us; on we ran; I was the first in the ravine.  Ha! my God! how the lieutenants fell, and the colonels, and the soldiers!  No matter! all the more shoes for those that had none, and epaulets for the clever ones who knew how to read.  ‘Victory!’ cried the whole line; ’Victory!’—­and, would you believe it? a thing never seen before, there lay twenty-five thousand Frenchmen on the ground.  ’Twas like mowing down a wheat-field; only in place of the ears of wheat put the heads of men!  We were sobered by this time—­those who were left alive.  The MAN rode up; we made the circle round him.  Ha! he knew how to cajole his children; he could be amiable when he liked, and feed ’em with words when their stomachs were ravenous with the hunger of wolves.  Flatterer! he distributed the crosses himself, he uncovered to the dead, and then he cried to us, ‘On! to Moscow!’ ’To Moscow!’ answered the army.

“We took Moscow.  Would you believe it? the Russians burned their own city!  ’Twas a haystack six miles square, and it blazed for two days.  The buildings crashed like slates, and showers of melted iron and lead rained down upon us, which was naturally horrible.  I may say to you plainly, it was like a flash of lightning on our disasters.  The Emperor said, ‘We have done enough; my soldiers shall rest here.’  So we rested awhile, just to get the breath into our bodies and the flesh on our bones, for we were really tired.  We took possession of the golden cross that was on the Kremlin; and every soldier brought away with him a small fortune.  But out there the winter sets in a month earlier—­a thing those fools of science didn’t properly explain.  So, coming back, the cold nipped us.  No longer an army—­do you hear me?—­no longer any generals, no longer any sergeants even.  ’Twas the reign of wretchedness and hunger—­a reign of equality at last.  No one thought of anything but to see France once more; no one stooped to pick up his gun or his money if he dropped them; each man followed his nose, and went as he pleased without caring for glory.  The weather was so bad the Emperor couldn’t see his star; there was something between him and the skies.  Poor man! it made him ill to see his eagles flying away from victory.  Ah! ’twas a mortal blow, you may believe me.

“Well, we got to the Beresina, My friends, I can affirm to you by all that is most sacred, by my honour, that since mankind came into the world, never, never was there seen such a fricassee of any army—­guns, carriages, artillery-waggons—­in the midst of such snows, under such relentless skies!  The muzzles of the muskets burned our hands if we touched them, the iron was so cold.  It was there that the army was saved by the pontoniers, who were firm at their post; and there that Gondrin—­sole survivor of the men who were bold enough to go into the water and build the bridges by which the army crossed—­that Gondrin, here present, admirably conducted himself, and saved us from the Russians, who, I must tell you, still respected the grand army, remembering its victories.  And,” he added, pointing to Gondrin, who was gazing at him with the peculiar attention of a deaf man, “Gondrin is a finished soldier, a soldier who is honour itself, and he merits your highest esteem.