《War And Peace》　Book11 　CHAPTER XXI
　　　　by Leo Tolstoy

THE RUSSIAN TROOPS were crossing Moscow from two o'clock at night to two
o'clock in the day, and took with them the last departing inhabitants and
wounded soldiers.

The greatest crush took place on the Kamenny bridge, the Moskvoryetsky
bridge, and Yauzsky bridge. While the troops, parting in two about the Kremlin,
were crowding on to the Moskvoryetsky and Kamenny bridges, an immense number of
soldiers availed themselves of the stoppage and the block to turn back, and
slipping stealthily and quietly by Vassily the Blessed, and under the Borovitsky
gates, they made their way uphill to the Red Square, where some instinct told
them they could easily carry off other people's property. Every passage and
alley of the Gostinny bazaar was filled with a crowd, such as throngs there at
sales. But there were no ingratiating, alluring voices of shopmen, no hawkers,
no motley, female mob of purchasers-everywherewere the uniforms and overcoats of
soldiers without guns, going out in silence with loads of booty, and coming in
empty-handed. The shopkeepers and shopmen (they were few) were walking about
among the soldiers, like men distraught, opening and shutting their shops, and
helping their assistants to carry away their wares. There were drummers in the
square before the bazaar beating the muster-call. But the roll of the drum made
the pillaging soldiers not run up at the call as of old, but, on the contrary,
run away from the drum. Among the soldiers in the shops and passages could be
seen men in the grey coats, and with the shaven heads of convicts. Two officers,
one with a scarf over his uniform, on a thin, dark grey horse, the other on
foot, wearing a military overcoat, stood at the corner of Ilyinka, talking. A
third officer galloped up to them.

"The general has sent orders that they positively must all be driven out.
Why, this is outrageous! Half the men have run off."

"Why, are you off too? ... Where are you fellows off to?" ... he shouted to three
infantry soldiers, who ran by him into the bazaar without guns, holding up the
skirts of their overcoats. "Stop, rascals!"

"Yes, you see, how are you going to get hold of them?" answered another
officer. "There's no getting them together; we must push on so that the last may
not be gone, that's the only thing to do!"

"How's one to push on? There they have been standing, with a block on the
bridge, and they are not moving. Shouldn't a guard be set to prevent the rest
running off?"

"Why, come along! Drive them out," shouted the senior officer.

The officer in the scarf dismounted, called up a drummer, and went with him
into the arcade. Several soldiers in a group together made a rush away. A
shopkeeper, with red bruises on his cheeks about his nose, with an expression on
his sleek face of quiet persistence in the pursuit of gain, came hurriedly and
briskly up to the officer gesticulating.

"Your honour," said he, "graciously protect us. We are not close-fisted-any
trifle now ... we shall be delighted! Pray, your honour, walk in, I'll bring out
cloth in a moment-a couple of pieces even for a gentleman -we shall be
delighted! For we feel how it is, but this is simple robbery! Pray, your honour!
a guard or something should be set, to let us at least shut up ..."

Several shopkeepers crowded round the officer.

"Eh! it's no use clacking," said one of them, a thin man, with a stern face;
"when one's head's off, one doesn't weep over one's hair. Let all take what they
please!" And with a vigorous sweep of his arm he turned away from the
officer.

"It's all very well for you to talk, Ivan Sidoritch," the first shopkeeper
began angrily. "If you please, your honour."

"What's the use of talking!" shouted the thin man; "in my three shops here I
have one hundred thousand worth of goods. How's one to guard them when the army
is gone? Ah, fellows, God's will is not in men's hands!"

"If you please, your honour," said the first shopkeeper, bowing.

The officer stood in uncertainty, and his face betrayed indecision. "Why,
what business is it of mine!" he cried suddenly, and he strode on rapidly along
the arcade. In one open shop he heard blows and high words, and just as the
officer was going into it, a man in a grey coat, with a shaven head, was thrust
violently out of the door.

This man doubled himself up and bounded past the shopkeepers and the officer.
The officer pounced on the soldiers who were in the shop. But meanwhile fearful
screams, coming from an immense crowd, were heard near the Moskvoryetsky bridge,
and the officer ran out into the square.

"What is it? What is it?" he asked, but his comrade had already galloped off
in the direction of the screams. The officer mounted his horse and followed him.
As he drew near the bridge, he saw two cannons that had been taken off their
carriages, the infantry marching over the bridge, a few broken-down carts, and
some soldiers with frightened, and some with laughing faces. Near the cannons
stood a waggon with a pair of horses harnessed to it. Behind the wheels huddled
four greyhounds in collars. A mountain of goods was piled up in the waggon, and
on the very top, beside a child's chair turned legs uppermost, sat a woman, who
was uttering shrill and despairing shrieks. The officer was told by his comrades
that the screams of the crowd and the woman's shrieks were due to the fact that
General Yermolov had come riding down on the crowd, and learning that the
soldiers were straying away in the shops, and crowds of the townspeople were
blocking the bridge, had commanded them to take the cannons out of their
carriages, and to make as though they would fire them at the bridge. The crowd
had made a rush; upsetting waggons, trampling one another, and screaming
desperately, the bridge had been cleared, and the troops had moved on.