Book Three: 1805 - Chapter XIV

by Leo Tolstoy

　　At five in the morning it was still quite dark. The troops of thecenter, the reserves, and Bagration's right flank had not yet moved,but on the left flank the columns of infantry, cavalry, and artillery,which were to be the first to descend the heights to attack the Frenchright flank and drive it into the Bohemian mountains according toplan, were already up and astir. The smoke of the campfires, intowhich they were throwing everything superfluous, made the eyessmart. It was cold and dark. The officers were hurriedly drinkingtea and breakfasting, the soldiers, munching biscuit and beating atattoo with their feet to warm themselves, gathering round the firesthrowing into the flames the remains of sheds, chairs, tables, wheels,tubs, and everything that they did not want or could not carry awaywith them. Austrian column guides were moving in and out among theRussian troops and served as heralds of the advance. As soon as anAustrian officer showed himself near a commanding officer'squarters, the regiment began to move: the soldiers ran from the fires,thrust their pipes into their boots, their bags into the carts, gottheir muskets ready, and formed rank. The officers buttoned up theircoats, buckled on their swords and pouches, and moved along theranks shouting. The train drivers and orderlies harnessed and packedthe wagons and tied on the loads. The adjutants and battalion andregimental commanders mounted, crossed themselves, gave finalinstructions, orders, and commissions to the baggage men whoremained behind, and the monotonous tramp of thousands of feetresounded. The column moved forward without knowing where andunable, from the masses around them, the smoke and the increasing fog,to see either the place they were leaving or that to which they weregoing.

　　A soldier on the march is hemmed in and borne along by hisregiment as much as a sailor is by his ship. However far he haswalked, whatever strange, unknown, and dangerous places he reaches,just as a sailor is always surrounded by the same decks, masts, andrigging of his ship, so the soldier always has around him the samecomrades, the same ranks, the same sergeant major Ivan Mitrich, thesame company dog Jack, and the same commanders. The sailor rarelycares to know the latitude in which his ship is sailing, but on theday of battle- heaven knows how and whence- a stern note of whichall are conscious sounds in the moral atmosphere of an army,announcing the approach of something decisive and solemn, andawakening in the men an unusual curiosity. On the day of battle thesoldiers excitedly try to get beyond the interests of theirregiment, they listen intently, look about, and eagerly ask concerningwhat is going on around them.

　　The fog had grown so dense that though it was growing light theycould not see ten paces ahead. Bushes looked like gigantic trees andlevel ground like cliffs and slopes. Anywhere, on any side, onemight encounter an enemy invisible ten paces off. But the columnsadvanced for a long time, always in the same fog, descending andascending hills, avoiding gardens and enclosures, going over new andunknown ground, and nowhere encountering the enemy. On the contrary,the soldiers became aware that in front, behind, and on all sides,other Russian columns were moving in the same direction. Every soldierfelt glad to know that to the unknown place where he was going, manymore of our men were going too.

　　"There now, the Kurskies have also gone past," was being said in theranks.

　　"It's wonderful what a lot of our troops have gathered, lads! Lastnight I looked at the campfires and there was no end of them. Aregular Moscow!"

　　Though none of the column commanders rode up to the ranks ortalked to the men (the commanders, as we saw at the council of war,were out of humor and dissatisfied with the affair, and so did notexert themselves to cheer the men but merely carried out theorders), yet the troops marched gaily, as they always do when goinginto action, especially to an attack. But when they had marched forabout an hour in the dense fog, the greater part of the men had tohalt and an unpleasant consciousness of some dislocation and blunderspread through the ranks. How such a consciousness is communicatedis very difficult to define, but it certainly is communicated verysurely, and flows rapidly, imperceptibly, and irrepressibly, aswater does in a creek. Had the Russian army been alone without anyallies, it might perhaps have been a long time before thisconsciousness of mismanagement became a general conviction, but asit was, the disorder was readily and naturally attributed to thestupid Germans, and everyone was convinced that a dangerous muddle hadbeen occasioned by the sausage eaters.

　　"Why have we stopped? Is the way blocked? Or have we already come upagainst the French?"

　　"No, one can't hear them. They'd be firing if we had."

　　"They were in a hurry enough to start us, and now here we stand inthe middle of a field without rhyme or reason. It's all those damnedGermans' muddling! What stupid devils!"

　　"Yes, I'd send them on in front, but no fear, they're crowding upbehind. And now here we stand hungry."

　　"I say, shall we soon be clear? They say the cavalry are blockingthe way," said an officer.

　　"Ah, those damned Germans! They don't know their own country!"said another.

　　"What division are you?" shouted an adjutant, riding up.

　　"The Eighteenth."

　　"Then why are you here? You should have gone on long ago, now youwon't get there till evening."

　　"What stupid orders! They don't themselves know what they aredoing!" said the officer and rode off.

　　Then a general rode past shouting something angrily, not in Russian.

　　"Tafa-lafa! But what he's jabbering no one can make out," said asoldier, mimicking the general who had ridden away. "I'd shoot them,the scoundrels!"

　　"We were ordered to be at the place before nine, but we haven'tgot halfway. Fine orders!" was being repeated on different sides.

　　And the feeling of energy with which the troops had started began toturn into vexation and anger at the stupid arrangements and at theGermans.

　　The cause of the confusion was that while the Austrian cavalry wasmoving toward our left flank, the higher command found that our centerwas too far separated from our right flank and the cavalry were allordered to turn back to the right. Several thousand cavalry crossed infront of the infantry, who had to wait.

　　At the front an altercation occurred between an Austrian guide and aRussian general. The general shouted a demand that the cavalryshould be halted, the Austrian argued that not he, but the highercommand, was to blame. The troops meanwhile stood growing listless anddispirited. After an hour's delay they at last moved on, descendingthe hill. The fog that was dispersing on the hill lay still moredensely below, where they were descending. In front in the fog ashot was heard and then another, at first irregularly at varyingintervals- trata... tat- and then more and more regularly and rapidly,and the action at the Goldbach Stream began.

　　Not expecting to come on the enemy down by the stream, and havingstumbled on him in the fog, hearing no encouraging word from theircommanders, and with a consciousness of being too late spreadingthrough the ranks, and above all being unable to see anything in frontor around them in the thick fog, the Russians exchanged shots with theenemy lazily and advanced and again halted, receiving no timely ordersfrom the officers or adjutants who wandered about in the fog inthose unknown surroundings unable to find their own regiments. In thisway the action began for the first, second, and third columns, whichhad gone down into the valley. The fourth column, with which Kutuzovwas, stood on the Pratzen Heights.

　　Below, where the fight was beginning, there was still thick fog;on the higher ground it was clearing, but nothing could be seen ofwhat was going on in front. Whether all the enemy forces were, as wesupposed, six miles away, or whether they were near by in that seaof mist, no one knew till after eight o'clock.

　　It was nine o'clock in the morning. The fog lay unbroken like asea down below, but higher up at the village of Schlappanitz whereNapoleon stood with his marshals around him, it was quite light. Abovehim was a clear blue sky, and the sun's vast orb quivered like ahuge hollow, crimson float on the surface of that milky sea of mist.The whole French army, and even Napoleon himself with his staff,were not on the far side of the streams and hollows of Sokolnitz andSchlappanitz beyond which we intended to take up our position andbegin the action, but were on this side, so close to our own forcesthat Napoleon with the naked eye could distinguish a mounted manfrom one on foot. Napoleon, in the blue cloak which he had worn on hisItalian campaign, sat on his small gray Arab horse a little in frontof his marshals. He gazed silently at the hills which seemed to riseout of the sea of mist and on which the Russian troops were movingin the distance, and he listened to the sounds of firing in thevalley. Not a single muscle of his face- which in those days was stillthin- moved. His gleaming eyes were fixed intently on one spot. Hispredictions were being justified. Part of the Russian force hadalready descended into the valley toward the ponds and lakes andpart were leaving these Pratzen Heights which he intended to attackand regarded as the key to the position. He saw over the mist thatin a hollow between two hills near the village of Pratzen, the Russiancolumns, their bayonets glittering, were moving continuously in onedirection toward the valley and disappearing one after another intothe mist. From information he had received the evening before, fromthe sound of wheels and footsteps heard by the outposts during thenight, by the disorderly movement of the Russian columns, and from allindications, he saw clearly that the allies believed him to be faraway in front of them, and that the columns moving near Pratzenconstituted the center of the Russian army, and that that center wasalready sufficiently weakened to be successfully attacked. But stillhe did not begin the engagement.

　　Today was a great day for him- the anniversary of his coronation.Before dawn he had slept for a few hours, and refreshed, vigorous, andin good spirits, he mounted his horse and rode out into the field inthat happy mood in which everything seems possible and everythingsucceeds. He sat motionless, looking at the heights visible abovethe mist, and his cold face wore that special look of confident,self-complacent happiness that one sees on the face of a boy happilyin love. The marshals stood behind him not venturing to distract hisattention. He looked now at the Pratzen Heights, now at the sunfloating up out of the mist.

　　When the sun had entirely emerged from the fog, and fields andmist were aglow with dazzling light- as if he had only awaited this tobegin the action- he drew the glove from his shapely white hand,made a sign with it to the marshals, and ordered the action tobegin. The marshals, accompanied by adjutants, galloped off indifferent directions, and a few minutes later the chief forces ofthe French army moved rapidly toward those Pratzen Heights whichwere being more and more denuded by Russian troops moving down thevalley to their left.