the time he needed. On 8 April he ordered mobilization, but delayed
conscription for another three weeks. By his old measures of encouraging
veterans to return to the colours, incorporating National Guardsmen,
drafting sailors, policemen, customs officials, etc, he quickly raised
28o,ooo. But it would be autumn before the 15o,ooo draftees from the
class of 1815 would be ready, and meanwhile draft evasion continued at
the high levels of 1813-14. But the worst blow was a fresh outbreak of the
Vendee in mid-May, which required the diversion of significant bodies of
troops.
As for officers and generals, Napoleon might have been well advised to
follow his own advice on Elba, when he regretted using the marshals in
1813-14 and reflected that he should have promoted able generals with
their batons still to win. This was an especially cogent consideration,
since those marshals who remained loyal were not keen to fight again; it
was the career officers and the old sweats of the Grande Armee, attracted
by loot, promotion and meaningful employment, who were most eager for
the adventure of the Hundred Days. The Emperor's staunchest support
among the marshals came from Lefebvre and Davout, but Napoleon
wasted Davout's great military talents by appointing him Minister of
War. So many of his marshals were either dead (Lannes, Poniatowski,
Bessieres) or had defected to the enemy (Bernadotte, Victor, Oudinot,
MacDonald, Marmont, Massena) that, with a few notable exceptions, the
Emperor was left with the dross (Ney, Soult, Grouchy).
Nothing more clearly shows the foredoomed nature of the Hundred
Days than Napoleon's failure to use the few military talents available to
him; though loyal, Davout, Suchet and Mortier all played no part in the
events of June 1815. One who did, albeit indirectly, was the dreadful
Murat. As soon as he heard of the Emperor's entry into Lyons, Murat
feared that the colossus might soon be bestriding Italy once more. To
preempt this Murat decided to raise Italy against the Austrians himself,
under a banner of unification, but was swiftly defeated by the Austrian
army, which entered Naples on 12 May. According to Henry Houssaye,
Marmont was the villain of 1814 and Fouche of 1815, but Napoleon
himself thought that it was Murat who was his double nemesis in both
years; he had aggravated matters twice, by declaring against France in
1814 and Austria in 1815.
As his enemies began assembling their armies - Blucher at Liege with
117,000 Prussians, Wellington at Brussels with 11o,ooo Anglo-Dutch,
Schwarzenberg with 210,000 Austrians on the upper Rhine, Barclay de
Tolly with 15o,ooo Russians in the central Rhine area and Frimont with
(^75) ,000 Austrians on the Riviera - Napoleon had to decide his strategy.