"Soldiers!" he cried, "you have done well. So have I. Hannibal crossed the Alps. We didn't; but we got here just the same. You have provided yourselves with food and clothes, and declared a dividend for the Treasury of France which will enable the Directory to buy itself a new hat through which to address the people. You have reason to be proud of yourselves. Pat yourselves on your backs with my compliments, but remember one thing. Our tickets are to Milan, and no stop-overs are allowed. Therefore, do not as yet relax your efforts. Milan is an imperial city. The guide-books tell us that its cathedral is a beauty, the place is full of pictures, and the opera-house finished in 1779 is the largest in the world. It can be done in two days, and the hotels are good. Can you, therefore, sleep here?"
"No, no!" cried the army.
"Then," cried Napoleon, tightening his reins and lifting his horse on to its hind-legs and holding his sword aloft, "A Milan!"
"How like a statue he looks," said Lannes, admiringly.
"Yes," replied Augereau, "you'd think he was solid brass."
The Austrian troops were now concentrated behind the Po, but Napoleon soon outgeneralled their leaders, drove them back to the Adda, and himself pushed on to the Bridge of Lodi, which connected the east and west branches of that river.
"When I set out for the P. O. P. E.," said Napoleon, "I'm not going to stop halfway and turn back at the P. O. We've got the Austrians over the Adda, and that's just where we want them. I had a dream once about the Bridge of Lodi, and it's coming true now or never. We'll take a few of our long divisions, cross the Adda, and subtract a few fractions of the remainder now left the Austrians. This will destroy their enthusiasm, and Milan will be ours."
The words were prophetic, for on the 10th of May the French did precisely what their commander had said they would do, and on the fourteenth day of May the victorious French entered Milan, the wealthy capital of Lombardy.
"Curious fact," said Napoleon. "In times of peace if a man needs a tonic you give him iron, and it builds him up; but in war if you give the troops iron it bowls 'em down. Look at those Austrians; they've got nervous prostration of the worst sort."
"They got too much iron," said Lannes.