editary states of Austria, and subduing | iety, desire the termination of the Rethe whole southern powers of Italy. volution. Should our internal misery An army which never mustered fifty continue, the people, exhausted by sufthousand men in the field, though main-fering, having experienced none of the tained by successive reinforcements benefits which they expected, will esnearly at that amount, had not only tablish a new order of things, which broken through the barrier of the Alps, will in its turn generate fresh revolusubdued Piedmont, conquered Lom- tions, and we shall undergo, for twenty bardy, and humbled the whole Italian or thirty years, all the agonies consestates, but defeated, and almost destroy- quent on such convulsions." ed, four powerful armies which Austria raised to defend her possessions, and wrenched the keys of Mantua from her grasp, under the eyes of the greatest successive arrays of armed men she had ever sent into the field. Successes so immense, gained against forces so vast and efforts so indefatigable, may almost be pronounced unparalleled in the annals of war.*

156. Much of Napoleon's success was no doubt owing to the admirable character, unwearied energy, and indomitable courage of the troops composing the French army. The world had never seen an array framed of such materials. The terrible whirlwind which had overthrown the fabric of society in France, the patriotic spirit which had brought its whole population into the field, the grinding misery which had forced all its activity into war, had formed a union of intelligence, skill, and ability, among the private soldiers, such as had never before been witnessed in modern warfare. Men from the middle, even the higher ranks, were to be seen with the musket on their shoulders; the great levies of 1793 had spared neither high nor low; the career of glory and ambition could be entered only through the

155. But although its victories in the field had been so brilliant, the internal situation of the Republic was in the highest degree discouraging; and it was more than doubtful whether it could continue for any length of time even so glorious a contest. Its condition is clearly depicted in a secret report, presented by order of the Directory, on 20th December 1796, by General Clarke to Napoleon :-"The lassitude of war is experienced in all parts of the Repub-portals of the bivouac. Hence it was lic. The people ardently desire peace; their murmurs are loud that it is not already concluded. The legislature desires it, commands it, no matter at what price; and its continued refusal to furnish to the Directory the necessary funds to carry on the contest, is the best proof of that fact. The finances are ruined; agriculture in vain demands the arms which are required for cultivation. The war is become so universal as to threaten to overturn the Republic; all parties, worn out with anx

*In his Confidential Despatch to the Directory of 28th December 1796, Napoleon states the force with which he commenced the campaign at thirty-eight thousand five hundred men, the subsequent reinforcements at twelve thousand six hundred, and the Losses by death and incurable wounds at seven

thousand. There can be no doubt that he enormously diminished his losses and reinforcements; for the Directory maintained he had received reinforcements to the amount of fifty-seven thousand men.-Corres. Conf. ii. 312.

that the spirit which animated them was so fervent, and their intelligence so remarkable, that the humblest grenadiers anticipated all the designs of their commanders, and knew of themselves, in every situation of danger and difficulty, what should be done. When Napoleon spoke to them, in his proclamations of Brutus, Scipio, and Tarquin, he was addressing men whose hearts thrilled at the recollections which these names awaken; and when he led them into action after a night-march of ten leagues, he commanded those who felt as thoroughly as himself the inestimable importance of time in war. With truth might Napoleon say, that his soldiers had surpassed the far-famed celerity of Cæsar's legions.

157. But however much was owing to the troops who obeyed, still more commanded, in this memorable camwas to be ascribed to the general who paign. In this struggle is to be seen

158. But, to the success of such a system of operations, it is indispensable that the troops who undertake it should be superior in bodily activity and moral courage to their adversaries, and that the general-in-chief can securely leave a slender force to cope with the enemy in one quarter, while he is accumulating his masses to overwhelm them in another. Unless this is the case, the commander who throws himself at the head of an inconsiderable body into the midst of the enemy, will be certain of encountering instead of inflicting disaster. Without such a degree of courage and activity as enables him to calculate with certainty upon hours, and sometimes minutes, it is impossible to expect success from such a hazardous system. Of this a signal proof occurred in Bohemia in 1813, when the French, encouraged by their great triumph before Dresden, threw themselves inconsiderately into the midst of the Allies in the mountains of Töplitz; but, meeting there with the undaunted Russian and Prussian forces, they experienced the most dreadful reverses, and in a few days lost the fruit of a mighty victory.

the commencement of the new system | steeps of the Monte Baldo, who afterof tactics which Napoleon brought to wards surrounded Provera on the lake such perfection-that of accumulating of Mantua. A similar system was afterforces in a central situation, striking wards pursued with the greatest sucwith the whole mass the detached cess by Wellington, in combating the wings of the enemy, separating them superior armies of Soult and Marmont from each other, and compensating by upon the frontiers of Portugal, and by rapidity of movement for inferiority of Napoleon himself around the walls of numbers. Most of his triumphs were Dresden in 1813, and in the plains of achieved by the steady and skilful ap- Champagne, in the year following. plication of this principle; all, when he was inferior in numerical amount to his opponents. At Montenotte he broke into the centre of the AustroSardinian army, when it was executing a difficult movement through the mountains; separated the Piedmontese from the Imperialists; accumulated an overwhelming force against the latter at Dego, and routed the former when detached from their allies at Mondovi. When Wurmser approached Verona, with his army divided into parts separated from each other by a lake, Napoleon was on the brink of ruin; but he retrieved his affairs by abandoning the siege of Mantua, and falling with superior numbers, first on Quasdanovich at Lonato, and then on Wurmser at Medola. When the second irruption of the Germans took place, and Wurmser still continued the system of dividing his troops, it was by a skilful use of his central position that the French general defeated his efforts; first assailing with a superior force the subsidiary force at Roveredo, and then pursuing with the rapidity of lightning the main body of the invaders through the gorges of the Brenta. When Alvinzi assumed the command, and Vaubois was routed in the Tyrol, the affairs of the French were all but desperate; but the central position and rapid movements of Napoleon again restored the balance checking, in the first instance, the advance of Davidovich on the plateau of Rivoli, and next engaging in a mortal strife with Alvinzi in the marshes of Arcola. When Austria made her final effort, and Alvinzi surrounded Joubert at Rivoli, it was only by the most rapid movements, and almost incredible activity, that the double attack was defeated; the same troops crushing the main body of the Austrians on the

159. The disasters of the Austrians were mainly owing to the injudicious plan which they so obstinately adopted, of dividing their force into separate bodies, and commencing an attack at the same time at stations so far distant, that the attacking columns could render little assistance to each other. This system may succeed very well against ordinary troops or timorous generals, who, the moment they hear of their flank being turned, or their communications menaced, lay down their arms, or fall back; but against intrepid soldiers and a resolute commander, who turn fiercely on every

161. It is melancholy to reflect on the degraded state of the powers of Italy during this terrible struggle. An invasion which brought on all her people unheard-of calamities, which overspread her plains with bloodshed and exposed her cities to rapine, was unable to excite the spirit of her pacific inha

side, and bring a preponderating mass first against one assailant, and then another, it is almost sure of leading to disaster. The Aulic Council was not to blame for adopting this system, in the first instance, against the French armies, because it might have been expected to succeed against ordinary troops, and had done so in many pre-bitants; and neither of the contending vious instances; but they were inexcusable for continuing it so long, after the character of the opponents with whom they had to deal had so fully displayed itself. The system of concentric attacks rarely succeeds against an able and determined enemy, because the chances which the force in the centre has, of beating first one column and then another, are so considerable. When it does, it is only when the different masses of the attacking party, as at Leipsic and Dresden, are so immense, that each can stand a separate encounter for itself, or can fall back, in the event of being outnumbered, without seriously endangering, by such a retreat, the safety of the other assailing columns.

parties deemed it worth their while to bestow a serious thought on the dispositions or assistance of the twenty millions of men who were to be the reward of the strife. The country of Cæsar and Scipio, of Cato and Brutus, beheld in silent dismay the protracted contest of two provinces of its ancient empire, and prepared to bow the neck in abject submission to whichever of its former vassals might prove victorious in the strife. A division of the French army was sufficient to disperse the levies of the Roman people. Such is the consequence of political divisions and longcontinued prosperity, even in the richest and most favoured countries; of that fatal policy which withers the spirits of men by fettering their ambition; of that indulgence of the selfish passions which ends in annihilating the generous; and of that thirst for pleasure which subverts the national independence by destroying the warlike spirit by which alone it can be maintained.

160. The Italian campaign demonstrates, in the most signal manner, the vast importance of fortresses in war, and the vital consequence of such barriers to arrest the course of military conquest. The surrender of the strongholds of Coni, Alessandria, and Tortona, by giving the French a secure base 162. Finally, this campaign evinced, for their operations, speedily made in the most signal manner, the persethem masters of the whole of Lom-vering character and patriotic spirit bardy; while the single fortress of of the Austrian people, and the proMantua arrested their victorious arms digious efforts of which its monarchy for six months, and gave time to Aus- is capable, when roused by real dantria to collect no less than four power-ger to vigorous exertion. It is imful armies for its deliverance. No man understood this better than Napoleon; and, accordingly, without troubling himself with the projects so earnestly pressed upon him of revolutionising Piedmont, he grasped the fortresses, and thereby laid the foundation for all his subsequent conquests. Without the surrender of the Piedmontese citadels, he would not have been able to push his advantages in Italy beyond the Po; but for the bastions of Mantua, he might have carried them, as in the succeeding campaign, to the Danube.

possible to contemplate, without admiration, the vast armies which they successively sent into the field, and the unconquerable courage with which these returned to a contest where so many thousands of their countrymen had perished before them. Had they been guided by greater, or opposed by less ability, they unquestionably would have been successful; and even against the soldiers of the Army of Italy, and the genius of Napoleon, the scales of fortune repeatedly hung equal. A nation capable of such sacrifices can

hardly ever be permanently subdued; our; the dreams of republican equality were forgotten, but the Austrian government remained unchanged; the French eagles retired over the Alps; and Italy, the theatre of so much bloodshed, finally belonged to the successors of the Cæsars.

a government, actuated by such steady principles, must ultimately be triumphant. Such, accordingly, has been the case in the present instance. Aristocratic firmness in the end asserted its wonted superiority over democratic vig

CHAPTER XXI.

CAMPAIGN OF 1796 IN GERMANY.

2. But, on the other hand, the external relations of the Republic had eminently improved; and the vast exertions of 1794, even though succeeded by the lassitude and weakness of 1795, had produced a most important effect on the relative situation of the belligerent powers. Spain, defeated and humiliated, had sued for peace; and her accession to the treaty of Bâle, by lib

1. WHEN the Directory was called, by | disgrace behind the Rhine, and the the suppression of the insurrection of troops in the Maritime Alps, worn out the Sections, and the establishment of with privations, could not be relied on the new constitution, to the helm of the with certainty for offensive operations. state, they found the Republic in a very critical situation, and its affairs, externally and internally, involved in almost insurmountable difficulties. The finances were in a state of increasing and inextricable confusion; the assignats, which had for long constituted the sole resource of government, had fallen almost to nothing; ten thousand francs in paper were hardly worth twenty francs in specie, and the un-erating the armies of the Eastern and bounded depreciation of that species of circulation seemed to render the establishment of any other circulating medium of the same description impossible. The taxes for many years back had been so ill paid, that Ramel, the minister of finance, estimated the arrears in his department at fifteen hundred millions in specie, or above £60,000,000 sterling. The armies, destitute of pay, ill equipped, worse clothed, were discontented; and the recent disasters on the Rhine had completely broken the susceptible spirit of the French soldiers. The artillery and cavalry were with out horses; the infantry, depressed by suffering and dejected by defeat, were deserting in great numbers, and seeking a refuge in their homes from the toils and the miseries of war. The contest in La Vendée was still unextinguished; the Republican armies had been driven with

Western Pyrenees, had enabled the French government both to reinforce the armies of La Vendée, and to afford means to the young Conquerer of the Sections of carrying the Republican standards into the plains of Lombardy. Prussia had retired, without either honour or advantage, from the struggle; the Low Countries were not only subdued, but their resources were turned against the allied powers; and the whole weight of the contest on the Rhine, it was plain, must now fall on the Austrian monarchy. Britain, baffled and disgraced on the Continent, was not likely to take any effective part in military warfare; and there seemed little doubt that the power which had recently defeated all the coalesced armies of Europe would be able to subdue the brave but now unaided forces of the Imperialists.

3. Aware of the coming danger, Mr | it necessary was deemed a conspirator Pitt had, in the September preceding, against its liberty, and an abettor of concluded a triple alliance between arbitrary power. Great Britain, Austria, and Russia: but the forces of Russia were too far distant, and the danger to its possessions too remote, to permit any material aid to be early acquired from its immense resources. It was not till a later period, and till the fire had fastened on its own vitals, that the might of this gigantic power was effectually roused, and the legions of the north brought to reassert their wonted superiority over the forces of southern Europe.