“Come now! You with all your forces fall on the unfortunate Mortier and his one division, and even then Mortier slips through your fingers! Where’s the victory?”

“But seriously,” said Prince Andréy, “we can at any rate say without boasting that it was a little better than at Ulm⁠ ⁠…”

“Why didn’t you capture one, just one, marshal for us?”

“Because not everything happens as one expects or with the smoothness of a parade. We had expected, as I told you, to get at their rear by seven in the morning but had not reached it by five in the afternoon.”

“And why didn’t you do it at seven in the morning? You ought to have been there at seven in the morning,” returned Bilíbin with a smile. “You ought to have been there at seven in the morning.”

“Why did you not succeed in impressing on Bonaparte by diplomatic methods that he had better leave Genoa alone?” retorted Prince Andréy in the same tone.