Forms a corps by itself, but not a close corporation--Alternation between service on the general staff and service with the troops--No career merely on the staff except for scientific work, involving abandonment of prospect of command--Numbers and distribution of general staff--Alternative service on great general staff, and on general staff of a constituent part of the army--Influence on the work of the experience thus acquired--Members of the general staff dispersed throughout the army--The general staff recruited from the pick of the young combatant officers PART III _THE GREAT GENERAL STAFF_ CHAPTER I AN INTELLIGENCE DEPARTMENT Direct preparation for war consists in determining beforehand the distribution of the forces, their concentration and transport to the frontier--Information on which these arrangements are based collected by general staff--Its subdivision for the purpose--Thoroughness of the work--The _Registrande_--Merely a preliminary groundwork--Explains Prussian knowledge of enemy's resources in 1866 and 1870--Similar organization in other armies--Railway arrangements--Production of maps CHAPTER II A MILITARY UNIVERSITY Regeneration of Prussia assisted by education--War school founded by Scharnhorst in 1810--Scharnhorst's earlier educational work--History of the war academy since 1810--The present regulations--The order of service--Object of the war academy--Constitution and management--Entrance examination--Practical lessons compulsory--The order of teaching--Standard by which to judge it---Course of study at the academy--Method of instruction--Tactics--Military history--History--Staff duties and tour--Comparison with the university ideal CHAPTER III THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING Relation between teaching and research--Exemplified in practice of general staff--Military history--School of Clausewitz--The critical method--Historical works of the Prussian general staff--Campaign of 1859--The "applicatory method"--Campaigns of 1866 and of 1870-71--Historical monographs--Connection between military history and theory--Theory in Prussia the work of individuals--Moltke's paper on the influence of new firearms upon tactics--His views justified by the events of 1866--Contributions to military doctrine by individual members of the Prussian staff--Moral influence of the intellectual lead taken by the general staff CHAPTER IV THE CHIEF OF THE GENERAL STAFF Character needed for a strategist--Relation between a commander-in-chief and the chief of his staff--Element of permanent value in the Prussian system--Classification of duties--General summary SKETCH MAPS I. THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF KÖNIGGRÄTZ II. PRUSSIA IN 1866 III. THE OPENING MOVEMENTS OF THE CAMPAIGN OF 1866 PART I _THE GENERAL STAFF IN THE MANAGEMENT OF A CAMPAIGN_ THE BRAIN OF AN ARMY CHAPTER I THE EVE OF KÖNIGGRÄTZ