintained itself in its

conquest. At the same time Ney made so furious an attack on the two

other redoubts, that he wrested them from the enemy.

It was now mid-day; the left Russian line being thus forced, and the

plain cleared, the emperor ordered Murat to proceed with his cavalry,

and complete the victory. An instant was sufficient for that prince to

show himself on the heights and in the midst of the enemy, who again

made his appearance there; for the second Russian line and the

reinforcements, led on by Bagawout and sent by Tutchkof, had come to the

assistance of the first line. They all rushed forward, resting upon

Semenowska, in order to retake their redoubts. The French, who were

still in the disorder of victory, were astonished and fell back.

The Westphalians, whom Napoleon had just sent to the assistance of

Poniatowski, were then crossing the wood which separated that prince

from the rest of the army; through the dust and smoke they got a glimpse

of our troops, who were retreating. By the direction of their march,

they guessed them to be enemies, and fired upon them. They persisted in

their mistake, and thereby increased the disorder.

The enemy's cavalry vigorously followed up their advantage; they

surrounded Murat, who forgot himself in his endeavours to rally his

troops; they were already stretching out their arms to lay hold of him,

when he threw himself into the redoubt, and escaped from them. But there

he found only some unsteady soldiers whose courage had forsaken them,

and running round the parapet in a state of the greatest panic. They

only wanted an outlet to run away.

The presence of the king and his cries first restored confidence to a

few. He himself seized a musket; with one hand he fought, with the other

he elevated and waved his plume, calling to his men, and restoring them

to their first valour by that authority which example gives. At the same

time Ney had again formed his divisions. Their fire stopped the enemy's

cuirassiers, and threw their ranks into disorder. They let go their

hold, Murat was at last disengaged, and the heights were reconquered.

Scarcely had the king escaped this peril, when he ran into another; with

the cavalry of Bruyère and Nansouty, he rushed upon the enemy, and by

obstinate and repeated charges overthrew the Russian lines, pushed and

drove them back on their centre, and, within an hour, completed the

total defeat of their left wing.

But the heights of the ruined village of Semenowska, where the left of

the enemy's centre commenced, were still untouched; the reinforcements

which Kutusof incessantly drew from his right, supported it. Their

commanding fire was poured down upon Ney and Murat's troops, and stopped

their victory; it was indispensable to acquire that position. Maubourg

with his cavalry first cleared the front; Friand, one of Davoust's

generals, followed him with his infantry. Dufour and the 15th light were

the first to climb the steep; they dislodged the Russians from the

village, the ruins of which were badly entrenched. Friand, although

wounded, followed up and secured this advantage.

CHAP. X.

This vigorous action opened up to us the road to victory; it was

necessary to rush into it; but Murat and Ney were exhausted: they

halted, and while they were rallying their troops, they sent to Napoleon

to ask for reinforcements. Napoleon was then seized with a hesitation

which he never before displayed; he deliberated long with himself, and

at last, after repeated orders and counter-orders to his young guard, he

expressed his belief that the appearance of Friand and Maubourg's troops

on the heights would be sufficient, the decisive moment not appearing to

him to be yet arrived.

But Kutusof took advantage of the respite which he had no reason to

expect; he summoned the whole of his reserve, even to the Russian

guards, to the support of his uncovered left wing. Bagration, with all

these reinforcements, re-formed his line, his right resting on the great

battery which Prince Eugene was attacking, his left on the wood which

bounded the field of battle towards Psarewo. His fire cut our ranks to

pieces; his attack was violent, impetuous, and simultaneous; infantry,

artillery, and cavalry, all made a grand effort. Ney and Murat stood

firm against this tempest; the question with them was no longer about

following up the victory, but about retaining it.

The soldiers of Friand, drawn up in front of Semenowska, repelled the

first charges, but when they were assailed with a shower of balls and

grape shot, they began to give way; one of their leaders got tired, and

gave orders to retreat. At that critical moment, Murat ran up to him,

and seizing him by the collar, exclaimed, "What are you about?" The

colonel, pointing to the ground, covered with half his troops, answered,

"You see well enough that it is impossible to stand here."--"Very well,

I will remain!" exclaimed the king. These words stopped the officer: he

looked Murat steadily in the face, and turning round, coolly said, "You

are right! Soldiers, face to the enemy! Let us go and be killed!"

Meanwhile, Murat had just sent back Borelli to the emperor to ask for

assistance; that officer pointed to the clouds of dust which the charges

of the cavalry were raising upon the heights, which had hitherto

remained tranquil since they had been taken. Some cannon-balls also for

the first time fell close to where Napoleon was stationed; the enemy

seemed to be approaching; Borelli insisted, and the emperor promised his

young guard. But, scarcely had it advanced a few paces, when he himself

called out to it to halt. The Count de Lobau, however, made it advance

by degrees, under pretence of dressing the line. Napoleon perceiving

it, repeated his order.

Fortunately, the artillery of the reserve advanced at that moment, to

take a position on the conquered heights; Lauriston had obtained the

emperor's consent to that manoeuvre, but it was rather a permission

than an order. Shortly after, however, he thought it so important, that

he urged its execution with the only movement of impatience he exhibited

during the whole of that day.

It is not known whether his doubts as to the results of Prince

Poniatowski and Prince Eugene's engagement on his right and left kept

him in uncertainty; what is certain is, that he seemed to be

apprehensive lest the extreme left of the Russians should escape from

the Poles, and return to take possession of the field of battle in the

rear of Ney and Murat. This at least was one of the causes of his

retaining his guard in observation upon that point. To such as pressed

him, his answer was, "that he wished to have a better view; that his

battle was not yet begun; that it would be a long one; that they must

learn to wait; that time entered into every thing; that it was the

element of which all things are composed; that nothing was yet

sufficiently clear." He then inquired the hour, and added, "that the

hour of his battle was not yet come; that it would begin in two hours."

But it never began: the whole of that day he was sitting down, or

walking about leisurely, in front, and a little to the left of the

redoubt which had been conquered on the 5th, on the borders of a

ravine, at a great distance from the battle, of which he could scarcely

see any thing after it got beyond the heights; not at all uneasy when he

saw it return nearer to him, nor impatient with his own troops, or the

enemy. He merely made some gestures of melancholy resignation, on every

occasion, when they came to inform him of the loss of his best generals.

He rose several times to take a few turns, but immediately sat down

again.

Every one around him looked at him with astonishment. Hitherto, during

these great shocks, he had displayed an active coolness; but here it was

a dead calm, a nerveless and sluggish inactivity. Some fancied they

traced in it that dejection which is generally the follower of violent

sensations: others, that he had already become indifferent to every

thing, even to the emotion of battles. Several remarked, that the calm

constancy and _sang-froid_ which great men display on these great

occasions, turn, in the course of time, to phlegm and heaviness, when

age has worn out their springs. Those who were most devoted to him,

accounted for his immobility by the necessity of not changing his place

too much, when he was commanding over such an extent, in order that the

bearers of intelligence might know where to find him. Finally, there

were others who, on much better grounds, attributed it to the shock

which his health had sustained, to a secret malady, and to the

commencement of a violent indisposition.

The generals of artillery, who were surprised at their stagnation,

quickly availed themselves of the permission to fight which was just

given them. They very soon crowned the heights. Eighty pieces of cannon

were discharged at once. The Russian cavalry was first broken by that

brazen line, and obliged to take refuge behind its infantry.

The latter advanced in dense masses, in which our balls at first made

wide and deep holes; they still, however, continued to advance, when the

French batteries crushed them by a second discharge of grape-shot. Whole

platoons fell at once; their soldiers were seen trying to keep together

under this terrible fire. Every instant, separated by death, they closed

together over her, treading her under foot.

At last they halted, not daring to advance farther, and yet unwilling to

retreat; either because they were struck, and, as it were, petrified

with horror, in the midst of this great destruction, or that Bagration

was wounded at that moment; or, perhaps, because their generals, after

the failure of their first disposition, knew not how to change it, from

not possessing, like Napoleon, the great art of putting such great

bodies into motion at once, in unison, and without confusion. In short,

these listless masses allowed themselves to be mowed down for two hours,

making no other movement than their fall. It was a most horrible

massacre; and our brave and intelligent artillerymen could not help

admiring the motionless, blind, and resigned courage of their enemies.

The victors were the first to be tired out. They became impatient at

the tardiness of this battle of artillery. Their ammunition being

entirely exhausted, they came to a decision, in consequence of which Ney

moved forward, extending his right, which he made to advance rapidly,

and again turn the left of the new front opposed to him. Davoust and

Murat seconded him, and the remnants of Ney's corps became the

conquerors over the remains of Bagration's.

The battle then ceased in the plain, and became concentrated on the rest

of the enemy's heights, and near the great redoubt, which Barclay with

the centre and the right, continued to defend obstinately against

Eugene.

In this manner, about mid-day, the whole of the French right wing, Ney,

Davoust, and Murat, after annihilating Bagration and the half of the

Russian line, presented itself on the half-opened flank of the remainder

of the hostile army, of which they could see the whole interior, the

reserves, the abandoned rears, and even the commencement of the retreat.

But as they felt themselves too weak to throw themselves into that gap,

behind a line still formidable, they called aloud for the guard: "The

young guard! only let it follow them at a distance! Let it show itself,

and take their place upon the heights! They themselves will then be

sufficient to finish!"

General Belliard was sent by them to the emperor. He declared, "that

from their position, the eye could penetrate, without impediment, a far

as the road to Mojaisk, in the rear of the Russian army; that they could

see there a confused crowd of flying and wounded soldiers, and carriages

retreating; that it was true there was still a ravine and a thin copse

between them, but that the Russian generals were so confounded, that

they had no thought of turning these to any advantage; that in short,

only a single effort was required to arrive in the middle of that

disorder, to seal the enemy's discomfiture, and terminate the war!"

The emperor, however, still hesitated, and ordered that general to go

and look again, and to return and bring him word. Belliard, surprised,

went and returned with all speed; he reported, "that the enemy began to

think better of it; that the copse was already lined with his marksmen:

that the opportunity was about to escape; that there was not a moment to

be lost, otherwise it would require a second battle to terminate the

first!"

But Bessières, who had just returned from the heights, to which Napoleon

had sent him to examine the attitude of the Russians, asserted, that,

"far from being in disorder, they had retreated to a second position,

where they seemed to be preparing for a fresh attack." The emperor then

said to Belliard, "That nothing was yet sufficiently unravelled: that to

make him give his reserves, he wanted to see more clearly upon his

chess-board." This was his expression; which he repeated several times,

at the same time pointing on one side to the old Moscow road, of which

Poniatowski had not yet made himself master; on the other, to an attack

of the enemy's cavalry in the rear of our left wing; and, finally, to

the great redoubt, against which the efforts of prince Eugene had been

ineffectual.

Belliard, in consternation, returned to the king of Naples, and informed

him of the impossibility of obtaining the reserve from the emperor; he

said, "he had found him still seated in the same place, with a suffering

and dejected air, his features sunk, and a dull look; giving his orders

languishingly, in the midst of these dreadful warlike noises, to which

he seemed completely a stranger!" At this account, Ney, furious and

hurried away by his ardent and unmeasured character, exclaimed, "Are we

then come so far, to be satisfied with a field of battle? What business

has the emperor in the rear of the army? There, he is only within reach

of reverses, and not of victory. Since he will no longer make war

himself, since he is no longer the general, as he wishes to be the

emperor every where, let him return to the Tuilleries, and leave us to

be generals for him!"

Murat was more calm; he recollected having seen the emperor the day

before, as he was riding along, observing that part of the enemy's line,

halt several times, dismount, and with his head resting upon the cannon,

remain there some time in the attitude of suffering. He knew what a

restless night he had passed, and that a violent and incessant cough cut

short his breathing. The king guessed that fatigue, and the first

attacks of the equinox, had shaken his weakened frame, and that in

short, at that critical moment, the action of his genius was in a manner

chained down by his body; which had sunk under the triple load of

fatigue, of fever, and of a malady which, probably, more than any other,

prostrates the moral and physical strength of its victims.

Still, farther incitements were not wanting; for shortly after Belliard,

Daru, urged by Dumas, and particularly by Berthier, said in a low voice

to the emperor, "that from all sides it was the cry that the moment for

sending the guard was now come." To which Napoleon replied, "And if

there should be another battle to-morrow, where is my army?" The

minister urged no farther, surprised to see, for the first time, the

emperor putting off till the morrow, and adjourning his victory.

CHAPTER XI.

Barclay, however, with the right, kept up a most obstinate struggle with

Prince Eugene. The latter, immediately after the capture of Borodino,

passed the Kologha in the face of the enemy's great redoubt. There,

particularly, the Russians had calculated upon their steep heights,

encompassed by deep and muddy ravines, upon our exhaustion, upon their

entrenchments, defended by heavy artillery, and upon 80 pieces of

cannon, planted on the borders of these banks, bristling with fire and

flames! But all these elements, art, and nature, every thing failed

them at once: assailed by a first burst of that _French fury_, which has

been so celebrated, they saw Morand's soldiers appear suddenly in the

midst of them, and fled in disorder.

Eighteen hundred men of the 30th regiment, with general Bonnamy at their

head, had just made that great effort.

It was there that Fabvier, the aid-de-camp of Marmont, who had arrived

but the day before from the heart of Spain, made himself conspicuous; he

went as a volunteer, and on foot, at the head of the most advanced

sharp-shooters, as if he had come there to represent the army of Spain,

in the midst of the grand army; and, inspired with that rivalry of glory

which makes heroes, wished to exhibit it at the head, and the first in

every danger.

He fell wounded in that too famous redoubt; for the triumph was

short-lived; the attack wanted concert, either from precipitation in the

first assailant, or too great slowness in those who followed. They had

to pass a ravine, whose depth protected them from the enemy's fire. It

is affirmed that many of our troops halted there. Morand, therefore, was

left alone in the face of several Russian lines. It was yet only ten

o'clock. Friand, who was on his right, had not yet commenced the attack

of Semenowska; and, on his left, the divisions Gérard, Broussier, and

the Italian guard, were not yet in line.

This attack, besides, should not have been made so precipitately: the

intention had been only to keep Barclay in check, and occupied on that

side, the battle having been arranged to begin by the right wing, and

pivot on the left. This was the emperor's plan, and we know not why he

himself altered it at the moment of its execution; for it was he who, on

the first discharge of the artillery, sent different officers in

succession to Prince Eugene, to urge his attack.

The Russians, recovering from their first surprise, rushed forward in

all directions. Kutaisof and Yermoloff advanced at their head with a

resolution worthy of so great an occasion. The 30th regiment, single

against a whole army, ventured to attack it with the bayonet; it was

enveloped, crushed, and driven out of the redoubt, where it left a third

of its men, and its intrepid general pierced through with twenty wounds.

Encouraged by their success, the Russians were no longer satisfied with

defending themselves, but attacked in their turn. Then were seen united,

on that single point, all the skill, strength, and fury, which war can

bring forth. The French stood firm for four hours on the declivity of

that volcano, under the shower of iron and lead which it vomited forth.

But to do this required all the skill and determination of Prince

Eugene; and the idea so insupportable to long-victorious soldiers, of

confessing themselves vanquished.

Each division changed its general several times. The viceroy went from

one to the other, mingling entreaties and reproaches, and, above all,

reminding them of their former victories. He sent to apprise the

emperor of his critical situation; but Napoleon replied, "That he could

not assist him; that he must conquer; that he had only to make a greater

effort; that the heat of the battle was there." The prince was rallying

all his forces to make a general assault, when suddenly his attention

was diverted by furious cries proceeding from his left.

Ouwarof, with two regiments of cavalry, and some thousand cossacks, had

attacked his reserve, and thrown it into disorder. He ran thither

instantly, and, seconded by Generals Delzons and Ornano, soon drove away

that troop, which was more noisy than formidable; after which he

returned to put himself at the head of a decisive attack.

It was about that time that Murat, forced to remain inactive on the

plain where he commanded, had sent, for the fourth time, to his

brother-in-law, to complain of the losses which his cavalry were

sustaining from the Russian troops, protected by the redoubts which were

opposed to Prince Eugene. "He only requested the cavalry of the guard,

with whose assistance he could turn the entrenched heights, and destroy

them along with the army which defended them."

The emperor seemed to give his consent, and sent in search of Bessières,

who commanded these horse-guards. Unfortunately they could not find the

marshal, who, by his orders, had gone to look at the battle somewhat

nearer. The emperor waited nearly an hour without the least impatience,

or repeating his order; and when the marshal returned, he received him

with a pleasant look, heard his report quietly, and allowed him to

advance as far as he might judge it desirable.

But it was too late; he could no longer think of making the whole

Russian army prisoners, or perhaps of taking entire possession of

Russia; the field of battle was all he was likely to gain. He had

allowed Kutusof leisure to reconnoitre his positions; that general had

fortified all the points of difficult approach which remained to him,

and his cavalry covered the plain.

The Russians had thus, for the third time, renewed their left wing, in

the face of Ney and Murat. The latter summoned the cavalry of Montbrun,

who had been killed. General Caulaincourt succeeded him; he found the

aides-de-camp of the unfortunate Montbrun in tears for the loss of their

commander. "Follow me," said he to them, "weep not for him, but come and

avenge his death!"

The king pointed out to him the enemy's fresh wing; he must break

through it, and push on as far as the breast of their great battery;

when there, during the time that the light cavalry is following up his

advantage, he, Caulaincourt, must turn suddenly, on the left with his

cuirassiers, in order to take in the rear that terrible redoubt whose

front fire is still mowing the ranks of the viceroy.

Caulaincourt's reply was, "You shall see me there presently, alive or

dead." He immediately set off, overthrew all before him, and turning

suddenly round on the left with his cuirassiers, was the first to enter

the bloody redoubt, when he was struck dead by a musket-ball. His

conquest was his tomb.

They ran immediately to acquaint the emperor with this victory, and the

loss which it had occasioned. The grand-equerry, brother of the

unfortunate general, listened, and was at first petrified; but he soon

summoned courage against this misfortune, and, but for the tears which

silently coursed down his cheeks, you might have thought that he felt

nothing. The emperor, uttering an exclamation of sorrow, said to him,

"You have heard the news, do you wish to retire?" But as at that moment

we were advancing against the enemy, the grand-equerry made no reply; he

did not retire; he only half uncovered himself to thank the emperor, and

to refuse.

While this determined charge of cavalry was executing, the viceroy, with

his infantry, was on the point of reaching the mouth of this volcano,

when suddenly he saw its fires extinguished, its smoke disappear, and

its summit glittering with the moveable and resplendent armour of our

cuirassiers. These heights, hitherto Russian, had at last become French;

he hastened forward to share and terminate the victory, and to

strengthen himself in that position.

But the Russians had not yet abandoned it; they returned with greater

obstinacy and fury to the attack; successively as they were beat back by

our troops, they were again rallied by their generals, and finally the

greater part perished at the foot of these works, which they had

themselves raised.

Fortunately, their last attacking column presented itself towards

Semenowska and the great redoubt, without its artillery, the progress of

which had, no doubt, been retarded by the ravines. Belliard had barely

time to collect thirty cannon against this infantry. They came almost

close to the mouths of our pieces, which overwhelmed them so apropos,

that they wheeled round and retreated without being even able to deploy.

Murat and Belliard then said, that if they could have had at that moment

ten thousand infantry of the reserve, their victory would have been

decisive; but that, being reduced to their cavalry, they considered

themselves fortunate to keep possession of the field of battle.

On his side, Grouchy, by sanguinary and repeated charges on the left of

the great redoubt, secured the victory, and scoured the plain. But it

was impossible to pursue the fugitive Russians; fresh ravines, with

armed redoubts behind them, protected their retreat. There they defended

themselves with fury until the approach of night, covering in this

manner the great road to Moscow, their holy city, their magazine, their

depôt, their place of refuge.

From this second range of heights, their artillery overwhelmed the first

which they had abandoned to us. The viceroy was obliged to conceal his

panting, exhausted, and thinned lines in the hollows of the ground, and

behind the half-destroyed entrenchments. The soldiers were obliged to

get upon their knees, and crouch themselves up behind these shapeless

parapets. In that painful posture they remained for several hours, kept

in check by the enemy, who stood in check of them.

It was about half-past three o'clock when this last victory was

achieved; there had been several such during the day; each corps

successively beat that which was opposed to it, without being able to

take advantage of its success to decide the battle; as, not being

supported in proper time by the reserve, each halted exhausted. But at

last all the first obstacles were overcome; the firing gradually

slackened, and got to a greater distance from the emperor. Officers were

coming in to him from all parts. Poniatowski and Sebastiani, after an

obstinate contest, were also victorious. The enemy halted, and

entrenched himself in a new position. It was getting late, our

ammunition was exhausted, and the battle ended.

Belliard then returned for the third time to the emperor, whose

sufferings appeared to have increased. He mounted his horse with

difficulty, and rode slowly along the heights of Semenowska. He found a

field of battle imperfectly gained, as the enemy's bullets, and even

their musket-balls, still disputed the possession of it with us.

In the midst of these warlike noises, and the still burning ardour of

Ney and Murat, he continued always in the same state, his gait

desponding, and his voice languid. The sight of the Russians, however,

and the noise of their continued firing, seemed again to inspire him;

he went to take a nearer view of their last position, and even wished to

drive them from it. But Murat, pointing to the scanty remains of our own

troops, declared that it would require the guard to finish; on which,

Bessières continuing to insist, as he always did, on the importance of

this _corps d'élite_, objected "the distance the emperor was from his

reinforcements; that Europe was between him and France; that it was

indispensable to preserve, at least, that handful of soldiers, which was

all that remained to answer for his safety." And as it was then nearly

five o'clock, Berthier added, "that it was too late; that the enemy was

strengthening himself in his last position; and that it would require a

sacrifice of several more thousands, without any adequate results."

Napoleon then thought of nothing but to recommend the victors to be

prudent. Afterwards he returned, still at the same slow pace, to his

tent, that had been erected behind that battery which was carried two

days before, and in front of which he had remained ever since the

morning, an almost motionless spectator of all the vicissitudes of that

terrible day.

As he was thus returning, he called Mortier to him, and ordered him "to

make the young guard now advance, but on no account to pass the new

ravine which separated us from the enemy." He added, "that he gave him

in charge to guard the field of battle; that that was all he required of

him; that he was at liberty to do whatever he thought necessary for that

purpose, and nothing more." He recalled him shortly after to ask "if he

had properly understood him; recommended him to make no attack; but

merely to guard the field of battle." An hour afterwards he sent to him

to reiterate the order, "neither to advance nor retreat, whatever might

happen."

CHAP. XII.

After he had retired to his tent, great mental anguish was added to his

previous physical dejection. He had seen the field of battle; places had

spoken much more loudly than men; the victory which he had so eagerly

pursued, and so dearly bought, was incomplete. Was this he who had

always pushed his successes to the farthest possible limits, whom

Fortune had just found cold and inactive, at a time when she was

offering him her last favours?

The losses were certainly immense, and out of all proportion to the

advantages gained. Every one around him had to lament the loss of a

friend, a relation, or a brother; for the fate of battles had fallen on

the most distinguished. Forty-three generals had been killed or wounded.

What a mourning for Paris! what a triumph for his enemies! what a

dangerous subject for the reflections of Germany! In his army, even in

his very tent, his victory was silent, gloomy, isolated, even without

flatterers!

The persons whom he had summoned, Dumas and Daru, listened to him, and

said nothing; but their attitude, their downcast eyes, and their

silence, spoke more eloquently than words.

It was now ten o'clock. Murat, whom twelve hours' fighting had not

exhausted, again came to ask him for the cavalry of his guard. "The

enemy's army," said he, "is passing the Moskwa in haste and disorder; I

wish to surprise and extinguish it." The emperor repelled this sally of

immoderate ardour; afterwards he dictated the bulletin of the day.

He seemed pleased at announcing to Europe, that neither he nor his guard

had been at all exposed. By some this care was regarded as a refinement

of self-love; but those who were better informed thought very

differently. They had never seen him display any vain or gratuitous

passion, and their idea was, that at that distance, and at the head of

an army of foreigners, who had no other bond of union but victory, he

had judged it indispensable to preserve a select and devoted body.

His enemies, in fact, would have no longer any thing to hope from fields

of battle; neither his death, as he had no need to expose his person in

order to insure success, nor a victory, as his genius was sufficient at

a distance, even without bringing forward his reserve. As long,

therefore, as this guard remained untouched, his real power and that

which he derived from opinion would remain entire. It seemed to be a

sort of security to him, against his allies, as well as against his

enemies: on that account he took so much pains to inform Europe of the

preservation of that formidable reserve; and yet it scarcely amounted to

20,000 men, of whom more than a third were new recruits.

These were powerful motives, but they did not at all satisfy men who

knew that excellent reasons may be found for committing the greatest

faults. They all agreed, "that they had seen the battle which had been

won in the morning on the right, halt where it was favourable to us, and

continue successively in front, a contest of mere strength, as in the

infancy of the art! it was a battle without any plan, a mere victory of

soldiers, rather than of a general! Why so much precipitation to

overtake the enemy, with an army panting, exhausted, and weakened? and

when we had come up with him, why neglect to complete his discomfiture,

and remain bleeding and mutilated, in the midst of an enraged nation, in

immense deserts, and at 800 leagues' distance from our resources?"

Murat then exclaimed, "That in this great day he had not recognized the

genius of Napoleon!" The viceroy confessed "that he had no conception

what could be the reason of the indecision which his adopted father had

shown." Ney, when he was called on for his opinion, was singularly

obstinate in advising him to retreat.

Those alone who had never quitted his person, observed, that the

conqueror of so many nations had been overcome by a burning fever, and

above all by a fatal return of that painful malady which every violent

movement, and all long and strong emotions excited in him. They then

quoted the words which he himself had written in Italy fifteen years

before: "Health is indispensable in war, and nothing can replace it;"

and the exclamation, unfortunately prophetic, which he had uttered on

the plains of Austerlitz: "Ordener is worn out. One is not always fit

for war; I shall be good for six years longer, after which I must lie

by."

During the night, the Russians made us sensible of their vicinity, by

their unseasonable clamours. Next morning there was an alert, close to

the emperor's tent. The old guard was actually obliged to run to arms; a

circumstance which, after a victory, seemed insulting. The army remained

motionless until noon, or rather it might be said that there was no

longer an army, but a single vanguard. The rest of the troops were

dispersed over the field of battle to carry off the wounded, of whom

there were 20,000. They were taken to the great abbey of Kolotskoi, two

leagues in the rear.

Larrey, the surgeon-in-chief, had just taken assistants from all the

regiments; the _ambulances_ had rejoined, but all was insufficient. He

has since complained, in a printed narrative, that no troop had been

left him to procure the most necessary articles in the surrounding

villages.

The emperor then rode over the field of battle; never did one present so

horrible an appearance. Every thing concurred to make it so; a gloomy

sky, a cold rain, a violent wind, houses burnt to ashes, a plain turned

topsy-turvy, covered with ruins and rubbish, in the distance the sad and

sombre verdure of the trees of the North; soldiers roaming about in all

directions, and hunting for provisions, even in the haversacks of their

dead companions; horrible wounds, for the Russian musket-balls are

larger than ours; silent bivouacs, no singing or story-telling--a gloomy

taciturnity.

Round the eagles were seen the remaining officers and subalterns, and a

few soldiers, scarcely enough to protect the colours. Their clothes had

been torn in the fury of the combat, were blackened with powder, and

spotted with blood; and yet, in the midst of their rags, their misery,

and disasters, they had a proud look, and at the sight of the emperor,

uttered some shouts of triumph, but they were rare and excited; for in

this army, capable at once of analysis and enthusiasm, every one was

sensible of the position of all.

French soldiers are not easily deceived; they were astonished to find so

many of the enemy killed, so great a number wounded, and so few

prisoners, there being not 800 of the latter. By the number of these,

the extent of a victory had been formerly calculated. The dead bodies

were rather a proof of the courage of the vanquished, than the evidence

of a victory. If the rest retreated in such good order, proud, and so

little discouraged, what signified the gain of a field of battle? In

such extensive countries, would there ever be any want of ground for the

Russians to fight on?

As for us, we had already too much, and a great deal more than we were

able to retain. Could that be called conquering it? The long and

straight furrow which we had traced with so much difficulty from Kowno,

across sands and ashes, would it not close behind us, like that of a

vessel on an immense ocean! A few peasants, badly armed, might easily

efface all traces of it.

In fact they were about to carry off, in the rear of the army, our

wounded and our marauders. Five hundred stragglers soon fell into their

hands. It is true that some French soldiers, arrested in this manner,

affected to join these cossacks; they assisted them in making fresh

captures, until finding themselves sufficiently numerous, with their new

prisoners, they collected together suddenly and rid themselves of their

unsuspecting enemies.

The emperor could not value his victory otherwise than by the dead. The

ground was strewed to such a degree with Frenchmen, extended prostrate

on the redoubts, that they appeared to belong more to them than to those

who remained standing. There seemed to be more victors killed there,

than there were still living.

Amidst the crowd of corses which we were obliged to march over in

following Napoleon, the foot of a horse encountered a wounded man, and

extorted from him a last sign of life or of suffering. The emperor,

hitherto equally silent with his victory, and whose heart felt

oppressed by the sight of so many victims, gave an exclamation; he felt

relieved by uttering cries of indignation, and lavishing the attentions

of humanity on this unfortunate creature. To pacify him, somebody

remarked that it was only a Russian, but he retorted warmly, "that after

victory there are no enemies, but only men!" He then dispersed the

officers of his suite, in order to succour the wounded, who were heard

groaning in every direction.

Great numbers were found at the bottom of the ravines, into which the

greater part of our men had been precipitated, and where many had

dragged themselves, in order to be better protected from the enemy, and

the violence of the storm. Some groaningly pronounced the name of their

country or their mother; these were the youngest: the elder ones waited

the approach of death, some with a tranquil, and others with a sardonic

air, without deigning to implore for mercy or to complain; others

besought us to kill them outright: these unfortunate men were quickly

passed by, having neither the useless pity to assist them, nor the cruel

pity to put an end to their sufferings.

One of these, the most mutilated (one arm and his trunk being all that

remained to him) appeared so animated, so full of hope, and even of

gaiety, that an attempt was made to save him. In bearing him along, it

was remarked that he complained of suffering in the limbs, which he no

longer possessed; this is a common case with mutilated persons, and

seems to afford additional evidence that the soul remains entire, and

that feeling belongs to it alone, and not to the body, which can no more

feel than it can think.

The Russians were seen dragging themselves along to places where dead

bodies were heaped together, and offered them a horrible retreat. It has

been affirmed by several persons, that one of these poor fellows lived

for several days in the carcase of a horse, which had been gutted by a

shell, and the inside of which he gnawed. Some were seen straightening

their broken leg by tying a branch of a tree tightly against it, then

supporting themselves with another branch, and walking in this manner to

the next village. Not one of them uttered a groan.

Perhaps, when far from their own homes, they looked less for compassion.

But certainly they appeared to support pain with greater fortitude than

the French; not that they suffered more courageously, but that they

suffered less; for they have less feeling in body and mind, which arises

from their being less civilized, and from their organs being hardened by

the climate.

During this melancholy review, the emperor in vain sought to console

himself with a cheering illusion, by having a second enumeration made of

the few prisoners who remained, and collecting together some dismounted

cannon: from seven to eight hundred prisoners, and twenty broken cannon,

were all the trophies of this imperfect victory.

CHAP. XIII.

At the same time, Murat kept pushing the Russian rear-guard as far as

Mojaisk: the road which it uncovered on its retreat was perfectly clear,

and without a single fragment of men, carriages, or dress. All their

dead had been buried, for they have a religious respect for the dead.

At the sight of Mojaisk, Murat fancied himself already in possession of

it, and sent to inform the emperor that he might sleep there. But the

Russian rear-guard had taken a position outside the walls of the town,

and the remains of their army were placed on a height behind it. In this

way they covered the Moscow and the Kalouga roads.

Perhaps Kutusof hesitated which of these two roads to take, or was

desirous of leaving us in uncertainty as to the one he had taken, which

was the case. Besides, the Russians felt it a point of honour to bivouac

at only four leagues from the scene of our victory. That also allowed

them time to disencumber the road behind them and clear away their

fragments.

Their attitude was equally firm and imposing as before the battle, which

we could not help admiring; but something of this was also attributable

to the length of time we had taken to quit the field of Borodino, and to

a deep ravine which was between them and our cavalry. Murat did not

perceive this obstacle, but General Dery, one of his officers, guessed

it. He went and reconnoitred the ground, close to the gates of the town,

under the Russian bayonets.

But the king of Naples, quite as fiery as at the beginning of the

campaign, or of his military life, made nothing of the obstacle; he

summoned his cavalry, called to them furiously to advance, to charge and

break through these battalions, gates, and walls! In vain his

aid-de-camp urged the impossibility of effecting his orders; he pointed

out to him the army on the opposite heights, which commanded Mojaisk,

and the ravine where the remains of our cavalry were about to be

swallowed up. Murat, in greater fury than ever, insisted "that they must

march, and if there was any obstacle, they would see it." He then made

use of insulting phrases to urge them on, and his orders were about to

be carried,--with some delay, nevertheless, for there was generally an

understanding to retard their execution, in order to give him time to

reflect, and to allow time for a counter-order, which had been

anticipated to arrive before any misfortune happened, which was not

always the case, but was so this time. Murat was satisfied with wasting

his cannon and powder on some drunken and straggling cossacks by whom he

was almost surrounded, and who attacked him with frightful howls.

This skirmish, however, was sufficiently serious to add to the losses of

the preceding day, as general Belliard was wounded in it. This officer,

who was a great loss to Murat, was employed in reconnoitring the left of

the enemy's position. As it was approachable, the attack should have

been made on that side, but Murat never thought of any thing but

striking what was immediately before him.

The emperor only arrived on the field of battle at nightfall, escorted

by a very feeble detachment. He advanced towards Mojaisk, at a still

slower pace than the day before, and so completely absent, that he

neither seemed to hear the noise of the engagement, nor that of the

bullets which were whistling around him.

Some one stopped him, and pointed out to him the enemy's rear-guard

between him and the town; and on the heights behind, the fires of an

army of 50,000 men. This sight was a proof of the incompleteness of his

victory, and how little the enemy were discouraged; but he seemed quite

insensible of it; he listened to the reports with a dejected and

listless air, and returned to sleep at a village some little distance

off, which was within reach of the enemy's fire.

The Russian autumn had triumphed over him: had it not been for that,

perhaps the whole of Russia would have yielded to our arms on the plains

of the Moskwa: its premature inclemency was a most seasonable assistance

to their empire. It was on the 6th of September, the very day before the

great battle! that a hurricane announced its fatal commencement. It

struck Napoleon. Ever since the night of that day, it has been seen that

a wearying fever had dried up his blood, and oppressed his spirits, and

that he was quite overcome by it during the battle; the suffering he

endured from this, added to another still more severe, for the five

following days arrested his march, and bound up his genius. This it was

which preserved Kutusof from total ruin at Borodino, and allowed him

time to rally the remainder of his army, and withdraw it from our

pursuit.

On the 9th of September we found Mojaisk uncovered, and still standing:

but beyond it the enemy's rear-guard on the heights which command it,

and which their army had occupied the day before. Some of our troops

entered the town for the purpose of passing through it in pursuit of the

enemy, and others to plunder and find lodgings for themselves. They

found neither inhabitants nor provisions, but merely dead bodies, which

they were obliged to throw out of the windows, in order to get

themselves under cover, and a number of dying soldiers, who were all

collected into one spot. These last were so numerous, and had been so

scattered about, that the Russians had not dared to set fire to the

habitations; but their humanity, which was not always so scrupulous, had

given way to the desire of firing on the first French they saw enter,

which they did with shells: the consequence was, that this wooden town

was soon set fire to, and a part of the unfortunate wounded whom they

had abandoned were consumed in the flames.

While we were making attempts to save them, fifty voltigeurs of the 33d

climbed the heights, of which the enemy's cavalry and artillery still

occupied the summit. The French army, which had halted under the walls

of Mojaisk, was surprised at seeing this handful of men, scattered about

on this uncovered declivity, teasing with their fire thousands of the

enemy's cavalry. All at once what had been foreseen happened; several of

the enemy's squadrons put themselves in motion, and in an instant

surrounded these bold fellows, who immediately formed, and kept facing

and firing at them in all directions; but they were so few in the midst

of a large plain, and the number of cavalry about them was so great,

that they soon disappeared from our eyes. A general exclamation of

sorrow burst from the whole of our lines. Every one of the soldiers with

his neck stretched, and his eye fixed, followed the enemy's movements,

and endeavoured to distinguish the fate of his companions in arms. Some

were lamenting the distance they were at, and wishing to march; others

mechanically loaded their muskets or crossed their bayonets with a

threatening air, as if they had been near enough to assist them. Their

looks were sometimes as animated as if they were fighting, and at other

times as much distressed as if they had been beat. Others advised and

encouraged them, forgetting that they were out of reach of hearing.

Several volleys of smoke, ascending from amidst the black mass of

horses, prolonged the uncertainty. Some cried out, that it was our men

firing, and still defending themselves, and that they were not yet beat.

In fact, a Russian commanding officer had just been killed by the

officer commanding these _tirailleurs_. This was the way in which he

replied to the summons to surrender. Our anxiety lasted some minutes

longer, when all at once the army set up a cry of joy and admiration at

seeing the Russian cavalry, intimidated at this bold resistance,

separate in order to escape their well-directed fire, disperse, and at

last allow us to see once more this handful of brave fellows master of

this extensive field of battle, of which it only occupied a few feet.

When the Russians saw that we were manoeuvring seriously to attack

them, they disappeared without leaving us any traces to follow them.

This was the same they had done at Witepsk and Smolensk, and what was

still more remarkable, the second day after their great disaster. At

first there was some uncertainty whether to follow the road to Moscow or

that to Kalouga, after which Murat and Mortier proceeded, at all

hazards, towards Moscow.

They marched for two days, with no other food than horse-flesh and

bruised wheat, without finding a single person or thing by which to

discover the Russian army. That army, although its infantry only formed

one confused mass, did not leave behind it a single fragment; such was

the national spirit and habit of obedience in it, collectively and

singly, and so thoroughly unprovided were we with every kind of

information, as well as resources, in this deserted and thoroughly

hostile country.

The army of Italy was advancing at some leagues' distance on the left of

the great road, and surprised some of the armed peasantry, who were not

accustomed to fighting; but their master, with a dagger in his hand,

rushed upon our soldiers like a madman: he exclaimed that he had no

longer a religion, empire, or country to defend, and that life was

odious to him; they were willing, however, to leave him that, but as he

attempted to kill the soldiers who surrounded him, pity yielded to

anger, and his wish was gratified.

Near Krymskoié, on the 11th of September, the hostile army again made

its appearance, firmly established in a strong position. It had returned

to its plan of looking more to the ground, in its retreat, than to the

enemy. The duke of Treviso at first satisfied Murat of the impossibility

of attacking it; but the smell of powder soon intoxicated that monarch.

He committed himself, and obliged Dufour, Mortier, and their infantry,

to advance to his support. This consisted of the remains of Friand's

division, and the young guard. There were lost, without the least

utility, 2000 men of that reserve which had been so unseasonably spared

on the day of battle; and Mortier was so enraged, that he wrote to the

emperor, that he would no longer obey Murat's orders. For it was by

letter that the generals of the vanguard communicated with Napoleon. He

had remained for three days at Mojaisk, confined to his apartment, still

consumed by a burning fever, overwhelmed with business, and worn out

with anxiety. A violent cold had deprived him of the use of his voice.

Compelled to dictate to seven persons at once, and unable to make

himself heard, he wrote on different papers the heads of his despatches.

When any difficulty arose, he explained himself by signs.

There was a moment when Bessières enumerated to him all the generals who

were wounded on the day of the battle. This fatal list affected him so

poignantly, that by a violent effort he recovered his voice, and

interrupted the marshal by the sudden exclamation, "Eight days at

Moscow, and there will be an end of it!"

Meantime, although he had hitherto placed all his futurity in that

capital, a victory so sanguinary and so little decisive lowered his

hopes. His instructions to Berthier of the 11th of September for marshal

Victor exhibited his distress: "The enemy, attacked at the heart, no

longer trifles with us at the extremities. Write to the duke of Belluno

to direct all, infantry, cavalry, artillery, and isolated soldiers to

Smolensk, in order to be forwarded from thence to Moscow."

In the midst of these bodily and mental sufferings, which he carefully

concealed from his army, Davoust obtained access to him; his object was

to offer himself again, notwithstanding his wound, to take the command

of the vanguard, promising that he would contrive to march night and

day, reach the enemy, and compel him to fight, without squandering, as

Murat did, the strength and lives of the soldiers. Napoleon only

answered him by extolling in high terms the audacious and inexhaustible

ardour of his brother-in-law.

He had just before heard, that the enemy's army had again been found;

that it had not retired upon his right flank, towards Kalouga, as he had

feared it would; that it was still retreating, and that his vanguard was

already within two days' march of Moscow. That great name, and the great

hopes which he attached to it, revived his strength, and on the 12th of

September, he was sufficiently recovered to set out in a carriage, in

order to join his vanguard.

END OF VOL. I.

HISTORY

OF THE

EXPEDITION TO RUSSIA,

UNDERTAKEN BY THE

EMPEROR NAPOLEON,

IN THE YEAR 1812.

BY GENERAL, COUNT PHILIP DE SEGUR.

Quamquam animus meminisse horret, luctuque refugit,

Incipiam--.

VIRGIL.

_SECOND EDITION, CAREFULLY REVISED AND CORRECTED._

IN TWO VOLUMES,

WITH A MAP AND SEVEN ENGRAVINGS.

VOL. II.

LONDON:

TREUTTEL AND WURTZ, TREUTTEL, JUN. AND RICHTER, 30,

SOHO-SQUARE.

1825.

[Illustration: Portrait of the Emperor Alexander]

HISTORY

OF

NAPOLEON'S EXPEDITION

TO

RUSSIA.

BOOK VIII.

CHAP. I.

We have seen how the Emperor Alexander, surprised at Wilna amidst his

preparations for defence, retreated with his disunited army, and was

unable to rally it till it was at the distance of a hundred leagues from

that city, between Witepsk and Smolensk. That Prince, hurried along in

the precipitate retreat of Barclay, sought refuge at Drissa, in a camp

injudiciously chosen and entrenched at great expense; a mere point in

the space, on so extensive a frontier, and which served only to indicate

to the enemy the object of his manoeuvres.

Alexander, however, encouraged by the sight of this camp, and of the

Düna, took breath behind that river. It was there that he first

consented to receive an English agent, so important did he deem it to

appear till that moment faithful to his engagements with France. Whether

he acted with real good faith, or merely made a show of doing so, we

know not: so much is certain, that at Paris, after his success, he

affirmed, on his honour, to Count Daru, that, "notwithstanding the

accusations of Napoleon, this was his first infraction of the treaty of

Tilsit."

At the same time he caused Barclay to issue addresses, designed to

corrupt the French and their allies, similar to those which had so

irritated Napoleon at Klubokoe;--attempts which the French regarded as

contemptible, and the Germans as unseasonable.

In other respects, the Emperor had given his enemies but a mean opinion

of his military talents: this opinion was founded on his having

neglected the Berezina, the only natural line of defence of Lithuania;

on his eccentric retreat towards the north, when the rest of his army

was fleeing southward; and lastly, on his ukase relative to recruiting,

dated Drissa, which assigned to the recruits, for their places of

rendezvous, several towns that were almost immediately occupied by the

French. His departure from the army, as soon as it began to fight, was

also a subject of remark.

As to his political measures in his new and in his old provinces, and

his proclamations from Polotsk to his army, to Moscow, to his great

nation, it was admitted that they were singularly adapted to persons and

places. It appears, in fact, that in the political means which he

employed there was a very striking gradation of energy.

In the recently acquired portion of Lithuania, houses, inhabitants,

crops, in short every thing had been spared, either from hurry or

designedly. The most powerful of the nobles had alone been carried off:

their defection might have set too dangerous an example, and had they

still further committed themselves, their return in the sequel would

have been more difficult; besides, they were hostages.

In the provinces of Lithuania which had been of old incorporated with

the empire, where a mild administration, favours judiciously bestowed,

and a longer habit of subjection, had extinguished the recollection of

independence, the inhabitants were hurried away with all they could

carry with them. Still it was not deemed expedient to require of

subjects professing a different religion, and a nascent patriotism, the

destruction of property: a levy of five men only out of every five

hundred males was ordered.

But in Russia Proper, where religion, superstition, ignorance,

patriotism, all went hand in hand with the government, not only had the

inhabitants been obliged to retreat with the army, but every thing that

could not be removed had been destroyed. Those who were not destined to

recruit the regulars, joined the militia or the cossacks.

The interior of the empire being then threatened, it was for Moscow to

set an example. That capital, justly denominated by its poets, "_Moscow

with the golden cupolas_," was a vast and motley assemblage of two

hundred and ninety-five churches, and fifteen hundred mansions, with

their gardens and dependencies. These palaces of brick, and their parks,

intermixed with neat houses of wood, and even thatched cottages, were

spread over several square leagues of irregular ground: they were

grouped round a lofty triangular fortress; the vast double inclosure of

which, half a league in circuit, contained, the one, several palaces,

some churches, and rocky and uncultivated spots; the other, a prodigious

bazaar, the town of the merchants and shopkeepers, where was displayed

the collected wealth of the four quarters of the globe.

These edifices, these palaces, nay, the very shops themselves, were all

covered with polished and painted iron: the churches, each surmounted by

a terrace and several steeples, terminating in golden balls, then the

crescent, and lastly the cross, reminded the spectator of the history of

this nation: it was Asia and its religion, at first victorious,

subsequently vanquished, and finally the crescent of Mahomet surmounted

by the cross of Christ.

A single ray of sun-shine caused this splendid city to glisten with a

thousand varied colours. At sight of it the traveller paused, delighted

and astonished. It reminded him of the prodigies with which the oriental

poets had amused his childhood. On entering it, a nearer view served but

to heighten his astonishment: he recognized the nobles by the manners,

the habits, and the different languages of modern Europe; and by the

rich and light elegance of their dress. He beheld, with surprise, the

luxury and the Asiatic form of those of the merchants; the Grecian

costumes of the common people, and their long beards. He was struck by

the same variety in the edifices: and yet all this was tinged with a

local and sometimes harsh colour, such as befits the country of which

Moscow was the ancient capital.

When, lastly, he observed the grandeur and magnificence of so many

palaces, the wealth which they displayed, the luxury of the equipages,

the multitude of slaves and servants, the splendour of those gorgeous

spectacles, the noise of those sumptuous festivities, entertainments,

and rejoicings, which incessantly resounded within its walls, he fancied

himself transported into a city of kings, into an assemblage of

sovereigns, who had brought with them their manners, customs, and

attendants from all parts of the world.

They were, nevertheless, only subjects; but opulent and powerful

subjects; grandees, vain of their ancient nobility, strong in their

collected numbers, and in the general ties of consanguinity contracted

during the seven centuries which this capital had existed. They were

landed proprietors, proud of their existence amidst their vast

possessions; for almost the whole territory of the government of Moscow

belongs to them, and they there reign over a million of serfs. Finally,

they were nobles, resting, with a patriotic and religious pride, upon

"the cradle and the tomb of their nobility"--for such is the appellation

which they give to Moscow.

It seems right, in fact, that here the nobles of the most illustrious

families should be born and educated; that hence they should launch into

the career of honours and glory; and lastly, that hither, when

satisfied, discontented, or undeceived, they should bring their disgust,

or their resentment to pour it forth; their reputation, in order to

enjoy it, to exercise its influence on the young nobility; and to

recruit, at a distance from power, of which they have nothing farther to

expect, their pride, which has been too long bowed down near the throne.

Here their ambition, either satiated or disappointed, has assumed,

amidst their own dependents, and as it were beyond the reach of the

court, a greater freedom of speech: it is a sort of privilege which time

has sanctioned, of which they are tenacious, and which their sovereign

respects. They become worse courtiers, but better citizens. Hence the

dislike of their princes to visit this vast repository of glory and of

commerce, this city of nobles whom they have disgraced or disgusted,

whose age or reputation places them beyond their power, and to whom they

are obliged to show indulgence.

To this city necessity brought Alexander: he repaired thither from

Polotsk, preceded by his proclamations, and looked for by the nobility

and the mercantile class. His first appearance was amidst the assembled

nobility. There every thing was great--the circumstance, the assembly,

the speaker, and the resolutions which he inspired. His voice betrayed

emotion. No sooner had he ceased, than one general simultaneous,

unanimous cry burst from all hearts:--"Ask what you please, sire! we

offer you every thing! take our all!"

One of the nobles then proposed the levy of a militia; and in order to

its formation, the gift of one peasant in twenty-five: but a hundred

voices interrupted him, crying, that "the country required a greater

sacrifice; that it was necessary to grant one serf in ten, ready armed,

equipped, and supplied with provisions for three months." This was

offering, for the single government of Moscow, eighty thousand men, and

a great quantity of stores.

This sacrifice was immediately voted without deliberation--some say with

enthusiasm, and that it was executed in like manner, so long as the

danger was at hand. Others have attributed the concurrence of this

assembly to so urgent a proposition, to submission alone--a sentiment

indeed, which, in the presence of absolute power, absorbs every other.

They add, that, on the breaking up of the meeting, the principal nobles

were heard to murmur among themselves against the extravagance of such a

measure. "Was the danger then so pressing? Was there not the Russian

army, which, as they were told, still numbered four hundred thousand

men, to defend them? Why then deprive them of so many peasants! The

service of these men would be, it was said, only temporary; but who

could ever wish for their return? It was, on the contrary, an event to

be dreaded. Would these serfs, habituated to the irregularities of war,

bring back their former submission? Undoubtedly not: they would return

full of new sentiments and new ideas, with which they would infect the

villages; they would there propagate a refractory spirit, which would

give infinite trouble to the master by spoiling the slave."

Be this as it may, the resolution of that meeting was generous, and

worthy of so great a nation. The details are of little consequence. We

well know that it is the same everywhere; that every thing in the world

loses by being seen too near; and lastly, that nations ought to be

judged by the general mass and by results.

Alexander then addressed the merchants, but more briefly: he ordered

that proclamation to be read to them, in which Napoleon was represented

as "a perfidious wretch; a Moloch, who, with treachery in his heart and

loyalty on his lips, was striving to sweep Russia from the face of the

earth."

It is said that, at these words, the masculine and highly coloured faces

of the auditors, to which long beards imparted a look at once antique,

majestic and wild, were inflamed with rage. Their eyes flashed fire;

they were seized with a convulsive fury: their stiffened arms, their

clenched fists, the gnashing of their teeth, and subdued execrations,

expressed its vehemence. The effect was correspondent. Their chief, whom

they elect themselves, proved himself worthy of his station: he put down

his name the first for fifty thousand rubles. It was two-thirds of his

fortune, and he paid it the next day.

These merchants are divided into three classes: it was proposed to fix

the contribution for each; but one of the assembly, who was included in

the lowest class, declared that his patriotism would not brook any

limit, and he immediately subscribed a sum far surpassing the proposed

standard: the others followed his example more or less closely.

Advantage was taken of their first emotions. Every thing was at hand

that was requisite to bind them irrevocably while they were yet

together, excited by one another, and by the words of their sovereign.

This patriotic donation amounted, it is said, to two millions of rubles.

The other governments repeated, like so many echoes, the national cry of

Moscow. The Emperor accepted all; but all could not be given

immediately: and when, in order to complete his work, he claimed the

rest of the promised succours, he was obliged to have recourse to

constraint; the danger which had alarmed some and inflamed others,

having by that time ceased to exist.

CHAP. II.

Meanwhile Smolensk was soon reduced; Napoleon at Wiazma, and

consternation in Moscow. The great battle was not yet lost, and already

people began to abandon that capital.

The governor-general, Count Rostopchin, told the women, in his

proclamations, that "he should not detain _them_, as the less fear the

less danger there would be; but that their brothers and husbands must

stay, or they would cover themselves with infamy." He then added

encouraging particulars concerning the hostile force, which consisted,

according to his statement, of "one hundred and fifty thousand men, who

were reduced to the necessity of feeding on horse-flesh. The Emperor

Alexander was about to return to his faithful capital; eighty-three

thousand Russians, both recruits and militia, with eighty pieces of

cannon, were marching towards Borodino, to join Kutusoff."

He thus concluded: "If these forces are not sufficient, I will say to

you, 'Come, my friends, and inhabitants of Moscow, let us march also! we

will assemble one hundred thousand men: we will take the image of the

Blessed Virgin, and one hundred and fifty pieces of cannon, and put an

end to the business at once!'"

It has been remarked as a purely local singularity, that most of these

proclamations were in the scriptural style and in poetic prose.

At the same time a prodigious balloon was constructed, by command of

Alexander, not far from Moscow, under the direction of a German

artificer. The destination of this winged machine was to hover over the

French army, to single out its chief, and destroy him by a shower of

balls and fire. Several attempts were made to raise it, but without

success, the springs by which the wings were to be worked having always

broken.

Rostopchin, nevertheless, affecting to persevere, is said to have caused

a great quantity of rockets and other combustibles to be prepared.

Moscow itself was designed to be the great infernal machine, the sudden

nocturnal explosion of which was to consume the Emperor and his army.

Should the enemy escape this danger, he would at least no longer have an

asylum or resources; and the horror of so tremendous a calamity, which

would be charged to his account, as had been done in regard to the

disasters of Smolensk, Dorogobouje, Wiazma, and Gjatz, would not fail to

rouse the whole of Russia.

Such was the terrible plan of this noble descendant of one of the

greatest Asiatic conquerors. It was conceived without effort, matured

with care, and executed without hesitation. This Russian nobleman has

since visited Paris. He is a steady man, a good husband, an excellent

father: he has a superior and cultivated mind, and in society his

manners are mild and pleasing: but, like some of his countrymen, he

combines an antique energy with the civilization of modern times.

His name henceforth belongs to history: still he had only the largest

share in the honour of this great sacrifice. It had been previously

commenced at Smolensk, and it was he who completed it. This resolution,

like every thing great and entire, was admirable; the motive sufficient

and justified by success; the devotedness unparalleled, and so

extraordinary, that the historian is obliged to pause in order to

fathom, to comprehend, and to contemplate it.[19]

[Footnote 19: A Count Rostopchin, we know, has written that he had no

hand in that great event: but we cannot help following the opinion of

the Russians and French, who were witnesses of and actors in this grand

drama. All, without exception, persist in attributing to that nobleman

the entire honour of that generous resolution. Several even seem to

think, that if Count Rostopchin, who is yet animated by the same noble

spirit, which will render his name imperishable, still refuses the

immortality of so great an action, it is that he may leave all the glory

of it to the patriotism of the nation, of which he is become one of the

most remarkable characters.]

One single individual, amidst a vast empire nearly overthrown, surveys

its danger with steady eye: he measures, he appreciates it, and

ventures, perhaps uncommissioned, to devote all the public and private

interests a sacrifice to it. Though but a subject, he decides the lot of

the state, without the countenance of his sovereign; a noble, he decrees

the destruction of the palaces of all the nobles, without their consent;

the protector, from the post which he occupies, of a numerous

population, of a multitude of opulent merchants and traders, of one of

the largest capitals in Europe, he sacrifices their fortunes, their

establishments, nay, the whole city: he himself consigns to the flames

the finest and the richest of his palaces, and proud and satisfied, he

quietly remains among the resentful sufferers who have been injured or

utterly ruined by the measure.

What motive then could be so just and so powerful as to inspire him with

such astonishing confidence? In deciding upon the destruction of Moscow,

his principal aim was not to famish the enemy, since he had contrived to

clear that great city of provisions; nor to deprive the French army of

shelter, since it was impossible to suppose that out of eight thousand

houses and churches, dispersed over so vast a space, there should not be

left buildings enough to serve as barracks for one hundred and fifty

thousand men.

He was no doubt aware also that by such a step he would counteract that

very important point of what was supposed to be the plan of campaign

formed by Alexander, whose object was thought to be to entice forward

and to detain Napoleon, till winter should come upon him, seize him, and

deliver him up defenceless to the whole incensed nation. For it was

natural to presume that these flames would enlighten that conqueror;

they would take from his invasion its end and aim. They would of course

compel him to renounce it while it was yet time, and decide him to

return to Lithuania, for the purpose of taking up winter quarters in

that country--a determination which was likely to prepare for Russia a

second campaign more dangerous than the first.

But in this important crisis Rostopchin perceived two great dangers; the

one, which threatened the national honour, was that of a disgraceful

peace dictated at Moscow, and forced upon his sovereign; the other was a

political rather than a military danger, in which he feared the

seductions of the enemy more than his arms, and a revolution more than a

conquest.

Averse, therefore, to any treaty, this governor foresaw that in the

populous capital, which the Russians themselves style the oracle, the

example of the whole empire, Napoleon would have recourse to the weapon

of revolution, the only one that would be left him to accomplish his

purpose. For this reason he resolved to raise a barrier of fire between

that great captain and all weaknesses, from whatever quarter they might

proceed, whether from the throne or from his countrymen, either nobles

or senators; and more especially between a population of serfs and the

soldiers of a free nation; in short, between the latter and that mass of

artisans and tradesmen, who form in Moscow the commencement of an

intermediate class--a class for which the French Revolution was

specially adapted.

All the preparations were made in silence, without the knowledge either

of the people, the proprietors of all classes, or perhaps of their

Emperor. The nation was ignorant that it was sacrificing itself. This is

so strictly true, that, when the moment for execution arrived, we heard

the inhabitants who had fled to the churches, execrating this

destruction. Those who beheld it from a distance, the most opulent of

the nobles, mistaken like their peasants, charged us with it; and in

short, those by whom it was ordered threw the odium of it upon us,

having engaged in the work of destruction in order to render us objects

of detestation, and caring but little about the maledictions of so many

unfortunate creatures, provided they could throw the weight of them upon

us.

The silence of Alexander leaves room to doubt whether he approved this

grand determination or not. What part he took in this catastrophe is

still a mystery to the Russians: either they are ignorant on the

subject, or they make a secret of the matter:--the effect of despotism,

which enjoins ignorance or silence.

Some think that no individual in the whole empire excepting the

sovereign, would have dared to take on himself so heavy a

responsibility. His subsequent conduct has disavowed without

disapproving. Others are of opinion that this was one of the causes of

his absence from the army, and that, not wishing to appear either to

order or to defend, he would not stay to be a witness of the

catastrophe.

As to the general abandonment of the houses, all the way from Smolensk,

it was compulsory, the Russian army defending them till they were

carried sword in hand, and describing us every where as destructive

monsters. The country suffered but little from this emigration. The

peasants residing near the high road escaped through by-ways to other

villages belonging to their lords, where they found accommodation.

The forsaking of their huts made of trunks of trees laid one upon

another, which a hatchet suffices for building, and of which a bench, a

table, and an image, constitute the whole furniture, was scarcely any

sacrifice for serfs, who had nothing of their own, whose persons did not

even belong to themselves, and whose masters were obliged to provide for

them, since they were their property, and the source of all their

income.