ions, and slipping between the legs of the generals she darted
out of the room.

When he had dismissed the generals Kutuzov sat a long time with his
elbows on the table, thinking always of the same terrible question:
"When, when did the abandonment of Moscow become inevitable? When was
that done which settled the matter? And who was to blame for it?"

"I did not expect this," said he to his adjutant Schneider when the
latter came in late that night. "I did not expect this! I did not think
this would happen."

"You should take some rest, your Serene Highness," replied Schneider.

"But no! They shall eat horseflesh yet, like the Turks!" exclaimed
Kutuzov without replying, striking the table with his podgy fist. "They
shall too, if only..."

CHAPTER V

At that very time, in circumstances even more important than retreating
without a battle, namely the evacuation and burning of Moscow,
Rostopchin, who is usually represented as being the instigator of that
event, acted in an altogether different manner from Kutuzov.

After the battle of Borodino the abandonment and burning of Moscow was
as inevitable as the retreat of the army beyond Moscow without fighting.

Every Russian might have predicted it, not by reasoning but by the
feeling implanted in each of us and in our fathers.

The same thing that took place in Moscow had happened in all the towns
and villages on Russian soil beginning with Smolensk, without the
participation of Count Rostopchin and his broadsheets. The people
awaited the enemy unconcernedly, did not riot or become excited or tear
anyone to pieces, but faced its fate, feeling within it the strength to
find what it should do at that most difficult moment. And as soon as the
enemy drew near the wealthy classes went away abandoning their property,
while the poorer remained and burned and destroyed what was left.

The consciousness that this would be so and would always be so was and
is present in the heart of every Russian. And a consciousness of this,
and a foreboding that Moscow would be taken, was present in Russian
Moscow society in 1812. Those who had quitted Moscow already in July
and at the beginning of August showed that they expected this. Those who
went away, taking what they could and abandoning their houses and half
their belongings, did so from the latent patriotism which expresses
itself not by phrases or by giving one's children to save the fatherland
and similar unnatural exp