“On parade the Emperor turned to the group of officers and said—‘Gentlemen, you are not maintaining proper discipline in your corps; there are too many stragglers. Officers seem to stop on the march whenever they please, in order to spend their time in country-houses. They are tired of camping out; but true courage does not fear rainy weather, nor will mud stain a soldier’s honour. The men have no regard for discipline; under the pretext of foraging for provisions they desert from their regiments and wander about in disorder. Complaints reach me from every side of their lawless behaviour. This condition of things must be put a stop to, gentlemen; and those who absent themselves without leave shall be severely punished. In the event of an engagement with the enemy, our regiments would be greatly below their strength. The efficient force of our army is such as it might naturally have been after a battle, whereas we have not yet even seen the enemy. Marshals Oudinot and Macdonald have secured victories because they had their full complement of troops when they came to the banks of the Dvina and Drissa.’ “Then the Emperor called for Baron Larrey, but as he was not to be found, Dr. Paulet, the head of the Ambulance Corps, presented himself instead. Napoleon asked him— “‘For how many wounded have you bandages ready?’ “‘Ten thousand,’ replied the doctor. “‘And about how many days does it take to heal a wound?’ “‘About thirty,’ answered the doctor. “‘If that is so,’ replied the Emperor, ‘you cannot even give assistance to four hundred men! We shall want many more than that!’ “There was a low murmur in the crowd, and some one remarked, ‘I wonder how many he thinks there will be killed?’ “Napoleon must have heard the remark, but he paid no attention. He continued his cross-examination of the doctor, and asked him, ‘Where are the ambulance and medical stores?’ “‘They were left at Vilna for want of means of transport.’ “‘So the army is entirely unprovided with medicine,’ cried Napoleon, ‘and if I wanted physic I should have to go without it?’ “‘Your Majesty has your own private medical stores,’ replied the doctor. “This made the Emperor very angry. ‘I am the first soldier in the army,’ he said, raising his voice, ‘and I have a right to be attended to in the army hospital.’ Then he asked where the chief dispenser was. He was told at Vilna. “‘What!’ cried Napoleon. ‘One of the chief medical officers absent from the army! Let him be sent back to Paris to peddle his drugs to the women of the Rue St. Honoré! Appoint some one else in his place, and let the whole medical service rejoin the army.’” The army did not meet with the same enthusiastic reception at Vitebsk as at Vilna. The inhabitants treated the French not as liberators, but as conquerors. Evidently Lithuania was not particularly well pleased at the prospect of re-union with its native Poland, for the disposition of the inhabitants was by no means friendly.