“Soldiers! Here is the battle which you have so long desired! Henceforth the victory depends upon you; it is necessary for us. It will give you abundance, good winter quarters, and a speedy return to your country! Behave as you did at Austerlitz, at Friedland, at Vitebsk, at Smolensk, and the most remote posterity will quote with pride your conduct on this day; let it say of you: _he was at the great battle under the walls of Moscow_.” The French gained the battle at Borodino, at a cost of some thirty thousand men, but they did not destroy the Russian army. Although the Russians lost fifty thousand men, they retreated in good order. Under the circumstances, a victory which allowed the enemy to retire in order was of little use. It was Napoleon’s fault, the critics said; he was inactive. But it was not sluggishness which troubled Napoleon at Borodino. He had a new enemy—a headache. On the day of the battle he suffered so that he was obliged to retire to a ravine to escape the icy wind. In this sheltered spot he paced up and down all day, giving his orders from the reports brought him. [Illustration: ATTENTION! THE EMPEROR HAS HIS EYE ON US. By Raffet.] Moscow was entered on the 15th of September. Here the French found at last food and shelter, but only for a few hours. That night Moscow burst into flames, set on fire by the authorities, by whom it had been abandoned. It was three days before the fire was arrested. It would cost Russia two hundred years of time, two hundred millions of money, to repair the loss which she had sustained, Napoleon wrote to France. Suffering, disorganization, pillage, followed the disaster. But Napoleon would not retreat. He hoped to make peace. Moscow was still smoking when he wrote a long description of the conflagration to Alexander. The closing paragraph ran: “I wage war against your Majesty without animosity; a note from you before or after the last battle would have stopped my march, and I should even have liked to sacrifice the advantage of entering Moscow. If your Majesty retains some remains of your former sentiments, you will take this letter in good part. At all events, you will thank me for giving you an account of what is passing at Moscow.”