General Mack was impressed with the great strength of his troops and felt that he could easily overcome Napoleon with the superiority of his numbers. Schulmeister learned of this over-confidence and was all the more anxious to reach the big man. Captain Wend undertook to present the Alsatian to Mack. It proved to be easy. The Austrian commander was not anxious to move unless it was necessary, and when he learned that there was a man in the vicinity who had been in the camp of Napoleon he was eager to meet him. Schulmeister was bidden to come into his presence and told to describe all that he had seen in the camp of the “enemy.” He did so with a vividness of imagination that would have done credit to Baron Munchausen. For nearly an hour the medium-sized man with the ugly scars and the sky-blue eyes sat there and poured fiction into the ears of the great general—the man decorated with many medals and filled with a sense of his own importance. And Mack believed it all. At the conclusion the Austrian turned to one of his subordinates. “You see; it is as I suspected. We must not move from this place. We must watch and wait.” So, on the strength of the information—the false information—supplied by the Alsatian smuggler, the great army dawdled away its time in idleness. That is to say, it was really idle while making a pretense of activity. General Mack moved his troops about aimlessly in order to fool the enemy. That was his notion of military strategy. But alas! for his expectations, he was dealing with the master military strategist of his time—if not of all times. Having deluded the Austrian commander and obtained accurate data concerning his plans, Schulmeister now made it his business to convey the information to Napoleon. He was readily given leave to go to the French camp, with instructions to get all the facts possible as to its future movements. He was in an enviable position. He had the passwords of both armies and he made his way to the quarters of the Emperor without any difficulty. As before, he found the silent, mysterious figure in the long gray coat, in the midst of his brilliantly attired staff. Schulmeister almost ran into the presence of the “Little Corporal.” “Sire,” he said, “I have important news from the front.” Napoleon dismissed his officers, and sat down to listen to the report of the spy. His penetrating eyes seemed to pierce the soul of Schulmeister, but the Alsatian bore the scrutiny without flinching. The Emperor was satisfied. His determined look gave way to one of his charming smiles. “Proceed,” said he.