In the campaign of 1796-97 in Italy, Bonaparte had shown himself a consummate master of tactics and of strategy. In the campaign of Marengo he exhibited, in addition to these qualities, great organizing power. When he returned from Egypt, civil war existed in certain parts of France, the finances were in a deplorable state, and the French armies had been everywhere defeated. In a few months, under his leadership, all was changed. He crushed out the civil war, placed the finances on a firm basis, sent re-enforcements to the Army of the Rhine, and organized the Army of Reserve. Referring to this period, Alison says:-- "The sudden resurrection of France, when Napoleon assumed the helm, is one of the most extraordinary passages of European history.... After the fall of the Committee of Public Safety, the triumph of France centered in Napoleon alone; wherever he did not command in person, the greatest reverses were experienced. In 1795 the Republicans were defeated by Clairfait on the Rhine; in 1796 by the Archduke Charles in Germany. In 1799 their reverses were unexampled both in Italy and Germany; from the 9th Thermidor to the 18th Brumaire, a period of about five years, the fortunes of the Republic were singly sustained by the sword of Napoleon and the lustre of his Italian campaigns. When he seized the helm in November, 1799, he found the armies defeated and ruined; the frontier invaded both on the sides of Italy and Germany; the arsenals empty; the soldiers in despair, deserting their colours; the Royalists revolting against their government; general anarchy in the interior; the treasury empty; the energies of the Republic apparently exhausted. Instantly, as if by enchantment, everything was changed; order reappeared out of chaos, talent emerged from obscurity, vigour arose out of the elements of weakness. The arsenals were filled, the veterans crowded to their eagles, the conscripts joyfully repaired to the frontier, La Vendée was pacified, the exchequer began to overflow. In little more than six months after Napoleon's accession, the Austrians were forced to seek refuge under the cannon of Ulm, Italy was regained, unanimity and enthusiasm prevailed among the people, and the revived energy of the nation was finally launched into a career of conquest." At the beginning of the campaign of Marengo, Kray's army, numbering one hundred and twenty thousand men, occupied western Germany. The army of Melas, one hundred and twenty thousand strong, occupied northwestern Italy; a British corps of twelve thousand was in Minorca, and a British fleet in the Gulf of Genoa.