As for the Emperor, who could scarcely be deceived, he had but a few moments of a factitious joy.  He soon complained “that an annoying warfare of partizans hovered around him; that notwithstanding all these pacific demonstrations, he was sensible that bodies of Cossacks were prowling on his flanks and in his rear.  Had not one hundred and fifty dragoons of his old guard been surprised and routed, by a number of these barbarians?  And this two days after the armistice, on the road to Mojaisk, on his line of operation, that by which the army communicated with its magazines, its reinforcements, its depots, and himself with Europe!”

In fact two convoys had just fallen into the enemy’s hands on that road:  one through the negligence of its commander, who put an end to his life in despair; and the other through the cowardice of an officer, who was about to be punished when the retreat commenced.  To the destruction of the army he owed his escape.

Our soldiers, and especially our cavalry, were obliged every morning to go to a great distance in quest of provisions for the evening and the next day; and as the environs of Moscow and Vinkowo became gradually more and more drained, they were daily necessitated to extend their excursions.  Both men and horses returned worn out with fatigue, that is to say such of them as returned at all; for we had to fight for every bushel of rye, and for every truss of forage.  It was a series of incessant surprises, skirmishes, and losses.  The peasantry took a part in it.  They punished with death such of their number as the prospect of gain had allured to our camp with provisions.  Others set fire to their own villages, to drive our foragers out of them, and to give them up to the Cossacks whom they had previously summoned, and who kept us there in a state of siege.

It was the peasantry also who took Vereia, a town in the neighbourhood of Moscow.  One of their priests is said to have planned and executed this coup-de-main.  He armed the inhabitants, obtained some troops from Kutusoff; then on the 10th of October, before daybreak, he caused the signal of a false attack to be given in one quarter, while in another he himself rushed upon our palisades, destroyed them, penetrated into the town, and put the whole garrison to the sword.

Thus the war was every where; in our front, on our flanks and in our rear:  the army was weakening, and the enemy becoming daily more enterprising.  This conquest was destined to fare like many others, which are won in the mass, and lost in detail.

Murat himself at length grew uneasy.  In these daily skirmishes he saw half of the remnant of his cavalry melted away.  At the advanced posts, or on meeting with our officers, those of the Russians, either from weariness, vanity, or military frankness carried to indiscretion, exaggerated the disasters which threatened us.  They showed us those “wild-looking horses, scarcely at all broken in, whose long manes swept the dust of the plain.  Did not this tell us that a numerous cavalry was joining them from all quarters, while ours was gradually perishing?  Did not the continual discharges of fire-arms within their line apprise us that a multitude of recruits were there training under favour of the armistice?”