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completed the establishment of a system which set all former rules and practice at defiance.' And to pass over hundreds of volumes which have appeared since Napoleon's death we may quote the following significant phrase from a long article on Strategy in the Encyclopædia Britannica of 1911: The revolution in warfare which Napoleon was destined to effect.'

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It would be beyond the scope of this article to include within it a detailed review of Napoleon's campaigns. But within the limit of a few paragraphs we hope to show, first, that such a 'revolution' in war did actually take place, and secondly, that, pace the opinion of the old 'Quarterly' reviewer of January 1820, this was brought abbut less by the daring and impulsive spirit of Buonaparte' than by the enormous advantages he enjoyed from changed conditions as compared with his predecessors and actual opponents in war. That war was revolutionised in the early years of the 19th century will be apparent from a comparison of war as waged by Napoleon with war as carried out in the days of his nearest great predecessors, Marlborough and Frederick. Although Marlborough broke away from the system, it is nevertheless true to say that war at the beginning of the 18th century was almost entirely an affair of sieges, and that after a summer spent in manoeuvres, sometimes of no very decided kind, both parties would by mutual consent retire into winter quarters. How entirely Napoleon's system differed from that state of things requires no detailed elucidation. And, to compare the war of Frederick with that of Napoleon, the main difference is this. War in Frederick's eyes was mainly a dynastic tournament. Princes, not nations, fought. Pursuit after victory-a recognised feature of strategy -although admitted to be theoretically advisable was not usually necessary, for 'a wounded prince was expected to cry touché and to give in honourably to the accompaniment of polite remarks on both sides.' In the time of Frederick there was but little of the spirit of nationality on the Continent. The relentless pursuits of Napoleon, on the other hand, introduced a new feature, a feature rendered possible by the national spirit which craved the complete destruction of the enemy.

It was not from imitation of Hannibal and Cæsar,

or even of Gustavus Adolphus and Turenne, but from the exploitation of advantages he possessed over his rivals that Napoleon was able to give scope to his genius. Chief among these advantages of course was conscription. When Napoleon boasted to Metternich in 1805, 'I can expend 30,000 men a month,' his words were merely a periphrasis for the statement, 'I have an advantage which neither my opponents enjoy nor my predecessors knew of. For be it remembered the advantage consisted not merely in the possession of a reservoir of men but that a constant and regular supply from that reservoir had been arranged. The principle of conscription was not new. That every able-bodied male was liable to be called upon for the defence of the State was a doctrine dating from the earliest times. But in practice it never became really effective until the passing of the little-known French law in 1798. To use the words of Dr Holland Rose: The French Revolution was the mother of conscription,' and to quote the late Colonel F. N. Maude: 'It was the power thus conferred upon the French Government which alone rendered the Napoleonic policy of conquest possible.'

Nor must we overlook the tremendous change which had come over war, at any rate so far as Napoleon was concerned, by the supply system brought in by the French Revolution. No matter what precise signification we assign to 'strategy,' it is clear that the great operations of war hinge upon the facilities for supplies. Napoleon himself was under no illusion in this matter as his saying: 'An army marches on its belly,' amply proves. Napoleon exploited to the full the system of 'living on the country,' and the consequent freedom from convoys and other impedimenta yielded him an enormous increase of mobility. It may be asked why the adoption of such a system had not been open to his opponents, at any rate in the earlier stages of his career. A reply would necessitate a complete inquiry into the conditions governing dynastic as compared with national wars, but it may be said that the former were no concern of the ordinary citizen. He took little interest in the progress of such a war, and on the whole favoured the army which paid highest for its accommodation when billeted in towns and villages. The result was that

commanders vied with each other to secure the goodwill of the inhabitants, and respect for private property and rights reached an absurd level. Thus, during the whole of the campaign of the Netherlands in 1793 the Austrians paid hire to the owners of the fields in which they camped. On one occasion when payment for lodgings hired for the wounded was in arrear the wretched men were flung out into the streets. At the capture of Mainz by the French in 1794 a strong party of Austrians endeavoured to escape across the Rhine to Kastel; but the ferryman refused to transport them until payment was made, and, rather than break the law and seize the boats, the Austrians laid down their arms and surrendered. The absurdity of the system extended to Prussia, and lasted till Jena in 1806. Just before that battle the Prussians, camped close to huge piles of felled wood, yet perished from cold. Even on the following day they had not the wherewithal to cook their food, and it was decided to seize the supplies only after the soldiers in desperation had begun to help themselves and were felling trees in the neighbourhood. In the same critical days the supply of oats for the cavalry ran out altogether, but though abundant quantities were known to be in Jena, the commander-in-chief felt it incumbent on him to write officially to the local authorities for permission to purchase what was necessary. Before the reply was received the oats were in French hands. After the battle large bodies of Prussian troops were two whole days without food. On the third day they staggered, famished, into a rich village. Moved by compassion Prince Augustus gave permission to his grenadiers, who were nearly dead from starvation, to requisition provisions. But the inhabitants raised an uproar, and an old staff officer galloped up, and in a paroxysm of indignation made the strongest representations to the Prince, alleging hotly that such a system was robbery and unknown to the Prussian army and repugnant to its spirit. The wonder is not that the Prussians were broken at Jena but that they were able to stand up to Napoleon at all.

A factor often overlooked is that of 'communications' in the sense of facilities for receiving and transmitting information rapidly. Here again Napoleon was favoured.

The French had the practically exclusive use of the telegraph. Chappé's invention synchronised with the outbreak of the Revolution. In a report of July 1793, the word télégramme appears for the first time. The first telegram in the world's history was sent from Lille to Paris just when Napoleon was beginning his active career as a soldier. It announced to the Government the capture of Quesnoy from the Austrians. The Lille line was extended to Dunkirk in 1798 and to Brussels in 1803. Other lines were built to Brest, Lyon, and Strasbourg. The last was extended to the vicinity of Basle, from which place a dispatch was sent from the commander-in-chief of the Army of the Rhine on May 8, 1800, giving details of the battle of Moskirch on the previous day. Dispatched at 10 a.m. the message was in the hands of the Government at Paris by 1 p.m. It is hardly necessary to lay stress on the advantage which Napoleon and other French generals thus enjoyed in being able to communicate rapidly with Paris, and the effect which such facilities exercised on reinforcements and supplies. We make so bold as to state that, imperfect though it was, the French telegraph system of Napoleon's days was worth more to him than all the lore of Alexander, Hannibal, and Cæsar.

These four factors, to which we have lightly referred, namely, the Spirit of Nationalism: Conscription: Living on the Country: and Rapidity of Communication, help to explain that 'revolution' of war to which several writers on the Napoleonic campaigns directly refer. With these advantages Napoleon quickly realised that the 'pieces' with which he played could be given a range, a mobility, and a striking power far superior to the attributes of the legions of his opponents. Earlier in this article we ventured to refer to the analogy between war and chess, but we did so somewhat apologetically, for we were unaware at the time of any Napoleonic process of thought which might have supported our arguments. But by one of those coincidences which do occur in real life we have discovered evidence which suggests that Napoleon may possibly have discovered on the chess-board the key to his military success. Hardly had the paragraphs above referred to been written when a habit of dilatory browsing took us by

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the merest chance to the pleasant meads of Madame de Rémusat. She tells us that when Napoleon played chess he liked to move the pieces occasionally in any way that suited his plans and without any particular regard for the established rules of the game. If it seemed advantageous at any moment to give his king the unlimited movements of the queen, he was in the habit of composedly adopting the new principle. Is it putting too great a strain on the reader's imagination to ask him to believe that this was no childish inconsequence on the part of Napoleon: that the advantage of playing with pieces with powers greater than those of his opponent opened up a startling military vista: and that the chess-board supplemented, if it did not eclipse, the reading and re-reading the campaigns of people who fought on old and restricted lines?

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Be this as it may, we trust that we have adduced sufficient evidence to show that war in Napoleon's day differed considerably from war before his time: that success was won by him in a way different from that of his predecessors: and that the statement made by many writers that war was thus revolutionised is justified. If Napoleon gave as his secret of success the famous phrase, Read and re-read the campaigns of Alexander, Hannibal, Cæsar,' etc., it must not be forgotten-though it often is overlooked-that another recipe he gave for victory was, 'Above all, it is necessary to use common sense.' The tendency to look backward prevailed, however, in his country long after his death, and with results that should do much to shake any lingering belief in the efficacy of the study of past campaigns as a guide for future war. After the staggering disasters of 1870-1 French military students and writers turned eagerly to the campaigns of Napoleon, hoping thereby to be able to discover a means of binding victory to the chariot wheels of France, but disregarding or minimising the fact that steam and electricity alone had so changed conditions since the era of Napoleon as once again to bring about a revolution in war. From the exhaustive study of Napoleon's correspondence and campaigns sprung what was known as the French School' of strategy in opposition to the rival or 'German' school. Students of war awaited with keen professional interest

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