In the army, thus constituted, there were, then, three Marshals. Of these, one, Soult, was serving in a new capacity for him, that of chief-of-staff; another, Ney, had not been given a fair chance to get a good hold on the troops assigned to him; the third, Grouchy, was not a man of superior capacity, had never commanded an army-corps in his life, and had only just been made a Marshal. Grouchy was at first assigned to the command of the reserve cavalry, consisting of the four cavalry corps of Pajol, Exelmans, Kellermann and Milhaud, numbering in all 13,784 men. But the campaign had scarcely opened when he was relieved from this duty, and placed in command of the right wing of the army, consisting of the 3d and 4th Corps, those of Generals Vandamme and Gérard, together with a considerable force of cavalry. Here again was a singular neglect on Napoleon’s part of the importance of allowing the new Marshal time to get used to his new duties; and, as we shall ultimately have occasion to see, this circumstance operated most unfavorably when Grouchy found himself in an independent command. It looks very much as if Napoleon only decided to send for Ney at the last minute, and as if the assignment of Grouchy to the command of the two corps of Vandamme and Gérard was not determined on until the campaign had opened. But not only was the organization of the army not as perfect as it might have been by reason of the course which Napoleon pursued in regard to Ney and Grouchy; there was an officer whom he ordered to stay behind when he might have had him with himself as well as not, a man of the highest reputation, the Duke of Auërstadt, the Prince of Eckmühl, Marshal Davout. The Emperor had made him Minister of War, but Davout begged to have a command in the field. He represented to the Emperor,—[29] “That the defence of Paris, notwithstanding its incontestable importance, was, like all questions of interior defence, only secondary, and essentially subordinate to the result of military operations; that when it was a question of playing a decisive part on the field of battle, it was not the time to make experiments with new men; that it was necessary, on the contrary, for the Emperor to surround himself with men who had given good account of themselves and who had had long experience in high command. The Marshal did not succeed in convincing the Emperor, who contented himself with replying: ‘I cannot entrust Paris to any one else.’ ‘But, sire,’ replied Davout, ‘if you are the victor, Paris will be yours; and if you are beaten, neither I nor any one else can do anything for you.’”