Bagration drove up in his carriage to the house occupied by Barclay. Barclay put on his official scarf, and came out to greet and to present his report to his senior officer, Bagration. Bagration, to rival his magnanimity, acknowledged Barclay as his superior officer, in spite of his own seniority; but he was less in accord with him than ever. At the Tsar’s command, he sent reports personally to him, and wrote to Araktcheev: ‘My sovereign’s will is law, but I can do nothing acting with the minister ’ (so he called Barclay). ‘For God’s sake, send me somewhere else, if only in command of a regiment, for here I can do nothing. The headquarters are crammed full of Germans, there’s no living here for a Russian, and no making head or tail of anything.
I supposed I was serving my sovereign and my country, but in practice it comes to serving Barclay. I must own I do not care to.’
The swarm of Bronnitskys, Wintzengerodes, and others like them, embittered the feud between the commanders still further, and there was less unity than ever. Preparations were made to attack the French before Smolensk. A general was sent to review the position. This general, detesting Barclay, visits a friend of his own, a commander of a corps, and after spending the day with him, returns and condemns on every point the proposed field of battle without having seen it.
While disputes and intrigues were going on as to the suitable spot for a battle, and while we were looking for the French and mistaking their line of advance, the French fell upon Nevyerovsky’s division, and advanced upon the walls of Smolensk itself.
W'e were surprised into having to fight at Smolensk to save our communications. A battle was fought. Thousands were slain on both sides.
Smolensk was abandoned against the will of the Tsar and the whole people. But Smolensk was burnt by its own inhabitants, who had been deceived by their governor. And those ruined inhabitants, after setting an example to the rest of Russia, full of their losses, and burning with hatred of the enemy, moved on to Moscow. Napoleon advances; we retreat; and so the very result is attained that is destined to overthrow Napoleon.
II
The day after his son’s departure, Prince Nikolay Andreitch sent for Princess Marya.
‘Well, now are you satisfied?’ he said to her. ‘You have made me quarrel with my son! Are you satisfied? That was all you wanted! Satisfied? ... It’s a grief to me, a grief. I’m old and weak, and it was your wish. Well, now, rejoice over it. . . .’ And after that, Princess Marya did not see her father again for a week. He was ill and did not leave his study.
Princess Marya noticed to her surprise that during this illness the old prince excluded Mademoiselle Bourienne too from his room. Tihon was the only person who looked after him.
A week later the prince reappeared, and began to lead the same life as before, showing marked energy in the laying out of farm buildings and gardens, and completely breaking off all relations with Mademoiselle Bourienne. His frigid tone and air with Princess Marya seemed to say: ‘You see, you plotted against me, told lies to Prince Andrey of my relations with that Frenchwoman, and made me quarrel with him, but you see I can do without you, and without the Frenchwoman too.’
One half of the day Princess Marya spent with Nikolushka, giving him his Russian lessons, following his other lessons, and talking to Dessalle. The rest of the day she spent in reading, or with her old
nurse and ‘God’s folk,’ who came by the back stairs sometimes to visit her. The war Princess Marya looked on as women do look on war. She was apprehensive for her brother who was at the front, and was horrified, without understanding it, at the cruelty of men, that led them to kill one another. But she had no notion of the significance of this war, which seemed to her exactly like all the preceding wars. She had no notion of the meaning of this war, although Dessalle, who was her constant companion, was passionately interested in the course of the war, and tried to explain his views on the subject to her, and although ‘God’s folk’ all, with terror, told her in their own way of the rumours among the peasantry of the coming of Antichrist, and although Julie, now Princess Drubetskoy, who had renewed her correspondence with her, was continually writing her patriotic letters from Moscow.
‘I write to you in Russian, my sweet friend,’ Julie wrote, ‘because I feel a hatred for all the French and for their language too; I can’t bear to hear it spoken. ... In Moscow we are all wild with en- enthusiasm for our adored Emperor.
‘My poor husband is enduring hardships and hunger in wretched Jewish taverns, but the news I get from him only increases my ardour.
