Buonaparte has been much criticised by strategists for the rashness of thus passing the Danube into Moravia, while the Archduke Ferdinand was organising the Bohemians on his left, the Archdukes Charles and John in Hungary, with still formidable and daily increasing forces on his right, the population of Vienna and the surrounding territories ready to rise, in case of any disaster, in his rear; and Prussia as decidedly hostile in heart as she was wavering in policy.  The French leader did not disguise from himself the risk of his adventure; but he considered it better to run all that risk, than to linger in Vienna until the armies in Hungary and Bohemia should have had time to reinforce the two emperors.

Napoleon’s preparations were as follows:—­his left, under Larmes, lay at Santon, a strongly fortified position:  Soult commanded the right wing:  the centre, under Bernadotte, had with them Murat and all the cavalry.  Behind the line lay the reserve, consisting of 20,000, 10,000 of whom were of the Imperial guard, under Oudinot:  and here Napoleon himself took his station.  But besides these open demonstrations, Davoust, with a division of horse and another of foot, lay behind the convent of Raygern, considerably in the rear of the French right—­being there placed by the Emperor, in consequence of a false movement, into which he, with a seer-like sagacity, foresaw the enemy might, in all likelihood, he tempted; and to which he lured them on accordingly by every engine of his craft.

Buonaparte, on learning that the Emperor Alexander was personally in the hostile camp, sent Savary to present his compliments to that sovereign; but really, as we may suppose, to observe as much as he could of the numbers and condition of the troops.  Savary, on his return, informed his master that the Russian prince was surrounded by a set of young coxcombs, whose every look and gesture expressed overweening confidence in themselves and contempt for their opponents.  All the reverses of the previous campaign were, as they took care to signify, the result of unpardonable cowardice among the Austrians, whose spirit had been quite broken by the wars in Italy:  but they were the countrymen of the same Suwarrow who had beaten the French out of all Buonaparte’s Lombard conquests, and the first general battle would show what sort of enemies the Russians were.  How much of this statement is true we know not:  it was openly made at the time in one of Buonaparte’s bulletins—­and, what is of more moment, he appears to have acted on the belief that Savary told the truth.  Having, ere he received it, advanced several leagues beyond the chosen field of battle, near Austerlitz, he forthwith retreated on that position, with a studied semblance of confusion.  The Czar sent a young aide-de-camp to return the compliment carried by Savary; and this messenger found the French soldiery actively engaged in fortifying their position—­the very position which their Emperor had all along determined to occupy.  The account of what the young Russian saw in the French lines gave, as Napoleon wished, a new stimulus to the presumption of his enemy; and, having made the preparations above described, he calmly expected the consequences of their rashness and inexperience.