AT FIVE O'CLOCK in the morning it was still quite dark. The troops of the centre, of the reserves, and of Bagration's right flank, were still at rest. But on the left flank the columns of the infantry, cavalry, and artillery, destined to be the first to descend from the heights, so as to attack the French right flank, and, according to Weierother's plan, to drive it back to the Bohemian mountains, were already up and astir. The smoke from the camp-fires, into which they were throwing everything superfluous, made the eyes smart. It was cold and dark. The officers were hurriedly drinking tea and eating breakfast; the soldiers were munching biscuits, stamping their feet rhythmically, while they gathered about the fires warming themselves, and throwing into the blaze remains of shanties, chairs, tables, wheels, tubs, everything superfluous that they could not take away with them. Austrian officers were moving in and out among the Russian troops, coming everywhere as heralds of their advance. As soon as an Austrian officer appeared near a commanding officer's quarters, the regiment began to bestir themselves; the soldiers ran from the fires, thrust pipes into boot-legs, bags into waggons, saw to their muskets, and formed into ranks. The officers buttoned themselves up, put on their sabres and pouches, and moved up and down the ranks shouting. The commissariat men and officers' servants harnessed the horses, packed and tied up the waggons. The adjutants and the officers in command of regiments and battalions got on their horses, crossed themselves, gave final orders, exhortations and commissions to the men who remained behind with the baggage, and the monotonous thud of thousands of feet began. The columns moved, not knowing where they were going, and unable from the crowds round them, the smoke, and the thickening fog, to see either the place which they were leaving, or that into which they were advancing.

The soldier in movement is as much shut in, surrounded, drawn along by his regiment, as the sailor is by his ship. However great a distance he traverses, however strange, unknown, and dangerous the regions to which he penetrates, all about him, as the sailor has the deck and masts and rigging of his ship, he has always everywhere the same comrades, the same ranks, the same sergeant Ivan Mitritch, the same regimental dog Zhutchka, the same officers. The soldier rarely cares to know into what region his ship has sailed; but on the day of battle—God knows how or whence it comes—there may be heard in the moral world of the troops a sterner note that sounds at the approach of something grave and solemn, and rouses them to a curiosity unusual in them. On days of battle, soldiers make strenuous efforts to escape from the routine of their regiment's interests, they listen, watch intently, and greedily inquire what is being done around them.

The fog had become so thick that though it was growing light, they could not see ten steps in front of them. Bushes looked like huge trees, level places looked like ravines and slopes. Anywhere, on any side, they might stumble upon unseen enemies ten paces from them. But for a long while the columns marched on in the same fog, going downhill and uphill, passing gardens and fences, in new and unknown country, without coming upon the enemy anywhere. On the contrary, the soldiers became aware that in front, behind, on all sides, were the Russian columns moving in the same direction. Every soldier felt cheered at heart by knowing that where he was going, to that unknown spot were going also many, many more of our men.

“I say, the Kurskies have gone on,” they were saying in the ranks.

“Stupendous, my lad, the forces of our men that are met together! Last night I looked at the fires burning, no end of them. A regular Moscow!”

Though not one of the officers in command of the columns rode up to the ranks nor talked to the soldiers (the commanding officers, as we have seen at the council of war, were out of humour, and displeased with the plans that had been adopted, and so they simply carried out their orders without exerting themselves to encourage the soldiers), yet the soldiers marched on in good spirits, as they always do when advancing into action, especially when on the offensive.

But after they had been marching on for about an hour in the thick fog, a great part of the troops had to halt, and an unpleasant impression of mismanagement and misunderstanding spread through the ranks. In what way that impression reached them it is very difficult to define. But there is no doubt that it did reach them, and with extraordinary correctness and rapidity, and spread imperceptibly and irresistibly, like water flowing over a valley. Had the Russian army been acting alone, without allies, possibly it would have taken a long time for this impression of mismanagement to become a general conviction. But as it was, it was so particularly pleasant and natural to ascribe the mismanagement to the senseless Germans, and all believed that there was some dangerous muddle due to a blunder on the part of the sausage-makers.

“What are they stopping for? Blocked up the way, eh? Or hit upon the French at last?”

“No, not heard so. There'd have been firing. After hurrying us to march off, and we've marched off—to stand in the middle of a field for no sense—all the damned Germans making a muddle of it. The senseless devils! I'd have sent them on in front. But no fear, they crowd to the rear. And now one's to stand with nothing to eat.”

“I say, will they be quick there?”

“The cavalry is blocking up the road, they say,” said an officer.

“Ah, these damned Germans, they don't know their own country,” said another.

“Which division are you?” shouted an adjutant, riding up.

“Eighteenth.”

“Then why are you here? You ought to have been in front long ago; you won't get there now before evening.”

“The silly fools' arrangements, they don't know themselves what they're about,” said the officer, and he galloped away. Then a general trotted up, and shouted something angrily in a foreign tongue.

“Ta-fa-la-fa, and no making out what he's jabbering,” said a soldier, mimicking the retreating general. “I'd like to shoot the lot of them, the blackguards!”

“Our orders were to be on the spot before ten o'clock, and we're not halfway there. That's a nice way of managing things!” was repeated on different sides, and the feeling of energy with which the troops had started began to turn to vexation and anger against the muddled arrangements and the Germans.

The muddle originated in the fact that while the Austrian cavalry were in movement, going to the left flank, the chief authorities had come to the conclusion that our centre was too far from the right flank, and all the cavalry had received orders to cross over to the right. Several thousands of mounted troops had to cross in front of the infantry, and the infantry had to wait till they had gone by.

Ahead of the troops a dispute had arisen between the Austrian officer and the Russian general. The Russian general shouted a request that the cavalry should stop. The Austrian tried to explain that he was not responsible, but the higher authorities. The troops meanwhile stood, growing listless and dispirited. After an hour's delay the troops moved on at last, and began going downhill. The fog, that overspread the hill, lay even more densely on the low ground to which the troops were descending. Ahead in the fog they heard one shot, and another, at first at random, at irregular intervals; tratta-tat, then growing more regular and frequent, and the skirmish of the little stream, the Holdbach, began.

Not having reckoned on meeting the enemy at the stream, and coming upon them unexpectedly in the fog, not hearing a word of encouragement from their commanding officers, with a general sense of being too late, and seeing nothing before or about them in the fog, the Russians fired slowly and languidly at the enemy, never receiving a command in time from the officers and adjutants, who wandered about in the fog in an unknown country, unable to find their own divisions. This was how the battle began for the first, the second, and the third columns, who had gone down into the low-lying ground. The fourth column, with which Kutuzov was, was still on the plateau of Pratzen.

The thick fog still hung over the low ground where the action was beginning; higher up it was beginning to clear, but still nothing could be seen of what was going on in front. Whether all the enemy's forces were, as we had assumed, ten versts away from us, or whether they were close by in that stretch of fog, no one knew till nine o'clock.

Nine o'clock came. The fog lay stretched in an unbroken sea over the plain, but at the village of Schlapanitz on the high ground where Napoleon was, surrounded by his marshals, it was now perfectly clear. There was bright blue sky over his head, and the vast orb of the sun, like a huge, hollow, purple float, quivered on the surface of the milky sea of fog. Not the French troops only, but Napoleon himself with his staff were not on the further side of the streams, and the villages of Sokolnitz and Schlapanitz, beyond which we had intended to take up our position and begin the attack, but were on the nearer side, so close indeed to our forces that Napoleon could distinguish a cavalry man from a foot soldier in our army with the naked eye. Napoleon was standing a little in front of his marshals, on a little grey Arab horse, wearing the same blue overcoat he had worn through the Italian campaign. He was looking intently and silently at the hills, which stood up out of the sea of mist, and the Russian troops moving across them in the distance, and he listened to the sounds of firing in the valley. His face—still thin in those days—did not stir a single muscle; his gleaming eyes were fixed intently on one spot. His forecasts were turning out correct. Part of the Russian forces were going down into the valley towards the ponds and lakes, while part were evacuating the heights of Pratzen, which he regarded as the key of the position, and had intended to take. He saw through the fog, in the dip between two hills near the village of Pratzen, Russian columns with glittering bayonets moving always in one direction towards the valleys, and vanishing one after another into the mist. From information he had received over night, from the sounds of wheels and footsteps he had heard in the night at the outposts, from the loose order of the march of the Russian columns, from all the evidence, he saw clearly that the allies believed him to be a long way in front of them, that the columns moving close to Pratzen constituted the centre of the Russian army, and that the centre was by this time too much weakened to be able to attack him successfully. But still he delayed beginning the battle.

That day was for him a day of triumph—the anniversary of his coronation. He had slept for a few hours in the early morning, and feeling fresh, and in good health and spirits, in that happy frame of mind in which everything seems possible and everything succeeds, he got on his horse and rode out. He stood without stirring, looking at the heights that rose out of the fog, and his cold face wore that peculiar shade of confident, self-complacent happiness, seen on the face of a happy boy in love. The marshals stood behind him, and did not venture to distract his attention. He looked at the heights of Pratzen, then at the sun floating up out of the mist.

When the sun had completely emerged from the fog, and was glittering with dazzling brilliance over the fields and the mist (as though he had been waiting for that to begin the battle), he took his glove off his handsome white hand, made a signal with it to his marshals, and gave orders for the battle to begin. The marshals, accompanied by adjutants, galloped in various directions, and in a few minutes the chief forces of the French army were moving towards those heights of Pratzen, which were left more and more exposed by the Russian troops as the latter kept moving to the left towards the valley.
 
 
早晨五点钟，天还很黑。中央阵地的军队、后备队和巴格拉季翁的右翼均未出动，但是左翼的步兵、骑兵和炮兵纵队都从宿营地起身，开始动弹起来了，他们务必要离开高地，前去进攻法军的右翼，根据进军部署迫使其右翼溃退至波希米亚山区。他们把各种用不着的东西扔进篝火中，一阵冒出的浓烟刺激着他们的眼睛。这时分天气很冷，四下里一片漆黑。军官们急急忙忙地饮茶，用早餐，士兵们嘴嚼干面包，急促地顿足，聚集在篝火对面取暖，他们把剩下的货棚、桌椅、车轮、木桶，凡是不能随身带走的用不着的东西都抛进木柴堆，一起烧掉。奥军的纵队长在俄国部队之间来来往往，充当进军的前驱和先知。一当奥国军官在团长的驻地附近出现，兵团就动弹起来：士兵们从篝火旁边跑开，把烟斗藏在靴筒中，把袋子藏在大车上，各人拿起火枪来排队。军官们扣上制服的钮扣，佩戴军刀，挎起背包，一面吆喝，一面巡视队列，辎重兵和勤务兵都在套车、装好行囊、扎好车子。副官、营长和团长都骑上战马，在胸前画着十字，向留下来的辎重兵发出最后的命令、训令，委托他们办理各项事务；这时候可以听见几千人的单调的脚步声。纵队正在启程，不知去向，因为四周挤满了许多人，因为篝火在冒烟，因为雾气越来越浓，所以他们非但看不见出发的地点，而且也看不见纵队开进的地点。

行进中的士兵就像战船上的水兵似的，被他自己的兵团所围住、所限制、所领导。无论他走了多么远的路，无论他进入多么奇怪的、人所不知而且危险的纬度地带，随时随地在他周围出现的总是那些同事、那些队伍、那个叫做伊万·米特里奇的上士、那只叫做茹奇卡的连队的军犬、那些首长，就像水兵那样，随时随地在他周围出现的总是兵船上的那些甲板、桅杆和缆绳。士兵不常想知道他的战船所处的纬度地带，但在作战的日子，天晓得是怎么回事，在军队的精神世界里不知从哪里传来一种大家都觉得严肃的声调，它意味着具有决定意义的、欢天喜地的时刻的临近，引起一种不符合军人本性的好奇心。士兵们在作战的日子心情激动而兴奋，极力地越出自己兵团的志趣范围，他们静听、谛视、贪婪地打听周围发生的情况。

雾气很浓，虽已黎明，而在十步路以外什么都看不清。一株株灌木仿佛是一头头大树，平地仿佛是陡岸或坡道。到处，从四面八方都有可能碰上十步路以外看不清的敌人。但是纵队还是在雾气沉沉的不熟悉的新地方走了很久，一会儿下山或上山，一会儿绕过花园和院墙，不过到处都没有碰见敌人。相反，时而在前面，时而在后面，士兵们从四面发现，我们俄国的纵队也沿着那个方向前进。每个士兵心里都觉得高兴，因为他知道，还有许多、许多我们的官兵也朝他走的那个方向，即是朝那未知的方向前进。

“你瞧，库尔斯克兵团的人也走过去了。”有人在队伍中说。

“我的老弟，我们的许多军队被募集起来，多极了！昨天晚上我瞧了一下，大家生火了，简直看不见尽头。总而言之，真像莫斯科！”

虽然纵队的首长之中没有任何人走到队伍前面去和士兵们谈话（正像我们在军事会议上看见的那样，纵队的列位首长心绪欠佳，并对他们采取的军事行动表示不满，因此只是执行命令而已，虽然士兵们像平时一样都很愉快地去参加战斗，特别是去参加进攻的战斗，但是首长们都不去关心使士兵开心的事）。大部分军队在浓雾之中行走了一小时左右后，应当停止前进，但在各个队列中蔓延一种令人厌恶的极为紊乱的意识。这种意识是怎样传播的，很难断定，不过这种意识一成不变地、异常迅速地泛滥着，就像谷地的流水难以发觉地、不可抗拒地奔流不息。这一点是无容置疑的。如果俄国的军队缺乏盟邦，孤军作战，那末，十之八九，在这种所谓紊乱的感觉变成共信之前，还要度过漫长的时间，但是现在大家都怀着诚挚的异常高兴的心情把这种紊乱的原因归咎于头脑不清的德国人，大家都深信，这种有害的紊乱是香肠商人（辱骂德国人的外号）一手制造的。

“干嘛停止前进了？是不是给挡住了？是不是碰到法国佬？”

“不是的，没听见什么。要不然，会放枪的。”

“可不是，催促别人出动，出动了，又没头没脑地站在战地中间，——这些可恶的德国人把什么都搞混了。真是一帮头脑不清的鬼东西！”

“我真想把他们送到前头去。要不然，他们恐怕会蜷缩在后头。瞧，现在空着肚皮栖在这儿哩。”

“怎么？快走到那儿吗？据说，那些骑兵挡住了道路。”军官说。

“咳，可恶的德国人连自己的土地都不熟悉哩。”另一名军官说道。

“你们是哪一师的？”副官驰近时喊道。

“第十八师的。”

“那你们干嘛待在这里呀！你们早就应该走到前面去，现在这样子到夜晚也走不过去的。”

“瞧，这真是愚蠢的命令；他们自己也不知道在做什么。”

这名军官走开时说道。

然后这名军官走过去了，他忿怒地喊叫，说的不是俄国话。

“塔法——拉法，他喃喃地说，根本听不清他说的话，”士兵模仿走开的将军时说，“我真要把他们这些卑鄙的家伙枪毙掉！”

“吩咐在八点多钟到达目的地，可是我们还没有走完一半路。这算什么命令啊！”四面传来重复的话语声。

部队满怀着强烈的感情去作战，这种感情开始转变成懊丧，转变成仇恨；痛恨糊涂的命令，痛恨德国人。

一片混乱的原因在于，左翼的奥国骑兵行进时，最高首长认为，我们的中心阵地离右翼太远，于是吩咐全部骑兵向右方转移。几千人的骑兵在步兵前面推进，步兵不得不等待。

奥国纵队长和俄国将军在前方发生冲突。俄国将军大声吆喝，要求骑兵部队停止前进，奥国人极力地证明，犯有过失的不是他，而是最高首长。当时，部队感到苦闷，垂头丧气，于是停在原地不动。耽搁一小时以后，部队向前推进，终于向山下走去。山上的雾霭渐渐地散开，而在部队经过的山下，雾气显得更浓了。在雾气弥漫的前方传来一阵又一阵枪声，在不同的间隔中，最初的枪声没有节奏。特啦哒……哒哒，之后越来越有节奏，频率也越来越大，霍尔德巴赫河上开始交战了。

因为俄国人没有预料到在山下的河上会遇见敌人，他们在大雾之中意外地碰上敌人了，他们没有听到最高首长激励士兵的话，部队中普遍存在着一种意识：已经迟到了。主要是，在浓雾之中看不见自己前面和周围的任何东西，俄国人懒洋洋地、行动迟缓地和敌人对射，向前推进一点，又停下来，没有及时地接到首长和副官的命令，他们没有去找自己的部队，却在雾气沉沉的不熟悉的地区徘徊寻路。走下山去的第一、第二、第三纵队就是这样开始战斗的。库图佐夫本人待在第四纵队，它驻扎于普拉茨高地。

浓雾依然弥漫于山下，这里开始战斗了。山上天气晴朗，但是一点也看不见前面的动静。正如我们推测的那样，敌人的全部兵力是否盘踞在十俄里以外的地方，抑或滞留在这一片雾霭之中，——八点多钟以前谁也不知道实情。

时值早晨九点钟。雾霭犹如一片汪洋大海弥漫于山下的洼地，但是在高地上的施拉帕尼茨村，天气十分晴朗。由数位元帅陪伴的拿破仑驻扎在这个高地上。雾霭的上方，晴朗的天空一片蔚蓝。圆球状的太阳就像深红色的空心的大浮标，在乳白色的雾海海面上荡漾。非但所有法国部队，而且拿破仑本人及其司令部都未驻扎在那几条小河的对面，都未驻扎在索科尔尼茨村和施拉帕尼茨村洼地对面，当时我们打算占领村后的阵地，并在该地开战；他们驻扎在小河的这边，离我军很近，因此拿破仑用肉眼都能把我军的骑兵和步兵分辨清楚。拿破仑骑着一匹阿拉伯的灰色的小马，身穿一件他在意大利作战时穿的蓝色军大衣，站在他的元帅们前面几步路远的地方。他默默无言地凝视那几座宛如雾海中浮现的山岗，俄国部队远远地沿着山岗向前推进；他并倾听谷地传来的枪声。那时他的消瘦的脸上，没有一块肌肉在颤动，闪闪发亮的眼睛一动不动地凝视着一个地方。他的设想原来是正确的。俄国部队部分地沿着下坡路走进了毗连沼泽和湖泊的谷地，朝着沼泽湖泊的方向推移，一部分官兵空出他打算进攻并且认为是阵地的关键的普拉茨高地。他在雾霭中望见，普拉茨村附近的两座大山之间形成的洼地上，俄国纵队都朝着一个方向向谷地前进，刺刀闪烁着亮光，他们一个跟着一个在雾海中逐渐地消失。他昨日夜晚接到了情报，前哨在深夜听见车轮声和脚步声，俄国纵队没有秩序地行进，依据这种种情形来推测，他清楚地看出，盟军都认为他正位于自己的远前方，在普拉茨高地附近向前推进的几个纵队构成俄国军队的中心，这个中心削弱到这种程度，以致足以顺利地予以攻击，但是他尚未开始战斗。

今日是他的一个隆重的纪念日——加冕周年纪念日。黎明前，他微睡数小时，觉得心旷神怡，精力充沛，他怀着万事亨通的幸福心情，纵身上马，向田野驰去。他一动不动地停在那里，观看从雾霭里显露出来的高地，他那冷淡的脸上有一种理应享受人间幸福的、特别自信的神情，就像是处于热恋之中的幸福少年脸上常有的表情。元帅们站在他身后，不敢分散他的注意力。他时而观看普拉茨高地，时而观看一轮从雾霭里浮现出来的太阳。

当太阳完全从雾霭中探出头来并用它那耀眼的光芒照射田野和雾霭的时候（仿佛他所期待的只是开战的这一天），他从美丽而洁白的手上脱下一只手套，用它给几个元帅打个手势，发出开战的命令。几个元帅在副官们的伴随下朝着不同的方向疾驰而去，几分钟以后法国军队的主力便向普拉茨高地迅速地挺进，俄国部队正向左边的谷地走去，普拉茨高地显得愈益空旷了。