for the Emperor, who could scarcely be deceived, he had but a few
moments of a factitious joy. He soon complained "that an annoying
warfare of partizans hovered around him; that notwithstanding all these
pacific demonstrations, he was sensible that bodies of Cossacks were
prowling on his flanks and in his rear. Had not one hundred and fifty
dragoons of his old guard been surprised and routed, by a number of
these barbarians? And this two days after the armistice, on the road to
Mojaisk, on his line of operation, that by which the army communicated
with its magazines, its reinforcements, its depots, and himself with
Europe!"

In fact two convoys had just fallen into the enemy's hands on that road:
one through the negligence of its commander, who put an end to his life
in despair; and the other through the cowardice of an officer, who was
about to be punished when the retreat commenced. To the destruction of
the army he owed his escape.

Our soldiers, and especially our cavalry, were obliged every morning to
go to a great distance in quest of provisions for the evening and the
next day; and as the environs of Moscow and Vinkowo became gradually
more and more drained, they were daily necessitated to extend their
excursions. Both men and horses returned worn out with fatigue, that is
to say such of them as returned at all; for we had to fight for every
bushel of rye, and for every truss of forage. It was a series of
incessant surprises, skirmishes, and losses. The peasantry took a part
in it. They punished with death such of their number as the prospect of
gain had allured to our camp with provisions. Others set fire to their
own villages, to drive our foragers out of them, and to give them up to
the Cossacks whom they had previously summoned, and who kept us there in
a state of siege.

It was the peasantry also who took Vereia, a town in the neighbourhood
of Moscow. One of their priests is said to have planned and executed
this _coup-de-main_. He armed the inhabitants, obtained some troops from
Kutusoff; then on the 10th of October, before daybreak, he caused the
signal of a false attack to be given in one quarter, while in another he
himself rushed upon our palisades, destroyed them, penetrated into the
town, and put the whole garrison to the sword.

Thus the war was every where; in our front, on our flanks and in our
rear: the army was weakening, and the enemy becoming daily more
enterprising. This conquest was desti