A few examples of the rapidity of their movements may not be without interest.
In 1797 a part of Napoleon's army left Verona after having fought the battle of St.Michaels, on the 13th of January, then marched all night upon Rivoli, fought in the mountains on the 14th, returned to Mantua on the 15th, and defeated the army of Provera on the morning of the 16th,--thus, in less than four days, having marched near fifty leagues, fought three battles, and captured more than twenty thousand prisoners! Well might he write to the Directory that his soldiers had surpassed the much vaunted rapidity of Caesar's legions.
In the campaign of 1800, Macdonald, wishing to prevent the escape of Loudon, in a single day marched forty miles, crossing rivers, and climbing mountains and glaciers.
In 1805 the grand French army broke up their camp at Boulogne, in the early part of September, and in two weeks reached their allotted posts on the Rhine, averaging daily from twenty-five to thirty miles.
During the same campaign the French infantry, pursuing the Archduke Ferdinand in his retreat from Ulm, marched thirty miles a day in dreadful weather, and over roads almost impassable for artillery.
Again, in the campaign of 1806, the French infantry pursued the Prussians at the rate of from twenty-five to thirty miles per day.
In 1808 the advanced posts of Napoleon's army pursued Sir John Moore's army at the rate of twenty-five miles a day, in the midst of winter.
Napoleon transported an army of fifty thousand men from Madrid to Astorga with nearly the same rapidity, marching through deep snows, across high mountains, and rivers swollen by the winter rains.

The activity, perseverance, and endurance of his troops, during these ten days' march, are scarcely equalled in history.
In 1812, the activity of the French forces under Clausel was truly extraordinary.

After almost unheard-of efforts at the battle of Salamanca, he retreated forty miles in a little more than twelve hours! In 1814, Napoleon's army marched at the rate of ten leagues a day, besides fighting a battle every twenty-four hours.

Wishing to form a junction with other troops, for the succor of Paris, he marched his army the distance of seventy-five miles in thirty-six hours; the cavalry marching night and day, and the infantry travelling _en poste_.
On his return from Elba, in 1815, his guards marched fifty miles the first day after landing; reached Grenoble through a rough and mountainous country, a distance of two hundred miles, in six days, and reached-Paris, a distance of six hundred miles, in less than twenty days! The marches of the allied powers, during the wars of the French Revolution, were much less rapid than those of the armies of Napoleon.
Nevertheless, for a single day the English and Spaniards have made some of the most extraordinary marches on record.
In 1809, on the day of the battle of Talavera, General Crawford, fearing that Wellington was hard pressed, made a forced march with three thousand men the distance of sixty-two miles in twenty-six hours! The Spanish regiment of Romana, in their march from Jutland to Spain, marched the extraordinary distance of fifty miles in twenty-one hours.
Cavalry, for a single day, will march a greater distance than infantry; but for a campaign of several months the infantry will march over the most ground.

In the Russian campaign of Napoleon, his cavalry failed to keep pace with the infantry in his forced march on Moskwa.