Probably Caulaincourt did not sufficiently comprehend, that by that expression Napoleon only wished to point him out as a negotiator who would be agreeable to Alexander; for as soon as Balachoff was gone, he advanced towards the emperor, and in an angry tone, asked him why he had insulted him? exclaiming, "that he was a Frenchman! a true Frenchman! that he had proved it already; and would prove it again by repeating, that this war was impolitic and dangerous; that it would destroy his army, France, and himself. That, as to the rest, as he had just insulted him, he should quit him; that all that he asked of him was a division in Spain, where nobody wished to serve, and the furthest from his presence possible." The emperor attempted to appease him; but not being able to obtain a hearing, he withdrew, Caulaincourt still pursuing him with his reproaches. Berthier, who was present at this scene, interposed without effect. Bessières, more in the back-ground, had vainly tried to detain Caulaincourt by holding him by the coat.
The next day, Napoleon was unable to bring his grand equerry into his presence, without formal and repeated orders. At length he appeased him by caresses, and by the expression of an esteem and attachment which Caulaincourt well deserved. But he dismissed Balachoff with verbal and inadmissible proposals.
Alexander made no reply to them; the full importance of the step he had just taken was not at the time properly comprehended. It was his determination neither to address nor even answer Napoleon any more. It was a last word before an irreparable breach; and that circumstance rendered it remarkable.
Meantime, Murat pursued the flying steps of that victory which was so much coveted; he commanded the cavalry of the advanced guard; he at last reached the enemy on the road to Swentziani, and drove him in the direction of Druïa. Every morning, the Russian rear-guard appeared to have escaped him; every evening he overtook it again, and attacked it, but always in a strong position, after a long march, too late, and before his men had taken any refreshment; there were, consequently, every day fresh combats, producing no important results.
Other chiefs, by other routes, followed the same direction. Oudinot had passed the Vilia beyond Kowno, and already in Samogitia, to the north of Wilna, at Deweltowo, and at Vilkomir, had fallen in with the enemy, whom he drove before him towards Dünabourg. In this manner he marched on, to the left of Ney and the King of Naples, whose right was flanked by Nansouty. From the 15th of July, the river Düna, from Disna to Dünabourg, had been approached by Murat, Montbrun, Sebastiani, and Nansouty, by Oudinot and Ney, and by three divisions of the 1st corps, placed under the orders of the Count de Lobau.
It was Oudinot who presented himself before Dünabourg: he made an attempt on that town, which the Russians had vainly attempted to fortify. This too eccentric march of Oudinot displeased Napoleon. The river separated the two armies. Oudinot re-ascended it in order to put himself in communication with Murat; and Wittgenstein, in order to form a junction with Barclay. Dünabourg remained without assailants and without defenders.
On his march, Wittgenstein had a view, from the right bank, of Druïa, and a vanguard of French cavalry, which occupied that town with too negligent a security. Encouraged by the approach of night, he made one of his corps pass the river, and on the 15th, in the morning, the advanced posts of one of our brigades were surprised, sabred, and carried off. After this, Wittgenstein recalled his people to the right bank, and pursued his way with his prisoners, among whom was a French general. This coup-de-main gave Napoleon reason to hope for a battle: believing that Barclay was resuming the offensive, he suspended, for a short time, his march upon Witepsk, in order to concentrate his troops and direct them according to circumstances. This hope, however, was of short duration.
During these events, Davoust, at Osmiana, to the south of Wilna, had got sight of some scouts of Bagration, who was already anxiously seeking an outlet towards the north. Up to that time, short of a victory, the plan of the campaign adopted at Paris had completely succeeded. Aware that the enemy was extended over too long a defensive line, Napoleon had broken it by briskly attacking it in one direction, and by so doing had thrown it back and pursued its largest mass upon the Düna; while Bagration, whom he had not brought into contact till five days later, was still upon the Niemen. During an interval of several days, and over a front of eighty leagues, the manœuvre was the same as that which Frederic the Second had often employed upon a line of two leagues, and during an interval of some few hours.
Already Doctorof, and several scattered divisions of each of these two separated masses had only escaped by favour of the extent of the country, of chance, and of the usual causes of that ignorance, which always exists during war, as to what passes close at hand in the ranks of an enemy.
Several persons have pretended that there was too much circumspection or too much negligence in the first operations of the invasion; that from the Vistula, the assailing army had received orders to march with all the precaution of one attacked; that the aggression once commenced, and Alexander having fled, the advanced guard of Napoleon ought to have re-ascended the two banks of the Vilia with more celerity and more in advance, and that the army of Italy should have followed this movement more closely. Perhaps Doctorof, who commanded the left wing of Barclay, being forced to cross our line of attack, in order to fly from Lida toward Swentziany, might then have been made prisoner. Pajol repulsed him at Osmiana; but he escaped by Smorgony. Nothing but his baggage was taken; and Napoleon laid the blame of his escape on Prince Eugene, although he had himself prescribed to him every one of his movements.