Chapter 20 Chapter Twenty

A few regiments of infantry, caught off guard in the forest, ran out of the forest; several companies, mingling with other companies, fled like a disorderly crowd.One soldier uttered in terror a meaningless word that sounded appalling in wartime: "cut off," and the word and fear infected the masses. "Detour! Cut off contact! Fuck!" shouted the running people. Just as the regimental commander heard the gunshots and shouts behind him, realizing that something dreadful had happened to his regiment, he thought, He is a model officer who has served for many years without fault, He was astonished at the idea that he was sorry to the chiefs because of his negligence or poor command, and at the same time he had forgotten the unruly cavalry colonel and the dignity due to him as a general, and what is important, he had completely forgotten The danger of war and the instinct of self-preservation.Holding the pommel with his hands, he thrust his spurs into the horse, and galloped towards the regiment under a hail of bullets which he had survived.He had but one desire: to know the truth, to remedy and correct the error, if he had caused it, at all costs, and that he, a model officer who had served twenty-two years and had never been reproached, should have done nothing wrong.

He had the good fortune to gallop through the middle of the French army, and was already approaching the field behind the forest, through which our officers and soldiers were fleeing, and they went straight down the hill without obeying the orders.The moment when the morale of the battle was shaken had come, and the group of disorganized soldiers either obeyed the command of the commander, or looked back at him, and continued to flee forward.No matter how majestic the regimental commander in the soldiers' minds was yelling desperately, no matter how angry the regimental commander's face looked, flushed and completely different from the original, even though he raised a long sword, the soldiers continued to run away, shouting loudly. Speech, fire the gun into the sky, and don't listen to the password.The morale that decided the fate of the battle was shaken, obviously creating an atmosphere of extreme terror.

Coughing loudly from the shouts and the smoke, the general stopped in despair.It seemed that all was lost, when suddenly, for no apparent reason, the French officers and soldiers who had attacked our army fled to the rear and disappeared on the edge of the forest, where the Russian infantry appeared up.This is the company commanded by Timokhin. Only this company successfully held its position in the forest, ambushed in a ditch near the forest, and suddenly launched an attack on the French officers and soldiers.Tymokhin yelled, and rushed towards the French officers and soldiers. He had the courageous spirit of a drunken man, held a saber, and charged at the enemy. Before the French officers and soldiers came to their senses, they dropped their weapons and fled.Running side by side, Dolokhov and Timohin shot at a Frenchman at close range, and were the first to grab the surrendering officer by the collar.The fugitives returned, several barracks were assembled, and the French's attempt to divide the left wing into two was instantly repulsed.The reserve troops have joined forces, and the fleeing people have stopped.The regimental commander and Major Ekonomov were standing by the bridge, letting the retreating companies pass by, when a soldier came up to him, grabbed his stirrups, and nearly leaned against him.The soldier wore a light blue factory coat, without a backpack and a tall military cap, with his head wrapped, and a French-style bullet bag slung over his shoulder.In his hand he held an officer's lance.The soldier's face was pale, his blue eyes shamelessly looked into the regimental commander's face, and there was a slight smile on his lips.Although the head of the regiment was busy and had no time to give instructions to Major Ekonomov, he had to pay attention to this soldier.

"My lord, here are two trophies," said Donohoff, pointing to the French saber and bullet pouch. "This officer was taken prisoner by me. I stopped the company," said Dolokhov, breathless with fatigue; he paused more than once in his speech, "the whole company can testify. Your Excellency, I ask you to remember." !" "Yes, yes," said the regimental commander, turning to Major Economov. But Dolokhov did not go away, he untied the handkerchief and pulled it sharply, so that the commander could see the blood that had clotted on his hair. "It was a bayonet wound, and I was stranded at the front. Please remember, my lord.

The battery in charge of Tushin had been forgotten, and Prince Bagration still heard the cannon from the center, and only towards the end of the battle did he send a colonel there, and then Prince Andrei. Order the artillery to retreat as soon as possible.During this battle, by whose orders, the covering corps stationed near the cannons in charge of Tushin departed, but the battery continued to fire, and it was not captured by the French only because the enemy could not guess. These four unguarded cannons have the power of a valiant shot.On the contrary, the enemy deduced from the very heavy shooting from this fort that the main force of the Russian army was concentrated in the central position here, so they made two attempts to attack this stronghold, but both times were fired by four cannons standing alone on the high ground. Dispelled by the shotgun.

Soon after Prince Bagration left, Tushin was able to burn the village of Schen Graben. "Look, it's a mess! It's on fire! Look, a smoke! Wonderful! Crow! A smoke, a smoke!" said the gunner excitedly. All the cannon fired without order in the direction of the fire.As if urging them, the soldiers yelled loudly every time they fired a cannon: "It's wonderful! Yes, just let it go! Look... croak!" The fire was blown up by the wind and spread quickly.The French column, which had reached the outside of the village, was already back in its place, but the enemy, having been defeated, set up ten cannon on the right of the village, as if in revenge, and began firing at Tushin.

The gunners of our army were as happy as children because the village was on fire, and they were all excited because they had succeeded in bombing the French; , when one of them toppled two horses, and the other blew up a leg of the driver of the ammunition cart, our gunners discovered the enemy's fort. It just changed the mood.The other horses carrying the spare carriages replaced the two, and the wounded were seen off, while the four guns were turned to aim at the ten-gun battery.One officer, Tushin's comrade, was killed at the beginning of the battle, and within an hour seventeen of the forty gunners retired, but the gunners were still cheerful and lively.Twice they spotted French officers and soldiers appearing very close to them down the hill, and they shot the Frenchman with shot.

A small officer, clumsy and feeble in his movements, kept asking the orderly to fill another pipe for the shot, and as he spoke he knocked out the sparks from his pipe and ran forward, catching the fire with his little hand. A pergola watched the French officers and soldiers. "Comrades, annihilate the enemy!" As he spoke, he held the wheel of the cannon and turned the screw. In the midst of the incessant booming of the guns, which made Tushin shudder with every shot, without putting down his pipe, he ran from gun to gun, now aiming, now counting He counted the shots, and now and then ordered the dead and wounded horses to be replaced and re-harnessed; and he kept shouting in his weak, shrill, undecided voice.He had a look of growing excitement on his face.It was only when they killed or wounded some that he frowned, turned his face away from the dead, and yelled angrily at those who were always dawdling and refusing to lift the wounded or the dead.The soldiers, for the most part good-looking lads (as is often the case in artillery batteries, are two heads taller than the officer and twice as wide as he is), all stared at themselves like children in awkward situations. company commander.

The company commander's facial expressions are usually reflected on their faces. Since Tushin heard this terrible roar and uproar, and needed to care for his brother and increase his mobility, he felt no unpleasant terror, nor did it occur to him that someone would kill him or seriously wound him.On the contrary, he became happier and happier.He seemed to feel that it had been a long time since the moment he saw the enemy and fired the first shot, it almost happened yesterday, and the small field where he was standing seemed to be a familiar place he had long known. A place like homeland.Although he remembered everything and considered everything, what a best officer in his position can do.He could do it all, but he was in a state of delirium like a fever, or in a state of drunken ecstasy.

For the deafening noise of his guns was heard from all sides, for the whistling and firing of the enemy's shells, for seeing the sweaty and flushed gunners bustling about the guns, for seeing men and horses flowing Blood, because he saw the smoke from the enemy's position (every time the smoke was followed by a shell, hitting the ground, people, cannon or horses), - because he saw all kinds of phenomena, So he formed his own fantasy world in his mind, which gave him a kind of joy at this moment.In his imagination, the enemy's cannon was not a cannon, but a pipe from which an invisible smoker exhaled intermittently a series of smoke rings.

"Look, it's blowing smoke again," Tushin said softly to himself, and at this moment there was already a cloud of gunpowder smoke rising from the mountain, and the strong wind blew a streamer of smoke to the left. the ball—give it back to him." "My lord, what are your orders?" asked the artillery sergeant standing near him, hearing him murmuring. "Nothing, just a grenade..." he replied. "Hey, our Matvivna, show me your hand," he said to himself.In his imagination, the old cannon next to him seemed to be Matvievna.He felt that the French officers and soldiers living around the cannon were a colony of ants.In Guta's fantasy world, that handsome, drunk man, the number one gunner of the second cannon was the uncle, and Tushin looked at him differently, and every movement of his made him feel happy.The sound of musketry firing down the hill, intermittent and violent, seemed to him to be someone breathing there.He listened to the intermittent, now intense shots at each other. "Listen, gasping again, gasping," he said to himself. He felt like a tall, strong man who could hold a shell in both hands and throw it at the French officers and soldiers. "Hey, Matvivna, my dear, don't betray us!" he said, when a strange, unfamiliar voice came from above his head, and went to the cannon. "Captain Tushin! Captain!" Tushin looked back in horror.This was the officer who had thrown Grunt out of the tent of the peddler.He called out to him in a breathless voice: "What's the matter with you, have you lost your mind? Twice you were ordered to retreat, and you..." "Come on, why are they doing this to me?..." Tushin thought to himself, looking at the chief in horror. "I... nothing..." He stretched two fingers to the brim of his hat and said, "..." But the colonel did not finish what he had to say.A passing shell forced him to duck after dodging on horseback.He was silent, and just about to say something, another shell stopped him.He turned his horse's head and ran away as if flying. "Retreat! All retreat!" he yelled from a distance. The soldiers laughed.A minute later, the adjutant came with the same order. He is Prince Andrew.When he came to the clearing where Tushin's guns were stationed, the first thing he saw was the unhasted horse with a broken leg, neighing beside the harnessed horses, bleeding Flowed from its legs like a fountain.Several dead were lying between the vehicles in front.Cannonballs flew overhead one after another, and as he drew nearer he felt a nervous shiver run down his spine.But the thought of his cowardice cheered him up. "I can't be afraid," he thought, dismounting slowly between the cannons.He communicated his order and had not yet left the fort.He resolved, under his supervision, to unload some of the cannon from the position, and to transport the cannon.Together with Tushin, he stepped over the corpses and withdrew the cannon under terrible French fire. "The chief was here just now, but he left very quickly," said the artillery sergeant to Prince Andrew, "not like your excellency." Prince Andrew said nothing to Tushin.Both of them are very busy, it seems that they haven't seen each other.When they had loaded the two undamaged of the four cannons into the front wagon and went down the hill (one damaged cannon and the Unicorn cannon remained in place), Prince Andrei approached Tushin . "Well, good-bye," said Prince Andrew, holding out his hand to Tushin. "Good-bye, my dear," said Tushin, "my dear!" Good-bye, my dear. said Tushin, with tears in his eyes, suddenly bursting into tears for no reason.