Chapter 30 Chapter Thirty

Pierre returned to Gorky from Prince Andrew's, ordered the groom to get the horse ready, and woke him up early in the morning, and then fell asleep in the corner of the partition that Boris had given him. When Pierre fully awoke the next morning, there was no one in the house. The glass in the small window vibrated.The groom stood by the bed and pushed him. "Your Excellency, Your Excellency, Your Excellency..." The groom kept pushing Pierre's shoulders without looking at him, and discussed the basic prerequisites for the transition to a communist society.See, pushing and calling, evidently he had lost hope of waking him.

"What? Has it begun? Is it time?" Pierre asked, waking up. "Listen to the roar," said the ex-soldier-groom, "the lords are all out, and the honors are gone long ago." Pierre dressed hastily and ran out onto the porch.It was fine outside, the air was fresh, and the dewdrops were gleaming pleasantly.The sun had just come out of the clouds, and the sun, half-obscured by fragments of cloud, went over the roofs of the opposite street, onto the dewy road dust, onto the walls of the houses, onto the walls of the fence. At the window and on Pierre's horse standing by the farmhouse.The cannonade outside was more clearly heard.An adjutant galloped through the street with a Cossack.

"It's time, Count, it's time!" cried the adjutant. Pierre told the groom to lead the horse and follow him.He walked down the street to the mound where he had watched the battle yesterday.There was a group of soldiers on the mound, and the staff officers could be heard talking in French, and Kutuzov's white-haired head in a white cap with a red hoop and the back of his head full of white hair tucked between his shoulders could be seen.Kutuzov scanned the road ahead with his binoculars. Pierre ascended the mound along the steps, and he was intoxicated by the beauty before him.This is still the view he had seen yesterday from this hill; but now the place is full of smoke, the hills are full of troops, and the sun rises brightly behind Pierre's left, and in the clean morning air The golden and rose-colored slanting light and long black shadows are projected on the ground, and the scenery gradually disappears. The forest in the distance is like a carved yellow emerald. The Sik Avenue, which runs through the middle of the woods behind the village of Valueva, is full of troops.Fields and groves of gold shone nearer.Front, right and left, troops everywhere.All this was so lively, majestic, and unexpected; but what surprised Pierre most was the sight of the battlefield on the plains on both sides of the Borodino and Kolocha rivers.

Above the Kolocha, on the village of Borodino and on both sides, especially to the left, where the Voina enters the Kolocha in the swamp, there is a morning mist, which is melting, dissipating, Translucent in the light of the bright sun that had just risen, all that could be seen in the mist was magically colored, and only the sharp outlines of those things were outlined.The smoke of the guns mingled with the mist, and in the mist the light of morning shone everywhere—on the water, now on the dew, now on the west bank, on the bayonets of the troops gathered at Borodino.Through the smoke you can see white churches, the roofs of Borodino farmhouses, dense crowds of soldiers, green bullet boxes and cannons.All of this seemed to float, or seemed to float, because the whole space was filled with smoke and fog in this area.In the depressions near foggy Borodino, and on the heights beyond it, especially to the left of the battle line, on the tops of woods, fields, depressions, and heights, as if out of nothing, the guns of the cannon were continuously fired. Clouds of thick smoke sometimes appear singly and sometimes in groups;

Strange to say, these gunpowder smoke and shooting sounds constitute the main beauty of the scenery in front of us. puff! ——Suddenly a round, dense, lavender, gray, and floating white smoke appeared, bang! ——After a second, there was a loud noise in the smoke. "Boom-boom" - two clouds of smoke rose, they collided with each other and mixed, "boom-boom" - two gunshots confirmed what was seen. Pierre turned his face to look at the puff of smoke which was originally like a bulging ball. It has turned into several balls and fluttered aside, puff... One, four, such sounds, spaced at equal intervals, echoed by a melodious, firm, precise sound—boom...boom-boom-boom!The smoke seemed to be running, and it seemed to be motionless, while the woods and fields and gleaming bayonets were running past under it.From the left, over the fields and coppices, there was a steady stream of smoke, accompanied by the solemn sound of cannon, and nearer, over the hollows and woods, small musket shots, before they had time to become round. The smoke of the ball, and at the same time there was a small sound, and the sound of tra-da-da-da-rifles was frequent, but compared with the sound of shelling, it seemed chaotic and weak.

Pierre longed to go where there was smoke, flashing bayonets and cannon, where there was movement and sound.He turned to Kutuzov and his squire, confirming his impression with the others.He felt that everyone was looking at the battlefield ahead with the same emotion as he did.All faces now glowed with that latent heat (chaleurlatente) which he had seen yesterday and which he had fully understood after his conversation with Prince Andrew. "Go, dear friend, go, and may Christ be with you," Kutuzov said to the general standing beside him, without taking his eyes off the field. After receiving his orders, the general passed Pierre and descended the hill.

"Go to the ferry!" The general replied coldly and sternly to a staff officer's question. "I'll go too, I'll go too," thought Pierre, and followed the general.The general mounted the horse brought to him by the Cossack.Pierre went up to the groom who led his horse.After Pierre had asked which horse was gentler, he climbed onto one of the horses, grabbed hold of the mane, with his toes pointing out, and pressed his heels against the horse's belly. With his hand free from the reins, he ran away with the general, amusing the staff officers standing on the hill watching him.