Part 28

This army, which left Moscow one hundred thousand strong, in five-and-twenty days had been reduced to thirty-six thousand men, while the artillery had lost three hundred and fifty of their cannon; and yet these feeble remains continued as before to be divided into eight armies, which were encumbered with sixty thousand unarmed stragglers, and a long train of cannon and baggage.

Whether it was the encumbrance of so many men and carriages, or a mistaken sense of security, which led the emperor to order a day's interval between the departure of each marshal, is uncertain; but most probably it was the latter. Be that, however, as it may, he, Eugene, Davoust, and Ney, quitted Smolensk in succession; and Ney was not to leave it till the 16th or 17th. He had orders to make the artillery dismount the cannon left behind, and bury them; to destroy the ammunition, to drive all the stragglers before him, and to blow up the towers which surrounded the city.

Kutusoff, meanwhile, was waiting for us at some leagues' distance, prepared to cut in pieces, one after the other, those remnants of corps thus extended and parcelled out.

§ 17. Napoleon leaves Smolensk; battle of Krasnoë.

It was on the 14th of November, about five in the morning, that the imperial column at last quitted Smolensk. Its march was still firm, but gloomy and silent as night, like the mute and sombre aspect of the country through which it was advancing.

This stillness was only interrupted by the cracking of the whips applied to the horses, and by short and violent imprecations when they met with ravines, and when down these icy declivities, men, horses, and artillery were rolling in the darkness one over the other. The first day they advanced five leagues, and the artillery of the guard took twenty-two hours to get over that distance.

Kutusoff, at the same time, with the bulk of his army, moved forward, and took a position in the rear of these advanced corps, within reach of them all, felicitating himself on the success of his manoeuvres, which, after all, would inevitably have failed, owing to his tardiness, had it not been for our want of foresight; for this was a contest of errors, in which, ours being the greatest, we narrowly escaped total destruction. Having made these dispositions, the Russian commander must have believed that the French army was entirely in his power; but this belief saved us. Kutusoff was wanting to himself at the moment of action; his old age executed only half, and that badly, the plans which it had wisely combined.

During the time that all these masses were arranging themselves round Napoleon, he remained perfectly tranquil in a miserable hut, the only one left standing in Korythnia, apparently quite unconscious of all these movements of infantry, artillery, and cavalry, which were surrounding him in all directions; at least he sent no orders to the three corps which had halted at Smolensk, to expedite their march, and he himself waited for daylight to proceed.

His column was advancing without precaution, preceded by a crowd of stragglers, all eager to reach Krasnoë, when, at two leagues from that place, a line of Cossacks, extending from the heights on our left across the great road, appeared before them. Seized with astonishment, these stragglers instantly halted: they had looked for nothing of the kind, and with their first impressions were led to believe that relentless fate had traced upon the snow between them and Europe that long, black, and motionless line as the fatal term assigned to their hopes.

Suddenly a Russian battery began firing. Their balls crossed the road. The German corps became confused and made no attempt to meet this attack. But a wounded officer who chanced to be there assumed the command of the Germans, and the men obeyed him as if he had been their rightful leader. On seeing this advanced column of Germans march forward in such good order, the enemy confined himself to attacking it with his artillery, which it disregarded and soon left behind. When it came to the turn of the Old Guard to pass through this fire, they closed their ranks around Napoleon like a movable fortress, proud of the honor of protecting him. Their band of music expressed their satisfaction. When the danger was greatest, it played the well-known air, "Where can one be happier than in the bosom of his family?" But the emperor, whom nothing escaped, stopped them with the exclamation, "Rather play, 'Let us watch for the safety of the empire!'" words much better suited to the feelings which then occupied him, and to the general condition of affairs.

At the same time, the enemy's fire becoming troublesome, he gave orders to silence it, and in two hours he reached Krasnoë.

On the 17th, before daylight, Napoleon issued his orders, armed himself, and going out on foot at the head of his Old Guard, began his march. But it was not towards Poland, his ally, that he directed it, nor towards France, where he would still be received as the head of a new dynasty, and the Emperor of the West. His words on grasping his sword on this occasion were, "I have sufficiently acted the emperor; it is time I should become the general." He turned back upon eighty thousand of the enemy, plunging into the thickest of them, in order to draw all their efforts against himself, to make a diversion in favor of Davoust and Ney, and to rescue them from a country, the gates of which were closed against them.

Daylight at last appeared, exhibiting on the one part the Russian battalions and batteries, which on three sides, in front, on our right, and in our rear, bounded the horizon, and on the other Napoleon, with his six thousand guards, advancing with a firm step, and proceeding to take his place in the centre of that terrible circle. At the same time, Mortier, a few yards in front of the emperor, deployed, in the face of the whole Russian army, with the five thousand men still remaining to him.

Here, then, it was made evident that renown is something more than a vain shadow, that it is real strength, and doubly powerful from the inflexible pride which it imparts to its favorites, and the timid precautions it imposes on those who venture to attack it. The enemy had only to march forward without manoeuvring, or even firing; their mass alone was sufficient to crush Napoleon with all his feeble battalions; still they did not dare come to close quarters with him. They were awed at the presence of the conqueror of Egypt and of Europe. The Pyramids, Marengo, Austerlitz, Friedland, a host of victories seemed to rise between him and the astounded Russians. Might we not also fancy that, in the eyes of that passive and superstitious people, a renown so extraordinary appeared like something supernatural? that they regarded it as wholly beyond their power, or, at least, believed that they could safely assail it only from a distance? and, in short, that against that Old Guard, that living fortress, that column of granite, as it had been called by its leader, human efforts were impotent, or that cannon alone could demolish it?

But every moment strengthened the enemy and weakened Napoleon. The noise of artillery, as well as Claparède, apprised him that in the rear of Krasnoë and his army Beningsen was proceeding to take possession of the road to Liady, and entirely cut off his retreat. The east, the west, and the south were flashing with the enemy's fires; one side alone remained open, that of the north and the Dnieper, towards an eminence, at the foot of which were the high road and the emperor. We fancied we saw the enemy already covering this eminence with his cannon. In that situation they would have been just over Napoleon's head, and might have crushed him at a few yards' distance. He was apprised of his danger, cast his eyes for an instant towards the height, and uttered merely these words, "Very well, let one of my battalions take possession of it." Immediately afterward, without giving farther heed to it, his whole attention was directed to the perilous situation of Mortier.

Fortunately, some troops which Davoust had rallied and the appearance of another troop of his stragglers, attracted the enemy's attention. Mortier availed himself of it. He gave orders to the three thousand men he had still remaining to retreat slowly in the face of their fifty thousand enemies. "Do you hear, soldiers?" cried General Laborde, "the marshal orders ordinary time! Ordinary time, soldiers!" And this brave and unfortunate troop, dragging with them some of their wounded, under a shower of balls and grape-shot, retired as deliberately from this field of carnage as they would have done from a field of manoeuvre.

§ 18. Napoleon reaches Dombrowna and Orcha; he holds a council.

As soon as Mortier had succeeded in placing Krasnoë between him and Beningsen, he was in safety.

The next day the march was resumed, though with reluctance. The impatient stragglers took the lead, and all of them got the start of Napoleon: he was on foot with a stick in his hand, walking slowly and hesitatingly, and halting every quarter of an hour, as if unwilling to tear himself away from that old Russia, whose frontier he was then passing, and in which he had left his unfortunate companions in arms.

In the evening he reached Dombrowna, a wooden town, and inhabited as well as Liady: a novel sight for an army, which had for three months seen nothing but ruins. At last, then, we had emerged from Russia proper, and her deserts of snow and ashes, and were entering into a friendly and inhabited country, whose language we understood. The weather just then became milder, a thaw began, and we received some provisions.

Thus the winter, the enemy, solitude, and, with some, famine and bivouacs, all ceased at once; but it was too late. The emperor saw that his army was destroyed: every moment the name of Ney escaped from his lips, with expressions of the deepest grief. That night he was heard groaning and exclaiming "that the misery of his poor soldiers cut him to the heart, and yet that he could not succor them without establishing himself in some place: but where was it possible for him to stop without ammunition, provisions, or artillery? He was no longer strong enough to halt: he must reach Minsk as quickly as possible."

He had scarcely spoken the words, when a Polish officer arrived with the news that Minsk itself, his magazine, his retreat, his only hope, had just fallen into the hands of the Russians, Tchitchakoff having entered it on the 16th. Napoleon at first was mute, and completely overpowered by this last blow; but immediately afterward, elevating himself in proportion to his danger, he coolly replied, "Very well! we have now nothing to do but to clear ourselves a passage with our bayonets."

Napoleon then turned to his Old Guard, and, stopping in front of each battalion, "Grenadiers!" said he, to them, "we are retreating without being conquered by the enemy; let us not be vanquished by ourselves! Set an example to the army. Several of you have already deserted your colors, and even thrown away your arms. I have no wish to have recourse to military laws to put a stop to this disorder, but appeal entirely to your sense of duty. Do justice to yourselves. To your own honor I commit the maintenance of your discipline!"

The other troops he addressed in a similar style. These few words were quite sufficient to the old grenadiers, who probably had no occasion for them. The others received them with acclamations; but an hour afterward, when the march was resumed, they were entirely forgotten. As to his rear guard, throwing the blame of this wild alarm mostly upon it, he sent an angry message to Davoust on the subject.

At Orcha we found rather an abundant supply of provisions, a bridge equipage of sixty boats, with all its appurtenances, which we burned, and thirty-six pieces of cannon, with their horses, which were distributed between Davoust, Eugene, and Latour-Maubourg.

Napoleon entered Orcha with six thousand guards, the remains of thirty-five thousand! Eugene, with eighteen hundred soldiers, the remains of forty-two thousand! and Davoust, with four thousand, the remains of seventy thousand!

This marshal had lost everything, was actually without linen, and emaciated with hunger. He seized upon a loaf, which was offered him by one of his comrades, and voraciously devoured it. A handkerchief was given him to wipe his face, which was white with frost. He exclaimed "that none but men with constitutions of iron could support such trials; that it was physically impossible to resist them; that there were limits to human strength, the utmost of which had been exceeded."

The emperor made fruitless efforts to check this general despondency. When alone, he was heard compassionating the sufferings of his soldiers; but in their presence, even upon that point, he wished to appear inflexible. He issued a proclamation, "ordering all who had deserted their ranks to return to them: if they did not, he would strip the officers of their commissions, and the soldiers should be shot."