《War And Peace》　Book10 　CHAPTER XIII
　　　　by Leo Tolstoy

ON THE 17TH of August Rostov and Ilyin, accompanied by Lavrushka, who had
just come back from being taken prisoner by the French, and an hussar on orderly
duty, rode out from Yankovo, fifteen versts from Bogutcharovo. They meant to try
a new horse that Ilyin had bought, and to find out whether there was hay to be
had in the village.

Bogutcharovo had been for the last three days between the two hostile armies,
so that the Russian rearguard could reach the village as easily as the French
vanguard; and therefore Rostov, like a careful officer, was anxious to
anticipate the French in securing any provisions that might be left there.

Rostov and Ilyin were in the liveliest spirits. On the way to Bogutcharovo,
which they knew to be an estate belonging to a prince, with a manor-house, where
they hoped to find a large household, and, perhaps, pretty servant-girls, they
questioned Lavrushka about Napoleon, and laughed at his stories; then raced
their horses to test Ilyin's new purchase. Rostov had no notion that the village
to which he was going was the property of the very Prince Bolkonsky who had been
betrothed to his sister.

Rostov and Ilyin had just let their horses race till they were weary for the
last time before Bogutcharovo, and Rostov, outstripping Ilyin was the first to
gallop into the village street.

"You started in front," said Ilyin, flushed.

"Yes, always in front, in the meadow and here too," answered Rostov, patting
his foaming Don horse.

"And on my Frenchy, your excellency," said Lavrushka from behind, meaning the
wretched cart-horse he was riding, "I could have overtaken you, only I didn't
want to put you to shame."

They rode at a walking pace towards the granary, where there was a great
crowd of peasants standing. Several of the peasants took off their caps, others
stared at them without taking off their caps. Two old peasants, with wrinkled
faces and scanty beards, came out of the tavern, reeling and singing a tuneless
song, and advanced with smiles towards the officers. "They're fine fellows!"
said Rostov, laughing. "Well, have you any hay?"

"And so alike, somehow ..." said Ilyin.

"Ma ... a ... aking mer ... ry in my sum ... sum ... mer ..." chanted the peasant, with a
blissful smile.

A peasant came out of the crowd and went up to Rostov.

"Which part will you be from?" asked the peasant.

"We're French," answered Ilyin, laughing. "And this is Napoleon himself," he
said, pointing to Lavrushka.

"I suppose you are Russians then?" the peasant inquired.

"And have you many troops here?" asked another short peasant,
approaching.

"A great many," answered Rostov. "But why are you all assembled here?" he
added. "Is it a holiday or what?"

"The old men are met about the village business," answered the peasant,
moving away from him.

At that moment there came into sight two women and a man in a white hat
running from the prince's house towards the officers.

"The one in pink's mine; hands off, beware!" said Ilyin, noticing Dunyasha
running resolutely towards them.

"She'll be the girl for us!" said Lavrushka, winking to Ilyin.

"What is it you want, my pretty?" said Ilyin, smiling.

"The princess sent me to ask of what regiment are you, and what is your
name?"

"This is Count Rostov, the commander of the squadron, and I am your humble
servant."

"Mer ... mer ... mer ... arbour!" chanted the drunken peasant, smiling blissfully,
and gazing at Ilyin as he talked to the girl. Alpatitch followed Dunyasha,
taking off his hat to Rostov as he approached.

"I make bold to trouble your honour," he said, putting one hand in his bosom,
and speaking with a respectfulness in which there was a shade of contempt for
the officer's youth. "My mistress, the daughter of general-in-chief Prince
Nikolay Andreitch Bolkonsky, who died on the 15th of this month, being in
difficulties owing to the coarse ignorance of those people"-he pointed to the
peasants-"begs you to come ... Would you not be pleased," said Alpatitch, with a
melancholy smile, "to move a little away, as it is not so convenient before ..."
Alpatitch indicated two peasants, who were hovering about him, like gadflies
about a horse.

"Ay! ... Alpatitch! ... Ay! Yakov Alpatitch! first-rate job! Eh? ... for Christ's
sake, forgive us. First-rate! ay?" cried the peasants, smiling gleefully at
him.

Rostov looked at the drunken peasants, and smiled.

"Or possibly this entertains your excellency?" said Yakov Alpatitch, with a
sober air, pointing with his other hand to the old peasants.

"No, there's nothing very entertaining in that," said Rostov, and he moved
away. "What is the matter?" he inquired.

"I make bold to submit to your excellency that the rude peasants here will
not let their lady leave the estate, and threaten to take the horses out of her
carriage, so that everything has been packed since morning, yet her excellency
cannot get away."

"Impossible!" cried Rostov.

"I have the honour of submitting to you the simple truth," said
Alpatitch.

Rostov got off his horse, and giving it to the orderly, walked with Alpatitch
to the house, questioning him further about the state of affairs.

The princess's offer of corn, and her interview with Dron and with the
peasants, had, in fact, made the position so much worse that Dron had finally
given up the keys of office, joined the peasants and refused to appear when
Alpatitch sent for him. In the morning when the princess ordered the horses to
be put in for her to set off, the peasants had come out in a great crowd to the
granary, and had sent to say that they would not let the princess go out of the
village; that there was an edict that people were not to leave their houses, and
that they would unharness the horses. Alpatitch went out to lecture them; in
reply they told him (a certain Karp was the principal speaker, Dron kept in the
background in the crowd) that the princess could not be allowed to go, that
there was an edict forbidding it, but that only let her stay, and they would
serve her and obey her in everything as before.

At the moment when Rostov and Ilyin were galloping along the village street,
regardless of the efforts of Alpatitch, the old nurse, and the maid to dissuade
her, Princess Marya had just ordered the horses to be put in, and was intending
to start. But seeing the horsemen galloping up, the coachmen took them for the
French, and ran away, and a great lamentation arose among the women of the
household.

"Kind sir! protector! God has sent thee," cried voices, with much feeling, as
Rostov crossed the vestibule. Princess Marya was sitting helpless and distraught
in the hall, when Rostov was shown in to see her. She did not know who he was,
or what brought him there, or what was happening to her. Seeing his Russian
face, and recognising him at his first words and gait for a man of her own rank,
she looked at him, with her deep, luminous gaze, and began speaking in a voice,
broken and trembling with emotion. Rostov at once conceived a romance in this
meeting. "A defenceless girl, crushed by sorrow, alone, abandoned to the mercy
of coarse, rebellious peasants! And what strange destiny has brought me here!"
thought Rostov, as he listened to her and looked at her. "And what mildness,
what nobility in her features and expression!" he thought, as he listened to her
timid story.

When she began to tell him that all this had happened the day after her
father's funeral, her voice trembled. She turned away, and as though afraid
Rostov might ascribe her words to a desire to work on his feelings, she glanced
at him with a look of apprehensive inquiry. There were tears in Rostov's eyes.
Princess Marya noticed it, and looked at him with the luminous eyes that made
one forget the plainness of her face.

"I cannot express how glad I am, princess, that I happened to come this way,
and am able to serve you in anything," said Rostov, rising. "I trust you will
start at once, and I answer for it on my honour, no person shall dare to cause
you annoyance, if you will only permit me to escort you," and making a deep bow,
such as are made to ladies of the royal family, he turned to the door.

By the respectfulness of his tone, Rostov tried to show that though he would
consider it a happiness to be acquainted with her, he did not wish to take
advantage of her misfortune to force an acquaintanceship upon her.

Princess Marya felt and appreciated this tone.

"I am very, very grateful to you," she said to him in French; "but I hope it
was all only a misunderstanding, and that no one is to blame." She began all at
once to cry.

"Excuse me," she said.

Rostov, knitting his brows, bowed low once more, and went out of the
room.