this disaster, now irremediable, and in which every one
had occasion for all his energies, the Emperor was afraid of complaints,
which could have no other effect but to discourage both him who indulged
in, and him who listened to them.

He remarked the attitude of Napoleon, the same which he retained
throughout the whole of this retreat. It was grave, silent, and
resigned; suffering much less in body than others, but much more in
mind, and brooding over his misfortunes. At that moment General
Charpentier sent him from Smolensk a convoy of provisions. Bessieres
wished to take possession of them, but the Emperor instantly had them
forwarded to the Prince of the Moskwa, saying, "that those who were
fighting must eat before the others." At the same time he sent word to
Ney "to defend himself long enough to allow him some stay at Smolensk,
where the army should eat, rest, and be re-organized."

But if this hope kept some to their duty, many others abandoned every
thing, to hasten towards that promised term of their sufferings. As for
Ney, he saw that a sacrifice was required, and that he was marked out as
the victim: he resigned himself, ready to meet the whole of a danger
great as his courage: thenceforward he neither attached his honour to
baggage, nor to cannon, which the winter alone wrested from him. A first
bend of the Borysthenes stopped and kept back part of his guns at the
foot of its icy slopes; he sacrificed them without hesitation, passed
that obstacle, faced about, and made the hostile river, which crossed
his route, serve him as the means of defence.

The Russians, however, advanced under favour of a wood and our forsaken
carriages, whence they kept up a fire of musketry on Ney's troops. Half
of the latter, whose icy arms froze their stiffened fingers, got
discouraged; they gave way, justifying themselves by their
faint-heartedness on the preceding day, fleeing because they had fled;
which before they would have considered as impossible. But Ney rushed in
amongst them, snatched one of their muskets, and led them back to the
fire, which he was the first to renew; exposing his life like a private
soldier, with a musket in his hand, the same as when he was neither
husband nor father, neither possessed of wealth, nor power, nor
consideration: in short, as if he had still every thing to gain, when in
fact he had every thing to lose. At the same time that he again turned
soldier, he ceased not to be a general; he t