"Now, boys!" he said, "here we are, all together. I want you to
get it fixed in your heads that in fifteen days more you 're going to be
conquerors. You're going to have new clothes, good leggings, the best of
shoes, and a warm overcoat for every man; but in order to get these
things you'll have to march to Milan, where they are." So we marched. We
were only thirty thousand bare-footed tramps, and we were going against
eighty thousand crack German soldiers--fine, well equipped men; but
Napoleon, who was only Bonaparte then, breathed a spirit of--I don't
know what--into us, and on we marched, night and day. We hit the enemy
at Montenotte, thrashed 'em at Rivoli, Lodi, Arcola, and Millesimo, and
stuck to 'em wherever they went. A soldier soon gets to like being a
conqueror; and Napoleon wheeled around those German generals, and pelted
away at 'em, until they didn't know where to hide long enough to get a
little rest. With fifteen hundred Frenchmen, whom he made to appear a
great host (that's a way he had), he'd sometimes surround ten thousand
men and gather 'em all in at a single scoop.
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