the
French into the wastes of Muscovy. It is strange that Napoleon's
Syrian adage, "Never make war against a desert," did not now recur to
his mind. But he gradually steeled himself to the conviction that war
with Alexander was inevitable, and that the help of Austria and
Prussia would enable him to beat back the Muscovite hordes into their
eastern steppes. For a time he had unquestionably thought of
destroying Prussia before he attacked the Czar; but he finally decided
to postpone her fate until he had used her for the overthrow of
Russia.[257]

After the experiences of Austerlitz and Friedland, the advantages of a
defensive campaign could not escape the notice of the Czar. As early
as October, 1811, when Scharnhorst was at St. Petersburg, he discussed
these questions with him; and not all that officer's pleading for the
cause of Prussian independence induced Alexander to offer armed help
unless the French committed a wanton aggression on Koenigsberg. Seeing
that there was no hope of bringing the Russians far to the west,
Scharnhorst seems finally to have counselled a Fabian strategy for the
ensuing war; and, when at Vienna, he drew up a memoir in this sense
for the guidance of the Czar.[258]

Alexander was certainly much in need of sound guidance. Though
Scharnhorst had pointed out the way of salvation, a strategic tempter
was soon at hand in the person of General von Phull, an uncompromising
theorist who planned campaigns with an unquestioning devotion to
abstract principles. Untaught by the catastrophes of the past,
Alexander once more let his enthusiasm for theories and principles
lead him to the brink of the abyss. Phull captivated him by setting
forth the true plan of a defensive campaign which he had evolved from
patient study of the Seven Years' War. Everything depended on the
proper selection of defensive positions and the due disposition of the
defending armies. There must be two armies of defence, and at least
one great intrenched camp. One army must oppose the invader on a line
near, or leading up to, the camp; while the other army must manoeuvre
on his rear or flanks. And the camp must be so placed as to stretch
its protecting influence over one, or more, important roads. It need
not be on any one of them: in fact, it was better that it should be
some distance away; for it thus fulfilled better the all-important
function of a "flanking position."

Such a position Phull had discovered at Drissa in a cu