recruits.

These were powerful motives, but they did not at all satisfy men who
knew that excellent reasons may be found for committing the greatest
faults. They all agreed, "that they had seen the battle which had been
won in the morning on the right, halt where it was favourable to us, and
continue successively in front, a contest of mere strength, as in the
infancy of the art! it was a battle without any plan, a mere victory of
soldiers, rather than of a general! Why so much precipitation to
overtake the enemy, with an army panting, exhausted, and weakened? and
when we had come up with him, why neglect to complete his discomfiture,
and remain bleeding and mutilated, in the midst of an enraged nation, in
immense deserts, and at 800 leagues' distance from our resources?"

Murat then exclaimed, "That in this great day he had not recognized the
genius of Napoleon!" The viceroy confessed "that he had no conception
what could be the reason of the indecision which his adopted father had
shown." Ney, when he was called on for his opinion, was singularly
obstinate in advising him to retreat.

Those alone who had never quitted his person, observed, that the
conqueror of so many nations had been overcome by a burning fever, and
above all by a fatal return of that painful malady which every violent
movement, and all long and strong emotions excited in him. They then
quoted the words which he himself had written in Italy fifteen years
before: "Health is indispensable in war, and nothing can replace it;"
and the exclamation, unfortunately prophetic, which he had uttered on
the plains of Austerlitz: "Ordener is worn out. One is not always fit
for war; I shall be good for six years longer, after which I must lie
by."

During the night, the Russians made us sensible of their vicinity, by
their unseasonable clamours. Next morning there was an alert, close to
the emperor's tent. The old guard was actually obliged to run to arms; a
circumstance which, after a victory, seemed insulting. The army remained
motionless until noon, or rather it might be said that there was no
longer an army, but a single vanguard. The rest of the troops were
dispersed over the field of battle to carry off the wounded, of whom
there were 20,000. They were taken to the great abbey of Kolotskoi, two
leagues in the rear.

Larrey, the surgeon-in-chief, had just taken assistants from all the
regiments; the _ambulances_ had rejoined, but all was insufficient. H