His strongest card was that, owing to his unique reputation as a General, all the Allied Commanders were frightened of him. Bernadotte had been one of the ablest Marshals, yet he had no confidence at all in his own ability to defeat his old master, so kept his Swedes well to the rear of the battle zone. Schwarzenberg, who was technically Commander-in-Chief of all the Allied forces, was an able diplomat but a craven soldier, and became scared out of his wits every time he heard that Napoleon was approaching. Barclay de Tolly had, again and again, perhaps wisely, scurried off with his army rather than stand and fight during the French advance to Moscow in the previous year; and the other Russian Generals were equally cagey about taking on the redoubtable Corsican. Old Blucher and his Prussians alone showed a determination to lose no opportunity of attacking the enemy, but the veteran was too shrewd to take die offensive with his limited forces unless he could be assured of die support of the Russians and Austrians.
This fear of Napoleon by the majority of the Allied Generals did not prove altogether to his advantage, since although it enabled him to move the bulk of his army wherever he wished, every time he advanced against one of the enemy armies it withdrew. The result was that he was constantly exhausting his troops by long marches in most evil weather, without being able to bring any of his opponents to engage in a pitched battle. For the - remainder of September, during which there was hardly a day upon which it did not rain, he forced the pace in desperate efforts to catch up with and defeat one of the Allied forces, only to hear that another was again threatening Dresden, so was forced to break off the pursuit and change direction in order to protect his base.
By the end of the month Roger was able to get about on crutches, but for him to have ridden any distance would have been certain to re-open his wound, so he began to - contemplate the possibility of hiring a coach and leaving the city clandestinely one night. But once more his plans were frustrated. The Emperor's Chief-of-Staff, Marshal Berthier, Prince de Neufchatel, happened to hear that he was able to get about again, so sent for him.
As Roger was that comparatively rare product, a beau sabreur who also had brains, during periods when Napoleon had not been engaged in active operations he had of tent lent him for a while to Berthier; so he was well acquainted with the Chief-of-Staff, and the complicated work for which he was responsible.
The Prince, an ugly little man with an enormous head that held a card index brain; he was most unpopular and ill-tempered but, recognising Roger's capabilities, had always been polite to him, and he now explained that he was in the devil of a mess.
The constant changes of direction by the Emperor and the other widely scattered French forces, were making it near-impossible to carry out his task of re-routing supply columns and keeping a record of units available, together with their whereabouts; so Roger's help would prove invaluable. His request, as the senior Marshal in the Emperor's army, was tantamount to an order so, for the ten days that followed, Roger had to labour for hours on end, working out statistics from maps and schedules.
Meanwhile, Blucher, inspired by Gneisenau and encouraged by both his King and the Czar, had determined on a flank march which would enable him to join up with Schwarzenberg's Austrians, south of Leipzig. A few days later the Emperor, hearing that the Prussians had crossed the Elbe, charged Murat with the defence of Leipzig and St. Cyr once more with that of Dresden, then hurried north-west, hoping to crush his most inveterate enemy while on the march and encumbered by his baggage. Having sent Ney forward to fall on the rear of Blucher's army, Napoleon waited further news for four days in the dank, fogbound castie of Duben. When it came he learned that Blucher had turned westward, thus disclosing his intention of joining Schwarzenberg.
Promptly the Emperor devised a new plan to disconcert his enemies. The great fortresses on the Elbe were all still in his hands; he would march to the Elbe and cross it. But the whole of his Staff considered this so reckless that they confronted him in a body and begged him to abandon this idea. Reluctantly he agreed, but only to substitute the still more venturesome design of first crushing Bernadotte, then crossing the Elbe at Torgan and circling round to strike at Schwarzenberg near Leipzig.
Had his men been tireless machines, this might have been possible, but for two months they had been marching and counter-marching, for a good part of the time in pouring rain. Their uniforms were sodden, their boots worn out and, owing to insufficient supplies to feed them, they were suffering from semi-starvation.
The Emperor had gained a great victory at Dresden, but his Marshals had been defeated in five major battles: at Grossbeeren, Hagelsberg, Katzbach, Kulm and Dennewitz. At the beginning of the campaign he had commanded half a million men but, mainly through his own ill-conceived strategy, frittered away over half of them. The hospitals were crammed, tens of thousands were suffering from minor wounds. Utter weariness and a spirit of despair now permeated the whole army.
By October 10th he had been forced to the conclusion that he dared take no further risks and now, if he were to save Leipzig, even abandon the middle Elbe in order to concentrate all his forces in the neighbourhood of that city. On the 11th, Berthier received orders to move the Imperial Headquarters to Leipzig, and a frantic packing of documents began.
During each of the past few days Roger had spent from a quarter to half an hour on a quiet horse, but he had not yet dared trot, and it was obviously out of the question for him to make the eighty-mile journey on horseback. In consequence he arranged to travel in one of the Mess carts, a small, two-wheeled, covered wagon.
All through the night and the following day the long columns of silent, depressed troops made their way westward and, late in the evening of the 12th, Roger reached the city to find that Berthier had taken over a Saxon noble's palace as a headquarters. Knowing that his leg wound pained him when going upstairs, one of Roger's brother officers had kindly reserved for him a large clothes closet on the first floor, and had a bed put in it. Tired out after his long journey, he pulled off his clothes, tumbled into bed and was almost instantly asleep.
On the 14th the Emperor arrived, bringing with him the unfortunate King and Queen of Saxony, whom for so long he had dragged at his chariot wheels while almost totally destroying what had once been their fair realm. With him, too, he brought the worst of news, which he had received a few days earlier. His hitherto most loyal ally, the King of Bavaria, had defected and entered into a pact with Austria that, in exchange for his putting thirty-six thousand troops at her disposal, she would guarantee a continuance of his sovereignty.
Having left the Saxon sovereigns at their palace, Napoleon pressed on to Wachau, a village about three miles to the south-west of the city, at which Murat had his headquarters. It was the central point opposite the arc from east to south where the allies had massed their main forces. Murat was superior to them only in cavalry, and his gloomy report conveyed the fact that he had not used it with his old dash and ability. The fact was that he was utterly sick of the war, and thought only of how soon he could get back to his Kingdom of Naples.
A similar spirit was displayed that evening by the other Marshals when the Emperor summoned them to a conference at the village of Reudnitz. Among others he bitterly reproached Augereau for no longer being the intrepid leader he had been at the battle of Castiglione; to which the Marshal replied with equal bitterness, 'Give me back the old soldiers of our Italian campaign, and I'll show you that I am.'