he merely saves us a great deal of trouble and all our
arrangements to the minutest detail remain the same."

"How is that?..." began Prince Andrew, who had for long been waiting an
opportunity to express his doubts.

Kutuzov here woke up, coughed heavily, and looked round at the generals.

"Gentlemen, the dispositions for tomorrow--or rather for today, for it
is past midnight--cannot now be altered," said he. "You have heard them,
and we shall all do our duty. But before a battle, there is nothing more
important..." he paused, "than to have a good sleep."

He moved as if to rise. The generals bowed and retired. It was past
midnight. Prince Andrew went out.

The council of war, at which Prince Andrew had not been able to
express his opinion as he had hoped to, left on him a vague and uneasy
impression. Whether Dolgorukov and Weyrother, or Kutuzov, Langeron, and
the others who did not approve of the plan of attack, were right--he did
not know. "But was it really not possible for Kutuzov to state his views
plainly to the Emperor? Is it possible that on account of court and
personal considerations tens of thousands of lives, and my life, my
life," he thought, "must be risked?"

"Yes, it is very likely that I shall be killed tomorrow," he thought.
And suddenly, at this thought of death, a whole series of most distant,
most intimate, memories rose in his imagination: he remembered his last
parting from his father and his wife; he remembered the days when he
first loved her. He thought of her pregnancy and felt sorry for her and
for himself, and in a nervously emotional and softened mood he went out
of the hut in which he was billeted with Nesvitski and began to walk up
and down before it.

The night was foggy and through the fog the moonlight gleamed
mysteriously. "Yes, tomorrow, tomorrow!" he thought. "Tomorrow
everything may be over for me! All these memories will be no more, none
of them will have any meaning for me. Tomorrow perhaps, even certainly,
I have a presentiment that for the first time I shall have to show all I
can do." And his fancy pictured the battle, its loss, the concentration
of fighting at one point, and the hesitation of all the commanders. And
then that happy moment, that Toulon for which he had so long waited,
presents itself to him at last. He firmly and clearly expresses his
opinion to Kutuzov, to Weyrother, and to the Emperors. All are struck by
the justness of his views, but no one under