to say and begged to be restored to his favor. To this letter the old prince had replied affectionately, and from that time had kept the Frenchwoman at a distance. Prince Andréy’s second letter, written near Vítebsk after the French had occupied that town, gave a brief account of the whole campaign, enclosed for them a plan he had drawn and forecasts as to the further progress of the war. In this letter Prince Andréy pointed out to his father the danger of staying at Bald Hills, so near the theater of war and on the army’s direct line of march, and advised him to move to Moscow.
At dinner that day, on Dessalles’ mentioning that the French were said to have already entered Vítebsk, the old prince remembered his son’s letter.
“There was a letter from Prince Andréy today,” he said to