not be with the army unless he is a general!” said Napoleon, evidently uttering these words as a direct challenge to the Emperor. He knew how Alexander desired to be a military commander.
“The campaign began only a week ago, and you haven’t even been able to defend Vílna. You are cut in two and have been driven out of the Polish provinces. Your army is grumbling.”
“On the contrary, Your Majesty,” said Balashëv, hardly able to remember what had been said to him and following these verbal fireworks with difficulty, “the troops are burning with eagerness …”
“I know everything!” Napoleon interrupted him. “I know everything. I know the number of your battalions as exactly as I know my own. You have not two hundred thousand men, and I have three times that number. I give you my word of honor,” said Napoleon, forgetting that his word of honor could carry no weight—“I give you my word of honor that I have five hundred and thirty thousand men this side of the Vistula. The Turks will be of no use to you; they are worth nothing and have shown it by making peace with you. As for the Swedes—it is their fate to be governed by mad kings. Their king was insane and they changed him for another—Bernadotte, who promptly went mad—for no Swede would ally himself with Russia unless he were mad.”