The fencing master, p.2
THE FENCING MASTER, page 2
Half-an-hour later a flash of lightning reveals the Emperor; he has ridden more than two leagues without encountering a living soul. Now the storm bursts; Napoleon seeks the shelter of a Monastery.
About five o’clock in the evening while the army continues its passage of the Niemen, Napoleon tormented by the silence and absence of life, rides on till he comes up to the Wilia, about a quarter of a league from its junction with the Niemen. The Russians in full retreat have burnt the bridge; it will take too much time to build another; the Polish light cavalry must find a ford.
By Napoleon’s orders a squadron of cavalry plunges into the river; at first the squadron preserves its ranks and the issue seems hopeful, but little by little men and horses begin to sink, and are carried off their feet; but none the less they push forward, and soon in spite of all efforts they break rank. The middle of the stream once attained, the violence of the current overwhelms them; some horses have already disappeared; the others become terrified and neigh frantically in their distress; the men struggle and flounder, but the power of the water is such that they are swept away. A few with difficulty reach the opposite bank, the others sink and disappear, shouting “Vive l’Empereur!” and the rest of the troops on the Niemen get the first news of their vanguard by watching the corpses of men and horses floating down the stream.
It took the French army three whole days to make the passage.
In two days Napoleon gains the passes which protect Vilna; he hopes that the Emperor Alexander will be waiting for him in a position so admirably suited to the defence of the capital of Lithuania; the defiles are deserted, he can hardly believe his eyes; the vanguard has already made the passage without the least opposition; he storms, he scolds, he threatens; not only is the enemy unapproachable, it is invisible. It is a preconceived plan, a skilfully arranged retreat; he knows the Russians from past experience, and when once they have received orders to fight, they become living walls which may be thrown down but never recoil.
In spite of possible danger Napoleon must profit by the retreat of the enemy. Accompanied by an escort of Poles he enters Vilna. The Lithuanians welcome with shouts of joy and enthusiasm the men whom they regard as compatriots and the leader who will bring them salvation; but Napoleon, harassed with anxiety, passes through Vilna, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, and hurries to the outposts who are already beyond the city walls. At last, he receives news of the Russians; the 8th Hussars, who had rashly plunged into a wood without any support, have been cut to pieces. Napoleon breathes again, he has no longer to deal with a phantom army; the enemy is retreating in the direction of Drissa; the Emperor hurls Murat and his cavalry after them, then he returns to Vilna and takes possession of the palace, deserted by Alexander only the previous evening. There he halts and pressing business claims his attention. Meanwhile the army continues to advance under the direction of his officers. Since a Russian army does exist, every effort must be made to force an engagement. Our convoys, our baggage waggons, our ambulances are not yet upon the scene; no matter, the indispensable thing now is a battle, for a battle means a victory, and Napoleon is thrusting four hundred thousand men into a country which failed to feed Charles XII. and his twenty thousand Swedes.
Most disastrous reports are brought in from every direction; the army, short of provisions, can only subsist by pillage; at last pillage no longer suffices. Then, although the country is friendly, recourse is had to threats, violence and incendiarism; doubtless this last mishap is due to carelessness, but whole villages fall victims to these accidents. In spite of everything the army begins to suffer, depression makes its appearance; there are ugly tales how young conscripts, less inured to hardships than the old campaigners, and unable to endure the prospect of long days of torture such as those they are experiencing, have turned their weapons upon themselves and left their brains scattered by the roadside. On both sides of the track are to be seen deserted ammunition limbers, and baggage wagons lying open and plundered as if they had been captured by the enemy, for more than ten thousand horses have died from eating the unripe rye.
Napoleon receives all these reports, but feigns disbelief. When visited in his apartments he is always to be seen poring over immense maps endeavouring to surmise the route the Russian army will follow; lacking positive data, he relies on his genius and believes he has discovered Alexander’s plan. The Czar’s patience will hold out so long as the French do not trample the soil of old Russia and only march across the modern conquests, but doubtless he will strain every nerve to defend Muscovy. But Muscovy does not begin until eighty leagues beyond Vilna. Two great rivers mark its borders — the Dnieper and the Dvina, the former rising above Viazma, the latter near Toropetz; they flow side by side for a distance of nearly sixty leagues from east to west, hugging the slopes of that great chain, the backbone of Russia, which extends from the Carpathian mountains to the Urals. They separate abruptly at Polotsk and Orsha, one to the right, the other to the left, the Dvina making for Riga on the Baltic, and the Dnieper for Kherson of the Black Sea, but before finally parting they almost reunite to embrace Smolensk and Vitebsk, the keys of St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Unquestionably this is the spot where Alexander will await Napoleon.
In a moment the Emperor perceives the situation: Barclay de Tolly is retiring by Drissa on Vitebsk and Bagration on Smolensk by way of Borisov; together they will oppose the entry of France into Russia.
The following orders are hurriedly distributed: Davoust is to seize the Dnieper and with the assistance of the King of Westphalia, attempt to overtake Bagration before he can reach Minsk: Murat, Oudinot and Ney are to hasten after Barclay de Tolly; and Napoleon himself with his army of picked men, the Italian and Bavarian divisions, the Imperial Guard and the Poles, a total of a hundred and fifty thousand men, will march between the two forces, ready to make a rapid deviation and unite with Davoust or with Murat, should either have need of his assistance to stave off an attack or to accomplish a victory.
A quarrel as to precedence between Davoust and the King of Westphalia gave Bagration his opportunity. Davoust at length overtakes him at Moghilev, but what should have been a battle degenerates into a skirmish; however, the desired end is partly attained, Bagration is compelled to abandon the direct route to Smolensk and make a wide détour.
On the left wing the same thing happens to Murat, who at length succeeds in getting in touch with Barclay de Tolly and every day there is an affair of outpost between the Russian rearguard and the French van; then Subervic and his light cavalry attack the Russians on the Visna and capture two hundred prisoners, while Montbrun’s artillery annihilates Korf’s division, when the latter is trying in vain to destroy a bridge in the rear, meanwhile Sébastiani enters Vidzi which had been abandoned by the Emperor Alexander only the previous evening.
Barclay de Tolly decides to wait for the French in the entrenched camp at Drissa where he hopes to be joined by Bagration; but at the end of three or four days he learns of the check to the Russian Prince and the point scored by Napoleon. If he does not hurry the French will be at Vitebsk first; so orders to advance are given and the Russian army, after this momentary halt, is once more in full retreat.
As for Napoleon, on the 16th he left Vilna, by the 17th he had got to Sventrioni and on the 18th he was at Klupokoé. There he learns that Barclay has evacuated his camp at Drissa; he supposed him to be already at Vitebsk; perhaps there is time for him to get there before him. He starts immediately for Kamen. Six days are spent in forced marches, but the enemy is not even sighted. The army marches forward on the alert, ready to wheel round at the call of danger. At length on the 24th the rumbling of cannon is heard in the direction of Bezenkovitzi; it is Eugène engaged on the Dvina with Barclay’s rearguard. Napoleon dashes in the direction of the firing, but all is over before he can come up with the combatants, and when at length he arrives on the scene he finds Eugène busy repairing the bridge, destroyed by the retreating Doctorov. He crosses the instant it is possible; not that he is in a hurry to take possession of the river, his latest conquest, but to see for himself in which direction the Russian army is marching. From the appearance of the enemy’s rearguard, and the remarks of some prisoners, he gathers that Barclay must be already at Vitebsk. He had made no mistake about the enemy’s plan, Barclay will await him there.
Napoleon has reached the spot where he directed his troops to concentrate a month ago. Looking back, he can discern, in three several directions, the gradual approach of three separate columns, which left the Niemen at different dates and different roads. All these troops, from a distance of a hundred leagues, arrive at the appointed spot, not only on the day resolved upon, but almost at the same hour. It is a masterpiece of strategy.
They meet at Bezenkovitzi and its neighbourhood, infantry, cavalry and artillery crowd and jostle together, intersect one another, get in each others way and push each other about in the utmost disorder. Some hunt for food, some for forage, while others search for quarters; the streets are blocked by orderlies and aides-de-camp who cannot force a way through the masses of common soldiers, so largely has the distinction between the different ranks already disappeared, and this forward movement assumed the features of a retreat. For six hours two hundred thousand men essay the task of bivouacing in a village of five hundred houses.
At length about ten o’clock at night orders arrive from Napoleon to collect the staff officers lost in this multitude, two-thirds of whom have not eaten or drunk anything for the last twelve hours and are on the point of coming to blows. The officers mount and set out in the name of the Emperor, the only name to have any effect on the mob. Instantly, and as if by magic, the confused masses melt away; every man returns to his post and all rally to their colours; long files thread their way through the crowds, like streams flowing from a lake, and march forth with bands playing. The crowds disperse in the direction of Ostrovno and at Bezenkovitzi an oppressive silence succeeds the frightful turmoil. Conscious of the vigour and rapidity with which orders have been received and carried out, every man feels certain that a battle is imminent and such a conviction always awakens the most solemn thoughts in an army.
At daybreak the army awakens to find itself drawn up en échelon along a wide road bordered by birch trees. Murat and the cavalry are in the rear. He has under him Dumont, du Coêtlosquet and Carignan, with the 8th Hussars as scouts. The latter, under the impression that two regiments of their division have gone ahead on the flanks, press on confidently in the direction of Ostrovno, in ignorance that the regiments are hampered by the inequalities of the ground, and that instead of following, they are actually in front of them. Suddenly the head of the French column when nearly at the top of some rising ground, catches sight of a line of cavalry ranged in order of battle along the ridge of the hill, and takes it for the two regiments of scouts. General Piré receives orders to charge, but he cannot believe that what he sees in front of him is the enemy; he sends an officer to reconnoitre the mysterious troops and continues on his way. The officer sets off at a gallop, but almost before he reaches the summit he is surrounded and made prisoner. At this juncture six pieces of cannon thunder forth together and mow down whole files. It is no longer any question of strategy; a shout of “Charge!” rings out, and the 8th Hussars and the 10th Chasseurs dart forth, and at the first assault, before there is time to reload them a second time, fall upon the pieces, capture them, throw into confusion the opposing regiment, pierce the lines through and through and find themselves in the rear of the Russians. Seeing nothing in front of them they wheel round and perceive that the regiment which they left on the right is stupefied at such impetuosity. They immediately attack it while engaged in executing a quarter turn and annihilate it; they retrace their steps and perceiving that the regiment on the left is in full retreat, follow, attack, and send it flying to the woods which form a continuous belt round the town of Ostrovno. Just then Murat approaches the hill with all the men he can muster: he orders his reinforcements to the front masses the whole force upon the woods, for he imagines he is only dealing with the rearguard; however he receives a check. In all probability the Russian army is at Ostrovno. Murat rapidly surveys the position and perceives that it is in reality excellent, though he finds himself more involved than he could wish; but Murat is not the man to retreat, and he orders the leaders of the column, composed of the Bruyère and Saint-Germain divisions, to hold the positions they have just gained.
This matter settled, he puts himself at the head of the light cavalry and awaits the enemy, whose turn it is now to debouch; every man who ventures outside the wood is instantly assailed; the Russians approach with a view to attack but are compelled to put themselves on the defensive. The cavalry are cut to pieces by the long lances of the Poles, the infantry are sabred by the Hussars and the Chasseurs. But the woods are of as much service to the Russians as the earth was to Antaeus: scarcely had they disappeared within them, before they came rushing out more numerous than ever. So hot is the attack, that lances are broken, swords lose their edge and the infantry have exhausted their ammunition. At this critical moment the Delzons division makes its appearance on the rising ground coming up at the charge and eager for the fight. Murat notes its approach, orders it up at the double quick and throws it against the enemy’s right. At sight of reinforcements the enemy wavers; Murat orders a final assault; and now there is no show of resistance, the Russians are in full retreat; the French army comes up to the woods, which no longer vomit flames, and sweeping through them arrive at the further edge, only to see the Russian rearguard disappearing into another belt of forest.
Eugène hurries up bringing fresh reinforcements; but it is too late to venture into the unexplored defiles; night is falling, the advance must be postponed to the morrow. Murat and Eugène specify the various positions the troops are to occupy and establish all the artillery at their disposal upon a neighbouring slope. Then they retire to the same tent and fall asleep without undressing.
Réveille sounds before daybreak. The Russians are likewise drawn up for action; Murat and Eugène have no longer to deal with a paltry rearguard, but with a whole army corps. Palhen and Konovnitzin have joined forces with Ostermann. What matter? are they not themselves the advance guard of the Grand Army and will they not be reinforced by Napoleon?
At five in the morning the French are astir, Murat is laying out his plans of action, his left wing is already under way to attack the Russians while the right is awaiting his instructions. Suddenly Murat hears a great commotion; it is the cheering of ten thousand Russians who, pouring from the wood in dense masses, encounter our cavalry and infantry and twice drive them back. The brave fellows have been on the defensive too long, the order to advance has been given and they are taking advantage of it.
Murat takes note of these troops advancing to our artillery, which shows signs of uneasiness, for their fire seems to take no effect and the furrows ploughed through the packed columns are instantly closed up. The 84th regiment and a battalion of Croats check the advancing hordes and only retire step by step; but as they do so, heaps of dead are left behind and crowds of wounded and even a few fugitives. There are but two alternatives, — either to be annihilated or to disperse and leave our artillery unprotected save for the gunners. At the sight the right, which had so far stood firm, begins to waver, and the preliminary symptoms of panic become apparent. There is not an instant to be lost; in restricted and encumbered ground a check soon develops into a disaster.
Murat gives his orders with the promptness and decision that such a crisis demands. The right, instead of waiting to be attacked, will itself act on the aggressive, with General Piré in command.
General Anthouard is to hasten to his gunners and compel them to hold their ground; if need arise they must die at their posts.
General Girardin is to rally the 106th Regiment and again throw it against the Russian right wing, which continues to advance, while Murat will make a flank attack with a regiment of Polish lancers.
Everyone hurries to his post at lightning speed.
Murat dashes to the front of the Polish troops, and harangues them; the regiment believing that the King himself is going to lead them into action, answer with cheers, and lowering their lances charge. Murat, who only intended to urge them on, is perforce compelled himself to lead them; the lances in the rear spreading across the whole extent of the ground constrain him to gallop; he can neither pull up nor escape to one side; he accepts the situation like a hero, draws his sword, and shouting “Forward,” heads the charge as if he were a mere Captain and is lost to sight with the whole regiment amid the enemy’s ranks, which are pierced through and through and thrown into dire confusion by the tremendous carnage.
On the further side he falls in with Girardin and his regiment; and from a hill top he watches the effect of his artillery which is now firing with redoubled energy, while a well-sustained fusillade on the extreme left informs him that General Piré is not belying his great reputation.
Thus does the struggle continue for two hours with no material advantage to either side. At last the Russians give way and commence to abandon the ground, but step by step, like men yielding to orders rather than a beaten army in retreat. Finally they reach the woods once more and disappear while the French are left in possession of the open.
Murat and Eugène hesitate to pursue them through the thick forest. At this moment the Emperor appears on the scene, and putting spurs to his horse, gallops up to the top of the hill, which commands the battle field. There he draws rein and poses like an equestrian statue. Murat and Eugène are quickly at his side. In a few words they explain how they have been checked.
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