Even when I beat great armies with little ones--listen to this, you young men who obey to-day, and will command to-morrow--it was always the larger number which defeated the lesser." "I don't understand," said Arnault and Lefebvre together.
But Moreau made a sign with his head to show that he understood.
Bonaparte continued: "Follow my theory, for it contains the whole art of war.

When with lesser forces I faced a large army, I gathered mine together, with great rapidity, fell like a thunderbolt on a wing of the great army, and overthrew it; then I profited by the disorder into which this manoeuvre never failed to throw the enemy to attack again, always with my whole army, on the other side.

I beat them, in this way, in detail; and the victory which resulted was always, as you see, the triumph of the many over the few." As the able general concluded his definition of his own genius, the door opened and the servant announced that dinner was served.
"General," said Bonaparte, leading Moreau to Josephine, "take in my wife.

Gentlemen, follow them." On this invitation all present moved from the salon to the dining-room.
After dinner, on pretence of showing him a magnificent sabre he had brought from Egypt, Bonaparte took Moreau into his study.

There the two rivals remained closeted more than an hour.