Book Two: 1805 - Chapter XX

by Leo Tolstoy

　　The infantry regiments that had been caught unawares in theoutskirts of the wood ran out of it, the different companies gettingmixed, and retreated as a disorderly crowd. One soldier, in hisfear, uttered the senseless cry, "Cut off!" that is so terrible inbattle, and that word infected the whole crowd with a feeling ofpanic.

　　"Surrounded! Cut off? We're lost!" shouted the fugitives.

　　The moment he heard the firing and the cry from behind, thegeneral realized that something dreadful had happened to his regiment,and the thought that he, an exemplary officer of many years' servicewho had never been to blame, might be held responsible at headquartersfor negligence or inefficiency so staggered him that, forgetting therecalcitrant cavalry colonel, his own dignity as a general, andabove all quite forgetting the danger and all regard forself-preservation, he clutched the crupper of his saddle and, spurringhis horse, galloped to the regiment under a hail of bullets which fellaround, but fortunately missed him. His one desire was to know whatwas happening and at any cost correct, or remedy, the mistake if hehad made one, so that he, an exemplary officer of twenty-two years'service, who had never been censured, should not be held to blame.

　　Having galloped safely through the French, he reached a field behindthe copse across which our men, regardless of orders, were running anddescending the valley. That moment of moral hesitation which decidesthe fate of battles had arrived. Would this disorderly crowd ofsoldiers attend to the voice of their commander, or would they,disregarding him, continue their flight? Despite his desperateshouts that used to seem so terrible to the soldiers, despite hisfurious purple countenance distorted out of all likeness to his formerself, and the flourishing of his saber, the soldiers all continuedto run, talking, firing into the air, and disobeying orders. The moralhesitation which decided the fate of battles was evidently culminatingin a panic.

　　The general had a fit of coughing as a result of shouting and of thepowder smoke and stopped in despair. Everything seemed lost. But atthat moment the French who were attacking, suddenly and without anyapparent reason, ran back and disappeared from the outskirts, andRussian sharpshooters showed themselves in the copse. It wasTimokhin's company, which alone had maintained its order in the woodand, having lain in ambush in a ditch, now attacked the Frenchunexpectedly. Timokhin, armed only with a sword, had rushed at theenemy with such a desperate cry and such mad, drunken determinationthat, taken by surprise, the French had thrown down their musketsand run. Dolokhov, running beside Timokhin, killed a Frenchman atclose quarters and was the first to seize the surrendering Frenchofficer by his collar. Our fugitives returned, the battalionsre-formed, and the French who had nearly cut our left flank in halfwere for the moment repulsed. Our reserve units were able to joinup, and the fight was at an end. The regimental commander and MajorEkonomov had stopped beside a bridge, letting the retreating companiespass by them, when a soldier came up and took hold of thecommander's stirrup, almost leaning against him. The man was wearing abluish coat of broadcloth, he had no knapsack or cap, his head wasbandaged, and over his shoulder a French munition pouch was slung.He had an officer's sword in his hand. The soldier was pale, hisblue eyes looked impudently into the commander's face, and his lipswere smiling. Though the commander was occupied in giving instructionsto Major Ekonomov, he could not help taking notice of the soldier.

　　"Your excellency, here are two trophies," said Dolokhov, pointing tothe French sword and pouch. "I have taken an officer prisoner. Istopped the company." Dolokhov breathed heavily from weariness andspoke in abrupt sentences. "The whole company can bear witness. Ibeg you will remember this, your excellency!"

　　"All right, all right," replied the commander, and turned to MajorEkonomov.

　　But Dolokhov did not go away; he untied the handkerchief aroundhis head, pulled it off, and showed the blood congealed on his hair.

　　"A bayonet wound. I remained at the front. Remember, yourexcellency!"

　　Tushin's battery had been forgotten and only at the very end ofthe action did Prince Bagration, still hearing the cannonade in thecenter, send his orderly staff officer, and later Prince Andrewalso, to order the battery to retire as quickly as possible. Whenthe supports attached to Tushin's battery had been moved away in themiddle of the action by someone's order, the battery had continuedfiring and was only not captured by the French because the enemy couldnot surmise that anyone could have the effrontery to continue firingfrom four quite undefended guns. On the contrary, the energetic actionof that battery led the French to suppose that here- in the center-the main Russian forces were concentrated. Twice they had attempted toattack this point, but on each occasion had been driven back bygrapeshot from the four isolated guns on the hillock.

　　Soon after Prince Bagration had left him, Tushin had succeeded insetting fire to Schon Grabern.

　　"Look at them scurrying! It's burning! Just see the smoke! Fine!Grand! Look at the smoke, the smoke!" exclaimed the artillerymen,brightening up.

　　All the guns, without waiting for orders, were being fired in thedirection of the conflagration. As if urging each other on, thesoldiers cried at each shot: "Fine! That's good! Look at it... Grand!"The fire, fanned by the breeze, was rapidly spreading. The Frenchcolumns that had advanced beyond the village went back; but asthough in revenge for this failure, the enemy placed ten guns to theright of the village and began firing them at Tushin's battery.

　　In their childlike glee, aroused by the fire and their luck insuccessfully cannonading the French, our artillerymen only noticedthis battery when two balls, and then four more, fell among ourguns, one knocking over two horses and another tearing off amunition-wagon driver's leg. Their spirits once roused were,however, not diminished, but only changed character. The horses werereplaced by others from a reserve gun carriage, the wounded werecarried away, and the four guns were turned against the ten-gunbattery. Tushin's companion officer had been killed at the beginningof the engagement and within an hour seventeen of the forty men of theguns' crews had been disabled, but the artillerymen were still asmerry and lively as ever. Twice they noticed the French appearingbelow them, and then they fired grapeshot at them.

　　Little Tushin, moving feebly and awkwardly, kept telling his orderlyto "refill my pipe for that one!" and then, scattering sparks from it,ran forward shading his eyes with his small hand to look at theFrench.

　　"Smack at 'em, lads!" he kept saying, seizing the guns by the wheelsand working the screws himself.

　　Amid the smoke, deafened by the incessant reports which alwaysmade him jump, Tushin not taking his pipe from his mouth ran fromgun to gun, now aiming, now counting the charges, now giving ordersabout replacing dead or wounded horses and harnessing fresh ones,and shouting in his feeble voice, so high pitched and irresolute.His face grew more and more animated. Only when a man was killed orwounded did he frown and turn away from the sight, shouting angrily atthe men who, as is always the case, hesitated about lifting theinjured or dead. The soldiers, for the most part handsome fellows and,as is always the case in an artillery company, a head and shoulderstaller and twice as broad as their officer- all looked at theircommander like children in an embarrassing situation, and theexpression on his face was invariably reflected on theirs.

　　Owing to the terrible uproar and the necessity for concentration andactivity, Tushin did not experience the slightest unpleasant senseof fear, and the thought that he might be killed or badly woundednever occurred to him. On the contrary, he became more and moreelated. It seemed to him that it was a very long time ago, almost aday, since he had first seen the enemy and fired the first shot, andthat the corner of the field he stood on was well-known and familiarground. Though he thought of everything, considered everything, anddid everything the best of officers could do in his position, he wasin a state akin to feverish delirium or drunkenness.

　　From the deafening sounds of his own guns around him, the whistleand thud of the enemy's cannon balls, from the flushed andperspiring faces of the crew bustling round the guns, from the sightof the blood of men and horses, from the little puffs of smoke onthe enemy's side (always followed by a ball flying past and strikingthe earth, a man, a gun, a horse), from the sight of all thesethings a fantastic world of his own had taken possession of hisbrain and at that moment afforded him pleasure. The enemy's gunswere in his fancy not guns but pipes from which occasional puffswere blown by an invisible smoker.

　　"There... he's puffing again," muttered Tushin to himself, as asmall cloud rose from the hill and was borne in a streak to the leftby the wind.

　　"Now look out for the ball... we'll throw it back."

　　"What do you want, your honor?" asked an artilleryman, standingclose by, who heard him muttering.

　　"Nothing... only a shell..." he answered.

　　"Come along, our Matvevna!" he said to himself. "Matvevna"* wasthe name his fancy gave to the farthest gun of the battery, whichwas large and of an old pattern. The French swarming round theirguns seemed to him like ants. In that world, the handsome drunkardNumber One of the second gun's crew was "uncle"; Tushin looked athim more often than at anyone else and took delight in his everymovement. The sound of musketry at the foot of the hill, nowdiminishing, now increasing, seemed like someone's breathing. Helistened intently to the ebb and flow of these sounds.

　　*Daughter of Matthew.

　　"Ah! Breathing again, breathing!" he muttered to himself.

　　He imagined himself as an enormously tall, powerful man who wasthrowing cannon balls at the French with both hands.

　　"Now then, Matvevna, dear old lady, don't let me down!" he wassaying as he moved from the gun, when a strange, unfamiliar voicecalled above his head: "Captain Tushin! Captain!"

　　Tushin turned round in dismay. It was the staff officer who hadturned him out of the booth at Grunth. He was shouting in a gaspingvoice:

　　"Are you mad? You have twice been ordered to retreat, and you..."

　　"Why are they down on me?" thought Tushin, looking in alarm at hissuperior.

　　"I... don't..." he muttered, holding up two fingers to his cap."I..."

　　But the staff officer did not finish what he wanted to say. A cannonball, flying close to him, caused him to duck and bend over his horse.He paused, and just as he was about to say something more, anotherball stopped him. He turned his horse and galloped off.

　　"Retire! All to retire!" he shouted from a distance.

　　The soldiers laughed. A moment later, an adjutant arrived with thesame order.

　　It was Prince Andrew. The first thing he saw on riding up to thespace where Tushin's guns were stationed was an unharnessed horse witha broken leg, that lay screaming piteously beside the harnessedhorses. Blood was gushing from its leg as from a spring. Among thelimbers lay several dead men. One ball after another passed over as heapproached and he felt a nervous shudder run down his spine. But themere thought of being afraid roused him again. "I cannot be afraid,"thought he, and dismounted slowly among the guns. He delivered theorder and did not leave the battery. He decided to have the gunsremoved from their positions and withdrawn in his presence. Togetherwith Tushin, stepping across the bodies and under a terrible fire fromthe French, he attended to the removal of the guns.

　　"A staff officer was here a minute ago, but skipped off," said anartilleryman to Prince Andrew. "Not like your honor!"

　　Prince Andrew said nothing to Tushin. They were both so busy as toseem not to notice one another. When having limbered up the only twocannon that remained uninjured out of the four, they began moving downthe hill (one shattered gun and one unicorn were left behind),Prince Andrew rode up to Tushin.

　　"Well, till we meet again..." he said, holding out his hand toTushin.

　　"Good-by, my dear fellow," said Tushin. "Dear soul! Good-by, my dearfellow!" and for some unknown reason tears suddenly filled his eyes.