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<h2> CHAPTER XV </h2>
<p>When returning from his leave, Rostov felt, for the first time, how close
was the bond that united him to Denisov and the whole regiment.</p>
<p>On approaching it, Rostov felt as he had done when approaching his home in
Moscow. When he saw the first hussar with the unbuttoned uniform of his
regiment, when he recognized red-haired Dementyev and saw the picket ropes
of the roan horses, when Lavrushka gleefully shouted to his master, "The
count has come!" and Denisov, who had been asleep on his bed, ran all
disheveled out of the mud hut to embrace him, and the officers collected
round to greet the new arrival, Rostov experienced the same feeling as
when his mother, his father, and his sister had embraced him, and tears of
joy choked him so that he could not speak. The regiment was also a home,
and as unalterably dear and precious as his parents' house.</p>
<p>When he had reported himself to the commander of the regiment and had been
reassigned to his former squadron, had been on duty and had gone out
foraging, when he had again entered into all the little interests of the
regiment and felt himself deprived of liberty and bound in one narrow,
unchanging frame, he experienced the same sense of peace, of moral
support, and the same sense of being at home here in his own place, as he
had felt under the parental roof. But here was none of all that turmoil of
the world at large, where he did not know his right place and took
mistaken decisions; here was no Sonya with whom he ought, or ought not, to
have an explanation; here was no possibility of going there or not going
there; here there were not twenty-four hours in the day which could be
spent in such a variety of ways; there was not that innumerable crowd of
people of whom not one was nearer to him or farther from him than another;
there were none of those uncertain and undefined money relations with his
father, and nothing to recall that terrible loss to Dolokhov. Here, in the
regiment, all was clear and simple. The whole world was divided into two
unequal parts: one, our Pavlograd regiment; the other, all the rest. And
the rest was no concern of his. In the regiment, everything was definite:
who was lieutenant, who captain, who was a good fellow, who a bad one, and
most of all, who was a comrade. The canteenkeeper gave one credit, one's
pay came every four months, there was nothing to think out or decide, you
had only to do nothing that was considered bad in the Pavlograd regiment
and, when given an order, to do what was clearly, distinctly, and
definitely ordered—and all would be well.</p>
<p>Having once more entered into the definite conditions of this regimental
life, Rostov felt the joy and relief a tired man feels on lying down to
rest. Life in the regiment, during this campaign, was all the pleasanter
for him, because, after his loss to Dolokhov (for which, in spite of all
his family's efforts to console him, he could not forgive himself), he had
made up his mind to atone for his fault by serving, not as he had done
before, but really well, and by being a perfectly first-rate comrade and
officer—in a word, a splendid man altogether, a thing which seemed
so difficult out in the world, but so possible in the regiment.</p>
<p>After his losses, he had determined to pay back his debt to his parents in
five years. He received ten thousand rubles a year, but now resolved to
take only two thousand and leave the rest to repay the debt to his
parents.</p>
<p>Our army, after repeated retreats and advances and battles at Pultusk and
Preussisch-Eylau, was concentrated near Bartenstein. It was awaiting the
Emperor's arrival and the beginning of a new campaign.</p>
<p>The Pavlograd regiment, belonging to that part of the army which had
served in the 1805 campaign, had been recruiting up to strength in Russia,
and arrived too late to take part in the first actions of the campaign. It
had been neither at Pultusk nor at Preussisch-Eylau and, when it joined
the army in the field in the second half of the campaign, was attached to
Platov's division.</p>
<p>Platov's division was acting independently of the main army. Several times
parts of the Pavlograd regiment had exchanged shots with the enemy, had
taken prisoners, and once had even captured Marshal Oudinot's carriages.
In April the Pavlograds were stationed immovably for some weeks near a
totally ruined and deserted German village.</p>
<p>A thaw had set in, it was muddy and cold, the ice on the river broke, and
the roads became impassable. For days neither provisions for the men nor
fodder for the horses had been issued. As no transports could arrive, the
men dispersed about the abandoned and deserted villages, searching for
potatoes, but found few even of these.</p>
<p>Everything had been eaten up and the inhabitants had all fled—if any
remained, they were worse than beggars and nothing more could be taken
from them; even the soldiers, usually pitiless enough, instead of taking
anything from them, often gave them the last of their rations.</p>
<p>The Pavlograd regiment had had only two men wounded in action, but had
lost nearly half its men from hunger and sickness. In the hospitals, death
was so certain that soldiers suffering from fever, or the swelling that
came from bad food, preferred to remain on duty, and hardly able to drag
their legs went to the front rather than to the hospitals. When spring
came on, the soldiers found a plant just showing out of the ground that
looked like asparagus, which, for some reason, they called "Mashka's sweet
root." It was very bitter, but they wandered about the fields seeking it
and dug it out with their sabers and ate it, though they were ordered not
to do so, as it was a noxious plant. That spring a new disease broke out
among the soldiers, a swelling of the arms, legs, and face, which the
doctors attributed to eating this root. But in spite of all this, the
soldiers of Denisov's squadron fed chiefly on "Mashka's sweet root,"
because it was the second week that the last of the biscuits were being
doled out at the rate of half a pound a man and the last potatoes received
had sprouted and frozen.</p>
<p>The horses also had been fed for a fortnight on straw from the thatched
roofs and had become terribly thin, though still covered with tufts of
felty winter hair.</p>
<p>Despite this destitution, the soldiers and officers went on living just as
usual. Despite their pale swollen faces and tattered uniforms, the hussars
formed line for roll call, kept things in order, groomed their horses,
polished their arms, brought in straw from the thatched roofs in place of
fodder, and sat down to dine round the caldrons from which they rose up
hungry, joking about their nasty food and their hunger. As usual, in their
spare time, they lit bonfires, steamed themselves before them naked;
smoked, picked out and baked sprouting rotten potatoes, told and listened
to stories of Potemkin's and Suvorov's campaigns, or to legends of Alesha
the Sly, or the priest's laborer Mikolka.</p>
<p>The officers, as usual, lived in twos and threes in the roofless,
half-ruined houses. The seniors tried to collect straw and potatoes and,
in general, food for the men. The younger ones occupied themselves as
before, some playing cards (there was plenty of money, though there was no
food), some with more innocent games, such as quoits and skittles. The
general trend of the campaign was rarely spoken of, partly because nothing
certain was known about it, partly because there was a vague feeling that
in the main it was going badly.</p>
<p>Rostov lived, as before, with Denisov, and since their furlough they had
become more friendly than ever. Denisov never spoke of Rostov's family,
but by the tender friendship his commander showed him, Rostov felt that
the elder hussar's luckless love for Natasha played a part in
strengthening their friendship. Denisov evidently tried to expose Rostov
to danger as seldom as possible, and after an action greeted his safe
return with evident joy. On one of his foraging expeditions, in a deserted
and ruined village to which he had come in search of provisions, Rostov
found a family consisting of an old Pole and his daughter with an infant
in arms. They were half clad, hungry, too weak to get away on foot and had
no means of obtaining a conveyance. Rostov brought them to his quarters,
placed them in his own lodging, and kept them for some weeks while the old
man was recovering. One of his comrades, talking of women, began chaffing
Rostov, saying that he was more wily than any of them and that it would
not be a bad thing if he introduced to them the pretty Polish girl he had
saved. Rostov took the joke as an insult, flared up, and said such
unpleasant things to the officer that it was all Denisov could do to
prevent a duel. When the officer had gone away, Denisov, who did not
himself know what Rostov's relations with the Polish girl might be, began
to upbraid him for his quickness of temper, and Rostov replied:</p>
<p>"Say what you like.... She is like a sister to me, and I can't tell you
how it offended me... because... well, for that reason...."</p>
<p>Denisov patted him on the shoulder and began rapidly pacing the room
without looking at Rostov, as was his way at moments of deep feeling.</p>
<p>"Ah, what a mad bweed you Wostovs are!" he muttered, and Rostov noticed
tears in his eyes.</p>
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