propped up by musket rests, and a campfire was built before
it. They beat the tattoo, called the roll, had supper, and settled down round the fires for the nightsome repairing their
footgear, some smoking pipes, and some stripping themselves naked to steam the lice out of their shirts.
2061
Chapter VIII
One would have thought that under the almost incredibly wretched conditions the Russian soldiers were in at
that timelacking warm boots and sheepskin coats, without
a roof over their heads, in the snow with eighteen degrees
of frost, and without even full rations (the commissariat did
not always keep up with the troops)they would have presented a very sad and depressing spectacle.
On the contrary, the army had never under the best material conditions presented a more cheerful and animated
aspect. This was because all who began to grow depressed
or who lost strength were sifted out of the army day by day.
All the physically or morally weak had long since been left
behind and only the flower of the armyphysically and mentallyremained.
More men collected behind the wattle fence of the Eighth
Company than anywhere else. Two sergeants major were
sitting with them and their campfire blazed brighter than
others. For leave to sit by their wattle they demanded contributions of fuel.
‘Eh, Makeev! What has become of you, you son of a bitch?
Are you lost or have the wolves eaten you? Fetch some more
wood!’ shouted a red-haired and red-faced man, screwing
up his eyes and blinking because of the smoke but not moving back from the fire. ‘And you, Jackdaw, go and fetch some
2062
War and Peace
wood!’ said he to another soldier.
This red-haired man was neither a sergeant nor a corporal, but being robust he ordered about those weaker than
himself. The soldier they called ‘Jackdaw,’ a thin little fellow
with a sharp nose, rose obediently and was about to go but
at that instant there came into the light of the fire the slender, handsome figure of a young soldier carrying a load of
wood.
‘Bring it herethat’s fine!’
They split up the wood, pressed it down on the fire, blew
at it with their mouths, and fanned it with the skirts of their
greatcoats, making the flames hiss and crackle. The men
drew nearer and lit their pipes. The handsome young soldier who had brought the wood, setting his arms akimbo,
began stamping his cold feet rapidly and deftly on the spot
where he stood.
‘Mother! The dew is cold but clear…. It’s well that I’m a
musketeer…’ he sang, pretending to hiccough after each syllable.
‘Look out, your soles will fly off!’ shouted the red-haired
man, noticing that the sole of the dancer’s boot was hanging
loose. ‘What a fellow you are for dancing!’
The dancer stopped, pulled off the loose piece of leather,
and threw it on the fire.
‘Right enough, friend,’ said he, and, having sat down,
took out of his knapsack a scrap of blue French cloth, and
wrapped it round his foot. ‘It’s the steam that spoils them,’
he added, stretching out his feet toward the fire.
‘They’ll soon be issuing us new ones. They say that when
2063
we’ve finished hammering them, we’re to receive double
kits!’
‘And that son of a bitch Petrov has lagged behind after
all, it seems,’ said one sergeant major.
‘I’ve had an eye on him this long while,’ said the other.
‘Well, he’s a poor sort of soldier..’
‘But in the Third Company they say nine men were missing yesterday.’
‘Yes, it’s all very well, but when a man’s feet are frozen
how can he walk?’
‘Eh? Don’t talk nonsense!’ said a sergeant major.
‘Do you want to be doing the same?’ said an old soldier,
turning reproachfully to the man who had spoken of frozen feet.
‘Well, you know,’ said the sharp-nosed man they called
Jackdaw in a squeaky and unsteady voice, raising himself at
the other side of the fire, ‘a plump man gets thin, but for a
thin one it’s death. Take me, now! I’ve got no strength left,’
he added, with sudden resolution turning to the sergeant
major. ‘Tell them to send me to hospital; I’m aching all over;
anyway I shan’t be able to keep up.’
‘That’ll do, that’ll do!’ replied the sergeant major quietly.
The soldier said no more and the talk went on.
‘What a lot of those Frenchies were taken today, and the
fact is that not one of them had what you might call real
boots on,’ said a soldier, starting a new theme. ‘They were
no more than make-believes.’
‘The Cossacks have taken their boots. They were clearing
2064
War and Peace
the hut for the colonel and carried them out. It was pitiful to
see them, boys,’ put in the dancer. ‘As they turned them over
one seemed still alive and, would you believe it, he jabbered
something in their lingo.’
‘But they’re a clean folk, lads,’ the first man went on; ‘he
was whiteas white as birchbarkand some of them are such
fine fellows, you might think they were nobles.’
‘Well, what do you think? They make soldiers of all classes there.’
‘But they don’t understand our talk at all,’ said the dancer with a puzzled smile. ‘I asked him whose subject he was,
and he jabbered in his own way. A queer lot!’
‘But it’s strange, friends,’ continued the man who had
wondered at their whiteness, ‘the peasants at Mozhaysk
were saying that when they began burying the deadwhere
the battle was you knowwell, those dead had been lying
there for nearly a month, and says the peasant, ‘they lie as
white as paper, clean, and not as much smell as a puff of
powder smoke.’’
‘Was it from the cold?’ asked someone.
‘You’re a clever fellow! From the cold indeed! Why, it was
hot. If it had been from the cold, ours would not have rotted
either. ‘But,’ he says, ‘go up to ours and they are all rotten
and maggoty. So,’ he says, ‘we tie our faces up with kerchiefs
and turn our heads away as we drag them off: we can hardly do it. But theirs,’ he says, ‘are white as paper and not so
much smell as a whiff of gunpowder.’’
All were silent.
‘It must be from their food,’ said the sergeant major.
2065
‘They used to gobble the same food as the gentry.’
No one contradicted him.
‘That peasant near Mozhaysk where the battle was said
the men were all called up from ten villages around and
they carted for twenty days and still didn’t finish carting
the dead away. And as for the wolves, he says..’
‘That was a real battle,’ said an old soldier. ‘It’s the only
one worth remembering; but since that… it’s only been tormenting folk.’
‘And do you know, Daddy, the day before yesterday we
ran at them and, my word, they didn’t let us get near before they just threw down their muskets and went on their
knees. ‘Pardon!’ they say. That’s only one case. They say Platov took ‘Poleon himself twice. But he didn’t know the right
charm. He catches him and catches himno good! He turns
into a bird in his hands and flies away. And there’s no way
of killing him either.’
‘You’re a first-class liar, Kiselev, when I come to look at
you!’
‘Liar, indeed! It’s the real truth.’
‘If he fell into my hands, when I’d caught him I’d bury
him in the ground with an aspen stake to fix him down.
What a lot of men he’s ruined!’
‘Well, anyhow we’re going to end it. He won’t come here
again,’ remarked the old soldier, yawning.
The conversation flagged, and the soldiers began settling
down to sleep.
‘Look at the stars. It’s wonderful how they shine! You
would think the women had spread out their linen,’ said one
2066
War and Peace
of the men, gazing with admiration at the Milky Way.
‘That’s a sign of a good harvest next year.’
‘We shall want some more wood.’
‘You warm your back and your belly gets frozen. That’s
queer.’
‘O Lord!’
‘What are you pushing for? Is the fire only for you? Look
how he’s sprawling!’
In the silence that ensued, the snoring of those who
had fallen asleep could be heard. Others turned over and
warmed themselves, now and again exchanging a few
words. From a campfire a hundred paces off came a sound
of general, merry laughter.
‘Hark at them roaring there in the Fifth Company!’ said
one of the soldiers, and what a lot of them there are!’
One of the men got up and went over to the Fifth Company.
‘They’re having such fun,’ said he, coming back. ‘Two
Frenchies have turned up. One’s quite frozen and the other’s
an awful swaggerer. He’s singing songs…’
‘Oh, I’ll go across and have a look…’
And several of the men went over to the Fifth Company.
2067
Chapter IX
The fifth company was bivouacking at the very edge
of the forest. A huge campfire was blazing brightly in the
midst of the snow, lighting up the branches of trees heavy
with hoarfrost.
About midnight they heard the sound of steps in the
snow of the forest, and the crackling of dry branches.
‘A bear, lads,’ said one of the men.
They all raised their heads to listen, and out of the forest
into the bright firelight stepped two strangely clad human
figures clinging to one another.
These were two Frenchmen who had been hiding in the
forest. They came up to the fire, hoarsely uttering something
in a language our soldiers did not understand. One was taller than the other; he wore an officer’s hat and seemed quite
exhausted. On approaching the fire he had been going to
sit down, but fell. The other, a short sturdy soldier with a
shawl tied round his head, was stronger. He raised his companion and said something, pointing to his mouth. The
soldiers surrounded the Frenchmen, spread a greatcoat on
the ground for the sick man, and brought some buckwheat
porridge and vodka for both of them.
The exhausted French officer was Ramballe and the man
with his head wrapped in the shawl was Morel, his orderly.
When Morel had drunk some vodka and finished his
2068
War and Peace
bowl of porridge he suddenly became unnaturally merry
and chattered incessantly to the soldiers, who could not understand him. Ramballe refused food and resting his head
on his elbow lay
