In placing Moreau at the head of the army of the Rhine, full 150,000 strong, and out of all comparison the best disciplined as well as largest force of the Republic, Buonaparte exhibited a noble superiority to all feelings of personal jealousy.  That general’s reputation approached the most nearly to his own, but his talents justified this reputation, and the Chief Consul thought of nothing but the best means of accomplishing the purposes of the joint campaign.  Moreau, in the sequel, was severely censured by his master for the manner in which he executed the charge entrusted to him.  His orders were to march at once upon Ulm, at the risk of placing the great Austrian army under Kray between him and France; but he was also commanded to detach 15,000 of his troops for the separate service of passing into Italy by the defiles of St. Gothard; and given to understand that it must be his business to prevent Kray, at all hazards, from opening a communication with Italy by way of the Tyrol.  Under such circumstances, it is not wonderful that a general, who had a master, should have proceeded more cautiously than suited the gigantic aspirations of the unfettered Napoleon.  Moreau, however, it must be admitted, had always the reputation of a prudent rather than a daring commander.  The details of his campaign against Kray must be sought elsewhere.  A variety of engagements took place with a variety of fortune.  Moreau, his enemies allow, commenced his operations by crossing the Rhine in the end of April; and, on the 15th of July, had his headquarters at Augsburg, and was in condition either to reinforce the French in Italy, or to march into the heart of the Austrian states, when the success of Buonaparte’s own expedition rendered either movement unnecessary.

The Chief Consul had resolved upon conducting, in person, one of the most adventurous enterprises recorded in the history of war.  The formation of the army of reserve at Dijon was a mere deceit.  A numerous staff, indeed, assembled in that town; and the preparation of the munitions of war proceeded there as elsewhere with the utmost energy:  but the troops collected at Dijon were few; and—­it being universally circulated and believed, that they were the force meant to re-establish the once glorious army of Italy, by marching to the headquarters of Massena at Genoa,—­the Austrians received the accounts of their numbers and appearance, not only with indifference but with derision.  Buonaparte, meanwhile, had spent three months in recruiting his armies throughout the interior of France; and the troops, by means of which it was his purpose to change the face of affairs beyond the Alps, were already marching by different routes, each detachment in total ignorance of the other’s destination, upon the territory of Switzerland.  To that quarter Buonaparte had already sent forward Berthier, the most confidential of his military friends, and other officers of the highest skill, with orders to reconnoitre the various passes in the great Alpine chain, and make every other preparation for the movement, of which they alone were, as yet, in the secret.