tion of the French army when the campaign commenced was as
follows:--The left wing, commanded by Macdonald, and amounting to 30,000
men, had orders to march through Courland, with the view of, if
possible, outflanking the Russian right, and gaining possession of the
sea coast, in the direction of Riga. The right wing, composed almost
wholly of the Austrians, 30,000 in number, and commanded by
Schwartzenberg, were stationed, as has been already mentioned, on the
Volhynian frontier. Between these moved the various corps forming the
grand central army, under the general superintendence of Napoleon
himself, viz. those of Davoust, Ney, the King of Westphalia, the Viceroy
of Italy, Poniatowski, Junot and Victor; and in numbers not falling
below 250,000. The communication of the centre and left was maintained
by the corps of Oudinot, and that of the centre and the extreme right by
the corps of Regnier, who had with him the Saxon auxiliaries and the
Polish legion of Dombrowski. The chief command of the whole cavalry of
the host was assigned to Murat, King of Naples; but he was in person at
the headquarters of the Emperor, having immediately under his order
three divisions of horse, those of Grouchy, Montbrun, and Nansouty.
Augereau with his division was to remain in the north of Germany, to
overawe Berlin and protect the communications with France.

A glance at the map will show that Napoleon's base of operations
extended over full one hundred leagues; and that the heads of his
various columns were so distributed, that the Russians could not guess
whether St. Petersburg or Moscow formed the main object of his march.

The Russian main army, under Barclay de Tolly himself, had its
headquarters at Wilna; and consisted, at the opening of the campaign, of
120,000. Considerably to the left lay "the second army," as it was
called, of 80,000, under Bagrathion; with whom were Platoff and 12,000
of his Cossacks; while, at the extreme of that wing, "the army of
Volhynia," 20,000 strong, commanded by Tormazoff, watched
Schwartzenberg. On the right of Barclay de Tolly was Witgenstein with
30,000, and between these again and the sea, the corps of Essen, not
more than 10,000 strong. Behind the whole line two armies of reserve
were rapidly forming at Novgorod and Smolensko; each, probably, of about
20,000 men. The Russians actually on the field at the opening of the
campaign were, then, as nearly as can be computed, in number 260,000;
while N