Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 03.djvu/19



were stationed at the front. "We were having our last engagements; the road through the forest was nearly finished, and we awaited from day to day the order from the staff to retreat to the fortress. Our division of battery guns stood on the side of a mountain range which ended in the swift torrent Méchik, and was to keep up a fire on the plain stretching out before us. On this picturesque plain, beyond the range of our guns, here and there occasionally appeared, especially toward evening, harmless groups of mountaineers on horseback, curious to look at the Russian encampment.

It was a clear, quiet, and fresh evening, like nearly all the December evenings in the Caucasus. The sun was setting behind the steep spur of the mountains on the left, and cast its rose-coloured beams on the tents which were scattered on the mountain, on the moving groups of the soldiers, and on our two guns which stood heavily and immovably, as though stretching out their necks, within two steps of us on an earth battery.