chapter 13, verse 18, of the Apocalypse, it is said:
Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
And in the fifth verse of the same chapter:
And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months.
The French alphabet, written out with the same numerical values as the Hebrew, in which the first nine letters denote units and the others tens, will have the following significance:
a b c d e f g h i k 1 m n 0 p q r s t u v w x y z
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150 160
Writing the words L’Empereur Napoleon in numbers, it appears that the sum of them is 666,1 and that Napoleon was therefore the beast foretold in the Apocalypse. Moreover, by applying the same system to the words quarante-deux [Forty-two], which was the term allowed to the beast that “spoke great things and blasphemies,” the same number 666 was obtained; from which it followed that the limit fixed for Napoleon’s power had come in the year 1812 when the French emperor was forty-two.2 This prophecy3 pleased Pierre very much and he often asked himself what would put an end to the power of the beast, that is, of Napoleon, and tried by the same system of using letters as numbers and adding them up, to find an answer to the question that engrossed him. He wrote the words L’Empereur Alexandre, La nation russe and added up their numbers, but the sums were either more or less than 666. Once when making such calculations he wrote down his own name in French, Comte Pierre Besouhoff, but the sum of the numbers did not come right. Then he changed the spelling, substituting a z for the s and adding de and the article le, still without obtaining the desired result. Then it occurred to him: if the answer to the question were contained in his name, his nationality would also be given in the answer. So he wrote Le russe Besuhof and adding up the numbers got 671. This was only five too much, and five was represented by e, the very letter elided from the article le before the word Empereur. By omitting the e, though incorrectly, Pierre got the answer he sought. L’russe Besuhof made 666.4 This discovery excited him. How, or by what means, he was connected with the great event foretold in the Apocalypse he did not know, but he did not doubt that connection for a moment. His love for Natasha, Antichrist, Napoleon, the invasion, the comet, 666, L’Empereur Napoleon, and L’russe Besuhof—all this had to mature and culminate, to lift him out of that spellbound, petty sphere of Moscow habits in which he felt himself held captive and lead him to a great achievement and great happiness.
On the eve of the Sunday when the special prayer was read, Pierre had promised the Rostovs to bring them, from Count Rostopchin whom he knew well, both the appeal to the people and the news from the army. In the morning, when he went to call at Rostopchin’s he met there a courier fresh from the army, an acquaintance of his own, who often danced at Moscow balls.
“Do, please, for heaven’s sake, relieve me of something!” said the courier. “I have a sackful of letters to parents.”
Among these letters was one from Nicholas Rostov to his father. Pierre took that letter, and Rostopchin also gave him the Emperor’s appeal to Moscow, which had just been printed, the last army orders, and his own most recent bulletin. Glancing through the army orders, Pierre found in one of them, in the lists of killed, wounded, and rewarded, the name of Nicholas Rostov, awarded a St. George’s Cross of the Fourth Class for courage shown in the Ostrovna affair, and in the same order the name of Prince Andrew Bolkonski, appointed to the command of a regiment of Chasseurs. Though he did not want to remind the Rostovs of Bolkonski, Pierre could not refrain from making them happy by the news of their son’s having received a decoration, so he sent that printed army order and Nicholas’ letter to the Rostovs, keeping the appeal, the bulletin, and the other orders to take with him when he went to dinner.
His conversation with Count Rostopchin and the latter’s tone of anxious hurry, the meeting with the courier who talked casually of how badly things were going in the army, the rumors of the discovery of spies in Moscow and of a leaflet in circulation stating that Napoleon promised to be in both the Russian capitals by the autumn, and the talk of the Emperor’s being expected to arrive next day—all aroused with fresh force that feeling of agitation and expectation in Pierre which he had been conscious of ever since the appearance of the comet, and especially since the beginning of the war.
He had long been thinking of entering the army and would have done so had he not been hindered, first, by his membership of the Society of Freemasons to which he was bound by oath and which preached perpetual peace and the abolition of war, and secondly, by the fact that when he saw the great mass of Muscovites who had donned uniform and were talking patriotism, he somehow felt ashamed to take the step. But the chief reason for not carrying out his intention to enter the army lay in the vague idea that he was L’russe Besuhof who had the number of the beast, 666; that his part in the great affair of setting a limit to the power of the beast that spoke great and blasphemous things had been predestined from eternity, and that therefore he ought not to undertake anything, but wait for what was bound to come to pass.

Including a 5 for the letter e dropped by elision from the le before Empereur.—A.M.

Apparently the correspondence of quarante-deux with 666 was sufficient for Pierre, and it did not trouble him that the text spoke of months, while to fit the 42 to Napoleon it was necessary to take years. Napoleon’s forty-second birthday was on August 15, 1811; so that till August, 1812, he was, in ordinary parlance, forty-two.—A.M.

Apocalyptic calculations such as Pierre here indulged in were not unusual among the Freemasons, and efforts to foretell Napoleon’s fate by consulting that book were made in Russia even before his invasion.—A.M.

Russians transliterating their names into the Latin alphabet have generally followed no fixed rule but have adopted such spelling as, in this or that country, seemed to them most likely to cause people to pronounce the name correctly. So it occurs that the name, which on the system now usually adopted in England is spelt Bezukhov, could be written by Pierre in French in more than one way, and he found Besuhof most convenient for the purpose of his calculation.—A.M.

Pierre at the Rostóvs’. Natásha again takes up her singing. Sónya reads Alexander’s manifesto. Pétya declares that he will enter the army. Natásha realizes that Pierre loves her. He decides to cease going to the Rostóvs’
A FEW INTIMATE FRIENDS were dining with the Rostovs that day, as usual on Sundays.
Pierre came early so as to find them alone.
He had grown so stout this year that he would have been abnormal had he not been so tall, so broad of limb, and so strong that he carried his bulk with evident ease.
He went up the stairs, puffing and muttering something. His coachman did not even ask whether he was to wait. He knew that when his master was at the Rostovs’ he stayed till midnight. The Rostovs’ footman rushed eagerly forward to help him off with his cloak and take his hat and stick. Pierre, from club habit, always left both hat and stick in the anteroom.
The first person he saw in the house was Natasha. Even before he saw her, while taking off his cloak, he heard her. She was practicing solfa exercises in the music room. He knew that she had not sung since her illness, and so the sound of her voice surprised and delighted him. He opened the door softly and saw her, in the lilac dress she had worn at church, walking about the room singing. She had her back to him when he opened the door, but when, turning quickly, she saw his broad, surprised face, she blushed and came rapidly up to him.
“I want to try to sing again,” she said, adding as if by way of excuse, “it is, at least, something to do.”
“That’s capital!”
“How glad I am you’ve come! I am so happy today,” she said, with the old animation Pierre had not seen in her for a long time. “You know Nicholas has received a St. George’s Cross? I am so proud of him.”
“Oh yes, I sent that announcement. But I don’t want to interrupt you,” he added, and was about to go to the drawing room.
Natasha stopped him.
“Count, is it wrong of me to sing?” she said blushing, and fixing her eyes inquiringly on him.
“No . . . Why should it be? On the contrary . . . But why do you ask me?”
“I don’t know myself,” Natasha answered quickly, “but I should not like to do anything you disapproved of. I believe in you