While making a show of preparations for the fortification and provisioning of Moscow the French Emperor, on October 4, sent his aide-de-camp, General Lauriston, who had been Ambassador at St. Petersburg before the war, on a mission to Kutuzov. Lauriston’s real object was to ascertain the chances of peace. It was certain that his mission could have no success. Apart from the firm resolve of the Tzar the generals at Tarutino were bitterly determined, and kept a close watch upon their commander-in-chief. Kutuzov consented to receive Lauriston; and thereupon his subordinates requested Wilson to inform him that if he conferred privately with Lauriston he would be deposed from the command. Kutuzov himself, not very confident of the ability of his army to beat Napoleon’s, persisted in his determination to receive Lauriston, but consented to do so publicly in the first instance. He then had a private conversation with the French general, of which he afterwards gave an account to Count Langeron. He ultimately consented to pass on a letter brought by Lauriston to St. Petersburg; but declared that he had no power to conclude an armistice. The successes of Schwarzenberg and St. Cyr appeared to make the French line of communications fairly safe, and the calling up of Victor’s 9th Corps to Smolensk was an additional measure of security. The 9th Corps crossed the frontier on September 3. It was increased by the addition of four German regiments to a strength of 33,500 men. Victor left Coutard’s German brigade at Vilna, and with the rest of the corps marched for Smolensk, where he arrived on September 27. Napoleon had appointed Comte Baraguay d’Hilliers Governor-General of the province of Smolensk, but he could do little to collect supplies and keep the roads clear. The country was infested by small parties of Cossacks and of armed peasantry on the one hand, and on the other by numbers of stragglers, disbanded troops and marauders belonging to the invading army. Until the arrival of the 9th Corps troops were entirely lacking wherewith to suppress the disorder, and it will soon be seen that Victor could make but a brief stay at Smolensk. Baraguay d’Hilliers, worried and distracted by Napoleon’s angry complaints, gave his master the facts of the situation in two letters, which enable us to appreciate the precise state of things in rear of the _Grande Armée_.