approval. The Russian, Austrian, and Prussian armies were concentrated at a point near Frankfort on the Maine, on the most natural and most direct line to the centre of the force of the French monarchy. These armies were then separated, that one might penetrate into France from Mayence, the other from Switzerland. As the enemy’s force was so reduced that a defence of the frontier was out of the question, the whole advantage to be expected from this concentric advance, if it succeeded, was that while Lorraine and Alsace were conquered by one army, Franche-Comte would be taken by the other. Was this trifling advantage worth the trouble of marching into Switzerland? We know very well that there were other (but just as insufficient) grounds which caused this march; but we confine ourselves here to the point which we are considering.
On the other side, Buonaparte was a man who thoroughly understood the defensive to oppose to a concentric attack, as he had already shown in his masterly campaign of 1796; and although the Allies were very considerably superior in numbers, yet the preponderance due to his superiority as a general was on all occasions acknowledged. He joined his army too late near Chalons, and looked down rather too much, generally, on his opponents, still he was very near hitting the two armies separately; and what was the state he found them in at Brienne? Blücher had only 27,000 of his 65,000 men with him, and the great army, out of 200,000, had only 100,000 present. It was impossible to make a better game for the adversary. And from the moment that active work began, no greater want was felt than that of re-union.
After all these reflections, we think that although the concentric attack is in itself a means of obtaining greater results, still it should generally only proceed from a previous separation of the parts composing the whole force, and that there are few cases in which we should do right in giving up the shortest and most direct line of operation for the sake of adopting that form.