Part 2 Book 1 Chapter 5 The Quid Obscurum of Battles

Every one is acquainted with the first phase of this battle; a beginning which was troubled, uncertain, hesitating, menacing to both armies, but still more so for the English than for the French.

It had rained all night, the earth had been cut up by the downpour, the water had accumulated here and there in the hollows of the plain as if in casks; at some points the gear of the artillery carriages was buried up to the axles, the circingles of the horses were dripping with liquid mud. If the wheat and rye trampled down by this cohort of transports on the march had not filled in the ruts and strewn a litter beneath the wheels, all movement, particularly in the valleys, in the direction of Papelotte would have been impossible.

The affair began late. Napoleon, as we have already explained, was in the habit of keeping all his artillery well in hand, like a pistol, aiming it now at one point, now at another, of the battle; and it had been his wish to wait until the horse batteries could move and gallop freely. In order to do that it was necessary that the sun should come out and dry the soil. But the sun did not make its appearance. It was no longer the rendezvous of Austerlitz. When the first cannon was fired, the English general, Colville, looked at his watch, and noted that it was thirty-five minutes past eleven.

The action was begun furiously, with more fury, perhaps, than the Emperor would have wished, by the left wing of the French resting on Hougomont. At the same time Napoleon attacked the centre by hurling Quiot's brigade on La Haie-Sainte, and Ney pushed forward the right wing of the French against the left wing of the English, which rested on Papelotte.

The attack on Hougomont was something of a feint; the plan was to draw Wellington thither, and to make him swerve to the left. This plan would have succeeded if the four companies of the English guards and the brave Belgians of Perponcher's division had not held the position solidly, and Wellington, instead of massing his troops there, could confine himself to despatching thither, as reinforcements, only four more companies of guards and one battalion from Brunswick.

The attack of the right wing of the French on Papelotte was calculated, in fact, to overthrow the English left, to cut off the road to Brussels, to bar the passage against possible Prussians, to force Mont-Saint-Jean, to turn Wellington back on Hougomont, thence on Braine-l'Alleud, thence on Hal; nothing easier. With the exception of a few incidents this attack succeeded Papelotte was taken; La Haie-Sainte was carried.

A detail to be noted. There was in the English infantry, particularly in Kempt's brigade, a great many raw recruits. These young soldiers were valiant in the presence of our redoubtable infantry; their inexperience extricated them intrepidly from the dilemma; they performed particularly excellent service as skirmishers: the soldier skirmisher, left somewhat to himself, becomes, so to speak, his own general. These recruits displayed some of the French ingenuity and fury. This novice of an infantry had dash. This displeased Wellington.

After the taking of La Haie-Sainte the battle wavered.

There is in this day an obscure interval, from mid-day to four o'clock; the middle portion of this battle is almost indistinct, and participates in the sombreness of the hand-to-hand conflict. Twilight reigns over it. We perceive vast fluctuations in that fog, a dizzy mirage, paraphernalia of war almost unknown to-day, pendant colbacks, floating sabre-taches, cross-belts, cartridge-boxes for grenades, hussar dolmans, red boots with a thousand wrinkles, heavy shakos garlanded with torsades, the almost black infantry of Brunswick mingled with the scarlet infantry of England, the English soldiers with great, white circular pads on the slopes of their shoulders for epaulets, the Hanoverian light-horse with their oblong casques of leather, with brass hands and red horse-tails, the Scotch with their bare knees and plaids, the great white gaiters of our grenadiers; pictures, not strategic lines--what Salvator Rosa requires, not what is suited to the needs of Gribeauval.

A certain amount of tempest is always mingled with a battle. Quid obscurum, quid divinum. Each historian traces, to some extent, the particular feature which pleases him amid this pellmell. Whatever may be the combinations of the generals, the shock of armed masses has an incalculable ebb. During the action the plans of the two leaders enter into each other and become mutually thrown out of shape. Such a point of the field of battle devours more combatants than such another, just as more or less spongy soils soak up more or less quickly the water which is poured on them. It becomes necessary to pour out more soldiers than one would like; a series of expenditures which are the unforeseen. The line of battle waves and undulates like a thread, the trails of blood gush illogically, the fronts of the armies waver, the regiments form capes and gulfs as they enter and withdraw; all these reefs are continually moving in front of each other. Where the infantry stood the artillery arrives, the cavalry rushes in where the artillery was, the battalions are like smoke. There was something there; seek it. It has disappeared; the open spots change place, the sombre folds advance and retreat, a sort of wind from the sepulchre pushes forward, hurls back, distends, and disperses these tragic multitudes. What is a fray? an oscillation? The immobility of a mathematical plan expresses a minute, not a day. In order to depict a battle, there is required one of those powerful painters who have chaos in their brushes. Rembrandt is better than Vandermeulen; Vandermeulen, exact at noon, lies at three o'clock. Geometry is deceptive; the hurricane alone is trustworthy. That is what confers on Folard the right to contradict Polybius. Let us add, that there is a certain instant when the battle degenerates into a combat, becomes specialized, and disperses into innumerable detailed feats, which, to borrow the expression of Napoleon himself, "belong rather to the biography of the regiments than to the history of the army." The historian has, in this case, the evident right to sum up the whole. He cannot do more than seize the principal outlines of the struggle, and it is not given to any one narrator, however conscientious he may be, to fix, absolutely, the form of that horrible cloud which is called a battle.

This, which is true of all great armed encounters, is particularly applicable to Waterloo.

Nevertheless, at a certain moment in the afternoon the battle came to a point.

大家知道那次战争最初阶段的局面对双方的军队都是紧张、混乱、棘手、危急的，但是英军比法军还更危殆。落了一整夜的雨；暴雨之后，一片泥泞；原野上，处处是水坑，水在坑里，如在盆中；在某些地方，辎重车的轮子淹没了一半，马的肚带上滴着泥浆；假使没有那群蜂拥前进的车辆所压倒的大麦和稞麦把车辙填起来替车轮垫底，一切行动，尤其是在帕佩洛特一带的山谷里，都会是不可能的。

战争开始得迟，拿破仑，我们已经说过，惯于把全部炮队握在手里，如同握管手枪，时而指向战争的某一点，时而又指向另一点；所以他要等待，好让驾好了的炮队能驰骤自如；要做到这一步，非得太阳出来晒干地面不可。但是太阳迟迟不现，这回它却不象奥斯特里茨那次那样守约了。第一炮发出时，英国的科维尔将军看了一下表，当时正是十一点卅五分。

战事开始时法军左翼猛扑乌古蒙，那种猛烈程度，也许比皇上所预期的还更猛些。同时拿破仑进攻中部，命吉奥的旅部冲击圣拉埃，内伊①也命令法军的右翼向盘据在帕佩洛特的英军左翼挺进。

①内伊（Ney），拿破仑部下的得力元帅。　

乌古蒙方面的攻势有些诱敌作用。原想把威灵顿引到那里去，使他偏重左方，计划是那样定的。假使那四连英国近卫军和佩尔蓬谢部下的那一师忠勇的比利时兵不曾固守防地，那计划也许成了功，但是威灵顿并没有向乌古蒙集中，只加派了四连近卫军和不伦瑞克的营部赴援。

法军右翼向帕佩洛特的攻势已经完成，计划是要击溃英军左翼，截断通向布鲁塞尔的道路，切断那可能到达的普鲁士军队的来路，进逼圣约翰山，想把威灵顿先撵到乌古蒙，再撵到布兰拉勒，再撵到阿尔，那是显而易见的。假使没有发生意外，那一路进击，一定会成功。帕佩洛特夺过来了，圣拉埃也占住了。

附带说一句。在英军的步兵中，尤其是在兰伯特的旅部里，有不少新兵。那些青年战士，在我们勇猛的步兵前面是顽强的，他们缺乏经验，却能奋勇作战，他们尤其作了出色的散兵战斗，散兵只须稍稍振奋，便可成为自己的将军，那些新兵颇有法国军人的那种独立作战和奋不顾身的劲头。那些乳臭小兵都相当冲动，威灵顿为之不乐。

在夺取了圣拉埃以后，战事形成了相持不下的局面。

那天，从中午到四点，中间有一段混乱过程；战况差不多是不明的，成了一种混战状态。黄昏将近，千军万马在暮霭中往复飘荡，那是一种惊心动魄的奇观，当时的军容今日已经不可复见了，红缨帽，飘荡的佩剑，交叉的革带，榴弹包，轻骑兵的盘绦军服，千褶红靴，缨络累累的羽毛冠，一色朱红，肩上有代替肩章的白色大圆环的英国步兵和几乎纯黑的不伦瑞克步兵交相辉映，还有头戴铜箍、红缨、椭圆形皮帽的汉诺威轻骑兵，露着膝头、披着方格衣服的苏格兰兵，我国羽林军的白色长绑腿，这是一幅幅图画，而不是一行行阵线，为萨尔瓦多·罗扎①所需，不为格里德瓦尔②所需。

①萨尔瓦多·罗扎（SalvatorRosa），1615?673），意大利画家，作画尚色彩富丽。

②格里博瓦尔（Gribeauval），法国十八世纪革命前的一个将军。　

每次战争总有风云的变幻。“天意莫测。”每个史学家都随心所欲把那些混乱情形描写几笔。为将者无论怎样筹划，一到交锋，总免不了千变万化，时进时退；在战事进行中，两军将领所定的计划必然互有出入，互相牵制。战场的某一点所吞没的战士会比另一点多些，仿佛那些地方的海绵吸水性强弱不同，因而吸收水量的快慢也不一样。为将者无可奈何，只得在某些地方多填一些士兵下去。那是一种意外的消耗。战线如长蛇，蜿蜒动荡，鲜血如溪水，狂妄地流着，两军的前锋汹涌如波涛，军队或进或退，交错如地角海湾，那一切礁石也都面面相对，浮动不停；炮队迎步兵，马队追炮队，队伍如烟云。那里明明有一点东西，细看却又不见了，稀疏的地方迁移不定，浓密的烟尘进退无常，有种阴风把那些血肉横飞的人堆推上前去，继又撵回来，扫集到一处，继又把他们驱散四方。混战是什么呢？是种周旋进退的动作。精密的计划是死东西，只适合于一分钟，对一整天不适合。描绘战争，非得有才气纵横、笔势雄浑的画家不可；伦勃朗①就比范·德·米伦②高明些。范·德·米伦正确地画出了中午的情形，却不是三点钟的真相。几何学不足为凭，只有飓风是真实的。因此福拉尔③有驳斥波利比乌斯④的理由。我们应当补充一句，在某个时刻，战争常转成肉博，人自为战，分散为无数的细枝末节。拿破仑说过：“那些情节属于各联队的生活史，而不属于大军的历史。”在那种情况下，史学家显然只能叙述一个梗概。他只能掌握战争的主要轮廓，无论怎样力求忠实，也决不能把战云的形态刻画出来。

①伦勃朗（Rembrandt），十七世纪荷兰画家。

②范·德·米伦（VonDerMeulen），十七世纪佛兰德画家，曾在路易十四朝廷工作二十五年，故一般视作法国画家。

③福拉尔（Folard），十八世纪法国兵法家。

④波利比乌斯（Polybe），公元前二世纪希腊历史学家。

　这对任何一次大会战都是正确的，尤其是对滑铁卢。

可是，到了下午，在某个时刻，战争的局势渐渐分明了。

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