Book Ten: 1812 - Chapter XXXII

by Leo Tolstoy

　　Beside himself with terror Pierre jumped up and ran back to thebattery, as to the only refuge from the horrors that surrounded him.

　　On entering the earthwork he noticed that there were men doingsomething there but that no shots were being fired from the battery.He had no time to realize who these men were. He saw the seniorofficer lying on the earth wall with his back turned as if he wereexamining something down below and that one of the soldiers he hadnoticed before was struggling forward shouting "Brothers!" andtrying to free himself from some men who were holding him by thearm. He also saw something else that was strange.

　　But he had not time to realize that the colonel had been killed,that the soldier shouting "Brothers!" was a prisoner, and that anotherman had been bayoneted in the back before his eyes, for hardly hadhe run into the redoubt before a thin, sallow-faced, perspiring man ina blue uniform rushed on him sword in hand, shouting something.Instinctively guarding against the shock- for they had been runningtogether at full speed before they saw one another- Pierre put out hishands and seized the man (a French officer) by the shoulder with onehand and by the throat with the other. The officer, dropping hissword, seized Pierre by his collar.

　　For some seconds they gazed with frightened eyes at one another'sunfamiliar faces and both were perplexed at what they had done andwhat they were to do next. "Am I taken prisoner or have I taken himprisoner?" each was thinking. But the French officer was evidentlymore inclined to think he had been taken prisoner because Pierre'sstrong hand, impelled by instinctive fear, squeezed his throat evertighter and tighter. The Frenchman was about to say something, whenjust above their heads, terrible and low, a cannon ball whistled,and it seemed to Pierre that the French officer's head had been tornoff, so swiftly had he ducked it.

　　Pierre too bent his head and let his hands fall. Without furtherthought as to who had taken whom prisoner, the Frenchman ran back tothe battery and Pierre ran down the slope stumbling over the deadand wounded who, it seemed to him, caught at his feet. But before hereached the foot of the knoll he was met by a dense crowd of Russiansoldiers who, stumbling, tripping up, and shouting, ran merrily andwildly toward the battery. (This was the attack for which Ermolovclaimed the credit, declaring that only his courage and good luck madesuch a feat possible: it was the attack in which he was said to havethrown some St. George's Crosses he had in his pocket into the batteryfor the first soldiers to take who got there.)

　　The French who had occupied the battery fled, and our troopsshouting "Hurrah!" pursued them so far beyond the battery that itwas difficult to call them back.

　　The prisoners were brought down from the battery and among themwas a wounded French general, whom the officers surrounded. Crowdsof wounded- some known to Pierre and some unknown- Russians andFrench, with faces distorted by suffering, walked, crawled, and werecarried on stretchers from the battery. Pierre again went up ontothe knoll where he had spent over an hour, and of that family circlewhich had received him as a member he did not find a single one. Therewere many dead whom he did not know, but some he recognized. The youngofficer still sat in the same way, bent double, in a pool of bloodat the edge of the earth wall. The red-faced man was stilltwitching, but they did not carry him away.

　　Pierre ran down the slope once more.

　　"Now they will stop it, now they will be horrified at what they havedone!" he thought, aimlessly going toward a crowd of stretcher bearersmoving from the battlefield.

　　But behind the veil of smoke the sun was still high, and in frontand especially to the left, near Semenovsk, something seemed to beseething in the smoke, and the roar of cannon and musketry did notdiminish, but even increased to desperation like a man who,straining himself, shrieks with all his remaining strength.