o describe, as well
as how to win, battles, the master of style in his rare speeches, the
clever and sympathetic investigator of and writer on manifold ethnic
life, the scientific explorer of the regions on the rivers Tigris and
Euphrates." It is obvious, though, that this mastery of style, this
superb union of form and content, was not attained miraculously and
from the start. Still, his first production, published in 1827, a tale
(_Novelle_) in the style of Tieck and his followers, shows distinctive
talent, and a tendency toward brevity as well as adequacy of
expression, not to mention a sustained sense of harmony and
proportion. The young lieutenant also published, anonymously, some
poetry, and showed a clever hand in translating from foreign poets. It
is a pity that most of these attempts are buried in inaccessible
periodicals and have never been republished. But he left the field of
poetry and fiction, so far as we know, forever with his next work, the
first published under his name and in pamphlet form, a work which,
though of genuine political interest and love, was at the same time
intended to increase his income to the level of a living wage:
_Holland and Belgium in their mutual relations; from their separation
under Philip II., till their re-union under William I_. He read more
than five thousand pages of sources for the preparation of this small
pamphlet. It was published in 1831, and followed within a year by
another one: _An account of the internal state of affairs and of the
social condition of Poland_. Both writings, as in fact everything else
from his pen since about 1830, had a more or less direct bearing on
his military vocation; since war, according to Clausewitz, is nothing
but the continuation of politics by other than diplomatic means.

But the height of his literary mastery is reached in 1841 by the
publication of the _Letters on the condition and events in Turkey from
the years_ 1835 _till_ 1839, the matured fruit of those eventful and
adventurous but, at the same time, constructive years in the Orient.
They have been likened to Goethe's _Italian Journey_. The comparison
is justified by striking resemblances. Both works have resulted from
diaries and letters actually kept, Moltke's work, however, more
faithfully retaining and professing its formal nature. But the
resemblance is much closer, arising, in the so-called inner form, from
a similarity of attitude, the same wide extent of interests whic