World's Best Histories Part 9

de Fezensac, "crying, 'What a ma.s.sacre, and without result!'" The Russians had retired behind the Pregel to cover Konigsberg. Napoleon re-entered his cantonments. He established his headquarters at the little town of Osterode, directing from this advanced post the works of defence on the Vistula and Pa.s.sarge, at the same time as the preparations for the siege of Dantzig. On arriving there he wrote to King Joseph: "Staff-officers, colonels, officers, have not undressed for two months, and a few of them not for four; I have myself been fifteen days without taking off my boots.

We are in the midst of snow and mud, without wine, without brandy, without bread, eating potatoes and meat, making long marches and countermarches, without anything to sweeten existence, and fighting at bayonet-point and under showers of grape-shot, the wounded very often obliged to be removed on a sledge for fifty leagues in the open air. After having destroyed the Prussian monarchy, we are making war against the remnants of Prussia, against the Russians, the Calmucs, the Cossacks, and the peoples of the north who formerly invaded the Roman Empire; we are making war in all its energy and all its horror." Such vigorous language was not permitted to all. "The gloomy pictures that have been drawn of our situation," wrote Napoleon to Fouche on April 13th, "have for authors a few gossips of Paris, who are simply blockheads. Never has the position of France been grander or finer. As to Eylau, I have said and resaid that the bulletin exaggerated the loss; and, for a great battle, what are 2000 men slain?

There were none of the battles of Louis XIV. or Louis XV. which did not cost more. When I lead back my army to France and across the Rhine, it will be seen that there are not many wanting at the roll-call."

It was against Russia and against the vigor of its resistance that Napoleon now concentrated all his efforts. Tardy hostilities had at length commenced between the Porte and Russia. For a moment the Sultan had appeared to hesitate before the demands of the English, united to those of the Russians: Admiral Duckworth forced the Dardanelles at the head of a squadron, and destroyed the Turkish division anch.o.r.ed at Cape Nagara. In spite of the terror which reigned in Constantinople, the energetic influence of General Sebastiani carried the day. The overtures of the English Legation were repulsed; the capital was armed all of a sudden, under the direction of French officers. When Admiral Duckworth appeared before the place, he found it in good condition of defence; thus the English squadron could not leave the Straits of the Dardanelles without sustaining serious damage. For the British navy the evil was small; the moral effect could not but have some influence.

The Emperor Napoleon sought to profit by this circ.u.mstance to enter afresh into negotiations with Austria. On the day after the battle of Eylau he sent General Bertrand to the King of Prussia, offering to surrender him his States as far as the Elbe. The messenger was charged with the significant insinuation: "You will give just a hint that as to Poland, since the emperor has become acquainted with it, he attaches to it no value." The sacrifice of a fourth of the Prussian monarchy seemed too bitter for King Frederick William; he replied to the envoy with evasive answers. Napoleon became disdainful as regards the Prussians. It was with Austria that he determined henceforth to treat concerning the affairs of Prussia. "See now my plan, and what you must say to M. de Vincent," wrote he on March 9, 1807, to Talleyrand: "To restore to the King of Prussia his throne and his estates, and to maintain the integrity of the Porte. As to Poland, that will be found included in the first part of the sentence. If these bases of peace suit Austria, we shall be able to understand each other. As for the remark of M. de Vincent, that Prussia is too thoroughly humiliated to hope for recovery, that is reasonable. The end of all this will be an arrangement between France and Austria, or between France and Russia; for there will be no repose for the people, who need it so much, except by this union."

Austria responded to these propositions of alliance by offer of mediation; at the same time, and without ostentation, as a precautionary measure, she was getting ready for war, and was secretly preparing her armaments. The small places in the north of Prussia had fallen, one after another; Dantzig alone was still waiting for the army which was to besiege it. The Prussians had profited by this delay to put the place into a good state of defence. On all sides Napoleon collected fresh forces, as if resolved upon terrifying his secret enemies and crushing his declared ones. The conscription for 1808 was enforced in France by an antic.i.p.ation of nearly two years; the Italian regiments and the auxiliary German corps were concentrated on the Vistula; the emperor even went so far as to demand from Spain the contingent which the Prince de la Paix had offered him on the day after the battle of Jena. Formerly the Spanish minister had nursed other ideas, and had counted on serving the Prussians; he, however, hastened to despatch 10,000 men to the all-powerful conqueror. An army of reserve had just been created on the Elbe; by the middle of March the town of Dantzig was completely invested.

I do not care to recount the incidents of a siege which lasted more than two months, and which was conducted in a masterly manner by Cha.s.seloup and Lariboisiere. Marshal Lefebvre grew weary of the long and able preparations of his colleagues, and wished to begin the actual a.s.sault.

Authorization for this step was asked of the emperor. "You only know how to grumble, to abuse your allies, and change your opinion at the will of the first comer," wrote Napoleon to the old warrior. "You treat the allies without any consideration; they are not accustomed to be under fire, but that will come. Do you think that we were as brave in '92 as we are to- day, after fifteen years of warfare? The chests of your grenadiers that you wish to push everywhere will not overturn walls; you must let your engineers work, and whilst waiting learn to have patience. The loss of a few days, which I should not just now know how to employ, does not require you to get several thousand men killed whose lives it is possible to economize. You will have the glory of taking Dantzig; when that is accomplished, you will be satisfied with me."

Meanwhile, the Russians and Prussians had resolved upon an attempt to raise the siege of Dantzig: a considerable body came to attack the French camp before the fort of Weichelsmunde. They were repulsed, after a furious combat, by the aid of the reinforcements which had arrived to succor Marshal Lefebvre; and the attempts of the English corvettes to re-victual the town were equally unsuccessful. A previous attack of the Swedes upon Stralsund had brought about no definite result, and their general, Essen, had been constrained to conclude an armistice. Dantzig capitulated at last, on the 26th of May, without having undergone the a.s.sault which the French soldiers loudly demanded. As early as the 22nd, Napoleon had written to Marshal Lefebvre: "I authorize Marshal Kalbreuth to go out under the ordinary regulations, wishing to give this general an especial proof of esteem; however, the capitulation of Mayence cannot be taken as a basis, as the siege was less advanced than that of Dantzig now is. I allowed, at the time, an honorable capitulation for General Wurmser, shut up in Mantua; I wish to accord one more advantageous to General Kalbreuth, taking a middle position between that of Mayence and that of Mantua."

All the French _corps d'armee_ occupied entrenched camps, prudently defended against the attacks of enemies; they were suffering from the rigors of the winter, and the large stores of wine found in Dantzig were an important resource for the soldiers. The attempts at mediation by Austria had failed; the campaign of 1809 was being prepared; everywhere the gra.s.s was springing up in the fields, affording necessary sustenance for the horses; the wild swans were reappearing in flocks upon the sh.o.r.es of the Pa.s.sarge. The Emperor Napoleon had fixed upon the 10th of June for the resumption of hostilities.

The Russians forestalled it: Alexander had sent his guard to General Benningsen. "Brothers, uphold honor!" said the young emperor to his soldiers as they began the march. "We will do everything that is possible," cried the troops: "adieu, master!" Already Benningsen was advancing against the corps of Ney, who occupied the advanced posts, but the clever and prudent arrangements of Napoleon had prepared the retreat of his lieutenants; without disorder and without weakness, always victoriously fighting, Marshal Ney fell back upon Deppen; two other attacks upon the bridges of Lanutten and Spanden were likewise repulsed.

The concentration of the French _corps d'armee_ began to be effected near Saafeldt, when General Benningsen changed all of a sudden his plan of campaign: pa.s.sing from the offensive to the defensive, he decided to repa.s.s the Alle, in order to protect the entrenched camp of Heilsberg, and by the same movement the town of Konigsberg, the last refuge of the resources of Prussia. The retreat of the Russians commenced on the evening of the 7th of June.

Napoleon followed them with almost the whole of his army; the detachments of the vanguard and rearguard had more than once been engaged in partial combats when, on the evening of the 10th of June, the French army debouched before the entrenched camp of Heilsberg strongly supported by the banks of the Alle. Napoleon followed the left bank, seeking to forestall the enemy at the confluence of the Alle and the Pregel, in the hope of seizing Konigsberg before the place could be succored. Murat and Davout were already threatening the city.

It was the supreme feature in the genius of Napoleon, that an indomitable perseverance in wisely calculated projects did not exclude the thunderbolts of a marvellous prompt.i.tude in resolution and combinations.

Uncertainty and want of foresight reigned, on the contrary, in the military councils of the Russians. General Benningsen, formerly in the att.i.tude of attack, now compelled to engage in a defensive march, and projecting the defence of Konigsberg, thought it all of a sudden necessary to protect himself against an attack in flank. He crossed the Alle under the eyes of the French, and meeting them on the left bank of the river, he advanced towards the corps of Marshal Lannes, whom the emperor had sent against Domnau; a strong Russian detachment drove from Friedland the regiment of French hussars, who had established themselves there. The whole Russian army attacked Marshal Lannes, who had just collected a few reinforcements. It was to judge badly of the able prudence of the Emperor Napoleon, to hope to encounter a single corps of his grand army: Lannes held out till mid-day upon the field of battle with heroic skill; he sent meanwhile express after express to the emperor, who arrived at a gallop, his face radiant with the antic.i.p.ation of the joys of victory. "It is the 14th of June," said he, "the anniversary of Marengo; it is a lucky day for us."

Napoleon and his staff had preceded the march of the troops; Lannes and his soldiers recovered their forces in the presence of the invincible chief who had so many times led them to victory. "Give me only a reinforcement, sire," cried Oudinot, whose coat was pierced with bullets, "and although my grenadiers can do no more, we will cast all the Russians into the water."

This was the aim of the emperor as well as of his soldiers; and the positions which General Benningsen had taken, concentred in a bend of the river, rendered the enterprise practicable. The day was advanced, and a few of the generals had been wishing to put off the battle till the morrow. "No!" said Napoleon; "one does not surprise the enemy twice in such a blunder." Then sweeping with his telescope the ma.s.ses of the enemy grouped before him, he quickly seized the arm of Marshal Ney. "You see the Russians and Friedland," said he; "the bridges are there--there only.

March right on before you; enter into Friedland; take the bridges, whatever it may cost, and do not disquiet yourself about what shall take place on your right, or your left, or in your rear. That concerns us--the army and me."

When Marshal Ney had set out, marching to danger as to a festival, the emperor turned towards Marshal Mortier and said, "That man is a lion."

Upon the field of battle, where he had just arrived in face of the enemy, who appeared hesitating and troubled, Napoleon dictated his orders, which he caused to be delivered to all his lieutenants. The troops continued to arrive; all the corps formed again at the posts which had been a.s.signed to them. The emperor checked the impatience of his generals. "The action," he told them, "will commence when the battery posted in the village of Posthenen shall commence to fire." It was half-past five when the cannon at last sounded.

Ney advanced towards Friedland under a terrible fire from the Russians; extricated by the cavalry of Latour-Marbourg, and protected by the artillery of General Victor, suddenly thrown in advance, the French columns had reached a stream defended by the imperial Russian guard. The resistance of these picked troops for a moment threw disorder into our lines, who fell back; when General Dupont, arriving with his division, broke the Russian guard. The French in pursuit of their enemies penetrated into Friedland. The city was in flames; the fugitives fled towards the bridges; a very small number had succeeded in reaching them when this only means of safety was s.n.a.t.c.hed from them; the bridges were cut and set on fire when Marshal Ney took possession of the burning remains of Friedland.

At the same moment the corps of General Gortschakoff, pressed by Marshals Lannes and Mortier, fighting valiantly in a position without egress, sought in vain to reconquer the city, and afterwards redescended the length of the river in the hope of finding fordable pa.s.sages. Many soldiers were drowned, others succeeded in regaining the right sh.o.r.e.

Almost the entire column of General Lambert succeeded in escaping. Night at length followed the long twilight; it was ten o'clock in the evening when the combat ceased. The victory was complete; the remains of the Russian army retired upon the Pregel without Napoleon being able again to encounter them. They soon afterwards gained the Niemen. Meanwhile Marshal Soult had occupied Konigsberg, evacuated by Generals Lestocq and Kaminsky.

The King of Prussia possessed nothing more than the little town of Memel.

The Emperor Alexander had rejoined his troops, vanquished and decimated in spite of their courage; the King Frederick William placed himself close to his ally, at Tilsit. Peace had become necessary for the Russians; for the Prussians it had long been so. Napoleon resolved on negotiating for himself. In response to the request for an armistice, he proposed an interview, with the Emperor Alexander. It was in the middle of the Niemen, upon a raft constructed for this purpose, that the two emperors met.

Alexander was young, amiable, winning, drawn along at times by chivalrous or mystical sentiments and enthusiasms, at other times under the dominion of Oriental tastes and pa.s.sions. No one could be more capable of being influenced by the charm of a superior genius and an extraordinary destiny, and the personal ascendancy of a man who knew at once how to please and how to vex.

Napoleon wished to captivate his vanquished enemy, whom he desired to make his ally; he succeeded in doing so with ease. Master of the destinies of the world--in his own idea more so than he even was in reality--he had resolved upon offering to Alexander compensations which might satisfy him, whilst distracting his attention from the conquests and encroachments which Napoleon reserved for himself. On the eve of Austerlitz, Napoleon had said to Prince Dolgorouki: "Ah well! let Russia extend herself at the expense of her neighbors!" It was the same thought that he was about to present to the young monarch, humiliated and conquered, wishing to display it before his eyes in order to blind him more completely.

The Russians and Prussians were equally irritated against England. She had granted them money, but her military efforts had not corresponded with her promises; and it was to her obstinate hatred of France that the two monarchs attributed the origin of their defeats. "If you have a grudge against England," said Alexander, "we shall easily understand each other, for I have myself to complain of her as much as you have." It was in this first interview the sole effort of Napoleon to develop in the mind of Alexander the sentiments of anger and weariness by which he had been inspired by the selfishness which he imputed to Great Britain and the inability and weakness which he recognized in Prussia, and to engage the Russian emperor to become friendly with the only power which could offer him a glorious and profitable alliance. In the mind of the emperor, we have already said, the necessity for a continental alliance had long since made itself felt. "Austria or Russia," he had said to Talleyrand. Napoleon offered his hand to the Emperor Alexander.

The city of Tilsit was neutralized, and the two emperors established their quarters there. Before quitting the opposite sh.o.r.e of the Niemen, Alexander presented the King of Prussia to Napoleon in that floating pavilion on the river which flowed between the two nations. Honest, moderate, and dignified even in his profound abas.e.m.e.nt, Frederick William neither experienced nor exercised in any degree the seductiveness to which the Emperor Alexander succ.u.mbed, and which he was in his turn capable of displaying. He entreated his ally to make constant and persevering efforts in his behalf, which Alexander felt himself compelled to do not without a secret ill feeling. It was with an ostentatious display of graciousness and condescension that Napoleon ceaselessly reminded the young Czar that he accorded no favor to the King of Prussia except out of regard for his entreaties.

"In the midst of the war in which Russia and France have been engaged,"

wrote Napoleon, on the 4th of July, 1807, "both sovereigns, enlightened as to the situation and the true policy of their empires, have desired the re-establishment not only of peace, but of a common accord, and by the force of reason and truth have wished to form an alliance, and to pa.s.s in a single instant from open war to the most intimate relations. The boundless amity and confidence which the high qualities of the Emperor Alexander have inspired in the Emperor Napoleon have caused his heart to seal that which his reason had already approved and ratified. The protection of the emperor will result in the King of Prussia being allowed to re-enter into the possession of all the countries which border on the two Haffs, extending from the sources of the Oder to the sea. Solely with a desire of pleasing the Emperor Alexander, a large number of fortified towns will be restored to the King of Prussia. The policy of the Emperor Napoleon is that his immediate influence should be bounded by the Elbe; and he has adopted this policy because it is the only one which can be reconciled with the system of sincere and constant amity which he wishes to maintain with the great empire of the north."

Under the veil of this apparent moderation the pretensions or resolutions of the Emperor Napoleon were thus summed up: King Frederick William recovered Old Prussia, Pomerania, Brandenburg, Upper and Lower Silesia; he would abandon all the provinces to the left of the Elbe, which were to const.i.tute, with the Grand Duchy of Hesse, a kingdom of Westphalia, destined for Joseph Bonaparte. The Duchies of Posen and Warsaw, s.n.a.t.c.hed from Russian Poland, were to form a Polish State under the t.i.tle of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, of which the Elector of Saxony, recently elevated to the royal dignity, received the gift, on condition of maintaining a military road across Silesia. All the States founded by Napoleon were to be recognized. Russia was charged with the mediation between France and England; France became arbitrator between Russia and the Porte.

It was much, and indeed too much, for Prussia, torn asunder without being completely destroyed, reduced to the half of its territory, and deprived of its most important towns--for Dantzig became a free city, and Magdeburg formed part of the new kingdom of Westphalia. When these hard conditions were revealed to Frederick William by the Emperor Alexander, the unfortunate king protested against a ruin so complete. He conceived, for a moment, the vain hope of obtaining from Napoleon some concessions, by bringing to bear on him the influence of the genius and beauty of Queen Louisa. This princess quitted Memel to present herself at Tilsit. "She is charming," wrote Napoleon to the Empress Josephine; but this cold appreciation of the accomplishments of the woman exercised no influence upon the resolutions of the conqueror and the politician. The queen in vain brought into play all the resources of her intellect and her charming graces; in vain presenting to the conqueror a rose which she had just plucked, she ventured to ask for Magdeburg in exchange for her flower. "It is you who have offered it to me, madame," said Napoleon, roughly. Queen Louisa quitted Memel, humiliated and sorrowful down to the very depths of her soul. Her children and her people were never to pardon us for their wrongs.

Alexander had loyally defended his friend, and felt a.s.sured of having obtained for him all that it was possible to obtain; in his secret thoughts he consoled himself for the concessions he had been constrained to make for others as well as for himself, by the dazzling prospects which Napoleon knew so well how to open brightly to his view. To the north and south the young Czar believed himself master of new territories, long objects of ambition to the Russian Empire. The Sultan Selim had just fallen at Constantinople before a revolt of the Janissaries; he was a prisoner in his own palace, and the government which was about to succeed him would naturally be hostile to French influence. Napoleon then found himself free to abandon to Russia a large part of that Ottoman Empire always coveted by her. "Constantinople! never!" Napoleon had said, in exclamation to himself, heard by one of his secretaries; "the empire of the world is at Constantinople!" But the _debris_ of the Turkish power were of a character to satisfy all the claimants; and in case Turkey should not accept the peace, the secret treaty concluded between France and Russia a.s.sured to the Czar all the European provinces, with the exception of Constantinople and Roumelia. In case of the cabinet of London refusing the mediation of Russia, Alexander engaged himself to declare war against England. Should Portugal and Sweden, equally subject to European influence, partic.i.p.ate in the same refusal, it was agreed that the Emperor Napoleon should send an army into Portugal, and that the Emperor Alexander should enter Sweden. Finland lay very convenient for the Russian Empire.

"The King of Sweden is in truth your brother-in-law and your ally," said Napoleon; "let him follow the changes in your policy, or let him undergo the consequences of his ill-will. Sweden is the geographical enemy of Russia. St. Petersburg finds itself too near to Finland. The good Russians must no longer hear from their palaces at St. Petersburg the cannon of the Swedes."

The treaty of Tilsit was concluded on the 7th of July, 1807, and was signed on the 8th. The King and Queen of Prussia departed immediately, full of bitter sorrow and discouragement. The two emperors separated on the 9th, with a cordiality at that time sincere in its ostentatious display. More than once they had together pa.s.sed their troops in review; yet once again they showed themselves to the two armies. Napoleon decorated, with his own hand, a soldier of the Russian army, who had been pointed out to him by the Czar. At last he accompanied Alexander to the sh.o.r.es of the Niemen, waiting upon the bank until his friend and ally had reached the farther sh.o.r.e. Then entering his carriage, he took the road to Konigsberg, and immediately afterwards that to France, charging Berthier and Marshal Kalbreuth with the regulation of the details of the evacuation of Prussia, and the payment of the war contributions with which the conquered countries were to be crushed down. On the 27th of July, at six o'clock in the morning, the emperor re-entered Paris, which he had quitted the preceding year, and which, since then, he had so many times intoxicated with the report of his victories. The military glory was brilliant and even dazzling; the political work remained precarious, by its nature as well as by its immensity. Empires founded upon conquest are necessarily fragile, even when the war has been undertaken from serious and legitimate motives. When the war is carried on through the ambition of a man or a people, in scorn of right or justice--when it injures at once the interests, the pride, and the repose of all nations--no genius or brightness of glory can succeed in a.s.suring its duration, or legitimatizing its success. France perceived this in the midst of the enthusiasm of victory. England repeated it with malicious confidence, in the hope of confirming the courage of its people. Once more the latter power found itself alone, in face of the ever-increasing might of France and the incomparable genius of its sovereign.

It is the mournful effect of a weakening of the moral sense in the chief of a state, to enfeeble that moral sense at the same time, and by an inevitable contagion, amongst his rivals and adversaries. In presence of the continental blockade, and of the resolution which the Emperor Napoleon had announced of imposing it upon the whole of Europe, the English cabinet, henceforth directed by the inheritors of the policy of Pitt, by Canning and Lord Castlereagh, resolved upon using violence in its turn.

Fearful of seeing the maritime forces of Denmark pa.s.s into the power of Napoleon, England violated the neutrality of this little kingdom, and forestalled the secret conditions of the treaty of Tilsit. Lord Cathcart, at the head of a considerable squadron, was charged with the duty of summoning the Prince Regent to deliver to him the Danish fleet, as a pledge of the loyal intentions of his country; he offered at the same time to defend the Danish territory and all its colonies. The prince responded with bitter irony, "Your protection? Have we not seen your allies waiting for succor more than a year, without receiving it?" Copenhagen was bombarded; Sir Arthur Wellesley, whose name, for the first time, became known in Europe, effected his disembarkation with a corps of 10,000 men.

The prince saw himself compelled to capitulate, and deliver to the English his fleet, with all the materiel of his a.r.s.enals. Vehemently did Europe reprobate this act of violence. The English cabinet made public the article of the Treaty of Tilsit, which had furnished the motive for its aggression. But any effort at mediation was now ridiculous. The Emperor Alexander perceived it to be so. On the 11th of November, Lord Leveson Gower, then Amba.s.sador of England at St. Petersburg, received his pa.s.sports, and the Czar haughtily adhered to the French alliance. "I deem it prudent to close one's eyes against the orders which English mercantile vessels have received to quit Russian ports," said General Savary, whom Napoleon had accredited to the Emperor Alexander. The latter treated the French envoy with distinction, but the court and world of St. Petersburg had not forgotten the part that Savary had taken in the murder of the Duke d'Enghien; he remained isolated in his palace, and even in the saloons of the emperor. The Russian declaration of war was responded to by the manifesto of England. "Publish the treaty of Tilsit, with the secret articles," said Canning; "they have not been communicated to England, but we are acquainted with them, nevertheless; they will explain to Europe our conduct and our fears, as well as the change of att.i.tude on the part of Russia." The Emperor Napoleon was already regretting the magnificent prospect which he had opened before the Czar on the side of Turkey; the government of the Sublime Porte had adroitly accepted the mediation of France. Napoleon sought to excite the covetousness of the Russians towards the north; M, de Caulaincourt, who had replaced Savary at St. Petersburg, pushed forward with ardor the war against Sweden, and the conquest of Finland. As a consequence of the English aggression, Denmark had cast itself into the arms of France; it accordingly became easy to close against England the pa.s.sage of the Sound. The Czar and his favorite counsellor, M. de Romanzoff, returned ceaselessly to the hopes that Napoleon had led them to conceive. "The ancient Ottoman Empire is played out," said the Russian minister; "unless the Czar lays his hand on it, the Emperor Napoleon will be soon obliged to announce in the _Moniteur_ that the succession of the Sultans is open, and the natural heirs have only to present themselves."

In the meantime, and as a constant menace against an ally whom he was not completely satisfying, Napoleon was prolonging his occupation of the Prussian territory, under the pretext of the alleged slowness of payment of the war contributions; he was organizing provisionally the government of Hanover, which he had reserved as a future bait for the English government; and he was treating with Spain for the pa.s.sage of troops necessary for the invasion of Portugal. This power, constantly faithful to the English alliance, having refused to give in its adhesion to the continental blockade, the emperor had sent against it General Junot with 26,000 men. The negotiations with Madrid had not been completed, and the French soldiers had already entered Spanish territory. A second army was preparing to follow them. Austria remained disquieted, and ready to take offence; a convention favorable to her was signed at Fontainebleau, on October 10th. On the 27th the eventual and provisional part.i.tion of Portugal was accepted by the Spanish envoy, Yzquierdo. A kingdom of Southern Lusitania was a.s.signed to the Queen of Etruria, who renounced her Italian possessions; the independent princ.i.p.ality of Algarve was to be const.i.tuted for the Prince de la Paix; the emperor reserved for himself the centre of the country, conquered by antic.i.p.ation. A Spanish corps was to join the French troops for the invasion of Portugal. General Junot marched upon Lisbon. Vast projects, unjustifiable in their nature, were linked with this invasion of the Peninsula, necessarily entailing blunders and crimes as dangerous as lamentable. Napoleon had resolved upon driving the Bourbons from all the thrones of Europe, in order to replace them with Bonapartes. He set out for Italy with the view of completing one part of his work before laying his hand on Spain.

Quitting Paris on November 16th, the Emperor surprised Eugene Beauharnais (whom he was about solemnly to adopt) by a.s.suring to him the succession of the crown of Italy. He ran through the north of the Italian peninsula, reorganizing at Venice the public services, which had fallen into desuetude; decreeing the creation of a commune on Mont Cenis; and providing for the needs of travellers by the new route which he had opened. At Mantua he had an interview with his brother Lucien, whom he would have wished to place upon the throne of Portugal, but that the latter remained obstinately rebellious against the authority of his all- powerful brother, who required of him the rupture of an already old union with Madame Jouberthon. Having returned to Milan on the 13th of December, Napoleon published there, on the 17th, a decree destined to aggravate the rigors of the continental blockade. By reprisals as unjust as awkward, directed against decree of Berlin, the English Cabinet had promulgated, on the 11th of November, 1807, an Order in Council which compelled the ships of all neutral nations to touch at an English port to import or export merchandise, paying custom-house dues averaging 25 per cent. The ships which neglected this precaution were to be declared lawful prizes. In response, the Emperor Napoleon decreed that any vessel touching at an English port, or submitting to inspection from an English ship, should be by that very fact deneutralized, and become in its turn a lawful prize. In this insensate rivalry, which ruined at the same time the commerce of England and of the world, the Cabinet of London had taken no care to modify, in favor of the United States, the rigor of its ordinances. This was for England the occasion of grave difficulties, and of a war at one time dangerous. Arbitrary interference and violence were the rule on all the seas.

Through difficulties and sufferings which threatened to destroy the army placed under his orders, General Junot arrived at the gates of Lisbon. He had to struggle with no other enemy than the bad roads and the want of provisions. Terror had seized upon the royal house of Portugal. The _Moniteur_ of November 13th already contained an article upon the fall of the ill.u.s.trious house of Braganza. "The Prince Regent of Portugal loses his throne," said the official journal; "he loses it influenced by the intrigues of the English; he loses it for not having been willing to seize the English merchandise at Lisbon. What does England do.--this ally so powerful? She regards with indifference all that is pa.s.sing in Portugal.

What will she do when Portugal shall be taken? Will she go to seize Brazil? No; if the English make this attempt the Catholics will drive them out. The fall of the House of Braganza will remain another proof that the fall of whatever attaches itself to the English is inevitable."

The Prince Regent of Portugal had thought it possible to arrest the march of General Junot by sending to him emissaries charged to make all the submissions required by Napoleon. The envoys had not been able to meet the French army, scattered and decimated by the ills it had undergone; it advanced, however, and the news of its approach drove the Court of Portugal on board the ships which were still to be found at the mouth of the Tagus. On November 27th the mad queen, her son the prince regent, her daughters, and nearly all the families of distinction in Lisbon, accompanied by their servants, crowded on board the Portuguese fleet, resolved to take their flight to Brazil. From seven to eight thousand persons, with all their portable property, thus obstructed the mouth of the Tagus, protected by the English fleet; on the 28th a favorable wind permitted them to sail. When General Junot entered Lisbon, on the 30th of November, at eight o'clock in the morning, the treasures which he was charged to seize were beyond his reach. He established himself without resistance in the capital, soon overwhelmed with confiscations and war contributions. "Everything is more easy in the first moment than afterwards," wrote the Emperor to Junot on the 13th of December, 1807. "Do not seek for popularity at Lisbon, nor for the means of pleasing the nation; that would be failing in your aim, emboldening the people, and preparing misfortunes for yourself. The hope that you conceive of commerce and prosperity, is a chimera with which one is lulled asleep."

Jerome Bonaparte had been declared King of Westphalia on the 8th of December. On the 10th the act announced by the treaty of Fontainebleau was consummated. The Queen Regent of Etruria, Maria Louisa of Bourbon, declared to her subjects, in the name of her son, that she was called upon to reign over a new kingdom. Tuscany then fell directly into the hands of the Emperor Napoleon, who confided its government to his sister, Eliza Baciocchi, to whom he had already given the princ.i.p.ality of Lucca and Piombino.

Submission or flight! such was the only alternative that seemed to remain to continental sovereigns in presence of the exactions and the imperious will of Napoleon. The Pope alone, as already for two years past, was still resisting his demands, and was evincing an independence with regard to him which was every day irritating more and more the all-powerful master of Europe. Sadly disabused of the illusions and the hopes which had drawn him to Paris for the coronation of Napoleon, Pius VII. had preserved in his personal communications with the emperor a paternal and tender graciousness. He had much to obtain and much to fear on the part of the conqueror. Returning to Italy in the month of June, 1805, he said, in his allocution to the cardinals: "We have clasped in our arms at Fontainebleau this prince, so powerful and so full of love for us. Many things have already been done, and are only the earnest of that which is yet to be accomplished."

Meanwhile, the Code Napoleon had been applied to Italy, authorizing divorce, and taking the place of the Italian Concordat, which declared the Catholic religion to be the religion of the State. The Pope had complained of it, not without warmth, and had received on the part of the emperor a.s.surances which were as vain as they were futile. But already the conflict was becoming personal and more pressing; the refusal of the Holy Father to dissolve the marriage of Jerome Bonaparte with Miss Paterson (June, 1805), at once produced antagonism between the conscience of the Pope and the views of Napoleon as to the elevation of his family to the new or ancient thrones which he destined for them in Europe. Pius VII. had long studied canonical interdictions; he consulted neither his ministers nor his doctors; it was a personal reply he addressed to the emperor. "It is out of our power." said he, "to p.r.o.nounce the judgment of nullity; if we were to usurp such an authority that we have not, we should render ourselves culpable of an abominable abuse before the tribunal of G.o.d; and your Majesty yourself, in your justice, would blame us for p.r.o.nouncing a sentence contrary to the testimony of our conscience and to the invariable principles of our Church."

Napoleon's anger remained warm, but he had surmounted the difficulty by dissolving by an imperial decree the marriage of his brother, and by causing him soon after to marry a princess of Wurtemberg. The disagreement with the Court of Rome, which was soon to break forth, depended on his all-powerful will, and caused him no care. In the movement of the troops, necessitated in October, 1805, by his campaign against Austria, the emperor had charged General Gouvion St. Cyr to traverse the States of the Church in order to take up a position in Lombardy. Upon the route lay the town of Ancona. The French troops received an order to seize the place and establish a garrison there, an order which was immediately executed.

In spite of the difficulties which had recently arisen between the emperor and himself, the Pope thought that Napoleon and the French Revolution were much indebted to him personally. Europe took this view, and frequent reproaches had been addressed to the Court of Rome by the powers who were enemies or rivals of France. It was, then, with astonishment, mingled with indignation, that Pius VII. learnt the news of the occupation of Ancona; he wrote, on the 13th November, 1805, a personal and secret letter to the emperor:--"We avow frankly to your Majesty the keen chagrin that we experience in seeing ourselves treated in a way that we do not think we have in any degree merited. Our neutrality has been recognized by your Majesty, as by all other powers. The latter have fully respected it, and we had especial motives for thinking that the sentiments of amity which your Majesty professed with regard to us would have preserved us from such a cruel affront. We will tell you frankly, since our return from Paris we have experienced only bitterness and trouble, and we do not find in your Majesty a return of those sentiments which we think ourselves warranted in justly expecting from you. That which we owe to ourselves is to ask from your Majesty the evacuation of Ancona, and, if met with a refusal, we should not see how to reconcile therewith a continuation of a good understanding with the French minister."

It was from Munich, on the morrow of the battle of Austerlitz and of the peace of Presburg, that Napoleon at length responded, on the 7th of January, 1806, to the letter of the Pope, in the midst of the concert of adulations and transports which were lavished on him by the vanquished as well as by his courtiers. The protest of Pius VII. recalled to him the disagreeable remembrance of an independent authority, and one which he had not been always able to submit to his will; the anger of the despot broke forth with violence at once spontaneous and measured: "Your Holiness complains that since your return from Paris you have had nothing but causes of sorrow. The reason is, that since then all those who were fearing my power and testifying their friendship have changed their sentiments, thinking themselves authorized to do so by the power of the coalition; and that since the return of your Holiness to Rome I have experienced nothing but refusals to all my designs, even those that were of the utmost importance to religion; as, for example, when it was a question of hindering Protestantism from raising its head in France. I look upon myself as the protector of the Holy See, and by this t.i.tle I have occupied Ancona. I look upon myself, like my predecessors of the second and third dynasty, as the eldest son of the Church, as alone bearing the sword to protect it and to shelter it from being defiled by Greeks and Mussulmans. I should ever be the friend of your Holiness, if you would only consult your heart and the true friends of religion. If your Holiness wishes to send away my minister, you are free to do so. You are free to receive in preference the English and the Caliph of Constantinople. G.o.d is the judge who has done most for the religion of all the princes who reign."

Napoleon had excluded his brother Jerome from the succession to the Empire, but he affected to dread for France the possibility of a Protestant sovereign. It was with an increase of coa.r.s.e violence that he wrote on the same day to his uncle, Cardinal Fesch: "Since these imbeciles think there will be no inconvenience in a Protestant occupying the throne of France, I will send them a Protestant amba.s.sador. I am religious, but I am not a bigot. Constantine separated the civil from the military, and I also may appoint a senator to command in my name at Rome. Tell Consalvi-- tell even the Pope himself--that since he wishes to drive my minister from Rome, I should be well able to re-establish him there. For the Pope, I am Charlemagne, because, like Charlemagne, I unite the crown of France with that of the Lombards, and my empire borders on that of the East. I expect then that his conduct towards me shall be regulated from this point of view. Otherwise I shall reduce the Pope to the position of Bishop of Rome."

The French troops did not evacuate Ancona, and the French minister remained at Rome. But soon new subjects of disagreement arose between Napoleon and the Pope, always a scrupulous observer of the neutrality which he thought due from him to all the powers. The emperor had already required that all the ports of his allies should be closed against English commerce; in proportion as his enemies became more numerous and his arbitrary power more oppressive, he extended his pretensions even over the countries neutral by situation and by state obligations. Joseph Bonaparte had just been proclaimed King of Naples; the house of Bourbon occupied in Italy only the ridiculous throne of Etruria, already on the point of being taken from them. Napoleon wished to exact from the Pope an interdiction of his ports and his territory to the exiles or the refugees who had from time immemorial been accustomed to seek an asylum in Rome. "Your Holiness would be able to avoid all these embarra.s.sments by going forward in a straight road," wrote Napoleon to Pius VII., on February 22, 1806. "All Italy will be subject to my laws. I will not touch in any way the independence of the Holy See; I will even repay it for the injuries which the movements of my armies may occasion to it; but it must be on the condition that your Holiness will show the same regard for me in temporal affairs as I show for you in spiritual ones, and that you will cease your useless consideration for the heretical enemies of the Church, and for the powers who can do nothing for you. Your Holiness is sovereign of Rome, but I am its emperor. All my enemies ought to be yours. It is not proper then that any agent of the King of Sardinia, any Englishman, Russian, or Swede, should reside at Rome or in your states, neither that any ship belonging to these powers should enter your ports. Those who speak any other language to your Holiness deceive you, and will end by drawing down upon you misfortunes that will be disastrous." He added in his letter to Cardinal Fesch: "Say plainly that I have my eyes open, that I am not deceived any more than I choose to be; that I am Charlemagne, the sword of the Church, the emperor; and that they ought not to know that there is an empire of Russia. I make the Pope acquainted with my intentions in a few words. If he does not agree, I shall reduce him to the same position which he occupied before Charlemagne."

It was against Cardinal Consalvi, formerly the clever and firm negotiator of the Concordat, that the emperor, a.s.sisted by Cardinal Fesch, nursed his suspicions and his anger; he regarded him as systematically hostile to France; but the attachment of the Pope for his minister remained unshakable; it was from Consalvi alone that a voluntary submission might be hoped for. "If he loves his religion and his country, tell Consalvi, plainly," wrote the emperor to his uncle, "that there are only two courses to select from--either to do always what I wish, or to quit the ministry."

The moderation and prudent resolutions of the Roman ministry showed itself in the response of the Pope to the requirements of Napoleon. Already an obscure Englishman--Mr. Jackson, for a long time accredited to the King of Sardinia--had excited the mistrust of Napoleon, who insulted him in official doc.u.ments. "An English minister, the disgrace of his country, found in Rome an asylum. There he organized conspiracies, subsidized brigands, hatched perfidies, bribed a.s.sa.s.sins; and Rome protected the traitor and his agents--becoming a theatre of scandal, a manufactory of libels, and an asylum of brigandage." The only crime of Jackson had been to keep his court _au courant_ with the state of affairs in Rome. Quietly, and with all the respect his character merited, Cardinal Consalvi prevailed on Mr. Jackson to quit Rome. The cardinals were a.s.sembled in secret Consistory. Cardinal Fesch was not summoned; he was informed that they were aware of his opinions, and that his station as amba.s.sador disqualified him for the Council of the holy father.

The Consistory did not deceive itself for a single instant as to the consequences that the concessions demanded by Napoleon would forcibly draw in their train. "We all saw," says Cardinal Consalvi in his memoirs, "that far from admitting the neutrality of the Holy See, Bonaparte expected it in the capacity of feudatory and va.s.sal to take up the quarrels of France in no matter what war the latter might subsequently be engaged. The Holy See might then see itself, any morning or evening, attacked by Austria or Spain, or by all the Catholic or non-Catholic powers. What! the sole ambition or greed of France was to have the right of despoiling the holy father of his t.i.tle of the common father of the faithful, and of compelling the representative of a G.o.d of Peace and the head of the religious world, to sow everywhere desolation and ruin, by keeping in a perpetual state of war the nations owing fealty to the tiara."

So many reasons, human and divine, as evident to common sense as to conscience, decided the response of the Pope. He was moderate, tender, prudent; but he replied categorically to the requirements of the emperor.

Pius VII wished to remain neuter, and not to drive from his states the English or the Russians; he did not admit the claim of the emperor to exercise over Rome a supreme protectorate. "The Pope does not recognize, and never has recognized, any power superior to himself. Your Majesty is infinitely great; you have been elected, crowned, consecrated, recognized emperor of the French, but not emperor of Rome. There exists no emperor of Rome."

There was a good deal of boldness in repelling so haughtily the imperial pretensions; the Pope and Cardinal Consalvi were soon involved in a still more dangerous course. The accession of the new King of Naples had been announced to the court of Rome, by Cardinal Fesch, in arrogant terms: "The throne of Naples being vacant by a penalty incurred by the most scandalous perfidy of which the annals of nations have ever made mention, and his Majesty having found himself under the necessity of shielding this country, and the whole of Italy, from the madness of an insensate court, has judged it suitable to his dignity to confide the destinies of this country, which he loves, to a prince of his own house. The undersigned doubts not but that the Pontifical Government will see in this happy event a new guarantee of the system of order, justice, and consistency, which he has always had at heart to establish in all the places which have submitted to his influence."