He knew by instinct all the intricacies of their being, which his genius controlled with the easy decisiveness of a master-key.

The rude shock of the Russian disaster served but to emphasize the thoroughness of his domination, and the dumb trustfulness of his forty-three millions of subjects.
And yet their patience might well have been exhausted.

His military needs had long ago drawn in levies the year before they were legally liable; but the mighty swirl of the Moscow campaign now sucked 150,000 lads of under twenty years of age into the devouring vortex.

In the Dutch and German provinces of his Empire the number of those who evaded the clutches of the conscription was very large.

In fact, the number of "refractory conscripts" in the whole realm amounted to 40,000.