CHAP. III.
From Königsberg to Gumbinnen, he reviewed several of his armies; conversing with the soldiers in a gay, frank, and often abrupt style; well aware that, with such unsophisticated and hardy characters, abruptness is looked upon as frankness, rudeness as force, haughtiness as true nobility; and that the delicacy and graces which some officers bring with them from the salons are in their eyes no better than weakness and pusillanimity; that these appear to them like a foreign language, which they do not understand, and the accents of which strike them as ridiculous.
According to his usual custom, he promenaded before the ranks. Knowing in which of his wars each regiment had been with him, at the sight of the oldest soldiers he occasionally halted; to one he recalled the battle of the Pyramids; another he reminded of Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, or Friedland, and always by a single word, accompanied by a familiar caress. The veteran who believed himself personally recognized by his emperor, rose in consequence in the estimation of his junior companions, who regarded him as an object of envy.
Napoleon, in this manner, continued his inspection; he overlooked not even the youngest soldiers: it seemed as if every thing which concerned them was to him matter of deep interest; their least wants seemed known to him. He interrogated them: Did their captains take care of them? had they received their pay? were they in want of any requisite? he wished to see their knapsacks.
At length he stopped at the centre of the regiment; there being apprised of the places that were vacant, he required aloud the names of the most meritorious in the ranks; he called those who were so designated before him, and questioned them. How many years' service? how many campaigns? what wounds? what exploits? He then appointed them officers, and caused them to be immediately installed, himself prescribing the forms;—all particularities which delighted the soldier! They told each other how this great emperor, the judge of nations in the mass, occupied himself with them in their minutest details; that they composed his oldest and his real family! Thus it was that he instilled into them the love of war, of glory and himself.
The army, meantime, marched from the Vistula to the Niemen. This last river, from Grodno as far as Kowno, runs parallel with the Vistula. The river Pregel, which unites the two, was loaded with provisions: 220,000 men repaired thither from four different points; there they found bread and some foraging provisions. These provisions ascended that river with them, as far as its direction would allow.
When the army was obliged to quit the flotilla, its select corps took with them sufficient provisions to reach and cross the Niemen, to prepare for a victory, and to arrive at Wilna. There, the emperor calculated on the magazines of the inhabitants, on those of the enemy and on his own, which he had ordered to be brought from Dantzic, by the Frischhaff, the Pregel, the Deine, the canal Frederic, and the Vilia.
We were upon the verge of the Russian frontier; from right to left, or from south to north, the army was disposed in the following manner, in front of the Niemen. In the first place, on the extreme right, and issuing from Gallicia, on Drogiczin, Prince Schwartzenberg and 34,000 Austrians; on their left, coming from Warsaw, and marching on Bialystok and Grodno, the King of Westphalia, at the head of 79,200 Westphalians, Saxons, and Poles; by the side of them was the Viceroy of Italy, who had just effected the junction, near Marienpol and Pilony, of 79,500 Bavarians, Italians and French; next, the emperor, with 220,000 men, commanded by the King of Naples, the Prince of Eckmühl, the Dukes of Dantzic, Istria, Reggio, and Elchingen. They advanced from Thorn, Marienwerder, and Elbing, and, on the 23d of June, had assembled in a single mass near Nogarisky, a league above Kowno. Finally, in front of Tilsit, was Macdonald, and 32,500 Prussians, Bavarians, and Poles, composing the extreme left of the grand army.
Every thing was now ready. From the banks of the Guadalquivir, and the shores of the Calabrian sea, to the Vistula, were assembled 617,000 men, of whom 480,000 were already present; one siege and six bridge equipages, thousands of provision-waggons, innumerable herds of oxen, 1372 pieces of cannon, and thousands of artillery and hospital-waggons, had been directed, assembled, and stationed at a short distance from the Russian frontier river. The greatest part of the provision-waggons were alone behind.
Sixty thousand Austrians, Prussians, and Spaniards, were preparing to shed their blood for the conqueror of Wagram, of Jena, and of Madrid; for the man who had four times beaten down the power of Austria, who had humbled Prussia, and invaded Spain. And yet all were faithful to him. When it was considered that one-third of the army of Napoleon was either foreign to him or hostile, one hardly knew at which most to be astonished,—the audacity of one party, or the resignation of the other. It was in this manner that Rome made her conquests contribute to her future means for conquering.