Chapter 31 Chapter Thirty-One

The general that Pierre was following disappeared from Pierre's sight by turning sharply to the left after descending the hill, and Pierre galloped into the ranks of infantry ahead.Now and then he tried to walk through them, but there were soldiers everywhere, all with the same look on their faces, all preoccupied, as if thinking of something unseen, yet seemingly necessary .They all looked at the fat man in the white hat with dissatisfied doubts, wondering why he stepped on them on horseback. "Why are you riding through the ranks!" a man shouted to him.Another man struck his horse with the butt of his rifle, and Pierre, barely able to control the frightened horse, leaned over the pommel and galloped to a more spacious place in front of the soldiers.

In front of him was a bridge by which other soldiers stood firing.Pierre galloped up to them, and without knowing it came to the head of the Kolocha Bridge, the bridge between Gorky and Borodino, the first battle of the French in the campaign (after the capture of the Borodino After Dino) the target of the attack.Pierre saw the bridge ahead, and on both sides of the bridge and on the meadow with rows of hay he had seen the day before, some soldiers were doing something in the smoke; Think of this place as a battlefield.He did not hear the sound of bullets whistling in all directions and the sound of shells flying over his head, nor did he see the enemy on the other side of the river, and for a long time he did not notice that there were many dead and wounded lying not far from him.He kept smiling and looked around.

"What is that man doing at the front?" someone shouted at him again. "Keep left, keep right," some shouted at him. Going to the right, Pierre unexpectedly came across General Raevsky's adjutant whom he knew.The adjutant cast an angry glance at Pierre, evidently also wanting to reprimand him, but recognizing him, he nodded. "How did you come here?" he said, and galloped forward. Pierre felt that this was not his place, and since he had nothing to do, fearing to disturb others, he drove away with the adjutant. "What's the matter here? May I follow you?" asked Pierre.

"Wait, wait," replied the adjutant, galloping up to a stout colonel standing on the grass, and conveying a few words to him, before turning to Pierre. "How did you come here?" he said to Pierre with a smile. "Are you curious about everything?" "Yes, yes," said Pierre.The adjutant turned his horse's head and went forward. "It's all right here," said the adjutant. "Bagratión on the left is fighting hard." "Really?" Pierre asked. "Where is that?" "Come on, let's go to the mound together, we can see it very clearly from there. Our artillery position is okay." The adjutant said, "Why, come or not?"

"Well, with you," said Pierre, looking around for his groom.Pierre saw the wounded for the first time.Some of them struggled to walk, and some were carried on stretchers.On the meadow lined with rows of fragrant hay that he rode past yesterday, a soldier was lying motionless beside the hay, his head tilted unnaturally, his military cap dropped aside. "Why don't you take this away?" Pierre was about to ask, when he saw the stern expression on the adjutant's face who was also looking back in this direction, and he stopped asking. Pierre did not find the groom, and he and the adjutant walked along the ravine to Laevsky mound.Pierre's horse was bouncing behind the adjutant.

"It seems that you are not used to riding a horse, count?" asked the adjutant. "No, it's nothing, it keeps bouncing around for some reason," said Pierre inexplicably. "Ah! . . . It's wounded," said the adjutant, "on the right foreleg, above the knee. Probably shot. Congratulations, count," he said, "lebaptemedufeu." They passed the Sixth Corps in the smoke, with the moving guns firing deafeningly behind them, and they came to a small forest.The forest is cool, quiet, and quite autumnal.Pierre and the adjutant dismounted and walked up the hill.

"Is the general here?" asked the adjutant as he climbed the hill, "Still here just now, just left." The people pointed to the right and replied. The adjutant looked back at Pierre, as if not knowing what to do with him now. "Don't worry about it," said Pierre. "I'll go to the mound, will I?" "Go ahead, you can see everything from there, and it's not so dangerous. I'll see you in a little while." Pierre went to the battery, and the adjutant rode away.They never saw each other again, and Pierre learned much later that the adjutant had lost an arm that day.

The mound to which Pierre ascended was a well-known place (later the Russians called it the mound fort, or Laevsky's fort, and the French called it lagranderedoute, lafatalered oute, laredouteducentre②), where Tens of thousands of people died around, and the French believed that it was the most important stronghold of the whole position. -------- ① French: the baptism of fire. ②French: Most of the forts, multi-faced forts to life, and central multi-faced forts. This multi-faceted fort is a mound with trenches dug on three sides.There were ten cannons in the trench, and they were firing from embrasures protruding from the earthen walls.

There are also some cannons on the defense line on both sides of Yougang, which are also firing continuously.There were infantry not far behind the guns.Pierre ascended the mound without realizing that this shallow ditch, where several cannons were fired, was the most important point of the battle. On the contrary, Pierre felt that this place (because he was there) was one of the least important points of the campaign. Pierre climbed up the mound, sat down at the end of the trench surrounding the battery, and looked at what was going on around him with an involuntarily cheerful smile.Sometimes Pierre stood up with that same smile, doing his best not to interfere with the soldiers who were constantly running past him in the battery, loading and turning their guns, carrying their pockets and powder.The cannons of this fortress fired one after another, deafeningly, and the smoke enveloped the surroundings.

Contrary to the frightening feeling among the covering troops, here the artillery battery was busy with only a few men, and it was separated from the rest of the combat troops by a trench--there was a sense of family that everyone felt. Joyful atmosphere. The presence of Pierre in a white cap, a non-military figure, at first displeased these people.The soldiers all squinted at him in strange, even startled way as they passed him.A tall, long-legged, pockmarked artillery officer, who seemed to be checking the firing of the rear cannon, approached Pierre and looked at him curiously. A round-faced junior officer, still quite a boy, evidently just out of the cadet corps, who commanded with particular vigor the two cannons handed to him, and treated Pierre severely.

"Get out of the way, sir," he said to him, "not here." The soldiers looked at Pierre and shook their heads disapprovingly.But when everyone believed that the man in the white hat would not do bad things, but that he would either sit quietly on the slope of the embankment, or politely give way to the soldiers with a timid smile, Walking in the battery as easily as in the avenue amidst the bullets, suspicion of his hostility faded to affectionate and teasing sympathy, as soldiers do to their puppies, roosters, goats, In short, it's like compassion for the animals that live in the military.The soldiers quickly took Pierre into their family as their own, and nicknamed him. "Our lord," they called him, and made good-natured jokes about him among them. A cannonball exploded two paces from Pierre.He dusted himself off and looked around with a smile. "You're not afraid, sir, that's all right!" said a red-faced, broad-shouldered soldier, showing his strong white teeth, to Pierre. "Are you afraid?" asked Pierre. "How can you not be afraid?" the soldier replied. "You should know that it is not polite. With a plop, the internal organs come out. You have to be afraid." He said with a smile. Several soldiers stood beside Pierre with pleasant faces.They seemed not to have expected that he could talk like a human being, and they were greatly amused by this new discovery. "We soldiers are in the trade. But a lord, what a queer one. That's a lord!" "Everyone!" shouted the young officer to the soldiers gathered around Pierre. This young officer was performing a mission either for the first time or for the second time, and he treated the soldiers and dignitaries very seriously and strictly. The sound of gunfire was increasing all over the field, especially on the left flank where Bagration's bulwark was located, but on Pierre's side the smoke was so thick that it was almost impossible to see anything.Moreover, Pierre was absorbed in observing the people of this small family in the battery (separated from other families).The emotion of excitement first aroused by the sights and sounds of the battlefield was now replaced by another, especially after the sight of a soldier lying alone in the grass.He was sitting on the slope of the trench now, watching the faces of the people around him. Just before ten o'clock, some twenty men were carried out of the battery; two guns were knocked out, and the shells fell on the battery more and more densely, and the shells flying in the distance made a humming and whistling sound.But the people who had stayed in the artillery barracks for a long time seemed to ignore this, and the sound of talking, laughing and joking could be heard everywhere. "Pie, hot!" a soldier shouted to the roaring shells. "It's not here! It's for the infantry!" Another soldier observed with a laugh that the shell flew past and fell into the covering troops. "What, is that your acquaintance?" Another soldier sneered at the farmer who squatted down when the shells flew by. A few soldiers gathered around the parapet to watch what was happening ahead. "The skirmisher line has withdrawn, look, retreated," they said, pointing to the parapet. "Mind your own business," an old sergeant yelled at them, "retreat back, of course there is something behind." The sergeant grabbed a soldier by the shoulder and pushed him with his knee, causing a burst of laughter. "Come on to battery five, push it up!" people yelled from one side. "Come on all at once, work together, and be a tracker." There was a cheerful shout of changing the gun position. "Oh, almost knocked off our lord's hat," said the red-faced buffoon, grinning at Pierre, baring his teeth. "Well, bastard," he cursed at a cannonball that hit a cannon wheel and a man's leg. "Look at you foxes!" said another soldier, mocking the reservists who hunched over the battery to carry the wounded. "This bowl of porridge doesn't suit your appetite? Huh, it's like a crow, so scared!" They shouted to the reserve soldiers, who hesitated in front of the soldier whose leg had been knocked out. "Here, there, boy," they said, imitating the reservists, "it's disgusting!" Pierre saw that every time a shell fell and suffered a loss, everyone became more active and excited. In the faces of these people, as from the dark clouds of an approaching storm, more and more frequent and brighter bursts of hidden fire and lightning, as if to counter what was happening. Pierre did not look at the battlefield ahead, nor cared about what was happening there, but was absorbed in observing the growing fire, and he felt that the same fire was burning in his soul. At ten o'clock, the soldiers who had been in the bushes in front of the battery and along the Changmai River withdrew.They could be seen from the battery, carrying the wounded with their rifles, running back from the side of the battery.One of the generals climbed up the mound with his entourage, talked with the colonel for a while, looked at Pierre angrily, and then went down. He ordered the soldiers standing behind the battery to lie down to reduce the danger.Then the beating of drums and the giving of commands could be heard from the ranks of infantry on the right of the battery, and the infantry could be seen moving forward from the battery. Pierre looked out from the earthen wall, and one figure in particular caught his attention.It was a pale young officer, holding his saber, looking around uneasily as he stepped back. The infantry ranks were drowned in smoke, and there were drawn-out shouts and heavy rifle fire.A few minutes later, groups of wounded and reservists carrying stretchers came from there.The shells fell on the battery more densely.Several lying people were not carried away.The soldiers near the cannon were busier and more active.No one paid any attention to Pierre.Once or twice people yelled angrily at him for blocking the way.The older officer walked sullenly, with hurried strides, from cannon to cannon.The young officer blushed even more, and directed the soldiers more vigorously.The soldiers passed the shells, turned the gun body, loaded the shells, and did their duties compactly and neatly.They ran to and fro as if jumping on springs. Dark clouds, heralding storms, descended, and all faces were ablaze with fire.Pierre was watching the fire, which was growing hotter.He was beside the older officer.The young officer ran up to the older officer and raised his hand to the brim of his hat. "Mr. Colonel, I have the honor to report to you that there are only eight rounds left. Are you still firing?" he asked. "Shotgun!" The elderly officer who was looking outside the earthen wall shouted without answering. Suddenly something happened: the young officer groaned, bent over, and sat down on the ground like a shot bird.Everything seemed to Pierre strange, vague, dim. The shells flew one after another, hitting the dirt walls, the soldiers, and the cannons.Pierre, who had previously ignored these voices, heard only this one now.On the right side of the battery, soldiers were running, shouting "Hurrah," and it seemed to Pierre that they were running backwards instead of forwards. A shell hit the edge of the earthen wall in front of Pierre, the dust fell, a black ball flashed before his eyes, and for a moment, with a plop, hit something.The reservists who were about to enter the battery ran back. "Shotshot!" shouted an officer. A sergeant ran up to the officer and murmured in alarm that there was no more powder (as if a steward had reported that there was no more wine for a banquet). "What are these bandits doing!" cried the officer, turning to Pierre.The older officer was flushed and sweating, his brows were furrowed, and his eyes were shining. "Run to the reserves and get the ammunition box!" he shouted at his soldiers, looking angrily away from Pierre. "I'll go," said Pierre.The officer ignored him and strode to the other side. "Don't put...wait!" he yelled. The soldier who had been ordered to fetch the ammunition box bumped Pierre. "Oh, sir, this is not your place," he said, and ran off.Pierre ran after the young officer round the place where he was sitting. One, two, three, the shells flew over his head and fell around him.Pierre ran below. "Where am I going?" When he suddenly remembered, he had already run to the front of the green ammunition box.He stopped hesitantly, not knowing whether to retreat or move forward.Suddenly, a terrible blast threw him to the ground behind him.At that very moment, a flash of fire flashed at him, and at the same time: a roar, an explosion, a whistling, which made his ears ring. Pierre came to himself and sat propped up on his hands; the ammunition box beside him was gone; The chariot galloped past him, and another horse, like Pierre, lay on the ground and howled shrilly.