It was on the 14th of November, about five in the morning, that the imperial column at last quitted Smolensk. Its march was still firm, but gloomy and silent as night, like the mute and sombre aspect of the country through which it was advancing.
This stillness was only interrupted by the cracking of the whips applied to the horses, and by short and violent imprecations when they met with ravines, and when down these icy declivities, men, horses, and artillery were rolling in the darkness one over the other. The first day they advanced five leagues, and the artillery of the guard took twenty-two hours to get over that distance.
Kutusoff, at the same time, with the bulk of his army, moved forward, and took a position in the rear of these advanced corps, within reach of them all, felicitating himself on the success of his manœuvres, which, after all, would inevitably have failed, owing to his tardiness, had it not been for our want of foresight; for this was a contest of errors, in which, ours being the greatest, we narrowly escaped total destruction. Having made these dispositions, the Russian commander must have believed that the French army was entirely in his power; but this belief saved us. Kutusoff was wanting to himself at the moment of action; his old age executed only half, and that badly, the plans which it had wisely combined.
During the time that all these masses were arranging themselves round Napoleon, he remained perfectly tranquil in a miserable hut, the only one left standing in Korythnia, apparently quite unconscious of all these movements of infantry, artillery, and cavalry, which were surrounding him in all directions; at least he sent no orders to the three corps which had halted at Smolensk, to expedite their march, and he himself waited for daylight to proceed.
His column was advancing without precaution, preceded by a crowd of stragglers, all eager to reach Krasnoë, when, at two leagues from that place, a line of Cossacks, extending from the heights on our left across the great road, appeared before them. Seized with astonishment, these stragglers instantly halted: they had looked for nothing of the kind, and with their first impressions were led to believe that relentless fate had traced upon the snow between them and Europe that long, black, and motionless line as the fatal term assigned to their hopes.
Suddenly a Russian battery began firing. Their balls crossed the road. The German corps became confused and made no attempt to meet this attack. But a wounded officer who chanced to be there assumed the command of the Germans, and the men obeyed him as if he had been their rightful leader. On seeing this advanced column of Germans march forward in such good order, the enemy confined himself to attacking it with his artillery, which it disregarded and soon left behind. When it came to the turn of the Old Guard to pass through this fire, they closed their ranks around Napoleon like a movable fortress, proud of the honor of protecting him. Their band of music expressed their satisfaction. When the danger was greatest, it played the well-known air, "Where can one be happier than in the bosom of his family?" But the emperor, whom nothing escaped, stopped them with the exclamation, "Rather play, 'Let us watch for the safety of the empire!'" words much better suited to the feelings which then occupied him, and to the general condition of affairs.
At the same time, the enemy's fire becoming troublesome, he gave orders to silence it, and in two hours he reached Krasnoë.
On the 17th, before daylight, Napoleon issued his orders, armed himself, and going out on foot at the head of his Old Guard, began his march. But it was not towards Poland, his ally, that he directed it, nor towards France, where he would still be received as the head of a new dynasty, and the Emperor of the West. His words on grasping his sword on this occasion were, "I have sufficiently acted the emperor; it is time I should become the general." He turned back upon eighty thousand of the enemy, plunging into the thickest of them, in order to draw all their efforts against himself, to make a diversion in favor of Davoust and Ney, and to rescue them from a country, the gates of which were closed against them.
Daylight at last appeared, exhibiting on the one part the Russian battalions and batteries, which on three sides, in front, on our right, and in our rear, bounded the horizon, and on the other Napoleon, with his six thousand guards, advancing with a firm step, and proceeding to take his place in the centre of that terrible circle. At the same time, Mortier, a few yards in front of the emperor, deployed,[170] in the face of the whole Russian army, with the five thousand men still remaining to him.
Here, then, it was made evident that renown is something more than a vain shadow, that it is real strength, and doubly powerful from the inflexible pride which it imparts to its favorites, and the timid precautions it imposes on those who venture to attack it. The enemy had only to march forward without manœuvring, or even firing; their mass alone was sufficient to crush Napoleon with all his feeble battalions; still they did not dare come to close quarters with him. They were awed at the presence of the conqueror of Egypt and of Europe. The Pyramids, Marengo, Austerlitz, Friedland, a host of victories seemed to rise between him and the astounded Russians. Might we not also fancy that, in the eyes of that passive and superstitious people, a renown so extraordinary appeared like something supernatural? that they regarded it as wholly beyond their power, or, at least, believed that they could safely assail it only from a distance? and, in short, that against that Old Guard, that living fortress, that column of granite, as it had been called by its leader, human efforts were impotent, or that cannon alone could demolish it?