the Apsherons.

"Here it is! The decisive moment has arrived. My turn has come," thought
Prince Andrew, and striking his horse he rode up to Kutuzov.

"The Apsherons must be stopped, your excellency," cried he. But at that
very instant a cloud of smoke spread all round, firing was heard quite
close at hand, and a voice of naive terror barely two steps from Prince
Andrew shouted, "Brothers! All's lost!" And at this as if at a command,
everyone began to run.

Confused and ever-increasing crowds were running back to where five
minutes before the troops had passed the Emperors. Not only would it
have been difficult to stop that crowd, it was even impossible not to
be carried back with it oneself. Bolkonski only tried not to lose touch
with it, and looked around bewildered and unable to grasp what was
happening in front of him. Nesvitski with an angry face, red and unlike
himself, was shouting to Kutuzov that if he did not ride away at once
he would certainly be taken prisoner. Kutuzov remained in the same place
and without answering drew out a handkerchief. Blood was flowing from
his cheek. Prince Andrew forced his way to him.

"You are wounded?" he asked, hardly able to master the trembling of his
lower jaw.

"The wound is not here, it is there!" said Kutuzov, pressing the
handkerchief to his wounded cheek and pointing to the fleeing soldiers.
"Stop them!" he shouted, and at the same moment, probably realizing that
it was impossible to stop them, spurred his horse and rode to the right.

A fresh wave of the flying mob caught him and bore him back with it.

The troops were running in such a dense mass that once surrounded by
them it was difficult to get out again. One was shouting, "Get on! Why
are you hindering us?" Another in the same place turned round and fired
in the air; a third was striking the horse Kutuzov himself rode. Having
by a great effort got away to the left from that flood of men, Kutuzov,
with his suite diminished by more than half, rode toward a sound of
artillery fire near by. Having forced his way out of the crowd of
fugitives, Prince Andrew, trying to keep near Kutuzov, saw on the slope
of the hill amid the smoke a Russian battery that was still firing and
Frenchmen running toward it. Higher up stood some Russian infantry,
neither moving forward to protect the battery nor backward with the
fleeing crowd. A mounted general separated himself from the infantry and
approached Kutuzov. Of Kutuzov's s