Such, around Napoleon, were the conversations of his officers; or rather their secret reflexions:  for their devotion to him remained entire for two whole years longer, in the midst of the greatest calamities, and of the general revolt of nations.

The Emperor, however, made an effort which was not altogether fruitless; namely, to rally, under one commander, all that remained of the cavalry:  of thirty-seven thousand cavalry which were present at the passage of the Niemen, there were now only eighteen hundred left on horseback.  He gave the command of them to Latour-Maubourg; whether from the esteem felt for him, or from fatigue, no one objected to it.

As to Latour-Maubourg, he received the honour or the charge without expressing either pleasure or regret.  He was a character of peculiar stamp; always ready without forwardness, calm and active, remarkable for his extreme purity of morals, simple and unostentatious; in other respects, unaffected and sincere in his relations with others, and attaching the idea of glory only to actions, and not to words.  He always marched with the same order and moderation in the midst of the most immoderate disorder; and yet, what does honour to the age, he attained to the highest distinctions as quickly and as rapidly as any who could be named.

This feeble re-organization, the distribution of a part of the provisions, the plunder of the rest, the repose which the Emperor and his guard were enabled to take, the destruction of part of the artillery and baggage, and finally, the expedition of a number of orders, were nearly all the benefits which were derived from that fatal delay.  In other respects, all the misfortunes happened which had been foreseen.  A few hundred men were only rallied for a moment.  The explosion of the mines scarcely blew up the outside of some of the walls, and was only of use on the last day, in driving out of the town the stragglers whom we had been unable to set in motion.

The soldiers who had totally lost heart, the women, and several thousand sick and wounded, were here abandoned.  This was when Augereau’s disaster near Elnia made it but too evident that Kutusoff, now become the pursuer, did not confine himself to the high road; that he was marching from Wiazma by Elnia, direct upon Krasnoe; finally, when we ought to have foreseen that we should be obliged to cut our way through the Russian army, it was only on the 14th of November that the grand army (or rather thirty-six thousand troops) commenced its march.

The old and young guard had not then more than from nine to ten thousand infantry, and two thousand cavalry; Davoust and the first corps, from eight to nine thousand; Ney and the third corps, five to six thousand; Prince Eugene and the army of Italy, five thousand; Poniatowski, eight hundred; Junot and the Westphalians, seven hundred; Latour-Maubourg and the rest of the cavalry, fifteen hundred; there might also be about one thousand light horse, and five hundred dismounted cavalry, whom we had succeeded in collecting together.