On the 23rd the imperial quarters were at Borowsk. That night was an agreeable one for the Emperor: he was informed that at six in the evening Delzons and his division had, four leagues in advance of him, found Malo-Yaroslawetz and the woods which command it unoccupied: this was a strong position within reach of Kutusoff, and the only point where he could cut us off from the new road to Kalouga.

The Emperor wished first to secure this advantage by his presence; the order to march was even given, but withdrawn, we know not why. He passed the whole of that evening on horseback, not far from Borowsk, on the left of the road, the side on which he supposed Kutusoff to be. He reconnoitred the ground in the midst of a heavy rain, as if he anticipated that it might become a field of battle. Next day, the 24th, he learned that the Russians had disputed the possession of Malo-Yaroslawetz with Delzons. Owing either to confidence or uncertainty in his plans, this intelligence gave him very little concern.

He quitted Borowsk, therefore, late and leisurely, when the noise of a very smart engagement reached where he was; he then became uneasy, hastened to an eminence and listened. "Had the Russians anticipated him? Was his manoeuvre thwarted? Had he not used sufficient expedition in that march, the object of which was to pass the left flank of Kutusoff?"

In reality there was in this whole movement a little of that torpor which succeeds a long repose. Moscow is but one hundred and ten wersts from Malo-Yaroslawetz; four days would have been sufficient to go that distance; we took six. The army, laden with provisions and pillage, was heavy, and the roads were deep. A whole day had been sacrificed to the passage of the Nara and its morass, as also to the rallying of the different corps. It is true that in defiling so near the enemy it was necessary to march close, that we might not present to him too long a flank. Be this as it may, we may date all our calamities from that delay.

The Emperor was still listening; the noise increased. "Is it then a battle?" he exclaimed. Every discharge agitated him, for the chief point with him was no longer to conquer, but to preserve, and he urged on Davoust, who accompanied him; but he and that marshal did not reach the field of battle till dark, when the firing was subsiding and the whole was over.

The Emperor saw the end of the battle, but without being able to assist the viceroy. A band of Cossacks from Twer had nearly captured one of his officers, who was only a very short distance from him.

It was not till then that an officer, sent by Prince Eugene, came to him to explain the whole affair. "The troops had," he said, "in the first place, been obliged to cross the Louja at the foot of Malo-Yaroslawetz, at the bottom of an elbow which the river makes in its course; and then to climb a steep hill: it is on this rapid declivity, broken by pointed crags, that the town is built. Beyond is an elevated plain, surrounded with wood from which run three roads, one in front, coming from Kalouga, and two on the left, from Lectazowo, the entrenched camp of Kutusoff.

"On the preceding day Delzons found no enemy there; but he did not think it prudent to place his whole division in the upper town, beyond a river and a defile, and on the margin of a precipice, down which it might have been thrown by a nocturnal surprise. He remained, therefore, on the low bank of the Louja, sending only two battalions to occupy the town and to watch the elevated plain.

"The night was drawing to a close; it was four o'clock, and all were already asleep in Delzons's bivouacs, excepting a few sentinels, when Doctorof's Russians suddenly rushed in the dark out of the wood with tremendous shouts. Our sentinels were driven back on their posts, the posts on their battalions, the battalions on the division: and yet it was not a coup-de-main, for the Russians had brought up cannon. At the very commencement of the attack, the firing had conveyed the tidings of a serious affair to the viceroy, who was three leagues distant."

The report added, that "the Prince had immediately hastened up with some officers, and that his divisions and his guard had precipitately followed him. As he approached, a vast amphitheatre, where all was bustle, opened before him; the Louja marked the foot of it, and a multitude of Russian riflemen already disputed its banks."

Behind them from the summit of the declivities on which the town was situated, their advanced guard poured their fire on Delzons: beyond that, on the elevated plain, the whole army of Kutusoff was hastening up in two long black columns, by the two roads from Lectazowo. They were seen stretching and entrenching themselves on this bare slope, upon a line of about half a league, where they commanded and embraced every thing by their number and position: they were already placing themselves across the old road to Kalouga, which was open the preceding day, which we might have occupied and travelled if we had pleased, but which Kutusoff would henceforward have it in his power to defend inch by inch.

The enemy's artillery had at the same time taken advantage of the heights which bordered the river on their side; their fire traversed the low ground in the bend of the river, in which were Delzons and his troops. The position was untenable, and hesitation would have been fatal. It was necessary to get out of it either by a prompt retreat, or by an impetuous attack; but it was before us that our retreat lay, and the viceroy gave orders for the attack.

After crossing the Louja by a narrow bridge, the high road from Kalouga runs along the bottom of a ravine which ascends to the town, and then enters Malo-Yaroslawetz. The Russians, in mass occupied this hollow way: Delzons and his Frenchmen rushed upon them head foremost; the Russians were broken and overthrown; they gave way and presently our bayonets glistened on the heights.

Delzons, conceiving himself sure of the victory, announced it as won. He had nothing but a pile of buildings to storm, his soldiers hesitated. He himself advanced and was encouraging them by his words, gestures and example, when a ball struck him on the forehead, and extended him on the ground. His brother threw himself upon him, covered him with his body, clasped him in his arms, and would have borne him off out of the fire and the fray, but a second ball hit him also, and both expired together.

This loss left a great void, which required to be filled up. Guilleminot succeeded Delzons, and the first thing he did was to throw a hundred grenadiers into a church and church-yard, in the walls of which they made loop-holes. This church stood on the left of the high road, which it commanded, and to this edifice we owed the victory. Five times on that day was this post passed by the Russian columns, which were pursuing ours, and five times did its fire, seasonably poured upon their flank and rear, harass them and slacken their progress: afterwards when we resumed the offensive, this position placed them between two fires and ensured the success of our attacks.

Scarcely had that general made this disposition when he was assailed by hosts of Russians; he was driven back towards the bridge, where the viceroy had stationed himself, in order to judge how to act and prepare his reserves. At first the reinforcements which he sent came up but slowly one after another; and as is almost always the case, each of them, being inadequate to any great effort, was successively destroyed without result.

At length the whole of the 14th division was engaged: the combat was then carried, for the third time, to the heights. But when the French had passed the houses, when they had removed from the central point from which they set out; when they had reached the plain, where they were exposed, and where the circle expanded; they could advance no farther: overwhelmed by the fire of a whole army they were daunted and shaken: fresh Russians incessantly came up; our thinned ranks gave way and were broken; the obstacles of the ground increased their confusion: they again descended precipitately and abandoned every thing.

Meanwhile the shells having set fire to the wooden town behind them, in their retreat they were stopped by the conflagration; one fire drove them back upon another; the Russian recruits, wrought up to a pitch of fanatic fury, closely pursued them; our soldiers became enraged; they fought man to man: some were seen seizing each other by one hand, striking with the other, until both victors and vanquished rolled down precipices into the flames, without losing their hold. There the wounded expired, either suffocated by the smoke, or consumed by the fire. Their blackened and calcined skeletons soon presented a hideous sight, when the eye could still discover in them the traces of a human form.

All, however, were not equally intent on doing their duty. There was one officer, a man who was known to talk very big, and who, at the bottom of a ravine, wasted the time for action in making speeches. In this place of security he kept about him a sufficient number of troops to authorize his remaining himself, leaving the rest to expose themselves in detail, without unison and at random.

The 15th division was still left. The viceroy summoned it: as it advanced, it threw a brigade into the suburb on the left, and another into the town on the right. It consisted of Italians, recruits, who had never before been in action. They ascended, shouting enthusiastically, ignorant of the danger or despising it, from that singular disposition, which renders life less dear in its flower than in its decline, either because while young we fear death less from the feeling of its distance, or because at that age, rich in years and prodigal of every thing, we squander life as the wealthy do their fortune.

The shock was terrible: every thing was reconquered for the fourth time, and lost in like manner. More eager to begin than their seniors, they were sooner disheartened, and returned flying to the old battalions, which supported and were obliged to lead them back to the danger.

The Russians, emboldened by their incessantly increasing numbers and success, then descended by their right to gain possession of the bridge and to cut off our retreat. Prince Eugene had nothing left but his last reserve: he and his guard now took part in the combat. At this sight, and at his call, the remains of the 13th, 14th, and 15th divisions mustered their courage; they made a powerful and a last effort, and for the fifth time the combat was transferred to the heights.

At the same time Colonel Peraldi and the Italian chasseurs overthrew with their bayonets the Russians, who were already approaching the left of the bridge, and inebriated by the smoke and the fire, through which they had passed, by the havoc which they made, and by their victory, they pushed forward without stopping on the elevated plain, and endeavoured to make themselves masters of the enemy's cannon: but one of those deep clefts, with which the soil of Russia is intersected, stopped them in the midst of a destructive fire; their ranks opened, the enemy's cavalry attacked them, and they were driven back to the very gardens of the suburbs. There they paused and rallied: all, both French and Italians, obstinately defended the upper avenues of the town, and the Russians being at length repulsed, drew back and concentrated themselves on the road to Kalouga, between the woods and Malo-Yaroslawetz.

In this manner eighteen thousand Italians and French crowded together at the bottom of a ravine, defeated fifty thousand Russians, posted over their heads, and seconded by all the obstacles that a town built on a steep declivity is capable of presenting.

The army, however, surveyed with sorrow this field of battle, where seven generals and four thousand Italians had been killed or wounded. The sight of the enemy's loss afforded no consolation; it was not twice the amount of ours, and their wounded would be saved. It was moreover recollected that in a similar situation Peter I., in sacrificing ten Russians for one Swede, thought that he was not sustaining merely an equal loss, but even gaining by so terrible a bargain. But what caused the greatest pain, was the idea that so sanguinary a conflict might have been spared.

In fact, the fires which were discovered on our left, in the night between the 23d and 24th, had apprised us of the movement of the Russians towards Malo-Yaroslawetz; and yet the French army had marched thither languidly; a single division, thrown to the distance of three leagues from all succour, had been carelessly risked; the corps d'armÉe had remained out of reach of each other. Where were now the rapid movements of Marengo, Ulm, and EckmÜhl? Why so slow and drawling a march on such a critical occasion? Was it our artillery and baggage that had caused this tardiness? Such was at least the most plausible presumption.