Genius so commanding had not been displayed even by Frederick or Marlborough.

And yet these brilliant results could not have been achieved by an army which rarely exceeded 45,000 men without the strenuous bravery and tactical skill of the best generals of division, Augereau, Massena, and Joubert, as well as of officers who had shown their worth in many a doubtful fight; Lannes, the hero of Lodi and Arcola; Marmont, noted for his daring advance of the guns at Castiglione; Victor, who justified his name by hard fighting at La Favorita; Murat, the _beau sabreur_, and Junot, both dashing cavalry generals; and many more whose daring earned them a soldier's death in order to gain glory for France and liberty for Italy.

Still less ought the soldiery to be forgotten; those troops, whose tattered uniforms bespoke their ceaseless toils, who grumbled at the frequent lack of bread, but, as Massena observed, never _before_ a battle, who even in retreat never doubted the genius of their chief, and fiercely rallied at the longed-for sign of fighting.

The source of this marvellous energy is not hard to discover.

Their bravery was fed by that wellspring of hope which had made of France a nation of free men determined to free the millions beyond their frontiers.