ed and the other pursued. Beyond Smolensk there were several
different roads available for the French, and one would have thought
that during their stay of four days they might have learned where
the enemy was, might have arranged some more advantageous plan and
undertaken something new. But after a four days' halt the mob, with no
maneuvers or plans, again began running along the beaten track, neither
to the right nor to the left but along the old--the worst--road, through
Krasnoe and Orsha.

Expecting the enemy from behind and not in front, the French separated
in their flight and spread out over a distance of twenty-four hours. In
front of them all fled the Emperor, then the kings, then the dukes. The
Russian army, expecting Napoleon to take the road to the right
beyond the Dnieper--which was the only reasonable thing for him to
do--themselves turned to the right and came out onto the highroad at
Krasnoe. And here as in a game of blindman's buff the French ran into
our vanguard. Seeing their enemy unexpectedly the French fell into
confusion and stopped short from the sudden fright, but then they
resumed their flight, abandoning their comrades who were farther behind.
Then for three days separate portions of the French army--first Murat's
(the vice-king's), then Davout's, and then Ney's--ran, as it were, the
gauntlet of the Russian army. They abandoned one another, abandoned
all their heavy baggage, their artillery, and half their men, and fled,
getting past the Russians by night by making semicircles to the right.

Ney, who came last, had been busying himself blowing up the walls of
Smolensk which were in nobody's way, because despite the unfortunate
plight of the French or because of it, they wished to punish the floor
against which they had hurt themselves. Ney, who had had a corps of ten
thousand men, reached Napoleon at Orsha with only one thousand men left,
having abandoned all the rest and all his cannon, and having crossed the
Dnieper at night by stealth at a wooded spot.

From Orsha they fled farther along the road to Vilna, still playing
at blindman's buff with the pursuing army. At the Berezina they again
became disorganized, many were drowned and many surrendered, but those
who got across the river fled farther. Their supreme chief donned a
fur coat and, having seated himself in a sleigh, galloped on alone,
abandoning his companions. The others who could do so drove away too,
leaving those who could not