t T., Prince V., and others. Then he bursts into one of his wild
furies and rages at everyone and everything, seizes the letters, opens
them, and reads those from the Emperor addressed to others. 'Ah! So
that's the way they treat me! No confidence in me! Ah, ordered to keep
an eye on me! Very well then! Get along with you!' So he writes the
famous order of the day to General Bennigsen:

'I am wounded and cannot ride and consequently cannot command the army.
You have brought your army corps to Pultusk, routed: here it is exposed,
and without fuel or forage, so something must be done, and, as you
yourself reported to Count Buxhowden yesterday, you must think of
retreating to our frontier--which do today.'

"'From all my riding,' he writes to the Emperor, 'I have got a saddle
sore which, coming after all my previous journeys, quite prevents my
riding and commanding so vast an army, so I have passed on the command
to the general next in seniority, Count Buxhowden, having sent him my
whole staff and all that belongs to it, advising him if there is a lack
of bread, to move farther into the interior of Prussia, for only one
day's ration of bread remains, and in some regiments none at all, as
reported by the division commanders, Ostermann and Sedmoretzki, and
all that the peasants had has been eaten up. I myself will remain in
hospital at Ostrolenka till I recover. In regard to which I humbly
submit my report, with the information that if the army remains in its
present bivouac another fortnight there will not be a healthy man left
in it by spring.

"'Grant leave to retire to his country seat to an old man who is already
in any case dishonored by being unable to fulfill the great and
glorious task for which he was chosen. I shall await your most gracious
permission here in hospital, that I may not have to play the part of a
secretary rather than commander in the army. My removal from the army
does not produce the slightest stir--a blind man has left it. There are
thousands such as I in Russia.'

"The field marshal is angry with the Emperor and he punishes us all,
isn't it logical?

"This is the first act. Those that follow are naturally increasingly
interesting and entertaining. After the field marshal's departure it
appears that we are within sight of the enemy and must give battle.
Buxhowden is commander in chief by seniority, but General Bennigsen does
not quite see it; more particularly as it is he and his corps who ar