But the country in the second part of this campaign was not less favourable to Bonaparte's peculiar gifts than that in which he had won his first laurels as commander.
Amidst the Apennines, where only small bodies of men could be moved, a general inexperienced in the handling of cavalry and infantry could make his first essays in tactics with fair chances of success.

Speed, energy, and the prompt seizure of a commanding central position were the prime requisites; the handling of vast masses of men was impossible.

The plains of Lombardy facilitated larger movements; but even here the numerous broad swift streams fed by the Alpine snows, and the network of irrigating dykes, favoured the designs of a young and daring leader who saw how to use natural obstacles so as to baffle and ensnare his foes.

Bonaparte was now to show that he excelled his enemies, not only in quickness of eye and vigour of intellect, but also in the minutiae of tactics and in those larger strategic conceptions which decide the fate of nations.

In the first place, having the superiority of force, he was able to attack.