War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [644]
This movement from the Nizhni Novgorod to the Ryazan, Tula, and Kaluga roads was so natural that the looters of the Russian army ran back in that same direction, and it was in that same direction that demands came from Petersburg for Kutuzov to move his army. In Tarutino, Kutuzov was almost reprimanded by the sovereign for leading the army to the Ryazan road, and that very position opposite Kaluga was pointed out to him which he was already in when he received the sovereign’s letter.
Rolling back in the direction of the push given it during the whole campaign and at the battle of Borodino, the ball of the Russian army, with the exhaustion of the force of the push, and not receiving any new pushes, assumed the position that was natural for it.
Kutuzov’s merit consisted not in some strategic maneuver of genius, as they call it, but in that he alone understood the significance of what was happening. He alone already understood then the significance of the French army’s inactivity, he alone went on insisting that the battle of Borodino had been a victory; he alone—who, it would seem, in his position as commander in chief, should have been disposed to attack—he alone used all his powers to keep the Russian army from useless battles.
The beast wounded at Borodino lay there where the fleeing hunter had left it; but whether it was alive, whether it was strong or only lying low, the hunter did not know. Suddenly the groaning of that beast was heard.
The groaning of that wounded beast, the French army, which betrayed its destruction, was the sending of Lauriston to Kutuzov’s camp with a request for peace.
Napoleon, with his assurance that the good was not what was good but whatever came into his head, wrote to Kutuzov the first words that came into his head, which had no meaning at all. He wrote:
Monsieur le prince Koutouzov,
J’envoie près de vous un de mes aides de camps généraux pour vous entretenir de plusieurs objets intéressants. Je désire que Votre Altesse ajoute foi à ce qu’il lui dira, surtout lorsqu’il exprimera les sentiments d’estime et de particulière considération que j’ai depuis longtemps pour sa personne…Cette lettre n’étant à autre fin, je prie Dieu, Monsieur le prince Koutouzov, qu’il vous ait en sa sainte et digne garde.*685
Moscou, le 3 Octobre, 1812. Signé:
Napoléon.
Je serais maudit par la postérité si l’on me regardait comme le premier moteur d’un accommodement quelconque. Tel est l’esprit actuel de ma nation.†686
So Kutuzov replied, and he went on using all his powers to keep the troops from attacking.
During the month that the French troops were looting Moscow and the Russian troops were quietly stationed at Tarutino, a change took place in the relative strength of the two armies (in spirit and numbers), as a result of which the advantage of strength turned out to be on the Russian side. Though the position of the French troops and their number were unknown to the Russians, as soon as the relations changed, the necessity of attacking expressed itself at once in a countless number of signs. These signs were: the sending of Lauriston, the abundance of provisions in Tarutino, the information coming from all sides about the inactivity and disorder of the French, the replenishing of our regiments with recruits, the good weather, the prolonged rest of the Russian soldiers, the impatience usually resulting from rest among troops to do what they had all been brought together for, curiosity about what was happening in the French army they had so long lost sight of, the boldness with which Russian outposts now poked around the French stationed at Tarutino, the news of easy victories of the peasants and partisans over the French, the envy it gave rise to, the desire for revenge that lay in each man’s soul as long as the French were in Moscow, and (above all) the vague awareness which emerged in the soul of every soldier that the relations of strength had now changed and the advantage was now