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.

CHAP.  II.

His resolution once taken, he was anxious that it should satisfy his friends; he conceived that by persuading them, they would be actuated by greater zeal, than by commanding their obedience.  It was, moreover, by their sentiments that he was enabled to judge of those of the rest of his army; in short, like all other men, the silent discontent of his household disturbed him.  Surrounded by disapproving countenances, and opinions contrary to his own, he felt himself uncomfortable.  And, besides, to obtain their assent to his plan, was in some degree to make them share the responsibility which possibly weighed upon his mind.

But all the officers of his household opposed his plan, each in the way that marked his peculiar character; Berthier, by a melancholy countenance, by lamentations, and even tears; Lobau and Caulaincourt, by a frankness, which in the first was stamped by a cold and haughty roughness, excusable in so brave a warrior; and which in the second was persevering even to obstinacy, and impetuous even to violence.  The emperor repelled their observations with some ill-humour; he exclaimed, addressing himself more especially to his aid-de-camp, as well as to Berthier, “that he had enriched his generals too much; that all they now aspired to was to follow the pleasures of the chase, and to display their brilliant equipages in Paris:  and that, doubtless, they had become disgusted with war.”  When their honour was thus attacked, there was no longer any reply to be made; they merely bowed and remained silent.  During one of his impatient fits, he told one of the generals of his guard, “you were born in a bivouac, and in a bivouac you will die.”