War and Peace

War and Peace

by Leo Tolstoy/Tolstoi




BOOK ONE: 1805




CHAPTER I


"Well, Prince, so Genoa and Lucca are now just family estates of the
Buonapartes. But I warn you, if you don't tell me that this means war,
if you still try to defend the infamies and horrors perpetrated by
that Antichrist--I really believe he is Antichrist--I will have
nothing more to do with you and you are no longer my friend, no longer
my 'faithful slave,' as you call yourself! But how do you do? I see
I have frightened you--sit down and tell me all the news."

It was in July, 1805, and the speaker was the well-known Anna
Pavlovna Scherer, maid of honor and favorite of the Empress Marya
Fedorovna. With these words she greeted Prince Vasili Kuragin, a man
of high rank and importance, who was the first to arrive at her
reception. Anna Pavlovna had had a cough for some days. She was, as
she said, suffering from la grippe; grippe being then a new word in
St. Petersburg, used only by the elite.

All her invitations without exception, written in French, and
delivered by a scarlet-liveried footman that morning, ran as follows:

"If you have nothing better to do, Count [or Prince], and if the
prospect of spending an evening with a poor invalid is not too
terrible, I shall be very charmed to see you tonight between 7 and 10-
Annette Scherer."

"Heavens! what a virulent attack!" replied the prince, not in the
least disconcerted by this reception. He had just entered, wearing
an embroidered court uniform, knee breeches, and shoes, and had
stars on his breast and a serene expression on his flat face. He spoke
in that refined French in which our grandfathers not only spoke but
thought, and with the gentle, patronizing intonation natural to a
man of importance who had grown old in society and at court. He went
up to Anna Pavlovna, kissed her hand, presenting to her his bald,
scented, and shining head, and complacently seated himself on the
sofa.

"First of all, dear friend, tell me how you are. Set your friend's
mind at rest," said he without altering his tone, beneath the
politeness and affected sympathy of which indifference and even
irony could be discerned.

"Can one be well while suffering morally? Can one be calm in times
like these if one has any feeling?" said Anna Pavlovna. "You are
staying the whole evening, I hope?"

"And the fete at the English ambassador's? Today is Wednesday. I
must put in an appearance there," said the prince. "My daughter is
coming for me to take me there."

"I thought today's fete had been canceled. I confess all these
festivities and fireworks are becoming wearisome."

"If they had known that you wished it, the entertainment would
have been put off," said the prince, who, like a wound-up clock, by
force of habit said things he did not even wish to be believed.

"Don't tease! Well, and what has been decided about Novosiltsev's
dispatch? You know everything."

"What can one say about it?" replied the prince in a cold,
listless tone. "What has been decided? They have decided that
Buonaparte has burnt his boats, and I believe that we are ready to
burn ours."

Prince Vasili always spoke languidly, like an actor repeating a
stale part. Anna Pavlovna Scherer on the contrary, despite her forty
years, overflowed with animation and impulsiveness. To be an
enthusiast had become her social vocation and, sometimes even when she
did not feel like it, she became enthusiastic in order not to
disappoint the expectations of those who knew her. The subdued smile
which, though it did not suit her faded features, always played
round her lips expressed, as in a spoiled child, a continual
consciousness of her charming defect, which she neither wished, nor
could, nor considered it necessary, to correct.

In the midst of a conversation on political matters Anna Pavlovna
burst out:

"Oh, don't speak to me of Austria. Perhaps I don't understand
things, but Austria never has wished, and does not wish, for war.
She is betraying us! Russia alone must save Europe. Our gracious
sovereign recognizes his high vocation and will be true to it. That is
the one thing I have faith in! Our good and wonderful sovereign has to
perform the noblest role on earth, and he is so virtuous and noble
that God will not forsake him. He will fulfill his vocation and
crush the hydra of revolution, which has become more terrible than
ever in the person of this murderer and villain! We alone must
avenge the blood of the just one.... Whom, I ask you, can we rely
on?... England with her commercial spirit will not and cannot
understand the Emperor Alexander's loftiness of soul. She has
refused to evacuate Malta. She wanted to find, and still seeks, some
secret motive in our actions. What answer did Novosiltsev get? None.
The English have not understood and cannot understand the
self-abnegation of our Emperor who wants nothing for himself, but only
desires the good of mankind. And what have they promised? Nothing! And
what little they have promised they will not perform! Prussia has
always declared that Buonaparte is invincible, and that all Europe
is powerless before him.... And I don't believe a word that Hardenburg
says, or Haugwitz either. This famous Prussian neutrality is just a
trap. I have faith only in God and the lofty destiny of our adored
monarch. He will save Europe!"

She suddenly paused, smiling at her own impetuosity.

"I think," said the prince with a smile, "that if you had been
sent instead of our dear Wintzingerode you would have captured the
King of Prussia's consent by assault. You are so eloquent. Will you
give me a cup of tea?"

"In a moment. A propos," she added, becoming calm again, "I am
expecting two very interesting men tonight, le Vicomte de Mortemart,
who is connected with the Montmorencys through the Rohans, one of
the best French families. He is one of the genuine emigres, the good
ones. And also the Abbe Morio. Do you know that profound thinker? He
has been received by the Emperor. Had you heard?"

"I shall be delighted to meet them," said the prince. "But tell me,"
he added with studied carelessness as if it had only just occurred
to him, though the question he was about to ask was the chief motive
of his visit, "is it true that the Dowager Empress wants Baron Funke
to be appointed first secretary at Vienna? The baron by all accounts
is a poor creature."

Prince Vasili wished to obtain this post for his son, but others
were trying through the Dowager Empress Marya Fedorovna to secure it
for the baron.

Anna Pavlovna almost closed her eyes to indicate that neither she
nor anyone else had a right to criticize what the Empress desired or
was pleased with.

"Baron Funke has been recommended to the Dowager Empress by her
sister," was all she said, in a dry and mournful tone.

As she named the Empress, Anna Pavlovna's face suddenly assumed an
expression of profound and sincere devotion and respect mingled with