GENERAL BOURBAKI’S CAMPAIGN, - 185 
Germany, and marching northwards cut the German line of communi- 
cations. ‘There was not the slightest doubt entertained in the mind of 
any Frenchman, Freycinet, Gambetta, Bourbaki, that that plan must 
necessarily succeed.! 
Now, gentlemen, there is not the least doubt that the railway was a 
vital matter. Requisitioning is all very well as long as armies are 
marching and moving; but a system of requisition would not feed 
250,000 men or so stationary round Paris. The requisitioning pro- 
cess with regard to feeding them collapsed at an early period. ‘They 
had to be fed from Germany, Hamley says by 16 trains a day. It 
may be interesting to enter into the details of the feeding of the 
Germans. Personally I am an advocate for the best possible feeding, 
having regard to temperance, that a man can get, whether a soldier or 
any other man, and I believe it is all nonsense to preach the doctrine that 
a soldier would be all the better man if he spent a considerable portion 
of his life on the verge of starvation. At any rate the Germans did 
not try the starvation policy; they tried to get all they could; they 
ate, drank and smoked like heroes ; this is what they had per diem, and 
you can easily see that no amount of requisitioning could provide this 
bill of fare, and that it was an elaborate business altogether. ‘‘ Ger- 
many throughout the war was the main basis of supply for her armies, 
whose enormous requirements may be conceived when we remember that 
in the course of 24 hours each corps d’armée consumed 18,000 loaves 
of 3 lbs. each, 120 ewt. of rice or pearl barley, either 60 oxen or 120 
ewt. of bacon or a proportionate amount of prepared sausage, large 
quantities of salt, coffee, and other minor details.” If there is any gentle- 
man strongly addicted to teetotalism in the audience he will be shocked 
at the next item—‘ 35,000 quarterns of spirits and 3500 ounces of 
orange bitters.” But, gentlemen, I am appalled personally, as not being 
a smoker, at the next item of the entertainment—“To this gigantic re- 
past must be added 60 cwt. of tobacco, 1,100,000 ordinary cigars, and 
50,000 officers’ cigars for every ten days.”” There then follows the num- 
bers of letters that were delivered, the number of parcels from soldiers’ 
relatives, and the amount of money that had to be distributed ; and 
it is very obvious that the German soldiers of all ranks were very 
much interested in preventing this incursion of Bourbaki on their 
line of supply from home to Paris. 
It was not until the 3rd or 4th of January that Von Werder, 
being at Vesoul, was quite clear that Bourbaki was moving eastward of 
that place. It was evident from the number of reconnoitring parties 
and skirmishes to the south, east and west of Vesoul, that very consider- 
able bodies of Frenchmen were in that neighbourhood by the 5th, and 
by the 6th the German head-quarters had come to the conclusion, partly 
from information received from Switzerland, partly from their general 
intelligence staff, and partly from the reports of the outpost engage- 
ments as sent to them from Von Werder, that large bodies of 
Frenchmen were going eastward. Then they issued definite orders, 
which, by the way, did not reach Von Werder until four days after they 
were drawn up. Manifestly there must be some science in war, it is not 
1 See Appendix, 
