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War and Peace
War and Peace
By Leo Tolstoy
Translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude
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‘Well, Prince, so Genoa and Lucca are now just family es-
tates of the Buonapartes. But I warn you, if you don’t tell me
that this means war, if you still try to defend the infamies
and horrors perpetrated by that AntichristI really believe
he is AntichristI will have nothing more to do with you and
you are no longer my friend, no longer my ‘faithful slave,’ as
you call yourself! But how do you do? I see I have frightened
yousit down and tell me all the news.’
It was in July, 1805, and the speaker was the well-known
Anna Pavlovna Scherer, maid of honor and favorite of the
Empress Marya Fedorovna. With these words she greeted
Prince Vasili Kuragin, a man of high rank and importance,
who was the first to arrive at her reception. Anna Pavlovna
had had a cough for some days. She was, as she said, suf-
fering from la grippe; grippe being then a new word in St.
Petersburg, used only by the elite.
All her invitations without exception, written in French,
and delivered by a scarlet-liveried footman that morning,
ran as follows:
‘If you have nothing better to do, Count [or Prince], and
if the prospect of spending an evening with a poor invalid is
not too terrible, I shall be very charmed to see you tonight
between 7 and 10Annette Scherer.’
‘Heavens! what a virulent attack!’ replied the prince,
It was past one o’clock when Pierre left his friend. It was a
cloudless, northern, summer night. Pierre took an open cab
intending to drive straight home. But the nearer he drew to
the house the more he felt the impossibility of going to sleep
on such a night. It was light enough to see a long way in the
deserted street and it seemed more like morning or evening
than night. On the way Pierre remembered that Anatole
Kuragin was expecting the usual set for cards that evening,
after which there was generally a drinking bout, finishing
with visits of a kind Pierre was very fond of.
‘I should like to go to Kuragin’s,’ thought he.
But he immediately recalled his promise to Prince An-
drew not to go there. Then, as happens to people of weak
character, he desired so passionately once more to enjoy that
dissipation he was so accustomed to that he decided to go.
The thought immediately occurred to him that his promise
to Prince Andrew was of no account, because before he gave
it he had already promised Prince Anatole to come to his
gathering; ‘besides,’ thought he, ‘all such ‘words of honor’
are conventional things with no definite meaning, especial-
ly if one considers that by tomorrow one may be dead, or
something so extraordinary may happen to one that honor
and dishonor will be all the same!’ Pierre often indulged in
reflections of this sort, nullifying all his decisions and inten-
At the men’s end of the table the talk grew more and more
animated. The colonel told them that the declaration of war
had already appeared in Petersburg and that a copy, which
he had himself seen, had that day been forwarded by courier
to the commander in chief.
‘And why the deuce are we going to fight Bonaparte?’
remarked Shinshin. ‘He has stopped Austria’s cackle and I
fear it will be our turn next.’
The colonel was a stout, tall, plethoric German, evidently
devoted to the service and patriotically Russian. He resent-
ed Shinshin’s remark.
‘It is for the reasson, my goot sir,’ said he, speaking with a
German accent, ‘for the reasson zat ze Emperor knows zat.
He declares in ze manifessto zat he cannot fiew wiz indif-
ference ze danger vreatening Russia and zat ze safety and
dignity of ze Empire as vell as ze sanctity of its alliances...’
he spoke this last word with particular emphasis as if in it
lay the gist of the matter.
Then with the unerring official memory that charac-
terized him he repeated from the opening words of the
manifesto:
... and the wish, which constitutes the Emperor’s sole
and absolute aimto establish peace in Europe on firm foun-
dationshas now decided him to despatch part of the army
The wind had fallen and black clouds, merging with the
powder smoke, hung low over the field of battle on the hori-
zon. It was growing dark and the glow of two conflagrations
was the more conspicuous. The cannonade was dying down,
but the rattle of musketry behind and on the right sounded
oftener and nearer. As soon as Tushin with his guns, con-
tinually driving round or coming upon wounded men, was
out of range of fire and had descended into the dip, he was
met by some of the staff, among them the staff officer and
Zherkov, who had been twice sent to Tushin’s battery but
had never reached it. Interrupting one another, they all
gave, and transmitted, orders as to how to proceed, repri-
manding and reproaching him. Tushin gave no orders, and,
silentlyfearing to speak because at every word he felt ready
to weep without knowing whyrode behind on his artil-
lery nag. Though the orders were to abandon the wounded,
many of them dragged themselves after troops and begged
for seats on the gun carriages. The jaunty infantry officer
who just before the battle had rushed out of Tushin’s wattle
shed was laid, with a bullet in his stomach, on ‘Matvevna’s’
carriage. At the foot of the hill, a pale hussar cadet, support-
ing one hand with the other, came up to Tushin and asked
for a seat.
‘Captain, for God’s sake! I’ve hurt my arm,’ he said tim-
It was long since the Rostovs had news of Nicholas. Not till
midwinter was the count at last handed a letter addressed in
his son’s handwriting. On receiving it, he ran on tiptoe to
his study in alarm and haste, trying to escape notice, closed
the door, and began to read the letter.
Anna Mikhaylovna, who always knew everything that
passed in the house, on hearing of the arrival of the letter
went softly into the room and found the count with it in his
hand, sobbing and laughing at the same time.
Anna Mikhaylovna, though her circumstances had im-
proved, was still living with the Rostovs.
‘My dear friend?’ said she, in a tone of pathetic inquiry,
prepared to sympathize in any way.
The count sobbed yet more.
‘Nikolenka... a letter... wa... a... s... wounded... my dar-
ling boy... the countess... promoted to be an officer... thank
God... How tell the little countess!’
Anna Mikhaylovna sat down beside him, with her own
handkerchief wiped the tears from his eyes and from the
letter, then having dried her own eyes she comforted the
count, and decided that at dinner and till teatime she would
prepare the countess, and after tea, with God’s help, would
inform her.
At dinner Anna Mikhaylovna talked the whole time
The day after Rostov had been to see Boris, a review was
held of the Austrian and Russian troops, both those freshly
arrived from Russia and those who had been campaigning
under Kutuzov. The two Emperors, the Russian with his
heir the Tsarevich, and the Austrian with the Archduke, in-
spected the allied army of eighty thousand men.
From early morning the smart clean troops were on
the move, forming up on the field before the fortress. Now
thousands of feet and bayonets moved and halted at the of-
ficers’ command, turned with banners flying, formed up at
intervals, and wheeled round other similar masses of infan-
try in different uniforms; now was heard the rhythmic beat
of hoofs and the jingling of showy cavalry in blue, red, and
green braided uniforms, with smartly dressed bandsmen in
front mounted on black, roan, or gray horses; then again,
spreading out with the brazen clatter of the polished shin-
ing cannon that quivered on the gun carriages and with the
smell of linstocks, came the artillery which crawled between
the infantry and cavalry and took up its appointed position.
Not only the generals in full parade uniforms, with their
thin or thick waists drawn in to the utmost, their red necks
squeezed into their stiff collars, and wearing scarves and all
their decorations, not only the elegant, pomaded officers,
but every soldier with his freshly washed and shaven face
The day after the review, Boris, in his best uniform and
with his comrade Berg’s best wishes for success, rode to Ol-
mutz to see Bolkonski, wishing to profit by his friendliness
and obtain for himself the best post he couldpreferably that
of adjutant to some important personage, a position in the
army which seemed to him most attractive. ‘It is all very
well for Rostov, whose father sends him ten thousand rubles
at a time, to talk about not wishing to cringe to anybody
and not be anyone’s lackey, but I who have nothing but my
brains have to make a career and must not miss opportuni-
ties, but must avail myself of them!’ he reflected.
He did not find Prince Andrew in Olmutz that day, but
the appearance of the town where the headquarters and
the diplomatic corps were stationed and the two Emperors
were living with their suites, households, and courts only
strengthened his desire to belong to that higher world.
He knew no one, and despite his smart Guardsman’s
uniform, all these exalted personages passing in the streets
in their elegant carriages with their plumes, ribbons, and
medals, both courtiers and military men, seemed so im-
measurably above him, an insignificant officer of the
Guards, that they not only did not wish to, but simply could
not, be aware of his existence. At the quarters of the com-
mander in chief, Kutuzov, where he inquired for Bolkonski,
Pierre had of late rarely seen his wife alone. Both in Pe-
tersburg and in Moscow their house was always full of
visitors. The night after the duel he did not go to his bed-
room but, as he often did, remained in his father’s room,
that huge room in which Count Bezukhov had died.
He lay down on the sofa meaning to fall asleep and for-
get all that had happened to him, but could not do so. Such
a storm of feelings, thoughts, and memories suddenly arose
within him that he could not fall asleep, nor even remain
in one place, but had to jump up and pace the room with
rapid steps. Now he seemed to see her in the early days of
their marriage, with bare shoulders and a languid, passion-
ate look on her face, and then immediately he saw beside her
Dolokhov’s handsome, insolent, hard, and mocking face as
he had seen it at the banquet, and then that same face pale,
quivering, and suffering, as it had been when he reeled and
sank on the snow.
‘What has happened?’ he asked himself. ‘I have killed
her lover, yes, killed my wife’s lover. Yes, that was it! And
why? How did I come to do it?’‘Because you married her,’
answered an inner voice.
‘But in what was I to blame?’ he asked. ‘In marrying her
without loving her; in deceiving yourself and her.’ And he
vividly recalled that moment after supper at Prince Vasili’s,
For two days after that Rostov did not see Dolokhov at his
own or at Dolokhov’s home: on the third day he received a
note from him:
As I do not intend to be at your house again for reasons
you know of, and am going to rejoin my regiment, I am
giving a farewell supper tonight to my friendscome to the
English Hotel.
About ten o’clock Rostov went to the English Hotel
straight from the theater, where he had been with his fam-
ily and Denisov. He was at once shown to the best room,
which Dolokhov had taken for that evening. Some twenty
men were gathered round a table at which Dolokhov sat be-
tween two candles. On the table was a pile of gold and paper
money, and he was keeping the bank. Rostov had not seen
him since his proposal and Sonya’s refusal and felt uncom-
fortable at the thought of how they would meet.
Dolokhov’s clear, cold glance met Rostov as soon as he
entered the door, as though he had long expected him.
‘It’s a long time since we met,’ he said. ‘Thanks for com-
ing. I’ll just finish dealing, and then Ilyushka will come
with his chorus.’
‘I called once or twice at your house,’ said Rostov, red-
dening.
Dolokhov made no reply.
An hour and a half later most of the players were but little
interested in their own play.
The whole interest was concentrated on Rostov. In-
stead of sixteen hundred rubles he had a long column of
figures scored against him, which he had reckoned up to
ten thousand, but that now, as he vaguely supposed, must
have risen to fifteen thousand. In reality it already exceeded
twenty thousand rubles. Dolokhov was no longer listen-
ing to stories or telling them, but followed every movement
of Rostov’s hands and occasionally ran his eyes over the
score against him. He had decided to play until that score
reached forty-three thousand. He had fixed on that num-
ber because forty-three was the sum of his and Sonya’s joint
ages. Rostov, leaning his head on both hands, sat at the ta-
ble which was scrawled over with figures, wet with spilled
wine, and littered with cards. One tormenting impression
did not leave him: that those broad-boned reddish hands
with hairy wrists visible from under the shirt sleeves, those
hands which he loved and hated, held him in their power.
‘Six hundred rubles, ace, a corner, a nine... winning it
back’s impossible... Oh, how pleasant it was at home!... The
knave, double or quits... it can’t be!... And why is he doing
this to me?’ Rostov pondered. Sometimes he staked a large
sum, but Dolokhov refused to accept it and fixed the stake
After his interview with his wife Pierre left for Peters-
burg. At the Torzhok post station, either there were no
horses or the postmaster would not supply them. Pierre was
obliged to wait. Without undressing, he lay down on the
leather sofa in front of a round table, put his big feet in their
overboots on the table, and began to reflect.
‘Will you have the portmanteaus brought in? And a bed
got ready, and tea?’ asked his valet.
Pierre gave no answer, for he neither heard nor saw any-
thing. He had begun to think of the last station and was still
pondering on the same questionone so important that he
took no notice of what went on around him. Not only was
he indifferent as to whether he got to Petersburg earlier or
later, or whether he secured accommodation at this station,
but compared to the thoughts that now occupied him it was
a matter of indifference whether he remained there for a few
hours or for the rest of his life.
The postmaster, his wife, the valet, and a peasant wom-
an selling Torzhok embroidery came into the room offering
their services. Without changing his careless attitude, Pierre
looked at them over his spectacles unable to understand
what they wanted or how they could go on living without
having solved the problems that so absorbed him. He had
been engrossed by the same thoughts ever since the day he
Soon after this there came into the dark chamber to fetch
Pierre, not the Rhetor but Pierre’s sponsor, Willarski, whom
he recognized by his voice. To fresh questions as to the firm-
ness of his resolution Pierre replied: ‘Yes, yes, I agree,’ and
with a beaming, childlike smile, his fat chest uncovered,
stepping unevenly and timidly in one slippered and one
booted foot, he advanced, while Willarski held a sword to
his bare chest. He was conducted from that room along pas-
sages that turned backwards and forwards and was at last
brought to the doors of the Lodge. Willarski coughed, he
was answered by the Masonic knock with mallets, the doors
opened before them. A bass voice (Pierre was still blind-
fold) questioned him as to who he was, when and where he
was born, and so on. Then he was again led somewhere still
blindfold, and as they went along he was told allegories of
the toils of his pilgrimage, of holy friendship, of the Eternal
Architect of the universe, and of the courage with which
he should endure toils and dangers. During these wan-
derings, Pierre noticed that he was spoken of now as the
‘Seeker,’ now as the ‘Sufferer,’ and now as the ‘Postulant,’ to
the accompaniment of various knockings with mallets and
swords. As he was being led up to some object he noticed a
hesitation and uncertainty among his conductors. He heard
those around him disputing in whispers and one of them
The day after he had been received into the Lodge, Pierre
was sitting at home reading a book and trying to fathom
the significance of the Square, one side of which symbol-
ized God, another moral things, a third physical things,
and the fourth a combination of these. Now and then his
attention wandered from the book and the Square and he
formed in imagination a new plan of life. On the previous
evening at the Lodge, he had heard that a rumor of his duel
had reached the Emperor and that it would be wiser for him
to leave Petersburg. Pierre proposed going to his estates in
the south and there attending to the welfare of his serfs. He
was joyfully planning this new life, when Prince Vasili sud-
denly entered the room.
‘My dear fellow, what have you been up to in Moscow?
Why have you quarreled with Helene, mon cher? You are
under a delusion,’ said Prince Vasili, as he entered. ‘I know
all about it, and I can tell you positively that Helene is as in-
nocent before you as Christ was before the Jews.’
Pierre was about to reply, but Prince Vasili interrupted
him.
‘And why didn’t you simply come straight to me as to a
friend? I know all about it and understand it all,’ he said.
‘You behaved as becomes a man values his honor, perhaps
too hastily, but we won’t go into that. But consider the po-
In the evening Andrew and Pierre got into the open car-
riage and drove to Bald Hills. Prince Andrew, glancing at
Pierre, broke the silence now and then with remarks which
showed that he was in a good temper.
Pointing to the fields, he spoke of the improvements he
was making in his husbandry.
Pierre remained gloomily silent, answering in monosyl-
lables and apparently immersed in his own thoughts.
He was thinking that Prince Andrew was unhappy, had
gone astray, did not see the true light, and that he, Pierre,
ought to aid, enlighten, and raise him. But as soon as he
thought of what he should say, he felt that Prince Andrew
with one word, one argument, would upset all his teaching,
and he shrank from beginning, afraid of exposing to pos-
sible ridicule what to him was precious and sacred.
‘No, but why do you think so?’ Pierre suddenly began,
lowering his head and looking like a bull about to charge,
‘why do you think so? You should not think so.’
‘Think? What about?’ asked Prince Andrew with sur-
prise.
‘About life, about man’s destiny. It can’t be so. I myself
thought like that, and do you know what saved me? Free-
masonry! No, don’t smile. Freemasonry is not a religious
ceremonial sect, as I thought it was: Freemasonry is the best
When returning from his leave, Rostov felt, for the first
time, how close was the bond that united him to Denisov
and and the whole regiment.
On approaching it, Rostov felt as he had done when
approaching his home in Moscow. When he saw the first
hussar with the unbuttoned uniform of his regiment, when
he recognized red-haired Dementyev and saw the picket
ropes of the roan horses, when Lavrushka gleefully shouted
to his master, ‘The count has come!’ and Denisov, who had
been asleep on his bed, ran all disheveled out of the mud hut
to embrace him, and the officers collected round to greet the
new arrival, Rostov experienced the same feeling his moth-
er, his father, and his sister had embraced him, and tears of
joy choked him so that he could not speak. The regiment
was also a home, and as unalterably dear and precious as
his parents’ house.
When he had reported himself to the commander of
the regiment and had been reassigned to his former squad-
ron, had been on duty and had gone out foraging, when he
had again entered into all the little interests of the regiment
and felt himself deprived of liberty and bound in one nar-
row, unchanging frame, he experienced the same sense of
peace, of moral support, and the same sense being at home
here in his own place, as he had felt under the parental roof.
Natasha was sixteen and it was the year 1809, the very
year to which she had counted on her fingers with Boris af-
ter they had kissed four years ago. Since then she had not
seen him. Before Sonya and her mother, if Boris happened
to be mentioned, she spoke quite freely of that episode as
of some childish, long-forgotten matter that was not worth
mentioning. But in the secret depths of her soul the question
whether her engagement to Boris was a jest or an important,
binding promise tormented her.
Since Boris left Moscow in 1805 to join the army he had
had not seen the Rostovs. He had been in Moscow several
times, and had passed near Otradnoe, but had never been
to see them.
Sometimes it occurred to Natasha that he not wish to see
her, and this conjecture was confirmed by the sad tone in
which her elders spoke of him.
‘Nowadays old friends are not remembered,’ the count-
ess would say when Boris was mentioned.
Anna Mikhaylovna also had of late visited them less fre-
quently, seemed to hold herself with particular dignity, and
always spoke rapturously and gratefully of the merits of her
son and the brilliant career on which he had entered. When
the Rostovs came to Petersburg Boris called on them.
He drove to their house in some agitation. The memory of
Next day Prince Andrew thought of the ball, but his mind
did not dwell on it long. ‘Yes, it was a very brilliant ball,’
and then... ‘Yes, that little Rostova is very charming. There’s
something fresh, original, un-Petersburg-like about her that
distinguishes her.’ That was all he thought about yesterday’s
ball, and after his morning tea he set to work.
But either from fatigue or want of sleep he was ill-
disposed for work and could get nothing done. He kept
criticizing his own work, as he often did, and was glad when
he heard someone coming.
The visitor was Bitski, who served on various committees,
frequented all the societies in Petersburg, and a passionate
devotee of the new ideas and of Speranski, and a diligent
Petersburg newsmongerone of those men who choose their
opinions like their clothes according to the fashion, but who
for that very reason appear to be the warmest partisans.
Hardly had he got rid of his hat before he ran into Prince
Andrew’s room with a preoccupied air and at once began
talking. He had just heard particulars of that morning’s sit-
ting of the Council of State opened by the Emperor, and he
spoke of it enthusiastically. The Emperor’s speech had been
extraordinary. It had been a speech such as only constitu-
tional monarchs deliver. ‘The Sovereign plainly said that the
Council and Senate are estates of the realm, he said that the
The old count went home, and Natasha and Petya prom-
ised to return very soon, but as it was still early the hunt
went farther. At midday they put the hounds into a ravine
thickly overgrown with young trees. Nicholas standing in a
fallow field could see all his whips.
Facing him lay a field of winter rye, there his own hunts-
man stood alone in a hollow behind a hazel bush. The
hounds had scarcely been loosed before Nicholas heard one
he knew, Voltorn, giving tongue at intervals; other hounds
joined in, now pausing and now again giving tongue. A mo-
ment later he heard a cry from the wooded ravine that a
fox had been found, and the whole pack, joining together,
rushed along the ravine toward the ryefield and away from
Nicholas.
He saw the whips in their red caps galloping along the
edge of the ravine, he even saw the hounds, and was ex-
pecting a fox to show itself at any moment on the ryefield
opposite.
The huntsman standing in the hollow moved and loosed
his borzois, and Nicholas saw a queer, short-legged red fox
with a fine brush going hard across the field. The borzois
bore down on it.... Now they drew close to the fox which
began to dodge between the field in sharper and sharper
curves, trailing its brush, when suddenly a strange white
The day after the opera the Rostovs went nowhere and
nobody came to see them. Marya Dmitrievna talked to
the count about something which they concealed from
Natasha. Natasha guessed they were talking about the old
prince and planning something, and this disquieted and of-
fended her. She was expecting Prince Andrew any moment
and twice that day sent a manservant to the Vozdvizhen-
ka to ascertain whether he had come. He had not arrived.
She suffered more now than during her first days in Mos-
cow. To her impatience and pining for him were now added
the unpleasant recollection of her interview with Princess
Mary and the old prince, and a fear and anxiety of which
she did not understand the cause. She continually fancied
that either he would never come or that something would
happen to her before he came. She could no longer think
of him by herself calmly and continuously as she had done
before. As soon as she began to think of him, the recollec-
tion of the old prince, of Princess Mary, of the theater, and
of Kuragin mingled with her thoughts. The question again
presented itself whether she was not guilty, whether she had
not already broken faith with Prince Andrew, and again she
found herself recalling to the minutest detail every word,
every gesture, and every shade in the play of expression on
the face of the man who had been able to arouse in her such
From the day his wife arrived in Moscow Pierre had been
intending to go away somewhere, so as not to be near her.
Soon after the Rostovs came to Moscow the effect Natasha
had on him made him hasten to carry out his intention. He
went to Tver to see Joseph Alexeevich’s widow, who had
long since promised to hand over to him some papers of her
deceased husband’s.
When he returned to Moscow Pierre was handed a letter
from Marya Dmitrievna asking him to come and see her on
a matter of great importance relating to Andrew Bolkonski
and his betrothed. Pierre had been avoiding Natasha be-
cause it seemed to him that his feeling for her was stronger
than a married man’s should be for his friend’s fiancee. Yet
some fate constantly threw them together.
‘What can have happened? And what can they want with
me?’ thought he as he dressed to go to Marya Dmitrievna’s.
‘If only Prince Andrew would hurry up and come and mar-
ry her!’ thought he on his way to the house.
On the Tverskoy Boulevard a familiar voice called to
him.
‘Pierre! Been back long?’ someone shouted. Pierre raised
his head. In a sleigh drawn by two gray trotting-horses that
were bespattering the dashboard with snow, Anatole and
his constant companion Makarin dashed past. Anatole was
It was nearly three o’clock but no one was yet asleep, when
the quartermaster appeared with an order to move on to the
little town of Ostrovna. Still laughing and talking, the offi-
cers began hurriedly getting ready and again boiled again
boiled some muddy water in the samovar. But Rostov went
off to his squadron without waiting for tea. Day was break-
ing, the rain had ceased, and the clouds were dispersing.
It felt damp and cold, especially in clothes that were still
moist. As they left the tavern in the twilight of the dawn,
Rostov and Ilyin both glanced under the wet and glistening
leather hood of the doctor’s cart, from under the apron of
which his feet were sticking out, and in the middle of which
his wife’s nightcap was visible and her sleepy breathing au-
dible.
‘She really is a dear little thing,’ said Rostov to Ilyin, who
was following him.
‘A charming woman!’ said Ilyin, with all the gravity of a
boy of sixteen.
Half an hour later the squadron was lined up on the road.
The command was heard to ‘mount’ and the soldiers crossed
themselves and mounted. Rostov riding in front gave the
order ‘Forward!’ and the hussars, with clanking sabers and
subdued talk, their horses’ hoofs splashing in the mud, de-
filed in fours and moved along the broad road planted with
Rostov, with his keen sportsman’s eye, was one of the first
to catch sight of these blue French dragoons pursuing our
Uhlans. Nearer and nearer in disorderly crowds came the
Uhlans and the French dragoons pursuing them. He could
already see how these men, who looked so small at the foot
of the hill, jostled and overtook one another, waving their
arms and their sabers in the air.
Rostov gazed at what was happening before him as at a
hunt. He felt instinctively that if the hussars struck at the
French dragoons now, the latter could not withstand them,
but if a charge was to be made it must be done now, at that
very moment, or it would be too late. He looked around. A
captain, standing beside him, was gazing like himself with
eyes fixed on the cavalry below them.
‘Andrew Sevastyanych!’ said Rostov. ‘You know, we could
crush them...’
‘A fine thing too!’ replied the captain, ‘and really..’
Rostov, without waiting to hear him out, touched his
horse, galloped to the front of his squadron, and before he
had time to finish giving the word of command, the whole
squadron, sharing his feeling, was following him. Ros-
tov himself did not know how or why he did it. He acted
as he did when hunting, without reflecting or considering.
He saw the dragoons near and that they were galloping in
From the day when Pierre, after leaving the Rostovs’ with
Natasha’s grateful look fresh in his mind, had gazed at the
comet that seemed to be fixed in the sky and felt that some-
thing new was appearing on his own horizonfrom that day
the problem of the vanity and uselessness of all earthly
things, that had incessantly tormented him, no longer pre-
sented itself. That terrible question ‘Why?’ ‘Wherefore?’
which had come to him amid every occupation, was now
replaced, not by another question or by a reply to the former
question, but by her image. When he listened to, or himself
took part in, trivial conversations, when he read or heard of
human baseness or folly, he was not horrified as formerly,
and did not ask himself why men struggled so about these
things when all is so transient and incomprehensiblebut he
remembered her as he had last seen her, and all his doubts
vanishednot because she had answered the questions that
had haunted him, but because his conception of her trans-
ferred him instantly to another, a brighter, realm of spiritual
activity in which no one could be justified or guiltya realm
of beauty and love which it was worth living for. Whatever
worldly baseness presented itself to him, he said to himself:
‘Well, supposing N. N. swindled the country and the
Tsar, and the country and the Tsar confer honors upon
him, what does that matter? She smiled at me yesterday and
The day after his son had left, Prince Nicholas sent for
Princess Mary to come to his study.
‘Well? Are you satisfied now?’ said he. ‘You’ve made me
quarrel with my son! Satisfied, are you? That’s all you want-
ed! Satisfied?... It hurts me, it hurts. I’m old and weak and
this is what you wanted. Well then, gloat over it! Gloat over
it!’
After that Princess Mary did not see her father for a
whole week. He was ill and did not leave his study.
Princess Mary noticed to her surprise that during this
illness the old prince not only excluded her from his room,
but did not admit Mademoiselle Bourienne either. Tikhon
alone attended him.
At the end of the week the prince reappeared and re-
sumed his former way of life, devoting himself with special
activity to building operations and the arrangement of
the gardens and completely breaking off his relations with
Mademoiselle Bourienne. His looks and cold tone to his
daughter seemed to say: ‘There, you see? You plotted against
me, you lied to Prince Andrew about my relations with that
Frenchwoman and made me quarrel with him, but you see I
need neither her nor you!’
Princess Mary spent half of every day with little Nicho-
las, watching his lessons, teaching him Russian and music
For a long time that night Princess Mary sat by the open
window of her room hearing the sound of the peasants’
voices that reached her from the village, but it was not of
them she was thinking. She felt that she could not under-
stand them however much she might think about them. She
thought only of one thing, her sorrow, which, after the break
caused by cares for the present, seemed already to belong to
the past. Now she could remember it and weep or pray.
After sunset the wind had dropped. The night was calm
and fresh. Toward midnight the voices began to subside, a
cock crowed, the full moon began to show from behind the
lime trees, a fresh white dewy mist began to rise, and still-
ness reigned over the village and the house.
Pictures of the near pasther father’s illness and last mo-
mentsrose one after another to her memory. With mournful
pleasure she now lingered over these images, repelling with
horror only the last one, the picture of his death, which she
felt she could not contemplate even in imagination at this
still and mystic hour of night. And these pictures present-
ed themselves to her so clearly and in such detail that they
seemed now present, now past, and now future.
She vividly recalled the moment when he had his first
stroke and was being dragged along by his armpits through
the garden at Bald Hills, muttering something with his
Many historians say that the French did not win the bat-
tle of Borodino because Napoleon had a cold, and that if he
had not had a cold the orders he gave before and during the
battle would have been still more full of genius and Russia
would have been lost and the face of the world have been
changed. To historians who believe that Russia was shaped
by the will of one manPeter the Greatand that France from
a republic became an empire and French armies went to
Russia at the will of one manNapoleonto say that Russia re-
mained a power because Napoleon had a bad cold on the
twenty-fourth of August may seem logical and convincing.
If it had depended on Napoleon’s will to fight or not to
fight the battle of Borodino, and if this or that other arrange-
ment depended on his will, then evidently a cold affecting
the manifestation of his will might have saved Russia, and
consequently the valet who omitted to bring Napoleon his
waterproof boots on the twenty-fourth would have been the
savior of Russia. Along that line of thought such a deduc-
tion is indubitable, as indubitable as the deduction Voltaire
made in jest (without knowing what he was jesting at) when
he saw that the Massacre of St. Bartholomew was due to
Charles IX’s stomach being deranged. But to men who do
not admit that Russia was formed by the will of one man,
Peter I, or that the French Empire was formed and the war
For the last two days, ever since leaving home, Pierre had
been living in the empty house of his deceased benefactor,
Bazdeev. This is how it happened.
When he woke up on the morning after his return to
Moscow and his interview with Count Rostopchin, he could
not for some time make out where he was and what was ex-
pected of him. When he was informed that among others
awaiting him in his reception room there was a Frenchman
who had brought a letter from his wife, the Countess He-
lene, he felt suddenly overcome by that sense of confusion
and hopelessness to which he was apt to succumb. He felt
that everything was now at an end, all was in confusion
and crumbling to pieces, that nobody was right or wrong,
the future held nothing, and there was no escape from this
position. Smiling unnaturally and muttering to himself,
he first sat down on the sofa in an attitude of despair, then
rose, went to the door of the reception room and peeped
through the crack, returned flourishing his arms, and took
up a book. His major-domo came in a second time to say
that the Frenchman who had brought the letter from the
countess was very anxious to see him if only for a minute,
and that someone from Bazdeev’s widow had called to ask
Pierre to take charge of her husband’s books, as she herself
was leaving for the country.
When the French officer went into the room with Pierre
the latter again thought it his duty to assure him that he was
not French and wished to go away, but the officer would not
hear of it. He was so very polite, amiable, good-natured, and
genuinely grateful to Pierre for saving his life that Pierre
had not the heart to refuse, and sat down with him in the
parlorthe first room they entered. To Pierre’s assurances
that he was not a Frenchman, the captain, evidently not
understanding how anyone could decline so flattering an
appellation, shrugged his shoulders and said that if Pierre
absolutely insisted on passing for a Russian let it be so, but
for all that he would be forever bound to Pierre by gratitude
for saving his life.
Had this man been endowed with the slightest capacity
for perceiving the feelings of others, and had he at all under-
stood what Pierre’s feelings were, the latter would probably
have left him, but the man’s animated obtuseness to every-
thing other than himself disarmed Pierre.
‘A Frenchman or a Russian prince incognito,’ said the of-
ficer, looking at Pierre’s fine though dirty linen and at the
ring on his finger. ‘I owe my life to you and offer you my
friendship. A Frenchman never forgets either an insult or a
service. I offer you my friendship. That is all I can say.’
There was so much good nature and nobility (in the
The glow of the first fire that began on the second of Sep-
tember was watched from the various roads by the fugitive
Muscovites and by the retreating troops, with many differ-
ent feelings.
The Rostov party spent the night at Mytishchi, fourteen
miles from Moscow. They had started so late on the first of
September, the road had been so blocked by vehicles and
troops, so many things had been forgotten for which ser-
vants were sent back, that they had decided to spend that
night at a place three miles out of Moscow. The next morn-
ing they woke late and were again delayed so often that they
only got as far as Great Mytishchi. At ten o’clock that eve-
ning the Rostov family and the wounded traveling with
them were all distributed in the yards and huts of that large
village. The Rostovs’ servants and coachmen and the order-
lies of the wounded officers, after attending to their masters,
had supper, fed the horses, and came out into the porches.
In a neighboring hut lay Raevski’s adjutant with a frac-
tured wrist. The awful pain he suffered made him moan
incessantly and piteously, and his moaning sounded terri-
ble in the darkness of the autumn night. He had spent the
first night in the same yard as the Rostovs. The countess
said she had been unable to close her eyes on account of his
moaning, and at Mytishchi she moved into a worse hut sim-
Four weeks had passed since Pierre had been taken pris-
oner and though the French had offered to move him from
the men’s to the officers’ shed, he had stayed in the shed
where he was first put.
In burned and devastated Moscow Pierre experienced al-
most the extreme limits of privation a man can endure; but
thanks to his physical strength and health, of which he had
till then been unconscious, and thanks especially to the fact
that the privations came so gradually that it was impossible
to say when they began, he endured his position not only
lightly but joyfully. And just at this time he obtained the
tranquillity and ease of mind he had formerly striven in vain
to reach. He had long sought in different ways that tranquil-
lity of mind, that inner harmony which had so impressed
him in the soldiers at the battle of Borodino. He had sought
it in philanthropy, in Freemasonry, in the dissipations of
town life, in wine, in heroic feats of self-sacrifice, and in ro-
mantic love for Natasha; he had sought it by reasoningand
all these quests and experiments had failed him. And now
without thinking about it he had found that peace and inner
harmony only through the horror of death, through priva-
tion, and through what he recognized in Karataev.
Those dreadful moments he had lived through at the
executions had as it were forever washed away from his
Kutuzov like all old people did not sleep much at night.
He often fell asleep unexpectedly in the daytime, but at
night, lying on his bed without undressing, he generally re-
mained awake thinking.
So he lay now on his bed, supporting his large, heavy,
scarred head on his plump hand, with his one eye open,
meditating and peering into the darkness.
Since Bennigsen, who corresponded with the Emperor
and had more influence than anyone else on the staff, had
begun to avoid him, Kutuzov was more at ease as to the pos-
sibility of himself and his troops being obliged to take part
in useless aggressive movements. The lesson of the Tarutino
battle and of the day before it, which Kutuzov remembered
with pain, must, he thought, have some effect on others
too.
‘They must understand that we can only lose by taking
the offensive. Patience and time are my warriors, my cham-
pions,’ thought Kutuzov. He knew that an apple should not
be plucked while it is green. It will fall of itself when ripe,
but if picked unripe the apple is spoiled, the tree is harmed,
and your teeth are set on edge. Like an experienced sports-
man he knew that the beast was wounded, and wounded
as only the whole strength of Russia could have wounded
it, but whether it was mortally wounded or not was still
From the time he received this news to the end of the cam-
paign all Kutuzov’s activity was directed toward restraining
his troops, by authority, by guile, and by entreaty, from use-
less attacks, maneuvers, or encounters with the perishing
enemy. Dokhturov went to Malo-Yaroslavets, but Kutuzov
lingered with the main army and gave orders for the evacu-
ation of Kalugaa retreat beyond which town seemed to him
quite possible.
Everywhere Kutuzov retreated, but the enemy without
waiting for his retreat fled in the opposite direction.
Napoleon’s historians describe to us his skilled maneuvers
at Tarutino and Malo-Yaroslavets, and make conjectures as
to what would have happened had Napoleon been in time to
penetrate into the rich southern provinces.
But not to speak of the fact that nothing prevented him
from advancing into those southern provinces (for the Rus-
sian army did not bar his way), the historians forget that
nothing could have saved his army, for then already it bore
within itself the germs of inevitable ruin. How could that
armywhich had found abundant supplies in Moscow and
had trampled them underfoot instead of keeping them,
and on arriving at Smolensk had looted provisions instead
of storing themhow could that army recuperate in Kaluga
province, which was inhabited by Russians such as those
It was a warm rainy autumn day. The sky and the hori-
zon were both the color of muddy water. At times a sort
of mist descended, and then suddenly heavy slanting rain
came down.
Denisov in a felt cloak and a sheepskin cap from which
the rain ran down was riding a thin thoroughbred horse
with sunken sides. Like his horse, which turned its head and
laid its ears back, he shrank from the driving rain and gazed
anxiously before him. His thin face with its short, thick
black beard looked angry.
Beside Denisov rode an esaul,* Denisov’s fellow worker,
also in felt cloak and sheepskin cap, and riding a large sleek
Don horse.
*A captain of Cossacks.
Esaul Lovayski the Third was a tall man as straight as an
arrow, pale-faced, fair-haired, with narrow light eyes and
with calm self-satisfaction in his face and bearing. Though
it was impossible to say in what the peculiarity of the horse
and rider lay, yet at first glance at the esaul and Denisov one
saw that the latter was wet and uncomfortable and was a
man mounted on a horse, while looking at the esaul one saw
that he was as comfortable and as much at ease as always
and that he was not a man who had mounted a horse, but a
man who was one with his horse, a being consequently pos-
The rain had stopped, and only the mist was falling and
drops from the trees. Denisov, the esaul, and Petya rode
silently, following the peasant in the knitted cap who, step-
ping lightly with outturned toes and moving noiselessly
in his bast shoes over the roots and wet leaves, silently led
them to the edge of the forest.
He ascended an incline, stopped, looked about him, and
advanced to where the screen of trees was less dense. On
reaching a large oak tree that had not yet shed its leaves, he
stopped and beckoned mysteriously to them with his hand.
Denisov and Petya rode up to him. From the spot where
the peasant was standing they could see the French. Imme-
diately beyond the forest, on a downward slope, lay a field of
spring rye. To the right, beyond a steep ravine, was a small
village and a landowner’s house with a broken roof. In the
village, in the house, in the garden, by the well, by the pond,
over all the rising ground, and all along the road uphill
from the bridge leading to the village, not more than five
hundred yards away, crowds of men could be seen through
the shimmering mist. Their un-Russian shouting at their
horses which were straining uphill with the carts, and their
calls to one another, could be clearly heard.
‘Bwing the prisoner here,’ said Denisov in a low voice,
not taking his eyes off the French.
After talking for some time with the esaul about next
day’s attack, which now, seeing how near they were to the
French, he seemed to have definitely decided on, Denisov
turned his horse and rode back.
‘Now, my lad, we’ll go and get dwy,’ he said to Petya.
As they approached the watchhouse Denisov stopped,
peering into the forest. Among the trees a man with long legs
and long, swinging arms, wearing a short jacket, bast shoes,
and a Kazan hat, was approaching with long, light steps. He
had a musketoon over his shoulder and an ax stuck in his
girdle. When he espied Denisov he hastily threw something
into the bushes, removed his sodden hat by its floppy brim,
and approached his commander. It was Tikhon. His wrin-
kled and pockmarked face and narrow little eyes beamed
with self-satisfied merriment. He lifted his head high and
gazed at Denisov as if repressing a laugh.
‘Well, where did you disappear to?’ inquired Denisov.
‘Where did I disappear to? I went to get Frenchmen,’
answered Tikhon boldly and hurriedly, in a husky but me-
lodious bass voice.
‘Why did you push yourself in there by daylight? You ass!
Well, why haven’t you taken one?’
‘Oh, I took one all right,’ said Tikhon.
‘Where is he?’
Next day the field marshal gave a dinner and ball which
the Emperor honored by his presence. Kutuzov had received
the Order of St. George of the First Class and the Emperor
showed him the highest honors, but everyone knew of the
imperial dissatisfaction with him. The proprieties were ob-
served and the Emperor was the first to set that example,
but everybody understood that the old man was blame-
worthy and good-for-nothing. When Kutuzov, conforming
to a custom of Catherine’s day, ordered the standards that
had been captured to be lowered at the Emperor’s feet on
his entering the ballroom, the Emperor made a wry face
and muttered something in which some people caught the
words, ‘the old comedian.’
The Emperor’s displeasure with Kutuzov was specially
increased at Vilna by the fact that Kutuzov evidently could
not or would not understand the importance of the coming
campaign.
When on the following morning the Emperor said to the
officers assembled about him: ‘You have not only saved Rus-
sia, you have saved Europe!’ they all understood that the
war was not ended.
Kutuzov alone would not see this and openly expressed
his opinion that no fresh war could improve the position or
add to the glory of Russia, but could only spoil and lower the
‘She has come to stay with me,’ said Princess Mary. ‘The
count and countess will be here in a few days. The countess
is in a dreadful state; but it was necessary for Natasha her-
self to see a doctor. They insisted on her coming with me.’
‘Yes, is there a family free from sorrow now?’ said Pierre,
addressing Natasha. ‘You know it happened the very day we
were rescued. I saw him. What a delightful boy he was!’
Natasha looked at him, and by way of answer to his words
her eyes widened and lit up.
‘What can one say or think of as a consolation?’ said
Pierre. ‘Nothing! Why had such a splendid boy, so full of
life, to die?’
‘Yes, in these days it would be hard to live without faith...’
remarked Princess Mary.
‘Yes, yes, that is really true,’ Pierre hastily interrupted
her.
‘Why is it true?’ Natasha asked, looking attentively into
Pierre’s eyes.
‘How can you ask why?’ said Princess Mary. ‘The thought
alone of what awaits..’
Natasha without waiting for Princess Mary to finish
again looked inquiringly at Pierre.
‘And because,’ Pierre continued, ‘only one who believes
that there is a God ruling us can bear a loss such as hers
Pierre was shown into the large, brightly lit dining room;
a few minutes later he heard footsteps and Princess Mary
entered with Natasha. Natasha was calm, though a severe
and grave expression had again settled on her face. They all
three of them now experienced that feeling of awkwardness
which usually follows after a serious and heartfelt talk. It
is impossible to go back to the same conversation, to talk
of trifles is awkward, and yet the desire to speak is there
and silence seems like affectation. They went silently to ta-
ble. The footmen drew back the chairs and pushed them up
again. Pierre unfolded his cold table napkin and, resolv-
ing to break the silence, looked at Natasha and at Princess
Mary. They had evidently both formed the same resolution;
the eyes of both shone with satisfaction and a confession
that besides sorrow life also has joy.
‘Do you take vodka, Count?’ asked Princess Mary, and
those words suddenly banished the shadows of the past.
‘Now tell us about yourself,’ said she. ‘One hears such im-
probable wonders about you.’
‘Yes,’ replied Pierre with the smile of mild irony now ha-
bitual to him. ‘They even tell me wonders I myself never
dreamed of! Mary Abramovna invited me to her house and
kept telling me what had happened, or ought to have hap-
pened, to me. Stepan Stepanych also instructed me how I
It was a long time before Pierre could fall asleep that night.
He paced up and down his room, now turning his thoughts
on a difficult problem and frowning, now suddenly shrug-
ging his shoulders and wincing, and now smiling happily.
He was thinking of Prince Andrew, of Natasha, and of
their love, at one moment jealous of her past, then reproach-
ing himself for that feeling. It was already six in the morning
and he still paced up and down the room.
‘Well, what’s to be done if it cannot be avoided? What’s
to be done? Evidently it has to be so,’ said he to himself, and
hastily undressing he got into bed, happy and agitated but
free from hesitation or indecision.
‘Strange and impossible as such happiness seems, I must
do everything that she and I may be man and wife,’ he told
himself.
A few days previously Pierre had decided to go to Pe-
tersburg on the Friday. When he awoke on the Thursday,
Savelich came to ask him about packing for the journey.
‘What, to Petersburg? What is Petersburg? Who is there
in Petersburg?’ he asked involuntarily, though only to him-
self. ‘Oh, yes, long ago before this happened I did for some
reason mean to go to Petersburg,’ he reflected. ‘Why? But
perhaps I shall go. What a good fellow he is and how at-
tentive, and how he remembers everything,’ he thought,
When Pierre and his wife entered the drawing room the
countess was in one of her customary states in which she
needed the mental exertion of playing patience, and so-
though by force of habit she greeted him with the words
she always used when Pierre or her son returned after an
absence: ‘High time, my dear, high time! We were all wea-
ry of waiting for you. Well, thank God!’ and received her
presents with another customary remark: ‘It’s not the gift
that’s precious, my dear, but that you give it to me, an old
woman...’yet it was evident that she was not pleased by
Pierre’s arrival at that moment when it diverted her atten-
tion from the unfinished game.
She finished her game of patience and only then examined
the presents. They consisted of a box for cards, of splendid
workmanship, a bright-blue Sevres tea cup with shepherd-
esses depicted on it and with a lid, and a gold snuffbox with
the count’s portrait on the lid which Pierre had had done by
a miniaturist in Petersburg. The countess had long wished
for such a box, but as she did not want to cry just then she
glanced indifferently at the portrait and gave her attention
chiefly to the box for cards.
‘Thank you, my dear, you have cheered me up,’ said she
as she always did. ‘But best of all you have brought your-
self backfor I never saw anything like it, you ought to give