oice."

But he sent an adjutant to take the news round the army.

When Scherbinin came galloping from the left flank with news that the
French had captured the fleches and the village of Semenovsk, Kutuzov,
guessing by the sounds of the battle and by Scherbinin's looks that the
news was bad, rose as if to stretch his legs and, taking Scherbinin's
arm, led him aside.

"Go, my dear fellow," he said to Ermolov, "and see whether something
can't be done."

Kutuzov was in Gorki, near the center of the Russian position. The
attack directed by Napoleon against our left flank had been several
times repulsed. In the center the French had not got beyond Borodino,
and on their left flank Uvarov's cavalry had put the French to flight.

Toward three o'clock the French attacks ceased. On the faces of all
who came from the field of battle, and of those who stood around him,
Kutuzov noticed an expression of extreme tension. He was satisfied with
the day's success--a success exceeding his expectations, but the old
man's strength was failing him. Several times his head dropped low as if
it were falling and he dozed off. Dinner was brought him.

Adjutant General Wolzogen, the man who when riding past Prince Andrew
had said, "the war should be extended widely," and whom Bagration so
detested, rode up while Kutuzov was at dinner. Wolzogen had come from
Barclay de Tolly to report on the progress of affairs on the left flank.
The sagacious Barclay de Tolly, seeing crowds of wounded men running
back and the disordered rear of the army, weighed all the circumstances,
concluded that the battle was lost, and sent his favorite officer to the
commander in chief with that news.

Kutuzov was chewing a piece of roast chicken with difficulty and glanced
at Wolzogen with eyes that brightened under their puckering lids.

Wolzogen, nonchalantly stretching his legs, approached Kutuzov with a
half-contemptuous smile on his lips, scarcely touching the peak of his
cap.

He treated his Serene Highness with a somewhat affected nonchalance
intended to show that, as a highly trained military man, he left it to
Russians to make an idol of this useless old man, but that he knew whom
he was dealing with. "Der alte Herr" (as in their own set the Germans
called Kutuzov) "is making himself very comfortable," thought Wolzogen,
and looking severely at the dishes in front of Kutuzov he began to
report to "the old gentleman" the position of affairs on the left fla