depot? If he ceased his
pursuit, it was only because Regnier and Durutte, the two French
generals, summoned him in the most urgent manner to come to their
assistance. Both they and he had reason to expect that Maret, Oudinot,
or Victor, would provide for the safety of Minsk."

CHAP. II.

In fact, no one had any right to accuse another of treachery, when we
had betrayed ourselves, for all had been wanting in the time of need.

At Wilna, they appeared to have had no suspicion of the real state of
affairs; and at a time when the garrisons, the depots, the marching
battalions, and the divisions of Durutte, Loison, and Dombrowski,
between the Berezina and the Vistula, might have formed at Minsk an army
of thirty thousand men, three thousand men, headed by a general of no
reputation, were the only forces which Tchitchakof found there to oppose
him. It was a known fact that this handful of young soldiers was exposed
in front of a river, into which they were precipitated by the admiral,
whereas, if they had been placed on the other side, that obstacle would
have protected them for some time.

For thus, as frequently happens, the faults of the general plan had led
to faults of detail. The governor of Minsk had been negligently chosen.
He was, it was said, one of those men who undertake every thing, who
promise every thing, and who do nothing. On the 16th of November, he
lost that capital, and with it four thousand seven hundred sick, the
warlike ammunition, and two million rations of provisions. It was five
days since the news of this loss had reached Dombrowna, and the news of
a still greater calamity came on the heels of it.

This same governor had retreated towards Borizof. There he neglected to
inform Oudinot, who was only at the distance of two marches, to come to
his assistance; and failed to support Dombrowski, who made a hasty march
thither from Bobruisk and Igumen. The latter did not arrive, however, in
the night of the 20th and 21st, at the _tete-du-pont_, until after the
enemy had taken possession of it; notwithstanding, he expelled
Tchitchakof's vanguard, took possession of it, and defended himself
gallantly there until the evening of the 21st; but being then
overwhelmed by the fire of the Russian artillery, which took him in
flank, and attacked by a force more than double his own, he was driven
across the river, and out of the town, as far as the road to Moscow.

Napoleon was wholly unprepared for this