By the middle of the day, Napoleon receives reports that all say the same thing: the weak Russians stand steady while the French dissolve and flee. All his officers are asking for reinforcements and he feels suddenly involved in a bad dream. His concern in all previous battles was to choose the various ways of success, but against these Russians — of whom not a single corps has been captured, not a flag or cannon taken in two months — he can only consider the possibilities of failure. From his view on a battlement, he sees his is a massacre not a battle, and, slowly, defeated, he turns back to Shevardino.
Kutuzov has remained in the same place since morning. He issues no orders, but simply assents to or disapproves of whatever is proposed to him. His old age has shown him battles are not won by commanders but by the intangible force called the spirit of the army, and he merely follows the force and leads it as far as it lays in his power to lead. When an adjutant-general reports that the battle is lost at all points, Kutuzov becomes furious and quickly pens an order to be sent all along the lines: Tomorrow we attack. The weary soldiers pass the message along; feeling confirmed by the highest command in what they wish to believe, they take heart and courage anew.
Prince Andrey's regiment, under heavy fire all day, is ordered to stand by inactive. The men carry off their wounded, close up ranks once more, and await death. A grenade drops among them, and, to set an example, Andrey remains standing. Gazing at the object of his death sputtering a few paces away, Bolkonsky is filled with love for the grass and earth and air. The explosion flings him into the air and he lands in a pool of his own blood.
