To the left down below in the mist, the musketry fire of unseen forces could be heard. It was there Prince Andréy thought the fight would concentrate. “There we shall encounter difficulties, and there,” thought he, “I shall be sent with a brigade or division, and there, standard in hand, I shall go forward and break whatever is in front of me.”

He could not look calmly at the standards of the passing battalions. Seeing them he kept thinking, “That may be the very standard with which I shall lead the army.”