Tuesday coffee break: "the best statistical graphic ever drawn"

"Napoleon's March to Moscow, 1812: Beginning at the left on the Polish/Russian border, the thick band shows the size of the army (422,000 men) as it invaded Russia in June 1812. The width of the band indicates the size of the army at each place on the map. The path of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow is depicted by the darker, lower band, which is linked to a temperature scale and dates at the bottom of the chart. The crossing of the Berezina River was a disaster, and the army finally struggled back into Poland with only 10,000 men remaining. Charles Joseph Minard's graphic plots six variables: the size of the army, its location on a 2-D surface, direction of the army's movement, and temperature on various dates. The word 'Napoleon' does not appear. It well be the best statistical graphic ever drawn." --excerpted from Edward R. Tufte, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information