ertembergers and Bavarians; many
Poles, Italians, Swiss, and Dutch were in others of the French corps;
and among the foreigners there were even Prussians from beyond the
Elbe. Some confusion was caused by this, and it was not diminished by
the fact that the French themselves had scarcely recovered from the
orgies in which they had been indulging for the last six weeks.
Moreover, the determination of the Emperor to "conquer the sea by
land" had emphasized in his mind the necessity of an overwhelming
superiority of numbers, and in November he demanded from the French
senate the eighty thousand conscripts who, according to law, could not
be drawn until September, 1807. This was the beginning of the fatal
practice destined in the end to enervate France and demoralize the
army. There was already little patriotism among the men, except what
served as a pretext for plunder; the homogeneity of purpose,
principle, nationality, and age was soon to disappear.

In the preliminary operations this deterioration was not apparent. The
troops marched doggedly through the mud, worked hard when called upon,
and although their rations, which were supplied by rascally
contractors, were very bad and altogether different from those to
which they had become accustomed in the years just preceding, the men
ate them without murmuring. But when, on December twenty-sixth, they
joined battle, the old push and nerve seemed lacking. The preparations
had been made on the plan of concentration, but at the last moment
Lannes was detached with his division to cut off the enemy's line of
retreat over the Narew. Napoleon, as at Jena, believed the main army
of his opponent to be where it was not, and he was incautious in thus
dividing and weakening his forces. Accordingly the battle had an
irregular and indecisive character. Lannes came unexpectedly upon the
mass of the Russian army, two columns forming the center and right,
and engaged them from ten in the morning until two in the afternoon.
At that hour a reserve arrived under Gudin, and attacked the Russian
right. But Bennigsen, the commander of that column, had ready a fresh
reserve, and with its aid the newcomers were repulsed. Lannes, who had
simultaneously made a final onset, was also beaten off by the superior
force of his enemy. On the same day, Murat, Davout, and Augereau
reached the neighboring village of Golymin, expecting to find the
Russian center there; on the left wing, at Neidenburg, Ney sto