NOTE.
In the campaign of 1697, Prince Eugene caused the courier to be intercepted, who was bringing him orders from the emperor forbidding him to hazard a battle, for which everything had been prepared, and which he foresaw would prove decisive. He considered, therefore, that he did his duty in evading the orders of his sovereign; and the victory of Zanta, in which the Turks lost about thirty thousand men, and four thousand prisoners, rewarded his audacity. In the meantime, notwithstanding the immense advantages which accrued from this victory to the imperial arms, Eugene was disgraced on his arrival at Vienna.
In 1793, General Hoche, having received orders to move upon Treves with an army harassed by constant marches in a mountainous and difficult country, refused to obey. He observed, with reason, that in order to obtain possession of an unimportant fortress, they were exposing his army to inevitable ruin. He caused, therefore, his troops to return into winter quarters, and preferred the preservation of his army, upon which the success of the future campaign depended, to his own safety. Recalled to Paris, he was thrown into a dungeon, which he only quitted on the downfall of Robespierre.
I dare not decide if such examples are to be imitated; but it seems to me highly desirable that a question so new and so important, should be discussed by men who are capable of determining its merits.
MAXIM LXXIII.
The first qualification in a general-in-chief is a cool head—that is, a head which receives just impressions, and estimates things and objects at their real value. He must not allow himself to be elated by good news, or depressed by bad.
The impressions he receives either successively or simultaneously in the course of the day, should be so classed as to take up only the exact place in his mind which they deserve to occupy; since it is upon a just comparison and consideration of the weight due to different impressions, that the power of reasoning and of right judgment depends.
Some men are so physically and morally constituted as to see everything through a highly-colored medium. They raise up a picture in the mind on every slight occasion, and give to every trivial occurrence a dramatic interest. But whatever knowledge, or talent, or courage, or other good qualities such men may possess, nature has not formed them for the command of armies, or the direction of great military operations.