With the conquest of Lithuania, the object of the war was attained, and, yet, the war appeared scarcely to have commenced; for places only had been vanquished, and not men. The Russian army was unbroken; its two wings, which had been separated by the vivacity of the first onset, had now united. We were in the finest season of the year. It was in this situation that Napoleon believed himself irrevocably decided to halt on the banks of the Boristhenes and the DÜna. At that time, he could much more easily deceive others as to his intentions, as he actually deceived himself.

His line of defence was already traced upon his maps; the siege-equipage was proceeding towards Riga; the left of the army would rest on that strong place; hence, proceeding to DÜnabourg and Polotsk, it would maintain a menacing defensive. Witepsk, so easy to fortify, and its woody heights, would serve as an entrenched camp for the centre. Thence, towards the south, the Berezina and its marshes, covered by the Boristhenes, supply no other passage but a few defiles; a very few troops would be sufficient to guard them. Further on, Bobruisk marked out the right of this great line, and orders were given to obtain possession of that fortress. In addition, an insurrection of the populous provinces of the south was calculated on; they would assist Schwartzenberg in expelling Tormasof, and the army would be increased by their numerous cossacks. One of the greatest proprietors of these provinces, a nobleman in whom every thing was distinguished, even to his external appearance, hastened to join the liberators of his country. He it was whom the emperor intended for the leader of this insurrection.

In this position nothing would be wanting. Courland would support Macdonald; Samogitia, Oudinot; the fertile plains of Klubokoe, the emperor; the southern provinces would effect the rest. In addition, the grand magazine of the army was at Dantzic; its intermediate ones at Wilna and Minsk. In this manner the army would be connected with the country which it had just set free; and all things appertaining to that country—its rivers, marshes, productions, and inhabitants, would be united with us: all things would be agreed for the purposes of defence.

Such was Napoleon's plan. He was at that time seen exploring Witepsk and its environs, as if to reconnoitre places where he was likely to make a long residence. Establishments of all kinds were formed there. Thirty-six ovens, capable of baking at once 29,000 pounds of bread, were constructed. Neither was utility alone attended to; embellishment was also considered. Some stone houses spoiled the appearance of the square of the palace; the emperor ordered his guard to pull them down, and to clear away the rubbish. Indeed, he was already anticipating the pleasures of winter; Parisian actors must come to Witepsk; and as that city was abandoned, fair spectators must be attracted from Warsaw and Wilna.

His star at that time enlightened his path: happy had it been for him, if he had not afterwards mistaken the movements of his impatience for the inspirations of genius. But, whatever may be said, it was by himself alone that he suffered himself to be hurried on; for in him every thing proceeded from himself; and it was a vain attempt to seduce his prudence. In vain did one of his marshals then promise him an insurrection of the Russians, in consequence of the proclamations which the officers of his advanced guard had been instructed to disseminate. Some Poles had intoxicated that general with inconsiderate promises, dictated by the delusive hope common to all exiles, with which they flatter the ambition of the leaders who rely upon them.

But Murat was the individual whose incitements were most frequent and animated. Tired of repose, and insatiable of glory, that monarch, who considered the enemy to be within his grasp, was unable to repress his emotions. He quitted the advanced guard, went to Witepsk, and in a private interview with the emperor, gave way to his impetuosity. "He accused the Russian army of cowardice; according to him it had failed in the rendezvous before Witepsk, as if it had been an affair of a duel. It was a panic-struck army, which his light cavalry alone was sufficient to put to flight." This ebullition extorted a smile from Napoleon; but in order to moderate his fervour, he said to him, "Murat! the first campaign in Russia is finished; let us here plant our eagles. Two great rivers mark out our position; let us raise block-houses on that line; let our fires cross each other on all sides; let us form in square battalion; cannons at the angles and the exterior; let the interior contain our quarters and our magazines: 1813 will see us at Moscow—1814 at Petersburgh. The Russian war is a war of three years!"

It was thus that his genius conceived every thing in masses, and his eye expatiated over an army of 400,000 men as if it were a regiment.

That very day he loudly addressed an administrator in the following words: "As for you, sir, you must take care to provide subsistence for us in these quarters; for," added he, in a loud voice, and addressing himself to some of his officers, "we shall not repeat the folly of Charles the Twelfth." But his actions in a short time belied his words; and there was a general astonishment at his indifference to giving the necessary orders for so great an establishment. To the left no instructions were sent to Macdonald, nor was he supplied with the means of obtaining possession of Riga. To the right, it was Bobruisk which it was necessary to capture; this fortress stands in the midst of an extensive and deep marsh; and it was to a body of cavalry that the task of besieging it was committed.

Napoleon, in former times, scarcely ever gave orders without the possibility of being obeyed; but the prodigies of the war of Prussia had since occurred, and from that time the idea of impossibility was not admitted. His orders were always, that every thing must be attempted, because up to that time every thing had succeeded. This at first gave birth to great exertions, all of which, however, were not equally fortunate. Persons got discouraged; but their chief persevered; he had become accustomed to command every thing; those whom he commanded got accustomed not to execute every thing.

Meantime Dombrowski was left before that fortress with his Polish division, which Napoleon stated at 8000 men, although he knew very well that it did not at that time amount to more than 1200; but such was his custom; either because he calculated on his words being repeated, and that they would deceive the enemy; or that he wished, by this exaggerated estimate, to make his generals feel all that he expected from them.

Witepsk remained for survey. From the windows of its houses the eye looked down perpendicularly into the DÜna, or to the very bottom of the precipices by which its walls are surrounded. In these countries the snow remains long upon the ground; it filters through its least solid parts, which it penetrates to a great depth, and which it dilutes and breaks down. Hence those deep and unexpected ravines, which no declination of the soil gives reason to foresee, which are imperceptible at some paces from their edge, and which on those vast plains surprised and suddenly arrested the charges of cavalry.

The French would not have required more than a month to render that city sufficiently strong as even to stand a regular siege: the natural strength of the place was such as to require little assistance from art, but that little was denied it. At the same time a few millions, which were indispensable to effect the levy of the Lithuanian troops, were refused to them. Prince Sangutsko was to have gone and commanded the insurrection in the South, but he was retained in the imperial head-quarters.

But the moderation of the first discourses of Napoleon had not deceived the members of his household. They recollected that, at the first view of the deserted camp of Barclay, and of Witepsk abandoned, when he heard them congratulating each other on this conquest, he turned sharply round to them and exclaimed, "Do you think then that I have come so far to conquer these huts?" They also knew perfectly, that when he had a great object in view, he never devised any other than a vague plan, preferring to take counsel of opportunity; a system more conformable to the promptitude of his genius.

In other respects, the whole army was loaded with the favours of its commander. If he happened to meet with convoys of wounded, he stopped them, informed himself of their condition, of their sufferings, of the actions in which they had been wounded, and never quitted them without consoling them by his words, or making them partakers of his bounty.

He bestowed particular attention on his guard; he himself daily reviewed some part of them, lavishing commendation, and sometimes blame; but the latter seldom fell on any but the administrators; which pleased the soldiers, and diverted their complaints.

Every day he went and visited the ovens, tasted the bread, and satisfied himself of the regularity of all the distributions. He frequently sent wine from his table to the sentinel who was nearest to him. One day he assembled the Élite of his guards for the purpose of giving them a new leader; he made them a speech, and with his own hand and sword introduced him to them; afterwards he embraced him in their presence. So many attentions were ascribed by some, to his gratitude for the past; by others, to his exigency for the future.

The latter saw clearly that Napoleon had at first flattered himself with the hope of receiving fresh overtures of peace from Alexander, and that the misery and debility of his army had occupied his attention. It was requisite to allow the long train of stragglers and sick sufficient time, the one for joining their corps, and the latter for reaching the hospitals. Finally, to establish these hospitals, to collect provisions, recruit the horses, and wait for the hospital-waggons, the artillery, and the pontoons, which were still laboriously dragging after us across the Lithuanian sands. His correspondence with Europe must also have been a source of occupation to him. To conclude, a destructive atmosphere stopped his progress! Such, in fact, is that climate; the atmosphere is always in the extreme—always excessive; it either parches or inundates, burns up or freezes, the soil and its inhabitants, for whose protection it appears expressly framed; a perfidious climate, the heat of which debilitated our bodies, in order to render them more accessible to the frosts by which they were shortly to be pierced.

The emperor was not the least sensible of its effects; but when he found himself somewhat refreshed by repose, when no envoy from Alexander made his appearance, and his first dispositions were completed, he was seized with impatience. He was observed to grow restless; whether it was that inactivity annoyed him, as it does all men of active habits, and that he preferred danger to the weariness of expectation, or that he was agitated by that desire of acquisition, which, with the greater part of mankind, has stronger efficacy than the pleasure of preserving, or the fear of losing.

It was then especially that the image of captive Moscow besieged him; it was the boundary of his fears, the object of his hopes: possessed of that, he would possess every thing. From that time it was foreseen that an ardent and restless genius, like his, and accustomed to short cuts, would not wait eight months, when he felt his object within his reach, and when twenty days were sufficient to attain it.

We must not, however, be too hasty in judging this extraordinary man by the weaknesses common to all men. We shall presently hear from himself;—we shall see how much his political position tended to complicate his military position. At a later period, we shall be less tempted to blame the resolution he was now about to take, when it is seen that the fate of Russia depended upon only one more day's health, which failed Napoleon, even on the very field of the Moskwa.

Meantime, he at first appeared hardly bold enough to confess to himself a project of such great temerity. But by degrees, he assumed courage to look it in the face. He then began to deliberate, and the state of great irresolution which tormented his mind affected his whole frame. He was observed to wander about his apartments, as if pursued by some dangerous temptation. Nothing could rivet his attention; he every moment began, quitted, and resumed his labour; he walked about without any object; inquired the hour, and looked at his watch; completely absorbed, he stopped, hummed a tune with an absent air, and again began walking about.

In the midst of his perplexity, he occasionally addressed the persons whom he met with such half sentences as "Well! what shall we do? Shall we stay where we are, or advance? How is it possible to stop short in the midst of so glorious a career?" He did not wait for their reply; but still kept wandering about, as if he was looking for something or somebody to terminate his indecision.

At length, quite overwhelmed with the weight of such an important consideration, and oppressed with so great an uncertainty, he would throw himself on one of the beds which he had caused to be laid on the floor of his apartments. His frame, exhausted by the heat, and the struggles of his mind, could only bear a covering of the slightest texture; it was in that state that he passed a portion of his days at Witepsk.

But when his body was at rest, his spirit was only the more active. "How many motives urged him towards Moscow! How support at Witepsk the ennui of seven winter months?—he, who till then had always been the assailant, was about to be reduced to a defensive position; a part unworthy of him, of which he had no experience, and adverse to his genius.

"Moreover, at Witepsk, nothing had been decided, and yet, at what a distance was he already from France! Europe, then, would at length behold him stopped, whom nothing had been able to stop. Would not the duration of the enterprise augment its danger? Ought he to allow Russia time to arm herself entirely? How long could he protract this uncertain condition without impairing the charm of his infallibility, (which the resistance of Spain had already enfeebled) and without engendering dangerous hopes in Europe? What would be thought, if it were known that a third of his army, dispersed or sick, were no longer in the ranks? It was indispensable, therefore, to dazzle the world speedily by the Éclat of a great victory, and hide so many sacrifices under a heap of laurels."

Then, if he remained at Witepsk, he considered that he should have the ennui, the whole expense, all the inconveniences and anxieties of a defensive position to bear; while at Moscow there would be peace, abundance, a reimbursement of the expenses of the war, and immortal glory. He persuaded himself that audacity for him was henceforth the greatest prudence; that it is the same with all hazardous undertakings, as with faults, in which there is always risk at the beginning, but frequently gain at the conclusion; that the more inexcusable they are, the more they require to be successful. That it was indispensable, therefore, to consummate this undertaking, to push it to the utmost, astonish the universe, beat down Alexander by his audacity, and carry off a prize which should be a compensation for so many losses.

Thus it was, that the same danger which perhaps ought to have recalled him to the Niemen, or kept him stationary on the DÜna, urged him towards Moscow! Such is the nature of false positions; every thing in them is perilous; temerity is prudence; there is no choice left but of errors; there is no hope but in the errors of the enemy, and in chance.

Having at last determined, he hastily arose, as if not to allow time to his own reflections to renew so painful a state of uncertainty; and already quite full of the plan which was to secure his conquest, he hastened to his maps; they presented to his view the cities of Smolensk and Moscow; "the great Moscow, the holy city;" names which he repeated with complacency, and which served to add new fuel to his ambitious flame. Fired with this prospect, his spirit, replete with the energy of his mighty conception, appears possessed by the genius of war. His voice deepens; his eye flashes fire; and his countenance darkens; his attendants retreat from his presence, struck with mingled awe and respect; but at length his plan is fixed; his determination taken; his order of march traced out. Instantly, the internal struggle by which he had been agitated subsided; and no sooner was he delivered of his terrible conception, than his countenance resumed its usual mild and tranquil character.