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Between three and four o'clock in the afternoon Prince Andrew,
who had persisted in his request to Kutuzov, arrived at Grunth
and reported himself to Bagration. Bonaparte's adjutant had not
yet reached Murat's detachment and the battle had not yet begun.
In Bagration's detachment no one knew anything of the general
position of affairs. They talked of peace but did not believe
in its possibility; others talked of a battle but also disbelieved
in the nearness of an engagement. Bagration, knowing Bolkonski
to be a favorite and trusted adjutant, received him with distinction
and special marks of favor, explaining to him that there would
probably be an engagement that day or the next, and giving him
full liberty to remain with him during the battle or to join the
rearguard and have an eye on the order of retreat, "which
is also very important."
"However, there will hardly be an engagement today,"
said Bagration as if to reassure Prince Andrew.
"If he is one of the ordinary little staff dandies sent
to earn a medal he can get his reward just as well in the rearguard,
but if he wishes to stay with me, let him... he'll be of use here
if he's a brave officer," thought Bagration. Prince Andrew,
without replying, asked the prince's permission to ride round
the position to see the disposition of the forces, so as to know
his bearings should he be sent to execute an order. The officer
on duty, a handsome, elegantly dressed man with a diamond ring
on his forefinger, who was fond of speaking French though he spoke
it badly, offered to conduct Prince Andrew.
On all sides they saw rain-soaked officers with dejected faces
who seemed to be seeking something, and soldiers dragging doors,
benches, and fencing from the village.
"There now, Prince! We can't stop those fellows,"
said the staff officer pointing to the soldiers. "The officers
don't keep them in hand. And there," he pointed to a sutler's
tent, "they crowd in and sit. This morning I turned them
all out and now look, it's full again. I must go there, Prince,
and scare them a bit. It won't take a moment."
"Yes, let's go in and I will get myself a roll and some
cheese," said Prince Andrew who had not yet had time to eat
anything.
"Why didn't you mention it, Prince? I would have offered
you something."
They dismounted and entered the tent. Several officers, with
flushed and weary faces, were sitting at the table eating and
drinking.
"Now what does this mean, gentlemen?" said the staff
officer, in the reproachful tone of a man who has repeated the
same thing more than once. "You know it won't do to leave
your posts like this. The prince gave orders that no one should
leave his post. Now you, Captain," and he turned to a thin,
dirty little artillery officer who without his boots (he had given
them to the canteen keeper to dry), in only his stockings, rose
when they entered, smiling not altogether comfortably.
"Well, aren't you ashamed of yourself, Captain Tushin?"
he continued. "One would think that as an artillery officer
you would set a good example, yet here you are without your boots!
The alarm will be sounded and you'll be in a pretty position without
your boots!" (The staff officer smiled.) "Kindly return
to your posts, gentlemen, all of you, all!" he added in a
tone of command.
Prince Andrew smiled involuntarily as he looked at the artillery
officer Tushin, who silent and smiling, shifting from one stockinged
foot to the other, glanced inquiringly with his large, intelligent,
kindly eyes from Prince Andrew to the staff officer.
"The soldiers say it feels easier without boots,"
said Captain Tushin smiling shyly in his uncomfortable position,
evidently wishing to adopt a jocular tone. But before he had finished
he felt that his jest was unacceptable and had not come off. He
grew confused.
"Kindly return to your posts," said the staff officer
trying to preserve his gravity.
Prince Andrew glanced again at the artillery officer's small
figure. There was something peculiar about it, quite unsoldierly,
rather comic, but extremely attractive.
The staff officer and Prince Andrew mounted their horses and
rode on.
Having ridden beyond the village, continually meeting and
overtaking soldiers and officers of various regiments, they saw
on their left some entrenchments being thrown up, the freshly
dug clay of which showed up red. Several battalions of soldiers,
in their shirt sleeves despite the cold wind, swarmed in these
earthworks like a host of white ants; spadefuls of red clay were
continually being thrown up from behind the bank by unseen hands.
Prince Andrew and the officer rode up, looked at the entrenchment,
and went on again. Just behind it they came upon some dozens of
soldiers, continually replaced by others, who ran from the entrenchment.
They had to hold their noses and put their horses to a trot to
escape from the poisoned atmosphere of these latrines.
"Voila l'agrement des camps, monsieur le Prince,"*
said the staff officer.
*"This is a pleasure one gets in camp, Prince."
They rode up the opposite hill. From there the French could
already be seen. Prince Andrew stopped and began examining the
position.
"That's our battery," said the staff officer indicating
the highest point. "It's in charge of the queer fellow we
saw without his boots. You can see everything from there; let's
go there, Prince."
"Thank you very much, I will go on alone," said
Prince Andrew, wishing to rid himself of this staff officer's
company, "please don't trouble yourself further."
The staff officer remained behind and Prince Andrew rode on
alone.
The farther forward and nearer the enemy he went, the more
orderly and cheerful were the troops. The greatest disorder and
depression had been in the baggage train he had passed that morning
on the Znaim road seven miles away from the French. At Grunth
also some apprehension and alarm could be felt, but the nearer
Prince Andrew came to the French lines the more confident was
the appearance of our troops. The soldiers in their greatcoats
were ranged in lines, the sergeants major and company officers
were counting the men, poking the last man in each section in
the ribs and telling him to hold his hand up. Soldiers scattered
over the whole place were dragging logs and brushwood and were
building shelters with merry chatter and laughter; around the
fires sat others, dressed and undressed, drying their shirts and
leg bands or mending boots or overcoats and crowding round the
boilers and porridge cookers. In one company dinner was ready,
and the soldiers were gazing eagerly at the steaming boiler, waiting
till the sample, which a quartermaster sergeant was carrying in
a wooden bowl to an officer who sat on a log before his shelter,
had been tasted.
Another company, a lucky one for not all the companies had
vodka, crowded round a pock-marked, broad-shouldered sergeant
major who, tilting a keg, filled one after another the canteen
lids held out to him. The soldiers lifted the canteen lids to
their lips with reverential faces, emptied them, rolling the vodka
in their mouths, and walked away from the sergeant major with
brightened expressions, licking their lips and wiping them on
the sleeves of their greatcoats. All their faces were as serene
as if all this were happening at home awaiting peaceful encampment,
and not within sight of the enemy before an action in which at
least half of them would be left on the field. After passing a
chasseur regiment and in the lines of the Kiev grenadiers- fine
fellows busy with similar peaceful affairs- near the shelter of
the regimental commander, higher than and different from the others,
Prince Andrew came out in front of a platoon of grenadiers before
whom lay a naked man. Two soldiers held him while two others were
flourishing their switches and striking him regularly on his bare
back. The man shrieked unnaturally. A stout major was pacing up
and down the line, and regardless of the screams kept repeating:
"It's a shame for a soldier to steal; a soldier must
be honest, honorable, and brave, but if he robs his fellows there
is no honor in him, he's a scoundrel. Go on! Go on!"
So the swishing sound of the strokes, and the desperate but
unnatural screams, continued.
"Go on, go on!" said the major.
A young officer with a bewildered and pained expression on
his face stepped away from the man and looked round inquiringly
at the adjutant as he rode by.
Prince Andrew, having reached the front line, rode along it.
Our front line and that of the enemy were far apart on the right
and left flanks, but in the center where the men with a flag of
truce had passed that morning, the lines were so near together
that the men could see one another's faces and speak to one another.
Besides the soldiers who formed the picket line on either side,
there were many curious onlookers who, jesting and laughing, stared
at their strange foreign enemies.
Since early morning- despite an injunction not to approach
the picket line- the officers had been unable to keep sight-seers
away. The soldiers forming the picket line, like showmen exhibiting
a curiosity, no longer looked at the French but paid attention
to the sight-seers and grew weary waiting to be relieved. Prince
Andrew halted to have a look at the French.
"Look! Look there!" one soldier was saying to another,
pointing to a Russian musketeer who had gone up to the picket
line with an officer and was rapidly and excitedly talking to
a French grenadier. "Hark to him jabbering! Fine, isn't it?
It's all the Frenchy can do to keep up with him. There now, Sidorov!"
"Wait a bit and listen. It's fine!" answered Sidorov,
who was considered an adept at French.
The soldier to whom the laughers referred was Dolokhov. Prince
Andrew recognized him and stopped to listen to what he was saying.
Dolokhov had come from the left flank where their regiment was
stationed, with his captain.
"Now then, go on, go on!" incited the officer, bending
forward and trying not to lose a word of the speech which was
incomprehensible to him. "More, please: more! What's he saying?"
Dolokhov did not answer the captain; he had been drawn into
a hot dispute with the French grenadier. They were naturally talking
about the campaign. The Frenchman, confusing the Austrians with
the Russians, was trying to prove that the Russians had surrendered
and had fled all the way from Ulm, while Dolokhov maintained that
the Russians had not surrendered but had beaten the French.
"We have orders to drive you off here, and we shall drive
you off," said Dolokhov.
"Only take care you and your Cossacks are not all captured!"
said the French grenadier.
The French onlookers and listeners laughed.
"We'll make you dance as we did under Suvorov...,"*
said Dolokhov.
*"On vous fera danser."
"Qu' est-ce qu'il chante?"* asked a Frenchman.
*"What's he singing about?"
"It's ancient history," said another, guessing that
it referred to a former war. "The Emperor will teach your
Suvara as he has taught the others..."
"Bonaparte..." began Dolokhov, but the Frenchman
interrupted him.
"Not Bonaparte. He is the Emperor! Sacre nom...!"
cried he angrily.
"The devil skin your Emperor."
And Dolokhov swore at him in coarse soldier's Russian and
shouldering his musket walked away.
"Let us go, Ivan Lukich," he said to the captain.
"Ah, that's the way to talk French," said the picket
soldiers. "Now, Sidorov, you have a try!"
Sidorov, turning to the French, winked, and began to jabber
meaningless sounds very fast: "Kari, mala, tafa, safi, muter,
Kaska," he said, trying to give an expressive intonation
to his voice.
"Ho! ho! ho! Ha! ha! ha! ha! Ouh! ouh!" came peals
of such healthy and good-humored laughter from the soldiers that
it infected the French involuntarily, so much so that the only
thing left to do seemed to be to unload the muskets, muskets,
explode the ammunition, and all return home as quickly as possible.
But the guns remained loaded, the loopholes in blockhouses
and entrenchments looked out just as menacingly, and the unlimbered
cannon confronted one another as before.
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