War and Peace Volume 2 Book 5 Chapter 21

In which the meeting of two Emperors unfolds with a formal ceremony of honour and uneasy camaraderie, witnessed keenly by a young soldier whose thoughts drift between the splendour of imperial pageantry and the harsh realities of war. The episode closes upon reflections in a crowded tavern where loyalty to duty and the enigmatic wisdom of sovereign decisions are wrestled with amid the clinking of glasses.