Chapter I: Napoleon (4)

On October 31, Napoleon reached Vyazma. For the first time since leaving Moscow he wore a sable cap, a green pelisse edged with sable, and slashed with gold frogs, and fur-lined boots. He continued to wear this costume during the rest of the retreat, and when the severe frosts began, and it was impossible to sit in the saddle, he either drove in a carriage or went on foot. The infantry of the Old Guard camped round his head-quarters as before in a square, finding shelter, as far as possible, in such houses as were still standing.

The troops, who had orders to burn everything, smashed in the doors and windows of the houses and set fire to them with torches, cartridges, and even ammunition-boxes. The towns and villages were filled with the smoke of burning houses and the stench of decomposing corpses. Davout, who despaired of preserving his men under such circumstances, wrote to Napoleon saying—“It should be left for the rear-guard to fire such villages as remain.” The daily losses of the army in men and horses were greatly increased by this destruction of every dwelling on the road.

The battle of Vyazma was most disastrous to the French. Dorogomilovsky took a number of prisoners, artillery, and baggage. Napoleon, however, only informed France of the loss of a few individuals who had been captured by the Cossacks,—some engineers and topographers who were taking plans, and a few wounded officers who were marching without sufficient caution, running into danger instead of marching in their place with the baggage.

“On November 6,” says Ségur, “there was a complete change in the weather, and the blue sky entirely disappeared. The French army had for some time past been moving through a frosty mist which grew constantly thicker and thicker; but on that day the mist turned into flakes of snow—it seemed as if the icy sky had united with the frozen earth. Everything took on a new and unknown form. The troops marched without knowing where they were or where they were going to, meeting obstacles at every step. While the soldiers were struggling forward against the icy hurricane, the snow, whirled up by the wind, drifted over the hollows and concealed their depth; the soldiers fell into them and were buried in the drifts, and many who were already enfeebled lay where they fell. Those who came behind them tried in vain to turn aside; the wind blinded their eyes with falling and drifting snow, buffeted and confused them, and prevented them from advancing. Their wet clothing froze upon them, and a garment of ice clung to their bodies and numbed their limbs. The strong bitterly cold wind caught their breath as it issued from their mouths and turned it into icicles on their beards and coats. Trembling in every limb they would plod on until the snow, forming balls under their feet, absolutely prevented all progress; then, stumbling over a piece of wood or the dead body of a comrade, they would fall and lie groaning and lamenting while the snow covered them up, leaving on the surface nothing but an almost invisible hillock—a soldier’s grave. The whole road was scattered with these tiny eminences, like a churchyard. There was snow, snow everywhere, as far as the eye could see nothing but a melancholy vista of snow. The effect on the imagination was profound; it seemed to be a winding-sheet which Nature was wrapping around the unfortunate French army! The only objects that stood out were the fir-trees with their funereal green, standing motionless and huge, their black boughs outspread, filling the heart with sadness and foreboding.

“Everything, even their weapons which had been serviceable at Malo Jaroslavetz, but were now only contemptible, hindered the wretched soldiers in their progress. They seemed insufferably heavy; when the miserable men stumbled, their muskets would fall and break or become buried in the snow. They would rise to their feet without them—not that they lost them intentionally—hunger and cold had snatched them from their grasp. Many had their hands frost-bitten, while their fingers clung stiff and numbed to their muskets.

“Then came the sixteen-hour nights. With the snow everywhere, covering everything, there was no place to lean against, to stop at, to sit or rest upon, there was no spot in which they could dig for roots to stay the pangs of hunger or obtain fuel for fires. The troops did their best to form a camp, but the wind cared for nobody, and rudely scattered all their preparations. The fir-wood was covered with hoar-frost and would not take fire, fresh snow fell from the sky, the old snow melted beneath, and even when, at infinite pains, the fire was kindled, it could not be kept alight. At last something like a fire might be obtained, and officers and soldiers began to prepare their wretched supper of scraps of lean meat from horses slaughtered or dead of fatigue, with perhaps a few spoonfuls of oatmeal soaked in melting snow. Next day a heap of frozen soldiers marked the position of the camp-fires, and all around lay thousands of dead horses!”

On the day on which winter broke in all its horror on the unfortunate French army, Count Daru stopped the head-quarters staff on the march and made a secret communication to the Emperor. It appeared that an _estafette_, the first that had arrived for a whole week, had reached the army with news of Malet’s conspiracy. On the march, under the public gaze, Napoleon received the news with the utmost _sang-froid_, but afterwards in camp he expressed the greatest wrath.

He was still more angry at Smolensk, where the army, after all its expectations of rest, found an insufficiency both of quarters and provisions. The Emperor was simply furious. “I never saw him,” says his servant Constant, “forget himself to such an extent. He sent for the Intendant; I could hear his cries from the adjoining room. Napoleon gave orders that this officer should be shot, and it was only by grovelling at the Emperor’s feet that the wretched man managed to get off.”

The calamities of this stage of the retreat were accentuated by the fact that no notice had been received of the return of the army, and officials at Smolensk and elsewhere, taken by surprise, completely lost their heads when they saw these crowds of ravenous fugitives storming and plundering their stores without much advantage to themselves, but to the ruin of all who came after them.

The army not only obtained no respite in Smolensk, it proceeded on its march in a worse condition than ever. There is no doubt that the Emperor hoped to give his disordered flight the air of a dignified and regular retreat, for, among other things, he directed that the walls of Smolensk should be razed to the ground, in order, to use his own expression, “that they might not stand in his way another time;” as if, at this moment of disaster, he could have dreamt of a new invasion.

As we have already said, Napoleon rode the first part of the way in a carriage. In this vehicle, which was closed and contained an abundant supply of furs, the Emperor, who was warmly clad, did not of course feel the cold himself. Moreover, shut up with Murat in his carriage, he ran less risk of being subjected to insults from his angry soldiery, nor was he haunted by the spectacle of their famine and despair, or the sound of their clamour for bread, bread, bread!

After Smolensk he covered a great part of the distance on foot, and in the course of the march he of course had ample opportunity of assuring himself of the terrible plight of his troops, who were suffering unspeakable hardships.

The Emperor gave orders that the greater part of the ill-starred trophies, as well as a quantity of cannon and weapons of every description, should be sunk in the Dnieper and in the Semlefsky Lake. But, come what might, he wished to convey the cross of Ivan the Great to Paris, and he seems to have brought it as far as Vilna.

We have already given some description of the sufferings which the army underwent on its retreat, but the details furnished by eye-witnesses are so full of character, interest, and instruction, that I may add a few more extracts.

At every step were to be seen gallant officers, dressed in tatters, and leaning on sticks of pinewood, with their hair and beards covered with icicles. Again and again one might hear them imploring assistance. “Comrades,” cried one in piteous tones, “help me to rise, give me a hand; I cannot be left behind!” Every one passed on without even glancing at him. Misery levelled all ranks and abolished all distinctions. In vain did many of the officers insist upon their right to command—no one paid any attention to their orders; the starving colonel had to beg for a scrap of biscuit from the common soldier; he who had a store of provisions, were he merely a simple officer’s orderly, was surrounded by a little court of sycophants, who laid aside rank and distinction, and flattered and fawned upon their more fortunate comrade. Officers accustomed to command, and unacquainted with want, were in the most grievous plight of all—every one shunned them to avoid rendering them any service.

“_À moi, mes amis!_ help me to rise, I am a Captain of Engineers,” cried an officer piteously. A passing grenadier stopped, “What, you are a Captain of Engineers?”—“Yes, dear friend, I am!”—“Work away at your plans then!” The road was covered with soldiers who no longer bore the semblance of humanity, and whom the enemy would not even trouble to take prisoners. Many were reduced by cold and hunger to idiocy; they cooked and ate the dead bodies of their fellow-soldiers or gnawed their own arms. Others were so weak that they could not fetch a log of wood nor carry a stone to sit upon; they seated themselves on the bodies of their comrades and turned a dull fixed stare upon the burning embers. Soon the fire would die out, and these living skeletons, having no strength to rise, would fall dead beside the bodies on which they sat. Many tried to warm themselves by thrusting their naked feet into the midst of the fire.

All the corps were mixed up: the remnants formed a number of little detachments, or rather groups, of eight or ten men, who kept together and had everything in common. Each group had a Russian horse—a _conya_ as they called it, under the impression they were speaking Russian—for their baggage, their cooking apparatus, and provisions; and every member of the group had also a sack for provisions. Each of these little communities lived apart from all the rest, repulsing every one who did not belong to them. The members kept close together and did their utmost not to get separated in the crowd, and woe betide him who lost sight of his mates—he would certainly find no one else to take the least interest in him or give him any assistance.

“We were a gang of ruffians,” says Labaume, “respecting neither person nor property. Necessity made thieves and rogues of us. Without the slightest feeling of shame we stole from one another whatever we wanted. Arson, murder, and destruction of every kind were incidents of everyday life, and crime became second nature. With the same indifference with which the soldiers set houses on fire for the sake of a moment’s warmth, they would deprive a weaker comrade of all his little store for their own maintenance.”

In spite of the fearful condition of the troops, Napoleon ordered occasional manœuvres—with what result may be imagined. Such divisions as could still be made to perform any evolutions, after wandering about over snow-blocked roads, would end the day by retiring without their artillery and baggage, which had been abandoned in the ditches.

The staff encampment, according to the testimony of an eye-witness, presented a sad and pitiable spectacle. “In a wretched outhouse, with a crazy roof, some twenty officers, sandwiched with as many servants, were gathered round a little fire. Behind them stood their horses, ranged in a circle to keep off the wind. The smoke was so thick that one could hardly discern the forms even of those who were sitting close to the fire blowing up a flame under the cauldron in which their food was simmering. The rest, wrapped in cloaks and fur-coats, were lying side by side almost on the top of one another for the sake of warmth. They did not stir a limb, but every now and then one might hear the voice of a man abusing his comrades for moving about and treading on him, or cursing the neighing of the horses, or the sparks from the fire that burnt his coat.”

Napoleon, who now travelled for the most part on foot, clearly recognized the condition of the army, but he saw no need for giving Europe any inkling of the truth in his bulletins. “The roads are very slippery,” he says in Bulletin XXVIII., “and are difficult travelling for the draught-horses—we have lost a considerable number through cold and fatigue.” From Vyazma he wrote—“Twelve thousand Russian infantry, under cover of swarms of Cossacks, cut the road between the Duke of Eckmühl and the Viceroy. The Duke and the Viceroy attacked them, drove them from the line of march, pursued them into the forest, and took a number of prisoners, including a general and six guns. Since then we have heard no more of the Russian infantry; only the Cossacks are to be seen moving about in the distance.”

Not a word about the number of prisoners, guns, and baggage taken by Dorogomilovsky in this battle, which proved so disastrous to the French army, or of the fact that the French had by this time lost some 40,000 prisoners, about 25 generals, 500 guns, 30 flags, and, in addition to a stupendous quantity of other baggage, all the trophies from Moscow which they had not yet burnt or destroyed! If to this total we add some 50,000 who had died of their sufferings, or been killed in different engagements since they left Moscow, we may calculate that the army contained not more than 70,000 men, and of these, inclusive of the Imperial Guard, there were only about 10,000 able to carry arms.

Kutuzof strictly enjoined his generals not to drive the enemy to despair, and for Napoleon and the Old Guard in particular, from which he expected a most desperate resistance, he ordered them to _faire des ponts d’or_, reckoning that even if they survived cold and hunger they would be unable to pass the Beresina, where they would have to deal with three armies at once. This is the only supposition upon which it is possible to explain the unnecessary caution displayed by the Russian Commander-in-Chief whenever his generals showed any intention of attacking their enfeebled adversary, and making an end of him and the war at a blow. The French army—or rather the remains of it—was indebted for its escape, not so much to its prestige, as to Kutuzof and Chichagof, and especially to the latter.

In consequence of Kutuzof’s plan, the Emperor and his picked troops were not harassed on the road to Krasnoye, while Marshals Davout and Ney, who brought up the rear, were exposed to the most determined attacks.

At Krasnoye, Napoleon, after a series of vacillating and contradictory movements, once more displayed his characteristic skill and audacity. By a bold manœuvre he held the Russians in check, and gave the remains of his two divisions an opportunity of escaping.

While he was manœvring with the Guards, an indescribable mass of broken-down fugitives absolutely incapable of defence filed past him. In spite of his self-command it was evident that the sight of these destitute remnants of his once invincible troops affected him deeply. Throughout the night that followed he was unable to sleep, and complained that he could not bear to think of the condition of his troops. “The very sight of them,” he said, “fills my soul with horror.”

“Imagine, if possible,” says René Bourgeois, “60,000 destitutes with sacks over their shoulders and long sticks in their hands, covered with rags of the filthiest description stuck together anyhow, swarming with vermin, and absolutely starving! Add to this picture pale, cadaverous faces covered with the dirt of camps and blackened by the smoke of fires, glazed and sunken eyes, dishevelled hair, long filthy beards—and you will still have but a faint notion of the appearance presented by the army! No men had brothers, friends, countrymen, or officers. _Sauve qui peut_ was the order of the day. We were waging a desperate warfare, each man against his neighbour; and it may truthfully be said, both in the literal and the figurative sense, that the strong devoured the weak. Wherever one turned one’s eyes they fell upon scenes of horror and barbarity. If a man was suspected of concealing provisions his comrades attacked him furiously, and snatched them from him in spite of all his struggles and curses. All day and every day one might hear the sound of dead men’s bones crunching beneath the feet of horses and the wheels of the wagons, as they were crushed into the ruts.”

In the face of these horrors one cannot but be surprised that any fraction, however small, of the Grande Armée ever managed to reach the frontier and the long-wished-for winter quarters, and it will therefore not be without interest to see how the fugitives lived their daily life.

“Whenever we halted,” says Bourgogne, “to take a mouthful of food, the soldiers laid eager hands on the horses that had been abandoned, or on those which were not guarded, cut them up, collected their blood in saucepans, boiled and ate it.... If it happened that the order to advance was given before they had time to finish, or the Russians were seen approaching and they had to make off, they carried their saucepans with them, and ate the contents on the march. Their hands of course became smeared with blood.

“They fought on the slightest provocation, and the air was filled with evil words. The foulest abuse and the vilest epithets were bandied about on the most frivolous occasion. Every quarrel ended, as a rule, in the disputants falling upon one another with fists and sticks; the troops had in fact arrived at such a condition of savagery that they were ready to tear one another in pieces.

“At the halting-places they rushed like madmen into the houses, sheds, outhouses, and buildings of whatever kind that were to be found, and in a few moments packed them so full that it was impossible either to leave or enter. Those who could not get in settled down outside, as near as possible to the walls. The first task was to get firewood and straw for the bivouac, and for this purpose they would climb on to the neighbouring houses and carry off roofs, rafters, partitions, and everything combustible, reducing the whole building to ruins, despite the cries, threats, and resistance of those who were within. The inmates had to stand a regular siege and drive away their assailants by a sortie, or rather by a series of sorties, for the place of those who were repulsed would be taken by other besiegers stronger and more resolute. They had to yield at last to superior force and escape in order to avoid being buried in the ruins. When it was impossible to effect a forcible entry the assailants would fire the building from outside in order to expel those who were warming themselves within. This happened as a rule when a building was tenanted by generals who had expelled its first occupants. The latter would then threaten to set the house on fire, and actually put their threat into execution. The unfortunate officers would rush for the door with execrations on their lips, falling and crushing one another in their eagerness to escape.”

Napoleon. Berthier. Murat. Rapp.
BIVOUAC.]

Even those highest in command now admitted that Napoleon in leading his army to Moscow had made the same error as Charles XII. when he invaded the Ukraine; that from a military point of view the campaign was lost by irresolution during the critical battle, and from a political point of view by the burning of Moscow; and that if the army had returned in time it might have retired in good order. After its entry into Moscow the Russian Commander-in-Chief and the Russian winter both gave the French ample grace; the former forty days, the latter fifty, to rest and retreat. And while they lamented the time wasted in Moscow and the indecision shown at Malo Jaroslavetz they reviewed the long catalogue of their own misfortunes. Since leaving Moscow they had lost all their baggage, half their artillery, thirty flags, some thirty generals, 40,000 prisoners, 60,000 dead. There remained some 50,000 helpless vagrants, and perhaps 10,000 who were still in a condition to defend themselves! It was, moreover, a grave mistake to entrust the task of covering the retreat of the army and all its stores to the Austrians without leaving some one in authority at Vilna or Minsk to correct their errors and omissions. The French were unanimous in charging Schwarzenberg with treachery, though Napoleon himself held his peace—perhaps out of policy, perhaps because he had not looked for any greater degree of zeal from his Austrian ally.

Napoleon endeavoured to check the general demoralization and despondency. In private, as we have already said, he bitterly bewailed the sufferings of his troops, but in public he assumed a tranquil air, and gave orders that every one should keep his proper place in the ranks. Failing obedience, he ordered that “officers be reduced to the ranks, and soldiers shot.” But this threat proved entirely ineffectual, for the soldiers were naturally less afraid of death than of the prolongation of such a state of misery.

At Orcha Napoleon burned his baggage with his own hands in order to prevent it from falling into the clutches of the enemy. Thus perished the documents which he had collected for the history of his own life, with the composition of which he had intended to occupy himself when he started on this campaign. He then counted upon establishing himself in a threatening position on the banks of the Dvina or Beresina, and during the six tedious months of winter devoting his leisure hours to writing his reminiscences. All these plans and hopes were now scattered to the winds.

A rumour gained currency that Chichagof had occupied Minsk, and that the line of retreat was therefore endangered. The Emperor, however, attached little importance to the report, for he was convinced that he commanded the passage of the Beresina at Borisof. The bridge at Borisof was protected by a strong fortress occupied by a Polish regiment. Napoleon was so confident upon this point that in order to relieve the burdens of the army, he gave orders at Orcha to burn all his pontoons. It must indeed have been a blow to learn after this that Chichagof had taken the town of Borisof, which commanded the passage of the river.

There is an interesting description of the arrival of an officer of the Young Guard who brought this unwelcome news—“On November 26 we were marching along the high-road in the direction of Borisof. The town was not far off. Bonaparte was walking, like the rest of us, with a stick in his hand. He was dressed in a fur-coat and hat, and was walking along the middle of the road a few paces from me, behind the Prince of Neufchâtel (Berthier). On every side reigned a melancholy silence. Suddenly we saw an officer riding to meet us. It was Colonel de F., attached to the staff. He halted in front of the Prince and made a report of something to him—I only heard the words ‘Beresina’ and ‘Russians.’ We all stopped. Bonaparte also halted; he was about six paces from the Chief of the Staff and the colonel. I moved a little closer in order to learn what it was all about. I could hear Bonaparte asking angrily, ‘What is he talking about? eh? What is he talking about? What is he talking about?’

“The Prince ordered the colonel to repeat his message to Bonaparte. I seem to hear them even now.

“_De F._—‘Monsieur le Maréchal has sent me to inform you that the Russian army of Moldavia has reached the Beresina and occupied all the crossings.’

“_Bonaparte._—‘It’s not true, it’s not true, it’s not true!’

“_De F._—‘That two divisions of the enemy have captured the bridge and occupied the left bank; also that the river is not frozen sufficiently to cross on the ice.’

“_Bonaparte_ (angrily).—‘You lie, you lie! It’s not true.’

“_De F._ (coldly, in a louder tone).— I was not sent to ascertain the position of the enemy. Monsieur le Maréchal sent me to bring this report, and I am performing my duty.’

“Seeing Napoleon beginning to brandish his stick, I thought he meant to strike the colonel with it; but at that moment he stepped back with his legs spread wide apart. Leaning his left hand on his stick and grinding his teeth together, he cast a furious glance at the heavens and shook his fist! A cry of passionate anger broke from his lips; he repeated his menacing gesture, and added one short expressive word—a word blasphemous enough by itself. I assure you that in all my life I never saw a more fearful expression of face and figure! He was evidently quite forgetful of the care with which he had striven till then to hide his feelings from us, and his endeavours to appear cheerful—though, of course, no one was deceived. We were so attentively engaged in watching his movements, and were so much surprised at the scene, that we only recollected ourselves at last when he gave orders to continue the advance.”

“That night,” says Ségur, “Napoleon had no sleep. Duroc and Daru, thinking he was asleep, began to talk of the desperate position in which the French were placed, unaware that he could hear all they said. When they uttered the words ‘royal prisoner’ he could keep silence no longer, but broke in, ‘Do you think that they would dare?’ Daru, after the first moment of surprise, replied that if the Emperor was obliged to yield at last he must be prepared for the worst; that he must not count on the magnanimity of his adversary, for politics, in the widest sense of the word, knew nothing of the ethics of everyday life, they have their own code.”

“‘And France?’ asked Napoleon. ‘What will France say?’

“‘Oh! as for France—one may fit one’s conjectures to one’s fancy, for it would be hard to say what the result will really be in France. The best thing,’ added Daru, ‘both for us and for your Majesty, would be if you could somehow get back into France, through the air, if it may not be along the road; for you would be more likely to save us by being there, than by staying here.’

“‘In fact, I am in the way?’ asked Napoleon.

“‘Yes, your Majesty.’

“‘And would not you like to be a royal prisoner?’

“Daru answered in the same jesting strain that ‘he would be satisfied to be an ordinary prisoner of war.’

“To this the Emperor made no reply; but after a long pause he asked if all the despatches had been burnt.

“‘Your Majesty did not wish that to be done?’

“‘Go at once and burn everything—our position, to be frank, is not one to boast of.’”

Marshal St. Cyr received strict orders to drive the Russians over the river. He performed this task; but the problem how the French army was to cross under the enemy’s fire without any pontoons still remained unsolved, and troubled the minds of every soldier from the highest to the lowest.

There was no longer any hope that the fugitives would be able to slip through between the Russian armies. Driven on by Kutuzof and Vittgenstein to the Beresina, they must cross the river without delay in spite of the threatening position occupied by Chichagof on the further bank.

On November 23 Napoleon began his preparations for this desperate step. The remains of the cavalry, under the command of Latour-Maubourg, were rapidly dwindling in number, and there were now only 150 left. The Emperor collected all the officers who could still sit in the saddle and formed them into a body of some 500, which he called his “Holy Squadron.” Divisional commanders acted in this squadron as captains; Grouchy and Sebastiani were appointed commanders. Napoleon further ordered that all superfluous vehicles should be burnt, and that no officer should have more than one; so that half the vans and wagons in the various corps were destroyed, and the horses distributed among the Horse Guards.

The retreating host soon came up with Marshal Victor’s army, which was awaiting Napoleon’s arrival.

“Still in good condition, having suffered but little, it welcomed the Emperor with the usual enthusiastic cries, which had long been unheard among the fugitives from Moscow,” says Ségur. “These troops knew nothing of the sufferings of the main army, so that they were perfectly astounded when, in the place of the well-appointed columns of the victors of Moscow, they saw Napoleon followed by this rabble of skeletons, clad in tatters, in women’s jackets, in fragments of old carpets or filthy remnants of rusty cloaks, burnt into holes, with their legs wrapped in all manner of scraps and rags. The real soldiers gazed in horror on these unfortunate warriors, their sunken cheeks, the earthy colour of their countenances, their straggling beards; defenceless, weaponless, jostling one another like a herd of cattle, their heads hanging down and their eyes cast upon the ground. What astonished them more than anything was the number of generals and colonels, marching by themselves, in solitary dejection, with no soldiers to command. Busied only with themselves, their persons, or their goods, they marched unnoticed and uncared for among the common soldiers—soldiers from whom they no longer looked for obedience, for every tie was broken and every rank levelled by misfortune. Victor’s and Oudinot’s troops could not believe their eyes. The impression produced by this fearful _débâcle_ had an immediate effect upon the discipline of the 2nd and 9th corps—disorder soon showed itself in their ranks; the soldiers threw away their muskets and laid hands on valuable walking-sticks.”

The Grande Armée reached the river, and it was decided to make the crossing at Studyanka. The only chance of success lay in deceiving the Russians as to the place in which the passage was to be attempted, for it was evidently impossible to effect a crossing by force. On the 24th, therefore, three hundred soldiers and a few hundred fugitives were sent down the river to Ukholda with orders to prepare materials for the construction of a bridge, and to make as much noise as possible over it. The remains of the Cuirassiers were sent to the same place by a road that was well within sight of the Russians. In addition—and this was the most cunning stroke of all—the Chief of the Staff summoned some Jews of the neighbourhood and questioned them with the greatest show of secrecy as to the fords and roads leading to Minsk. Then, as if delighted with the result of his examination, and allowing them to imagine that in his opinion this was the only way out of his difficulties, he retained some of the rogues as guides and dismissed the rest beyond his outposts. In order to make certain that they would repeat all they knew, the general forced them to take an oath that they would meet the French lower down the Beresina and inform them of the enemy’s movements.

While endeavouring in this way to hoodwink Chichagof, they made all necessary preparations for the passage of the river at Studyanka. The presence, however, of a division of the enemy on the far side of the river caused them to doubt seriously whether the Russians would fall into the trap. They expected every minute that the Russian guns would open fire on the workmen engaged in building the bridge. Even if the enemy had delayed until dawn the work would not have been sufficiently far advanced, and the opposite bank, which was low and marshy, was only too well adapted for opposing the passage.

Napoleon was aware of this, and when he left Borisof at ten o’clock in the evening he prepared for the last desperate stroke. He halted with the 6000 Guards which remained to him at Staro-Borisof in a house belonging to Radziwill. He did not go to bed that night, but was continuously on the alert, listening and making inquiries as to the movements of the enemy. In his anxiety he was haunted by the idea that the night was drawing to a close and dawn about to break. His attendants had great difficulty in assuring him that this was not the case. He went out to wait in a little hut on the banks of the river.

“Well, Berthier, how shall we get out of this?” he said to the Chief of the Staff, who was continually with him. In a quiet moment, when Napoleon was sitting in a room of the hut, they saw the tears rise to his eyes and course down his pale cheeks, paler now than ever.

The King of Naples openly expressed his doubts as to the possibility of effecting a crossing, and in the name of the army begged the Emperor to think of his own safety.

“There are brave Poles ready to escort the Emperor; they will take him up along the banks of the Beresina and will get him to Vilna within five days.” Napoleon hung his head in sign of refusal, but said nothing.

Hardly had the first piles of the bridge been driven when Marshal Ney and the King of Naples came running out of breath to the Emperor, crying that the enemy had abandoned their position on the other bank. Napoleon, beside himself with delight, and unable to believe his ears, ran to the river—it was indeed true! In an ecstasy of joy, he cried breathlessly, “Then I have deceived the Admiral!” And the Russians were indeed in the fullest sense of the word deceived. Their officers did not consider the work that had been going on at Studyanka for forty-eight hours as worthy of any attention. The carelessness and incautiousness of the French served to convince Admiral Chichagof that they meant to cross lower down the river, and he accordingly moved the whole of Chapletz’s corps, which was stationed opposite the bridge then in course of construction at Studyanka, and which could of course see and hear the work that was proceeding.

Admiral Chichagof was an excellent type of the crafty courtier. He had gained his promotion by the accident of interest and favour; he was proud, bold, and overbearing. Most aptly did Krylof characterize him in the fable of the pike that went mouse-hunting. The Jews sent out by the French, and the demonstration at Ukholda, firmly convinced him that the crossing was to be effected below Studyanka, and in spite of all reports of the progress of the works at that point, he drew off the whole division to the very last man.

Napoleon, however firmly he might believe in his lucky star, could scarcely have counted on such simplicity, and the French are right in saying that the historian will have to solve an interesting problem; how was it that a demoralized and exhausted army, hemmed in on every side by an enemy incomparably superior in numbers, who literally had only to put out their hand to seize their prey, found the way left open before them? The Russians retired—there were no obstacles, and the French army was allowed to retreat in peace along a route that was neither burnt nor devastated. Whatever the cause may have been—whether carelessness, misunderstanding, or indolence—the retreating army owed thanks to Heaven that among its enemies there was at least one stupendous fool.

Ségur graphically describes his own impressions and Napoleon’s feelings at this time. “Every stroke of our sappers’ axes which had been ringing in the adjacent woods for a whole day must have been heard by the enemy. We expected that at the first rays of dawn we should see the Russian battalions and guns drawn up before the frail construction which General Ebler had erected, while eight hours’ work were still wanting to complete the bridge. No doubt, we thought, the enemy is waiting for daylight in order to train his guns with more effect. Day broke, and our eyes beheld the camp-fires abandoned, the river-bank deserted, and in the distance, on the heights, thirty guns—moving away.

“A single cannon-ball would have sufficed to demolish our only hope of safety. But their artillery was retiring before our very eyes, moving further and further into the distance, while ours was at the same time being brought into position.

“Far away we could see the end of the long Russian column retiring to Borisof—they had but to look round. An infantry regiment of twelve guns remained, but scattered about, and evidently with no intention of interfering with us; while at the edge of the forest we could see a detachment of Cossacks—the rear-guard of Chapletz’s division, 6000 strong—withdrawing so as to leave the road open to us.

“The French simply could not believe their eyes. At last, delirious with joy, they began cheering and clapping their hands. Rapp and Oudinot ran in to the Emperor—‘Your Majesty, the enemy have struck their tents and abandoned the position!’—‘Impossible!’ answered the Emperor; but Ney and Murat in their turn came running up to confirm the news. Napoleon rushed out of his hut, looked, and saw the extreme end of Chapletz’s column in full retreat just disappearing into the woods.”

By one o’clock the Cossacks had completely abandoned the bank, and the bridge for the passage of the infantry was finished. Legrand’s division immediately crossed with its artillery before Napoleon’s eyes, to loud cries of “_Vive l’Empereur_!” Napoleon had been hurrying on the work, and he now assisted the passage of the artillery by his encouraging words and example of cheerfulness. When the foremost troops at last reached the further bank, he could not forbear from crying out—“My lucky star, again my star!”

Chichagof to his first mistake added yet another, into which no intelligent sergeant-major would have fallen, and which is really beyond forgiveness. Zemlin lies on the far side of the river in the middle of an extensive marsh, over which passes the Vilna road. The latter is constructed on a causeway of twenty-two wooden bridges, which the Russian general could and ought to have burnt before he retired. Combustible materials had indeed been put under them for this very purpose, but no one took the trouble to set fire to them. If Chichagof had been less self-confident he would at least, in withdrawing to Ukholda, have ensured the impossibility of the passage of the river at Studyanka by ordering the Vilna road to be destroyed. The French army would have been irretrievably lost, and all their labours and sacrifices at the passage of the Beresina would have availed them nothing, for the deep marshes which surround Zemlin would inevitably have stopped them.

The crowding, jostling, confusion, fighting, and killing which took place at the passage of the Beresina, according to the testimony of those who witnessed the scene, defy description. All rushed like madmen for the bridges; no one was master of himself, a universal frenzy possessed the whole army. They hewed a passage with their swords or whatever weapon they possessed, and hurled down every obstacle in their way. The word “Emperor,” which a month before had been one to conjure with, had lost its magic. Caulaincourt, the great Master of the Horse, was hustled and jostled, almost knocked from the saddle, before he managed with infinite difficulty to get the Emperor’s horses and carriages over.

By the evening the Russian guns (of Witgenstein’s army) were in position, and opened fire on the masses of soldiers who covered the banks and the bridges. It is difficult, nay impossible, to paint the scenes of horror, of butchery, which were enacted under the fire of the Russian batteries. The terrified troops were so closely huddled and packed together that every shot told with fearful effect. With the cries of despair which rang out on every side, with the groans of men and the neighing of horses as they fell and were trampled under-foot, mingled the ceaseless shrieking of the cannon-balls, the booming of the guns, the rain of lead upon wagons, carriages and caissons, broken, shattered and dispersed, their flying splinters still further adding to the slaughter. It was a scene of horror beyond the power of words to paint.

At last night put an end to the massacre. Some portion of the 9th Army Corps managed to cross the river, but the greater part was destroyed. The whole of General Portuneau’s division laid down its arms; it had lost its way, blundered among the Russians, and been surrounded. Marbot declares, but it seems improbable, that the general was accompanied by a guide from Borisof, who endeavoured to explain with all the expressiveness at his command that the camp in front of them was a Russian camp; but, having no interpreter, they did not understand him. The result was that the French lost from 7000 to 8000 men. There is no proof of Napoleon’s grave accusation that, to judge by report, “the commander lost his division because he took an independent line.”

By eight o’clock the next morning the bridge destined for the horses and wagons was broken, and the baggage and artillery proceeded to occupy the other bridge. This was the signal for a regular battle, in the truest sense of the word, between the infantry and cavalry. Many fell in this struggle, and still more at the beginning of the bridge, where the path was so blocked with the bodies of men and horses that the troops had literally to pass over heaps of dead.

“The last to cross was Gérard’s division, who made their way at the point of the sword, after clambering over the pile of corpses which cumbered the road. They had hardly reached the further shore when the Russians charged down after them; and the French immediately set the bridge on fire, thus sacrificing all that remained on the left bank, in order to prevent the Russians from crossing.”

Those who had not succeeded in getting across were mad with terror. Many endeavoured to dash over the burning bridge, and to avoid being roasted alive were forced to leap into the river, where they were drowned.

Thousands of fires lined the heights occupied by the Russians, while in the valley beneath, by the bank of the river, tens of thousands of wretched men were dying or preparing to die, without food or shelter. There was nothing but the sound of their moaning to tell that these hosts of men lay there, still breathing, in the darkness.

“Much has been said,” writes Marbot, “of the disasters of the Beresina; but no one has yet said that most of them might have been avoided if the staff had better understood its duties and availed itself of the night of the 27th and 28th for the transport of the baggage and of all those thousands of men who next day blocked the way across the river. That night the bridges were empty; not a soul crossed them, though within a hundred paces one might have seen by the light of the moon a rabble of more than 50,000 men of all sorts, stragglers from their own regiments, who went by the name of ‘broilers.’ These men sat calmly by their enormous fires cooking their supper of horse-flesh, unconscious that the passage of the river must cost many of them their lives on the following day, while at that very moment they might be crossing at their leisure and could cook their supper in safety on the other side. Their conduct is not to be wondered at, for no officer came from the Emperor, no aide-de-camp from the staff, nor from any one of the marshals, to warn these poor wretches, or, if necessary, to drive them by force to the bridges.

“Had the authorities borrowed a few battalions from Oudinot’s corps, or from the Guards, who still maintained discipline, they might easily have forced all these masses to cross the bridge. In vain did I urge, as I passed the Head-quarters Staff and that of Marshal Oudinot, that the bridges were lying idle, and that all these unarmed troops should be made to cross while the enemy remained quiet. I received only evasive replies, and found myself referred from one to another.”

The battle of the Beresina may be regarded as having decided the fate of the Grande Armée—the magnificent force that had once caused Europe to tremble.

It has often been said that the destruction of the French army was due to the cold; but, as we have seen, many other causes were at work. The 2nd and 9th Army Corps kept perfect order, though they had to endure much the same cold as the main army. The chief cause of the _débâcle_ was hunger, followed by rapid and ceaseless marches and bivouacs without sleep or rest; and lastly, the cold when it became very intense. We must not, however, forget the steadiness and endurance of the Russian troops. Napoleon and the whole of the French army were astonished by the fact that at “the great battle,” though there were hosts of Russians slain there were no prisoners. As for the horses, they sustained the cold very well so long as they were fed; and they too perished chiefly of hunger and fatigue.

Kutuzof, as has been said, was not alone responsible for Napoleon’s escape from Russia. The Russian Commander-in-Chief took a thoroughly sound view of the position of the French Emperor; and in this connection his conversations with one of his prisoners, a man occupying a high rank in the administrative branch of the French army, are full of interest. Kutuzof told him that he had thoroughly studied Napoleon’s character, and was sure that when once he had crossed the Niemen he would be tempted to extend his conquests indefinitely. “We have given him plenty of space to exhaust and dissipate his army, to give strategy, famine, and frost free play. What blindness is it that has prevented Napoleon alone from recognizing the trap that was so evident to everybody else?”

The Field-Marshal expressed astonishment at the ease with which Napoleon had been induced to stay in Moscow and encouraged in his absurd hopes of concluding an honourable peace, when he was helplessly caught in the toils.

“Napoleon’s intelligence,” he remarked, “has deteriorated—the whole campaign shows that. It is a pity he did not think of going further than Moscow, we would have given him another 5000 versts to conquer.”

He admitted that it would have been hard to imagine anything more dangerous for Russia than Napoleon’s original plan of remaining in Smolensk, covering Poland, and renewing the war in the spring. But he was convinced that the plan did not originate with Napoleon himself, for he was too much accustomed to short campaigns to devote two whole years to the conquest of a single empire. “One must know but little of Napoleon,” said Kutuzof, “to imagine him capable of the patient execution of an enterprise demanding time, caution, and tedious elaboration of detail.”

“When I left the Field-Marshal,” says this French officer, “he expressed the conviction that Bonaparte would inevitably be crushed at the passage of the Beresina.”

* * * * *

Beyond the Beresina, the retreat became more disastrous than ever. It was a headlong flight in which there was no longer any pretence of order. The fugitives behaved, in the most literal sense, like wild beasts. Muravyof, Fenschaw, Chichagof, and many others affirm that they saw the French devouring their dead comrades. They often found them in outhouses seated round a fire on the bodies of the dead, cutting out the best portions to roast and eat. When, on one occasion, a Russian officer expressed his horror and disgust, one of these cannibals replied with perfect equanimity, “Of course this stuff isn’t very nice, but at any rate it’s better than beastly horse-flesh.”

In the hospital at Minsk the French convalescents, for want of tables, played cards on the dead and stiffened bodies of their comrades, and the walls of the room were ornamented with the bodies of the dead dressed in fantastic costumes and with their faces daubed, by way of jest, with coal and brick-dust.

Fuel was so scarce that even the Viceroy Eugène, for instance, had to make shift without a fire. It is said that on one occasion, in order to scrape together a few billets of wood, his attendants had to remind the Bavarians that Prince Eugène was married to their king’s daughter, and consequently had a right to command them!

To make matters worse, on the far side of the Beresina, and during the first stages of the retreat, the arrival of the fugitives came as a complete surprise to the towns and halting-places along the road. At Vilna, for instance, there was a supply of flour for 100,000 men for forty days, exclusive of the corn in the granaries; there was meat for 100,000 men for thirty-six days, unkilled; beer and brandy in still larger proportions; 30,000 pairs of boots; 27,000 rifles, and an immense quantity of clothing, ammunition, saddlery, harness, and equipments of every kind. The officials, however, having received no instructions, did not dare to make an immediate distribution of these stores. They waited so long that the greater part of the supplies fell into the hands of the Russians, who followed close upon the heels of the French.

Vilna was, like Smolensk, a sort of Promised Land in the eyes of the soldiers. Here, they thought, they would be able to eat their fill at last and enjoy at least some rest from their flight. But they were disappointed in their hopes, and forced to continue their flight without a pause. The town was nothing but a plague-stricken cesspool. Thousands of corpses lay unburied, simply flung out of the houses into the yards, where the invalids also lay, forming a confused mass of sick and dead.

Most of the houses in the town were turned into hospitals, crammed full of sick and wounded. As soon as the French left Vilna the house-owners, who were Jews, stripped the sick of all their money and clothes and turned them, stark naked, into the streets. The Russian authorities, including the Emperor Alexander himself, were obliged to take stern and vigorous measures for housing the wounded and relieving their sufferings.

A few miles beyond Vilna is a steep hill, which was at that time covered with ice. It gave the French baggage as much trouble as the Beresina. In vain did the horses put forth every effort to surmount it—the French saved hardly a gun or private carriage. At the foot of the hill they were forced to abandon the whole of the artillery of the Guard, the Emperor’s baggage, and the army treasure-chest.

As the troops went by they smashed open the carriages and took the most valuable of their contents—clothes, furs, and money. Many poor wretches dying of hunger were to be seen covered with gold; articles of luxury of all kinds were strewn upon the snow. The plundering was only stopped by the appearance of the Cossacks, who swooped down and seized all the booty that remained. One of the officers gives us an account of the retreat from Vilna and of this last disaster—which, if we may trust eye-witnesses of the scene, might have been avoided, inasmuch as there was an easy road round the hill. “We passed out in silence, leaving the streets covered from end to end with soldiers, some asleep, some dead. The courtyards, the galleries, and the steps of the buildings were covered with them, but none were willing to rise and follow us, nor even to stir at the summons of their officers.

“We arrived at the foot of a hill, the ascent of which was rendered quite impracticable by reason of its steepness and the ice with which it was covered. All around lay Napoleon’s carriages and baggage, which were abandoned at Vilna, together with the army treasure-chest.