Emma Watson Pussy
Books:
Anna Karenina
War And Peace
|
and
taking his papers from under his pillow he went to the window, where
he had an inkpot, and sat down to write.
"It seems its no use knocking ones head against a wall!" he
said, coming from the window and giving Rostov a large envelope. In it
was the petition to the Emperor drawn up by the auditor, in which
Denisov, without alluding to the offenses of the commissariat
officials, simply asked for pardon.
"Hand it in. It seems..."
He did not finish, but gave a painfully unnatural smile.
CHAPTER XIX
Having returned to the regiment and told the commander the state
of Denisovs affairs, Rostov rode to Tilsit with the letter to the
Emperor.
On the thirteenth of June the French and Russian Emperors arrived in
Tilsit. Boris Drubetskoy had asked the important personage on whom
he was in attendance, to include him in the suite appointed for the
stay at Tilsit.
"I should like to see the great man," he said, alluding to Napoleon,
whom hitherto he, like everyone else, had always called Buonaparte.
"You are speaking of Buonaparte?" asked the general, smiling.
Boris looked at his general inquiringly and immediately saw that
he was being tested.
"I am speaking, Prince, of the Emperor Napoleon," he replied. The
general patted him on the shoulder, with a smile.
"You will go far," he said, and took him to Tilsit with him.
Boris was among the few present at the Niemen on the day the two
Emperors met. He saw the raft, decorated with monograms, saw Napoleon
pass before the French Guards on the farther bank of the river, saw
the pensive face of the Emperor Alexander as he sat in silence in a
tavern on the bank of the Niemen awaiting Napoleons arrival, saw both
Emperors get into boats, and saw how Napoleon--reaching the raft
first--stepped quickly forward to meet Alexander and held out his hand
to him, and how they both retired into the pavilion. Since he had
begun to move in the highest circles Boris had made it his habit to
watch attentively all that went on around him and to note it down. At
the time of the meeting at Tilsit he asked the names of those who had
come with Napoleon and about the uniforms they wore, and listened
attentively to words spoken by important personages. At the moment the
Emperors went into the pavilion he looked at his watch, and did not
forget to look at it again when Alexander came out. The interview had
lasted an hour and fifty-three minutes. He noted this down that same
evening, among other facts he felt to be of historic importance. As
the Emperors suite was a very small one, it was a matter of great
importance, for a man who valued his success in the service, to be at
Tilsit on the occasion of this interview between the two Emperors, and
having succeeded in this, Boris felt that henceforth his position was
fully assured. He had not only become known, but people had grown
accustomed to him and accepted him. Twice he had executed commissions
to the Emperor himself, so that the latter knew his face, and all
those at court, far from cold-shouldering him as at first when they
considered him a newcomer, would now have been surprised had he been
absent.
Boris lodged with another adjutant, the Polish Count Zhilinski.
Zhilinski, a Pole brought up in Paris, was rich, and passionately fond
of the French, and almost every day of the stay at Tilsit, French
officers of the Guard and from French headquarters were dining and
lunching with him and Boris.
On the evening of the twenty-fourth of June, Count Zhilinski
arranged a supper for his French friends. The guest of honor was an
aide-de-camp of Napoleons, there were also several French officers of
the Guard, and a page of Napoleons, a young lad of an old
aristocratic French family. That same day, Rostov, profiting by the
darkness to avoid being recognized in civilian dress, came to Tilsit
and went to the lodging occupied by Boris and Zhilinski.
Rostov, in common with the whole army from which he came, was far
from having experienced the change of feeling toward Napoleon and
the French--who from being foes had suddenly become friends--that
had taken place at headquarters and in Boris. In the army, Bonaparte
and the French were still regarded with mingled feelings of anger,
contempt, and fear. Only recently, talking with one of Platovs
Cossack officers, Rostov had argued that if Napoleon were taken
prisoner he would be treated not as a sovereign, but as a
War And Peace page 239 War And Peace page 241
|
