Though he had studied deeply the lessons of 1870, Maunoury was not cast down by them, but rather stimulated to greater effort. Immediately after the war he wrote to his family a letter which shows his faith in his country’s renaissance. "The frightful catastrophe leaves France mutilated, but she is not stricken to death. All can be repaired if she really wishes it." That was the language of a soldier and optimist, but it interpreted exactly the spirit of his countrymen and, above all, the capacity of their eventual leaders. He was well placed to form such an opinion, for, as General of Division, he became Director of the War School, and upon its benches sat the future commanders of French armies. Napoleon in his time made use of the material to his hand, often untrained scientifically—the soldier of fortune, of practical experience—but he held always that the best officer came from the Schools. And this generalisation is true to-day, truer than ever, because of the new character of war. Maunoury set himself against mere specialisation, and, though he became an expert, as we have seen, he enlarged his scope by studying tactics and then applied them in the field, by commanding first the Fourteenth Army Corps at Marseilles, and secondly the famous Twentieth Corps at Nancy, which looked directly in the face of the foe. As colonel he had commanded artillery at Vincennes. He seemed to have written "finis" to the more active part of his career when he became Governor of Paris, but even in this post of pure routine in peace time, he invented methods of reform. He objected to the slackness that prevailed, and circularised against the slovenliness of soldiers’ dress in the streets, and even on the parade-ground. He tried to revive officers’ interest in the morning ride in the Bois. Paris was amused and at the same time satisfied with a circular issued during the winter of 1911-12, which expressed surprise that the Governor met so few officers on wet and cold mornings in the Bois. Between the lines you could read his contempt for softness. Even in his most strenuous student days he had always kept himself fit by constant physical exercise. At the Cavalry School at Saumur, he was noted for his good riding; in the Bois his elegant, upright figure was a reproach against the carelessness of some officers.