,--as
Napoleon called the campaign of 1806,--or with those of the three months
which elapsed from the departure of the army from Boulogne in 1805 till
its arrival in the plains of Moravia, the reader may easily decide as to
the relative merits of the two systems.

The system of Napoleon was _to march twenty-five miles a day, to fight,
and then to camp in quiet_. He told me that he knew no other method of
conducting a war than this.

It may be said that the adventurous character of this great man, his
personal situation, and the tone of the French mind, all concurred in
urging him to undertakings which no other person, whether born upon a
throne, or a general under the orders of his government, would ever dare
to adopt. This is probably true; but between the extremes of very
distant invasions, and wars of position, there is a proper mean, and,
without imitating his impetuous audacity, we may pursue the line he has
marked out. It is probable that the old system of wars of positions will
for a long time be proscribed, or that, if adopted, it will be much
modified and improved.

If the art of war is enlarged by the adoption of the system of marches,
humanity, on the contrary, loses by it; for these rapid incursions and
bivouacs of considerable masses, feeding upon the regions they overrun,
are not materially different from the devastations of the barbarian
hordes between the fourth and thirteenth centuries. Still, it is not
likely that the system will be speedily renounced; for a great truth has
been demonstrated by Napoleon's wars,--viz.: that remoteness is not a
certain safeguard against invasion,--that a state to be secure must have
a good system of fortresses and lines of defense, of reserves and
military institutions, and, finally, a good system of government. Then
the people may everywhere be organized as militia, and may serve as
reserves to the active armies, which will render the latter more
formidable; and the greater the strength of the armies the more
necessary is the system of rapid operations and prompt results.

If, in time, social order assumes a calmer state,--if nations, instead
of fighting for their existence, fight only for their interests, to
acquire a natural frontier or to maintain the political
equilibrium,--then a new right of nations may be agreed upon, and
perhaps it will be possible to have armies on a less extensive scale.
Then also we may see armies of from eighty to one hundred thousand me