that if he relinquished his wounded, the
Cossacks would daily be seen triumphing over his sick and his
stragglers. He would appear to fly. All Europe would resound with the
report! Europe, which envied him, which was seeking a rival under whom
to rally, and would imagine that it had found such a rival in
Alexander."

The letter of which Lauriston was the bearer to the Czar had been
despatched on the 6th of October, and the answer to it could scarcely
arrive before the 20th: still, in spite of so many threatening
demonstrations, the pride, the policy, and perhaps the health of
Napoleon induced him to pursue the worst of all courses, that of waiting
for this answer, and of trusting to time, which was destroying him.
Daru, as well as his other officers, was astonished to find in him no
longer that prompt decision, variable and rapid as the occurrences which
called it forth: they asserted that his genius could no longer
accommodate itself to circumstances; and they placed it to the account
of his natural persistence, which had led to his elevation, and which
seemed destined to cause his downfall.

Sec. 9. Napoleon determines to leave Moscow.

Napoleon, however, was completely aware of his situation. To him
everything seemed lost if he receded in the face of astonished Europe,
and everything saved if he could surpass Alexander in determination. He
appreciated but too well the means that were left him to shake the
constancy of his rival; he knew that the diminishing number of his
effective troops, that his situation, the season, in short, everything,
would become daily more and more unfavorable to him; but he reckoned
upon that magic force which his renown gave him. Hitherto that had lent
to him a real and never failing strength: he endeavored, therefore, to
keep up, by specious arguments, the confidence of his army, and perhaps,
also, the faint hope that was still left to himself.

Moscow, empty of inhabitants, no longer furnished him with anything to
lay hold of. "It is no doubt a misfortune," he said, "but this
misfortune is not without its advantage. Had it been otherwise, he would
not have been able to keep order in so large a city, to overawe a
population of three hundred thousand souls, and to sleep in the Kremlin
but at the hazard of assassination. They have left us nothing but ruins,
but at least we are quiet among them. Millions have no doubt slipped
through our hands, but how many thousand millions is Russia