Nevertheless, our young cavalry lieutenant is strutting in a group of the enemy’s officers.
“I knew Count Sasonoff well,” says one of the latter. “He is one of the true Russian counts, such as we like.”
“I also knew a Sasonoff,” replies the cavalry officer, “but he wasn’t a count, as far as I know. He is a small, dark man about your age.”
“That’s it, sir—that’s he. Oh, how I would like to see the dear count! If you see him, give him my regards. Captain Latour,” he adds, bowing.
“What a miserable business we are carrying on! It was hot last night, wasn’t it?” continues the cavalry officer, anxious to keep up the conversation, and pointing to the corpses.
“Oh, sir, it is frightful. But what fine fellows your soldiers are! It is a pleasure to fight with fine fellows like that.”
“It must be confessed that your fellows are up to snuff also,” replies the Russian horseman, with a salute, satisfied that he has given him a good answer.
But enough on this subject. Let us watch that ten-year-old boy, with an old worn cap on his head which doubtless belonged to his father, and with naked legs and large shoes on his feet, dressed in a pair of cotton trousers, held up by a single brace. He came out of the fortifications at the beginning of the truce. He has been walking about ever since on the low ground, examining with stupid curiosity the French soldiers and the dead bodies lying on the ground. He is gathering the little blue field-flowers with which the valley is strewn. He retraces his steps with a great bouquet, holding his nose so as not to smell the fetid odor that comes on the wind. Stopping near a heap of corpses, he looks a long time at a headless, hideous, dead man. After an examination, he goes near and touches with his foot the arm stretched stiffly in the air. As he presses harder on it the arm moves and falls into place. The boy gives a cry, hides his face in the flowers, and enters the fortifications, running at full speed.
Yes, flags of truce float over the bastions and on the intrenchments; the brilliantly shining sun is setting into the blue sea, which ripples and sparkles under the golden rays. Thousands of people assemble, look at each other, chat, laugh. These people, who are Christians, who profess to obey the great law of love and devotion, are looking at their work without throwing themselves down in repentance at the knees of Him who gave them life, and with life the fear of death, the love of the good and the beautiful. They do not embrace each other like brothers, and shed tears of joy and happiness! We must at least take consolation in the thought that we did not begin the war, that we are only defending our country, our native land. The white flags are lowered; the engines of death and of suffering thunder once more; again a flood of innocent blood is shed, and groans and curses can be heard.
I have said what I have wanted to say for this time at least, but a painful doubt overwhelms me. It would have been better, perhaps, to have kept silent, for possibly what I have uttered is among those pernicious truths obscurely hidden away in every one’s soul, and which, in order to remain harmless, must not be expressed; just as old wine must not be disturbed lest the sediment rise and make the liquid turbid. Where, then, in my tale do we see the evil we must avoid, and the good towards which we must strive to go? Where is the traitor? Where is the hero? All are good and all are bad. It is not Kalouguine with his brilliant courage, his gentlemanly bravado, and his vanity—the chief motive power of all his actions; it is not Praskoukine, an inoffensive cipher, although he fell on the battle-field for his faith, his ruler, and his country; nor timid Mikhaïloff; nor Pesth, that child with no conviction and no moral sense, who can pass for traitors or for heroes.