As a matter of fact, however, Kray had his army so widely dispersed that he could not in any case have concentrated a sufficient force in time to oppose successfully the progress of Bonaparte. Even had he been able to assemble his entire army near Schaffhausen, it is doubtful whether, in the face of such odds, he could have prevented Bonaparte from crossing the river. Perhaps it will be well to substantiate this statement by an example. In the two passages of the Danube by Napoleon at Lobau near Vienna in 1809, the difficulties were greater and the odds less than in the hypothetical case now before us. Furthermore, in these operations Napoleon was opposed by that illustrious soldier, the Archduke Charles. Surely, these facts warrant the conclusion that an army of one hundred and seventy thousand soldiers, led by the greatest captain of modern times, could have successfully crossed the Rhine in spite of one hundred and twenty thousand Austrians, commanded by Marshal Kray. That Bonaparte could have executed this plan of campaign admits of little doubt. We have already shown why the plan was not adopted. But it is worthy of notice that afterwards, in the Ulm campaign, along almost identical lines, he carried out this great strategic conception with remarkable results. It is worthy of notice that, in 1805 at Ulm in the valley of the Danube, he captured an Austrian army, under General Mack, by manoeuvres similar to those by which in 1800 he purposed to overwhelm Marshal Kray in the Black Forest. It is worthy of notice that he then descended the Danube, and seized the Austrian capital, and that this march paralyzed to a certain extent the operations of the Archduke Charles in Italy. It is worthy of notice that this march was the principal cause which led the Archduke Charles to retreat before Masséna; and that the Archduke's army would have been captured or destroyed, had not Napoleon been compelled to march north from Vienna in order to meet the Austrian and Russian armies on the field of Austerlitz. Consider now the situation in northwestern Italy. Since the French were holding the Apennines and Maritime Alps on the south, the French Alps on the west, and Switzerland on the north, they were in possession of the three sides of a rectangle, which almost enclosed Melas in Italy. Should Bonaparte decide to take the offensive there, he could attack the Austrians from the south, from the west, or from the north. This situation gave him several advantages; for Melas could not know on which side to expect the French. Bonaparte might surprise his adversary; he might deceive him as to the real point of attack, and then mass his forces at some unexpected point where he would have the advantage of position.