ced at Smolensk, and it was he who completed it. This resolution,
like every thing great and entire, was admirable; the motive sufficient
and justified by success; the devotedness unparalleled, and so
extraordinary, that the historian is obliged to pause in order to
fathom, to comprehend, and to contemplate it.[19]

[Footnote 19: A Count Rostopchin, we know, has written that he had no
hand in that great event: but we cannot help following the opinion of
the Russians and French, who were witnesses of and actors in this grand
drama. All, without exception, persist in attributing to that nobleman
the entire honour of that generous resolution. Several even seem to
think, that if Count Rostopchin, who is yet animated by the same noble
spirit, which will render his name imperishable, still refuses the
immortality of so great an action, it is that he may leave all the glory
of it to the patriotism of the nation, of which he is become one of the
most remarkable characters.]

One single individual, amidst a vast empire nearly overthrown, surveys
its danger with steady eye: he measures, he appreciates it, and
ventures, perhaps uncommissioned, to devote all the public and private
interests a sacrifice to it. Though but a subject, he decides the lot of
the state, without the countenance of his sovereign; a noble, he decrees
the destruction of the palaces of all the nobles, without their consent;
the protector, from the post which he occupies, of a numerous
population, of a multitude of opulent merchants and traders, of one of
the largest capitals in Europe, he sacrifices their fortunes, their
establishments, nay, the whole city: he himself consigns to the flames
the finest and the richest of his palaces, and proud and satisfied, he
quietly remains among the resentful sufferers who have been injured or
utterly ruined by the measure.

What motive then could be so just and so powerful as to inspire him with
such astonishing confidence? In deciding upon the destruction of Moscow,
his principal aim was not to famish the enemy, since he had contrived to
clear that great city of provisions; nor to deprive the French army of
shelter, since it was impossible to suppose that out of eight thousand
houses and churches, dispersed over so vast a space, there should not be
left buildings enough to serve as barracks for one hundred and fifty
thousand men.

He was no doubt aware also that by such a step he would counteract that
very important p