Chapter 2 Chapter two

On May 29, Napoleon left Dresden, where he had spent three weeks, where princes, dukes, kings, and even an emperor formed a court around him.Before leaving, Napoleon kindly comforted those princes, kings and emperors who were worthy of his care, and reprimanded those kings and princes he was dissatisfied with. Empress of Austria and tenderly embraces Empress Maria Luisa.As his historians say, he bequeathed her a sad parting life that she—this Maria Luisa, whom he took as his wife, though he had another wife in Paris—seemed unable to bear it. .Although the diplomats still believed in the possibility of peace and worked tirelessly to achieve it, and although the Emperor Napoleon himself wrote to the Emperor Alexander, calling him Mon-sieur monfrere and earnestly assuring him that he did not want war, he Always loved and respected him--yet he set out after the army, issuing new orders at every stop, urging the army to advance rapidly from west to east.He set off in a six-horse station wagon, surrounded by squires, adjutants, and guards, along the roads to Posen, Torun, Danzig, and Kennesburg.Every time he arrived in a city, thousands of people greeted him with excitement and joy.

The army advanced from west to east, and he also galloped from west to east in six replacement carriages.On June 10, he caught up with the army and spent the night in the lodgings prepared for him in the Wilkowski Forest, an estate named after a Polish count. The next day, Napoleon crossed the army in a four-wheeled carriage and arrived at the Niemen River. In order to see where the river was crossed, he changed into a Polish uniform and came to the river bank. See the Cossacks (Les Cosaques) and the vast steppes (Lessteppes) across the river, and in the middle of that steppe is Moscoulavillesainte Like Skivsky, that was the capital of the country where Alexander Macedon went - Napoleon ordered attack.Regardless of strategic or diplomatic considerations, this is counterproductive, an unexpected idealist theory.Taking the new discoveries of the natural sciences at that time (X-rays, radium, etc.), his army began to cross the Nieman River the next day.

-------- ①French: Your Majesty, my brother (my dear brother). ②French: The holy city of Moscow. Early in the morning on the twelfth, he walked out of the tent that he had set up on the cliff on the left bank of the Neman River that day, and watched with binoculars the torrent composed of his own army gushing out of the Velkovy Forest and pouring into the three camps erected on the Neman River. on a floating bridge.Knowing that the emperor was coming, the officers and soldiers of the army looked for him with their eyes, and when they saw a figure in a frock coat and a hat who was far away from the followers in front of the tent on the mountain, they all threw their hats into the air and shouted: "Vive! 'Empereur!" Then, one by one, streams poured out from the great forest that had concealed them until now, spread out, and crossed to the opposite bank along the three pontoon bridges.

-------- ① French: Long live the emperor! "Is it the Emperor? Oh! He's out there himself, and things are going great. Now we're off! Really... that's him... Long live the Emperor! Ah, the Asiatic Steppes... But that's a nasty country. Goodbye, Bo Cy. I will keep a best palace in Moscow and if people choose me as Governor of India, I will make you Minister of Kashmir... Long live! That is the Emperor! Have you seen him? I have seen him twice, just As I see you now. A petty sergeant... I saw him put a cross on an old soldier... Long live the Emperor!" Voices, old and young, were conversing, each with a different character and a very different social position.On the faces of all these men was a common expression of joy at the long-awaited campaign at last beginning and of devotion and devotion to the man in the gray frock coat who stood on the hill.

On June 13th, a small Arabian thoroughbred was brought to Napoleon.He mounted his horse and ran towards a pontoon bridge across the Nieman River, and there were constant wild cheers by the river, obviously, he could bear these cheers only because he couldn't stop people from using them to express their love for him; But these cheers that accompanied him everywhere distressed him and distracted him from thinking about the military problems that had haunted his mind since he came to the army.He crossed a pontoon bridge of small boats, reached the opposite bank, turned sharply to the left, and galloped in the direction of Kovno, with his cheery and breathless chasseurs galloping ahead of him. He opened a passage through the troops.Running to the broad Vilja, he stopped near the Polish Lancers.

"Long live!" the Poles also shouted enthusiastically, and they were out of formation, trying to see him.Napoleon studied the river carefully, then dismounted and sat down on a log on the bank.He silently waved his hand, and someone handed him a pair of binoculars. He put the binoculars on the back of a young attendant who ran over joyfully, and began to observe the other side of the river.Then he buried himself in the map spread out among the logs.He said something without looking up, and his two lieutenants galloped towards the Polish Lancers. "What? What did he say?" These voices could be heard in the ranks as an adjutant galloped up to the Polish Lancers.

Ordering to find a shoal across the river, the Colonel of the Polish Lancers, blushing, was incoherent with excitement.A good-looking old man asked the adjutant to allow him to swim with his lancers across the river without looking for fords.Like a child who asks permission to ride, fearing refusal, he wishes to swim across the river in the presence of the Emperor.The adjutant said that the emperor probably disliked such excessive loyalty. As soon as the adjutant finished speaking, the old officer with a bushy mustache beamed with joy, his eyes sparkled, he raised his saber, shouted "Long live!" and ordered the Lancers to follow him.He spurred a horse and galloped toward the river.He slammed viciously at the stalled horse, plopped into the water, and swam deep into the rapids.Hundreds of Lancers jumped into the water afterward, and the middle of the river and the rapids were cold and terrible.The Lancers scratched each other and fell from their horses into the water.Some horses were drowned, and men were also drowned.The rest struggled to swim on to the other side of the river, although there was a ferry half (russia) miles away, they still took pride in swimming and drowning in the river under the watchful eyes of the man who sat in the circle The people on the board didn't even look at what they were doing.When the adjutant came back and found an opportune moment to draw the Emperor's attention to the loyalty of the Poles to the Emperor, the little man in the gray frock coat arose, called Berthier to him, and walked with him on the bank of the river, Giving him instructions, occasionally looking dissatisfied at the drowned Lancers who distracted him.

There was already a belief in him: he found that everywhere in the world, from Africa to the Moskva steppe, he was equally astonishing, driving people into a state of ecstasy.He summoned his own horse, rode on the horse and galloped back to his station. Although rescue ships were sent, about forty Lancers drowned.Most of the people were washed back to the original shore by the river.The colonel and several others swam across the river and climbed to the opposite bank with difficulty.But as soon as they landed, their soaked military uniforms were still dripping with glistening water, and they shouted: "Long live!" Looking excitedly at the place where Napoleon had stood and now left, they thought they were very happy at that time.

In the evening, Napoleon issued two orders: one was that the prepared counterfeit Russian banknotes should be sent as soon as possible for import into Russia, and the other was that a Saxon should be shot because one of his intercepted letters contained information about sending the French army The intelligence of the order issued, and then issued a third order - the integration of the Polish colonel who had no need to swim across the river into the Legion d'honneur, which was headed by Napoleon himself. Quosvultperdere—dementat. ① -------- ①French: Whoever wants to destroy—make him lose his mind first.