The best answer to this resolve was given in one of the Emperor Alexander’s proclamations—“He threatens to march on Moscow—let him do so. Even if he is victorious he will still share the fate of Charles XII.” Napoleon himself was far from feeling the confidence which he endeavoured to inspire into others. For instance, in writing to Marshal Victor from Smolensk he said—“It may be that I shall not find peace where I seek it; in that case I shall be able to retire under cover of your reserves steadily and without precipitation.” If one compare the words of Napoleon at the beginning of the campaign, when his intention was to remain at Vitebsk, or even at Smolensk, with what he said when his decision to march on Moscow was irrevocable, one is struck with wonderment at the total change of ideas, and at the irresistible impulse of which he was the victim. We have already mentioned the plan sketched out by Barclay-de-Tolly as to the best method of carrying on the war in Russia. Barclay was not the only person to recognize the weak spot in Napoleon’s genius. When the storm first began to gather, Tczernicheff, the military agent, pointed out with remarkable penetration both the French Emperor’s probable course of procedure and the best way of replying to his intended moves. “The preparations for the war are complete,” he wrote to the Minister of War at St. Petersburg in 1811. “The Emperor Napoleon’s animosity against us increases day by day, and if this autumn does not see us at war it will only be because the season is late, and Napoleon, taking a lesson from the Pultusk campaign, will perhaps be afraid of the marshes of Poland. They would of course hinder him in his plans, which are no doubt to end the campaign in one lightning stroke, as he has done in all preceding wars. “Accepting the conclusion that hostilities are unavoidable, we must make every preparation, not only for withstanding the first shock, but for prolonging the war as much as possible. Experience tells us that this is the only method by which we can hope for success against Napoleon; and it also tells us that he has always been embarrassed and led into mistakes of strategy when he has met with prolonged resistance. This is the course which our Government should adopt, in this difficult and critical situation. It is the only course that offers any hope of final triumph over the world’s oppressor. “The proper way to conduct this war, in my opinion, is to avoid a general engagement and to conform as far as possible to the guerilla tactics adopted against the French troops in Spain, so as to gradually demoralize them, and reduce by starvation the enormous forces they will bring against us.”