Provencal, the man of
Picardy and the man of Languedoc, there are greater temperamental
differences than one can find anywhere else on earth in an equal number
of square miles--except in some of our American cities.

To the commander of General Foch's type (and as we begin to study his
principles we shall, I believe, see that they apply to command in civil
no less than in military life) knowledge of different men's minds and
the way they work is absolutely fundamental to success.

And his preparation for this mastery was remarkably thorough.

At Saumur he learned not only to direct cavalry operations, but to know
the Angevin characteristics.

In each school he attended, beginning with Metz, he had close class
association with men from many provinces, men of many types. And this
was valuable to him in preparing him to command under-officers in whom
a rigorous uniformity of training could not obliterate bred-in-the-bone
differences.

Many another young officer bent on "getting on" in the army would have
felt that what he learned among his fellow officers of the provincial
characteristics was enough.

But not so Ferdinand Foch.

Almost his entire comprehension of war is based upon men and the way
they act under certain stress--not the way they might be expected to
act, but the way they actually do act, and the way they can be led to
act under certain stimulus _of soul_.

For Ferdinand Foch wins victories with men's souls--not just with their
flesh and blood, nor even with their brains.

And to command men's souls it is necessary to understand them.

VI

FIRST YEARS IN BRITTANY

Upon leaving the cavalry school at Saumur, in 1878, Ferdinand Foch went,
with the rank of captain of the Tenth Regiment of Artillery, to Rennes,
the ancient capital of Brittany and the headquarters of France's tenth
army corps.

He stayed at Rennes, as an artillery captain, for seven years.

It is not a particularly interesting city from some points of view, but
it is a very "livable" one, and for a student like Foch it had many
advantages. The library is one of the best in provincial France and has
many valuable manuscripts. There is also an archaeological museum of
antiquities found in that vicinity, many of them relating to prehistoric
warfare. Some good scientific collections are also treasured there.

What is now known as the University of Rennes was styled merely the
"college" in the days of Foch's residence there.