grand to the other side; they formed about seven
thousand men.

The marshal's first care was to secure the road to Zembin, by a
detachment which chased some Cossacks from it; to push the enemy towards
Borizof, and to keep him as far back as possible from the passage of
Studzianka.

Tchaplitz, in obedience to the admiral's orders, proceeded as far as
Stakhowa, a village close to Borizof, he then turned back, and
encountered the first troops of Oudinot commanded by Albert. Both sides
halted. The French, finding themselves rather too far off from their
main body, only wanted to gain time, and the Russian general waited for
orders.

Tchitchakof had found himself in one of those difficult situations, in
which prepossession, being compelled to fluctuate in uncertainty between
several points at once, has no sooner determined and fixed upon one
side, than it removes and gets overturned upon another.

His march from Minsk to Borizof in three columns, not only by the high
road, but by the roads of Antonopolia, Logoisk, and Zembin, showed that
his whole attention was at first directed to that part of the Berezina,
above Borizof. Feeling himself then so strong upon his left, he felt
only that his right was weakened, and in consequence, his anxiety was
entirely transferred to that side.

The error which led him into that false direction had other and stronger
foundations. Kutusoff's instructions directed his responsibility to that
point. Ertell, who commanded twelve thousand men near Bobruisk, refused
to quit his cantonments, to follow Dombrowski, and to come and defend
that part of the river. He alleged, as his justification for refusal,
the danger of a distemper among the cattle, a pretext unheard of and
improbable, but perfectly true, as Tchitchakof himself has admitted.

The admiral adds further, that information sent to him by Wittgenstein
directed his anxiety towards Lower Berezino, as well as the supposition,
natural enough, that the presence of that general on the right flank of
the grand army and above Borizof, would push Napoleon below that town.

The recollection of the passages of Charles XII. and of Davoust at
Berezino, might also be another of his motives. By taking that
direction, Napoleon would not only escape Wittgenstein, but he might
retake Minsk, and form a junction with Schwartzenberg. This last was a
serious consideration with Tchitchakof, Minsk being his conquest, and
Schwartzenberg his first adversary