* * * * *

In default of exceptional generals who remold in some campaigns, with
a superb stroke, the damaged or untempered military metal, it is of
importance to supply it with the ideals of Ardant du Picq. Those who
are formed by his image, by his book, will never fall into error. His
book has not been written to please aesthetic preciseness, but with a
sincerity which knows no limit. It therefore contains irrefutable
facts and theories.

The solidity of these fragmentary pages defies time; the work
interrupted by the German shell is none the less erected for eternity.
The work has muscles, nerves and a soul. It has the transparent
concentration of reality. A thought may be expressed by a single word.
The terseness of the calcined phrase explains the interior fire of it
all, the magnificent conviction of the author. The distinctness of
outline, the most astounding brevity of touch, is such that the vision
of the future bursts forth from the resurrection of the past. The work
contains, indeed, substance and marrow of a prophetic experience.

Amidst the praise rendered to the scintillating beauties of this book,
there is perhaps, none more impressive than that of Barbey
d'Aurevilly, an illustrious literary man of a long and generous
patrician lineage. His comment, kindled with lyric enthusiasm, is
illuminating. It far surpasses the usual narrow conception of
technical subjects. Confessing his professional ignorance in matters
of war, his sincere eulogy of the eloquent amateur is therefore only
the more irresistible.

"Never," writes Barbey d'Aurevilly, "has a man of action--of brutal