War and Peace
(always followed by a ball flying past and striking the earth, a man, a
gun, a horse), from the sight of all these things a fantastic world of
his own had taken possession of his brain and at that moment afforded
him pleasure. The enemy’s guns were in his fancy not guns but pipes
from which occasional puffs were blown by an invisible smoker.
“There... he’s puffing again,” muttered Túshin to himself, as a
small cloud rose from the hill and was borne in a streak to the left by
the wind.
“Now look out for the ball... we’ll throw it back.”
“What do you want, your honor?” asked an artilleryman, standing
close by, who heard him muttering.
“Nothing... only a shell...” he answered.
“Come along, our Matvévna!” he said to himself. “Matvévna” *
was the name his fancy gave to the farthest gun of the battery, which
was large and of an old pattern. The French swarming round their guns
seemed to him like ants. In that world, the handsome drunkard Number One
of the second gun’s crew was “uncle”; Túshin looked at him more
often than at anyone else and took delight in his every movement.
The sound of musketry at the foot of the hill, now diminishing, now
increasing, seemed like someone’s breathing. He listened intently to
the ebb and flow of these sounds.
* Daughter of Matthew.
“Ah! Breathing again, breathing!” he muttered to himself.
He imagined himself as an enormously tall, powerful man who was throwing
cannon balls at the French with both hands.
“Now then, Matvévna, dear old lady, don’t let me down!” he was
saying as he moved from the gun, when a strange, unfamiliar voice called
above his head: “Captain Túshin! Captain!”
Túshin turned round in dismay. It was the staff officer who had turned
him out of the booth at Grunth. He was shouting in a gasping voice:
“Are you mad? You have twice been ordered to retreat, and you...”
“Why are they down on me?” thought Túshin, looking in alarm at his
superior.
“I... don’t...” he muttered, holding up two fingers to his cap.
“I...”
But the staff officer did not finish what he wanted to say. A cannon
ball, flying close to him, caused him to duck and bend over his horse.
He paused, and just as he was about to say something more, another ball
stopped him. He turned his horse and galloped off.
“Retire! All to retire!” he shouted from a distance.
The soldiers laughed. A moment later, an adjutant arrived with the same
order.
It was Prince Andrew. The first thing he saw on riding up to the space
where Túshin’s guns were stationed was an unharnessed horse with a
broken leg, that lay screaming piteously beside the harnessed horses.
Blood was gushing from its leg as from a spring. Among the limbers lay
several dead men. One ball after another passed over as he approached
and he felt a nervous shudder run down his spine. But the mere thought
of being afraid roused him again. “I cannot be afraid,” thought he,
and dismounted slowly among the guns. He delivered the order and did
not leave the battery. He decided to have the guns removed from their
positions and withdrawn in his presence. Together with Túshin, stepping
across the bodies and under a terrible fire from the French, he attended
to the removal of the guns.
“A staff officer was here a minute ago, but skipped off,” said an
artilleryman to Prince Andrew. “Not like your honor!”
Prince Andrew said nothing to Túshin. They were both so busy as to seem
not to notice one another. When having limbered up the only two cannon
that remained uninjured out of the four, they began moving down the hill
(one shattered gun and one unicorn were left behind), Prince Andrew rode
up to Túshin.
“Well, till we meet again...” he said, holding out his hand to
Túshin.
“Good-by, my dear fellow,” said Túshin. “Dear soul! Good-by, my
dear fellow!” and for some unknown reason tears suddenly filled his
eyes.
CHAPTER XXI
The wind had fallen and black clouds, merging with the powder smoke,
hung low over the field of battle on the horizon. 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 Túshin with his guns,
continually 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 Zherkóv, who had been twice sent to
Túshin’s battery but had never reached it. Interrupting one
another, they all gave, and transmitted, orders as to how to proceed,
reprimanding and reproaching him. Túshin gave no orders, and,
silently—fearing to speak because at every word he felt ready to
weep without knowing why—rode behind on his artillery 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
Túshin’s wattle shed was laid, with a bullet in his stomach, on
“Matvévna’s” carriage. At the foot of the hill, a pale hussar
cadet, supporting one hand with the other, came up to Túshin and asked
for a seat.
“Captain, for God’s sake! I’ve hurt my arm,” he said timidly.
“For God’s sake... I can’t walk. For God’s sake!”
It was plain that this cadet had already repeatedly asked for a lift and
been refused. He asked in a hesitating, piteous voice.
“Tell them to give me a seat, for God’s sake!”
“Give him a seat,” said Túshin. “Lay a cloak for him to sit on,
lad,” he said, addressing his favorite soldier. “And where is the
wounded officer?”
“He has been set down. He died,” replied someone.
“Help him up. Sit down, dear fellow, sit down! Spread out the cloak,
Antónov.”
The cadet was Rostóv. With one hand he supported the other; he was
pale and his jaw trembled, shivering feverishly. He was placed on
“Matvévna,” the gun from which they had removed the dead officer.
The cloak they spread under him was wet with blood which stained his
breeches and arm.
“What, are you wounded, my lad?” said Túshin, approaching the gun
on which Rostóv sat.
“No, it’s a sprain.”
“Then what is this blood on the gun carriage?” inquired Túshin.
“It was the officer, your honor, stained it,” answered the
artilleryman, wiping away the blood with his coat sleeve, as if
apologizing for the state of his gun.
It was all that they could do to get the guns up the rise aided by the
infantry, and having reached the village of Gruntersdorf they halted. It
had grown so dark that one could not distinguish the uniforms ten paces
off, and the firing had begun to subside. Suddenly, near by on the
right, shouting and firing were again heard. Flashes of shot gleamed in
the darkness. This was the last French attack and was met by soldiers
who had sheltered in the village houses. They all rushed out of
the village again, but Túshin’s guns could not move, and the
artillerymen, Túshin, and the cadet exchanged silent glances as they
awaited their fate. The firing died down and soldiers, talking eagerly,
streamed out of a side street.
“Not hurt, Petróv?” asked one.
“We’ve given it ‘em hot, mate! They won’t make another push
now,” said another.
“You couldn’t see a thing. How they shot at their own fellows!
Nothing could be seen. Pitch-dark, brother! Isn’t there something to
drink?”
The French had been repulsed for the last time. And again and again in
the complete darkness Túshin’s guns moved forward, surrounded by the
humming infantry as by a frame.
In the darkness, it seemed as though a gloomy unseen river was flowing
always in one direction, humming with whispers and talk and the sound of
hoofs and wheels. Amid the general rumble, the groans and voices of the
wounded were more distinctly heard than any other sound in the darkness
of the night. The gloom that enveloped the army was filled with their
groans, which seemed to melt into one with the darkness of the night.
After a while the moving mass became agitated, someone rode past on
a white horse followed by his suite, and said something in passing:
“What did he say? Where to, now? Halt, is it? Did he thank us?” came
eager questions from all sides. The whole moving mass began pressing
closer together and a report spread that they were ordered to halt:
evidently those in front had halted. All remained where they were in the
middle of the muddy road.
Fires were lighted and the talk became more audible. Captain Túshin,
having given orders to his company, sent a soldier to find a dressing
station or a doctor for the cadet, and sat down by a bonfire the
soldiers had kindled on the road. Rostóv, too, dragged himself to the
fire. From pain, cold, and damp, a feverish shivering shook his whole
body. Drowsiness was irresistibly mastering him, but he kept awake by
an excruciating pain in his arm, for which he could find no satisfactory
position. He kept closing his eyes and then again looking at the fire,
which seemed to him dazzlingly red, and at the feeble, round-shouldered
figure of Túshin who was sitting cross-legged like a Turk beside him.
Túshin’s large, kind, intelligent eyes were fixed with sympathy and
commiseration on Rostóv, who saw that Túshin with his whole heart
wished to help him but could not.
From all sides were heard the footsteps and talk of the infantry, who
were walking, driving past, and settling down all around. The sound
of voices, the tramping feet, the horses’ hoofs moving in mud, the
crackling of wood fires near and afar, merged into one tremulous rumble.
It was no longer, as before, a dark, unseen river flowing through the
gloom, but a dark sea swelling and gradually subsiding after a storm.
Rostóv looked at and listened listlessly to what passed before and
around him. An infantryman came to the fire, squatted on his heels, held
his hands to the blaze, and turned away his face.
“You don’t mind your honor?” he asked Túshin. “I’ve lost my
company, your honor. I don’t know where... such bad luck!”
With the soldier, an infantry officer with a bandaged cheek came up to
the bonfire, and addressing Túshin asked him to have the guns moved a
trifle to let a wagon go past. After he had gone, two soldiers rushed to
the campfire. They were quarreling and fighting desperately, each trying
to snatch from the other a boot they were both holding on to.
“You picked it up?... I dare say! You’re very smart!” one of them
shouted hoarsely.
Then a thin, pale soldier, his neck bandaged with a bloodstained leg
band, came up and in angry tones asked the artillerymen for water.
“Must one die like a dog?” said he.
Túshin told them to give the man some water. Then a cheerful soldier
ran up, begging a little fire for the infantry.
“A nice little hot torch for the infantry! Good luck to you, fellow
countrymen. Thanks for the fire—we’ll return it with interest,”
said he, carrying away into the darkness a glowing stick.
Next came four soldiers, carrying something heavy on a cloak, and passed
by the fire. One of them stumbled.
“Who the devil has put the logs on the road?” snarled he.
“He’s dead—why carry him?” said another.
“Shut up!”
And they disappeared into the darkness with their load.
“Still aching?” Túshin asked Rostóv in a whisper.
“Yes.”
“Your honor, you’re wanted by the general. He is in the hut here,”
said a gunner, coming up to Túshin.
“Coming, friend.”
Túshin rose and, buttoning his greatcoat and pulling it straight,
walked away from the fire.
Not far from the artillery campfire, in a hut that had been prepared
for him, Prince Bagratión sat at dinner, talking with some commanding
officers who had gathered at his quarters. The little old man with
the half-closed eyes was there greedily gnawing a mutton bone, and the