These maxims contain the whole spirit of Napoleon’s instructions to his generals, after Badajos was succoured in 1811. At that time he ordered the army of Portugal to occupy the valley of the Tagus and the passes of the Gredos mountains, in which position it covered Madrid, and from thence it could readily march to aid either the army of the south, or the army of the north. Dorsenne, who commanded the latter, could bring twenty-six thousand men to Ciudad Rodrigo, and Soult could bring a like number to Badajos, but Wellington could not move against one or the other without having Marmont upon his flank; he could not move against Marmont, without having the others on both flanks, and he could not turn his opponent’s flanks save from the ocean. If notwithstanding this combination he took Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajos, it was by surprise, and because the French did not concentrate on the important points, which proved indeed his superiority to the executive general opposed to him but in no manner affected the principle of Napoleon’s plan. Again, when the preparations for the Russian war had weakened the army of the north, the emperor, giving Marmont two additional divisions, ordered him to occupy Castile, not as a defensive position, but as a central offensive one from whence he could keep the Gallicians in check, and by prompt menacing movements, prevent Wellington from commencing serious operations elsewhere. This plan also had reference to the maxim respecting flanks. For Marmont was forbidden to invade Portugal while Wellington was on the frontier of Beira, that is when he could not assail him in flank; and he was directed to guard the Asturias carefully as a protection to the great line of communication with France; in May also he was rebuked for having withdrawn Bonet from Oviedo, and for delaying to reoccupy the Asturias when the incursion against Beira terminated. But neither then nor afterwards did the duke of Ragusa comprehend the spirit of the Emperor’s views, and that extraordinary man, whose piercing sagacity seized every chance of war, was so disquieted by his lieutenant’s want of perception, that all the pomp, and all the vast political and military combinations of Dresden, could not put it from his thoughts. [Sidenote: Appendix No. 2.]