Here again we touch on the disputed question whether Metternich played a fair game against Napoleon, or whether he tempted him to play with loaded dice while his throne was at stake. The latter supposition for a long time held the field; but it is untenable. On several occasions the Austrian statesman warned Napoleon, or his trusty advisers, that the best course open to him was to sign peace at once. He did so at Dresden, and he did so now. On November 10th he sent Caulaincourt a letter, of which these are the most important sentences:
" ... M. de St. Aignan will speak to you of my conversations [with him]. I expect nothing from them, but I shall have done my duty.
France will never sign a more fortunate peace than that which the Powers will make to-day, and tomorrow if they have reverses. New successes may extend their views.... I do not doubt that the approach of the allied armies to the frontiers of France may facilitate the formation of great armaments by her Government. The questions will become problematical for the civilized world; but the Emperor Napoleon will not make peace. There is my profession of faith, and I shall never be happier than if I am wrong."
The letter rings true in every part. Metternich made no secret of sending it, but allowed Lord Aberdeen to see it.[393] And by good fortune it reached Caulaincourt about the time when he a.s.sumed the portfolio of Foreign Affairs. Its substance must therefore have been known to Napoleon; and the tone of the Frankfurt proposals ought to have convinced him of the need of speedily making peace while Austria held out the olive branch from across the Rhine. But Metternich"s gloomy forecast was only too true. During his sojourn at Paris he had tested the rigidity of that cast-iron will.
In fact, no one who knew the Emperor"s devotion to Italy could believe that he would give up Piedmont and Liguria. His own despatches show that he never contemplated such a surrender. On November 20th he gave orders for the enrolling of 46,000 Frenchmen _of mature age_--"not Italians or Belgians"--who were to reinforce Eugene and help him to defend Italy; that, too, at a time when the defence of Champagne and Languedoc was about to devolve on lads of eighteen.
He was equally determined not to give up Holland. On the possession of this maritime and industrious community he had always laid great stress. He once remarked to Roederer that the ruin of the French Bourbons was due to three events--the Battle of Rossbach, the affair of the diamond necklace, and the victory of Anglo-Prussian influence over that of France in Dutch affairs (1787). He even appealed to Nature to prove that that land must form part of the French Empire.
"Holland," said one of his Ministers in 1809, "is the alluvium of the Rhine, Meuse, and Scheldt--in other words, one of the great arteries of the Empire." Before the last battle at Leipzig he told Merveldt that he could not grant Holland its independence, for it would fall under the tutelage of England. And even while his Empire was crumbling away after that disaster, he wrote to his mother: "Holland is a French country, _and will remain so for ever_."[394]
Russia, Prussia, and Britain were equally determined that the Dutch should be independent; and if Metternich wavered on the subject of Dutch independence, his hesitation was at an end by the middle of December, for a memorandum of the Russian diplomatist, Pozzo di Borgo, states that Metternich then regarded the Rhine boundary as ending at Dusseldorf: "after that town the river takes the name of Waal."[395]
Such juggling with geography was surely superfluous; for by that time the Frankfurt terms had virtually lapsed, owing to Napoleon"s belated acceptance; and Metternich had joined the other allied Governments that now demanded a more thorough solution of the boundary question.
In fact, the allies were now able to make political capital out of their recent moderation.[396] On December 1st they issued an appeal to the French nation to the following effect: "We do not make war on France, but we are casting off the yoke which your Government imposed on our countries. We hoped to have found peace before touching your soil: we now go to find it there."
If the sovereigns hoped by means of this declaration to separate France from Napoleon, they erred. To cross the Rhine was to attack, not Napoleon, but the French Revolution. Belgium and the Rhine boundary had been won by Dumouriez, Jourdain, Pichegru, and Moreau, at a time when Bonaparte"s name was unknown outside Corsica and Provence.
France had looked on wearily at Napoleon"s wars in Germany, Spain, and Russia: they concerned him, not her. But when the "sacred soil" was threatened, citizens began to close their ranks: they ceased their declamations against the crushing taxes and youth-slaying conscription: they submitted to heavier taxes and levies of still younger lads. In fact, by doffing the mask of Charlemagne, the Emperor became once more the Bonaparte of the days of Marengo.
He counted on some such change in public opinion; and it enabled him to defy with impunity the beginnings of a Parliamentary opposition.
The Senate had been puffily obsequious, as usual; but the Corps Legislatif had mistaken its functions. Summoned to vote new taxes, it presumed to give advice. A commission of its members agreed to a report on the existing situation, drawn up by Laine, which gave the Emperor great offence. Its crime lay in its outspoken requests that peace should be concluded on the basis of the natural frontiers, that the rigours of the conscription should be abated, and that the laws which guaranteed the free exercise of political rights should be maintained intact. The Emperor was deeply incensed, and, despite the advice of his Ministers, determined to dissolve the Chamber forthwith (December 31st). Not content with this exercise of arbitrary power, he subjected its members to a barrack-like rebuke at the official reception on New Year"s Day.--He had convoked them to do good, and they had done evil. Two battles lost in Champagne would not have been so harmful as their last action. What was their mandate compared with his? France had twice chosen _him_ by some millions of votes: while _they_ were nominated only by a few hundreds apiece. They had flung mud at him: but he was a man who might be slain, never dishonoured. He would fight for the nation, hurl back the foe, and conclude an honourable peace. Then, for their shame, he would print and circulate their report.--Such was the gist of this diatribe, which he shot forth in strident tones and with flashing eyes. He had the copies of the report destroyed, and dismissed the deputies to their homes throughout France.
The country, in the main, took his side; and doubtless the national instinct was sound; for the allies had crossed the Rhine, and France once more was in danger. As in 1793, when the nation welcomed the triumph of the dare-devil Jacobins over the respectable parliamentary Girondins, as promising a vigorous rule and the expulsion of the monarchical invaders, so now the soldiers and peasants, if not the middle cla.s.ses, rejoiced at the discomfiture of the talkers by the one necessary man of action. The general feeling was pithily expressed by an old peasant: "It"s no longer a question of Bonaparte. Our soil is invaded: let us go and fight."
This was the feeling which the Emperor ruthlessly exploited. He decreed the enrolment of a great force of National Guards, exacted further levies for the regular army, and ordered a _levee en ma.s.se_ for the eastern Departments. The difficulties in his way were enormous. But he flung himself at the task with incomparable _verve_.
Soldiers were wanting: youths were dragged forth, even from the royalist districts of the extreme north and west and south. Money was wanting: it was extorted from all quarters, and Napoleon not only lavished 55,000,000 francs from his own private h.o.a.rd, but seized that of his parsimonious mother.[397] Cannon, muskets, uniforms were wanting: their manufacture was pushed on with feverish haste: Napoleon ordered his War Office to "procure all the cloth in France, good and bad," so as to have 200,000 uniforms ready by the end of February; and he counted on having half a million of effectives in the field at the close of spring.
Among these he reckoned--so, at least, he wrote to Melzi--"nearly 200,000" French soldiers from Arragon, Catalonia, and at Bayonne. Even if we allow for his desire to encourage his officials in Italy, the estimate is curious. Wellington at that time, it is true, had lessened his numbers by sending back across the Pyrenees all his Spanish troops, whose atrocities endangered that good understanding with the French peasantry which our great leader, for political motives, was determined to cultivate.[398] Yet, despite the shrinkage in numbers, he drove the French from the banks of the River Nive, and inflicted on them severe losses in desperate conflicts near Bayonne (December 9th-13th). In fact, the intrenched camp in front of that town was now the sole barrier to Wellington"s advance northwards, and it was with difficulty that Soult clung to this position. The peasantry, too, finding that they were far better treated by Wellington"s troops than by their own soldiers, began to favour the allied cause, with results that will shortly appear. Yet these disquieting symptoms did not daunt Napoleon; for he now based his hopes of resisting the British advance on a compact which he had concluded with Ferdinand VII., the rightful King of Spain.
As soon as he returned to St. Cloud after the Leipzig campaign he made secret overtures to that unhappy exile;[399] and by the Treaty of Valencay (December 11th, 1813) he agreed to recognize him as King of the whole of Spain, provided that British and French troops evacuated that land. His imagination ran riot in picturing the results of this treaty. Ferdinand was to enter Spain; Suchet, then playing a losing game in Catalonia, was quietly to withdraw his columns through the Pyrenees, while Wellington would have his base of operations cut from under him, and thenceforth be a negligeable quant.i.ty.[400] These pleasing fancies all rested on the acceptance of the new treaty by the Spanish Regency and Cortes. But, alas for Napoleon! they at once rejected it, declaring null and void all acts of Ferdinand while he was a prisoner, and forbidding all negotiations with France while French troops remained in the Peninsula (January 8th).
Equally disappointing were affairs in Italy. On the 11th of January, Murat made an alliance with Austria, and promised to aid her with a corps of 30,000 Neapolitans, while she guaranteed him his throne and a slice of the Roman territory. Napoleon directed Eugene, as soon as this bad news was confirmed, to prepare to fall back on the Alps. But, in order to clog Murat"s movements, the Emperor resolved to make use of the spiritual power, which for six years he had slighted. He gave orders that the aged Pope should be released from his detention at Fontainebleau, and hurried secretly to Rome. "Let him burst on that place like a clap of thunder," he wrote to Savary (January 21st). But this stagey device was not to succeed. Even now Napoleon insisted on conditions with which Pius VII. could not conscientiously comply, and he was still detained at Tarrascon when his captor was setting out for Elba.
Three days after Murat"s desertion, Denmark fell away from Napoleon.
Overborne by the forces of Bernadotte, the little kingdom made peace with England and Sweden, agreeing to yield up Norway to the latter Power in consideration of recovering an indemnity in Germany. To us the Danes ceded Heligoland. Thus, within three months of the disaster at Leipzig, all Napoleon"s allies forsook him, and all but the Danes were now about to fight against him--a striking proof of the artificiality of his domination.
By this time it was clear that even France would soon be stricken to the heart unless Napoleon speedily concentrated his forces. On the north and east the allies were advancing with a speed that nonplussed the Emperor. Accustomed to sluggish movements on their part, he had not expected an invasion in force before the spring, and here it was in the first days of January. Bulow and Graham had overrun Holland.
The allies, with the exception of the Czar, had no scruples about infringing the neutrality of Switzerland, as Napoleon had consistently done, and the const.i.tution, which he had imposed upon that land eleven years before, now straightway collapsed. Detaching a strong corps southwards to hold the Simplon and Great St. Bernard Pa.s.ses and threaten Lyons, Schwarzenberg led the allied Grand Army into France by way of Basel, Belfort, and Langres. The prompt seizure of the Plateau of Langres was an important success. The allies thereby turned the strong defensive lines of the Vosges Mountains, and of the Rivers Moselle and Meuse, so that Blucher, with his "Army of Silesia," was able rapidly to advance into Lorraine, and drive Victor from Nancy.
Toul speedily surrendered, and the st.u.r.dy veteran then turned to the south-west, in order to come into touch with Schwarzenberg"s columns.
Neither leader delayed before the eastern fortresses. The allies had learnt from Napoleon to invest or observe them and press on, a course which their vast superiority of force rendered free from danger.
Schwarzenberg, on the 25th, had 150,000 men between Langres, Chaumont, and Bar-sur-Aube; while Blucher, with about half those numbers, crossed the Marne at St. Dizier, and was drawing near to Brienne. In front of them were the weak and disheartened corps of Marmont, Ney, Victor, and Macdonald, mustering in all about 50,000 men. Desertions to the allies were frequent, and Blucher, wishing to show that the war was practically over, dismissed both deserters and prisoners to their homes.[401]
But the war was far from over: it had not yet begun. Hitherto Napoleon had hurried on the preparations from Paris, but the urgency of the danger now beckoned him eastwards. As before, he left the Empress as Regent of France, but appointed King Joseph as Lieutenant-General of France. On Sunday, January 23rd, he held the last reception. It was in the large hall of the Tuileries, where the Parisian rabble had forced Louis XVI. to don the _bonnet rouge_. Another dynasty was now tottering to its fall; but none could have read its doom in the faces of the obsequious courtiers, or of the officers of the Parisian National Guards, who offered their homage to the heir of the Revolution.
He came forward with the Empress and the King of Rome, a flaxen-haired child of three winters, clad in the uniform of the National Guard.
Taking the boy by the hand into the midst of the circle, he spoke these touching words: "Gentlemen,--I am about to set out for the army.
I intrust to you what I hold dearest in the world--my wife and my son.
Let there be no political divisions." He then carried him amidst his dignitaries and officers, while sobs and shouts bespoke the warmth of the feelings kindled by this scene. And never, surely, since the young Maria Theresa appealed in person to the Hungarian magnates to defend her against rapacious neighbours, had any monarch spoken so straight to the hearts of his lieges. The secret of his success is not far to seek. He had not commanded as Emperor: he had appealed as a father to fathers and mothers.
It is painful to have to add that many who there swore to defend him were even then beginning to plot his overthrow. Most painful of all is it to remember that when, before dawn of the 25th, Marie Louise bade him farewell, it was her last farewell: for she, too, deserted him in his misfortunes, refused to share his exile, and ultimately degraded herself by her connection with Count Neipperg.
Heedless of all that the future might bring, and concentrating his thoughts on the problems of the present, the great warrior journeyed rapidly eastwards to Chalons-sur-Marne, and opened the most glorious of his campaigns. And yet it began with disaster. At Brienne, among the scenes of his school-days, he a.s.sailed Blucher in the hope of preventing the junction of the Army of Silesia with that of Schwarzenberg further south (January 29th). After sharp fighting, the Prussians were driven from the castle and town. But the success was illusory. Blucher withdrew towards Bar-sur-Aube, in order to gain support from Schwarzenberg, and, three days later, turned the tables on Napoleon while the latter was indulging in hopes that the allies were about to treat seriously for peace.[402] Nevertheless, though surprised by greatly superior numbers, the 40,000 French clung obstinately to the village of La Rothiere until their thin lines were everywhere driven in or outflanked, with the loss of 73 cannon and more than 3,000 prisoners. Each side lost about 5,000 killed and wounded--a mere trifle to the allies, but a grave disaster to the defenders.
The Emperor was much discouraged. He had put forth his full strength, exposed his own person to the hottest fire, so as to encourage his men, and yet failed to prevent the union of the allied armies, or to hold the line of the River Aube. Early on the morrow he left the castle of Brienne, and took the road for Troyes; while Marmont, with a corps now reduced to less than 3,000 men, bravely defended the pa.s.sage of the Voire at Rosnay, and, after delaying the pursuit, took post at Arcis-sur-Aube. The means of defence, both moral and material, seemed wellnigh exhausted. When, on February 3rd, Napoleon entered Troyes, scarcely a single _vivat_ was heard. Even the old troops were cast down by defeat and hunger, while as many as 6,000 conscripts are said to have deserted. The inhabitants refused to supply the necessaries of life except upon requisition. "The army is perishing of famine,"
writes the Emperor at Troyes. Again at Nogent: "Twelve men have died of hunger, though we have used fire and sword to get food on our way here." And, now, into the s.p.a.ce left undefended between the Marne and the Aube, Blucher began to thrust his triumphant columns, with no barrier to check him until he neared the environs of Paris. Once more the Prussian and Russian officers looked on the war as over, and invited one another to dinner at the Palais-Royal in a week"s time.[403]
But it was on this confidence of the old hussar-general that Napoleon counted. He knew his p.r.o.neness to daring movements, and the strong bias of Schwarzenberg towards delay: he also divined that they would now separate their forces, Blucher making straight for Paris, while other columns would threaten the capital by way of Troyes and Sens.
That was why he fell back on Troyes, so as directly to oppose the latter movement, "or so as to return and manoeuvre against Blucher and stay his march."[404] Another motive was his expectation of finding at Nogent the 15,000 veterans whom he had ordered Soult to send northwards. And doubtless the final reason was his determination to use the sheltering curve of the Seine, which between Troyes and Nogent flows within twenty miles of the high-road that Blucher must use if he struck at Paris. At many a crisis Napoleon had proved the efficacy of a great river line. From Rivoli to Friedland his career abounds in examples of riverine tactics. The war of 1813 was one prolonged struggle for the line of the Elbe. He still continued the war because he could not yet bring himself to sign away the Rhenish fortresses: and he now hoped to regain that "natural boundary" by blows showered on divided enemies from behind the arc of the Seine.
With wonderful prescience he had guessed at the general plan of the allies. But he could scarcely have dared to hope that on that very day (February 2nd) they were holding a council of war at Brienne, and formally resolved that Blucher should march north-west on Paris with about 50,000 men, while the allied Grand Army of nearly three times those numbers was to diverge south-west towards Bar-sur-Seine and Sens.
So unequal a part.i.tion of forces seemed to court disaster. It is true that the allies had no magazines of supplies: they could not march in an undivided host through a hostile land where the scanty defenders themselves were nearly starving. If, however, they decided to move at all, it was needful to allot the more dangerous task to a powerful force. Above all, it was necessary to keep their main armies well in touch with one another and with the foe. Yet these obvious precautions were not taken. In truth, the separation of the allies was dictated more by political jealousy than by military motives. To these political affairs we must now allude; for they had no small effect in leading Napoleon on to an illusory triumph and an irretrievable overthrow. We will show their influence, first on the conduct of the allies, and then on the actions of Napoleon.
The alarm of Austria at the growing power of Russia and Prussia was becoming acute. She had drawn the sword only because Napoleon"s resentment was more to be feared than Alexander"s ambition. But all had changed since then. The warrior who, five months ago, still had his sword at the throat of Germany, was now being pursued across the dreary flats of Champagne. And his eastern rival, who then plaintively sued for Austria"s aid, now showed a desire to establish Russian control over all the Polish lands, indemnifying Prussia for losses in that quarter by the acquisition of Saxony. Both of these changes would press heavily on Austria from the north; and she was determined to prevent them as far as possible. Then there was the vexed question of the reconstruction of Germany to which we shall recur later on.
Smaller matters, involving the relations of the allies to Bernadotte, Denmark, and Switzerland further complicated the situation: but, above all, there was the problem of the future limits and form of government of France.
On that topic there were two chief parties: those who desired merely to clip Napoleon"s wings, and those who sought to bring back France to her old boundaries. The Emperor Francis was still disposed to leave him the "natural frontiers," provided he gave up all control of Germany, Holland, and Italy. On the other side were the Czar and the forward wing of the Prussian patriots. Frederick William was more cautious, but in the main he deferred to the Czar"s views on the boundary question. Still, so powerful was the influence of the Emperor Francis, Metternich, and Schwarzenberg, that the two parties were evenly balanced and beset by many suspicions and fears, until the arrival of the British Foreign Minister, Castlereagh, began to restore something like confidence and concord.
The British Cabinet had decided that, as none of our three envoys then at the allied headquarters had much diplomatic experience, our Minister should go in person to supervise the course of affairs. He reached head-quarters in the third week of January, and what Thiers has called the proud simplicity of his conduct, contrasting as it did with the uneasy finesse of Metternich and Nesselrode, imparted to his counsels a weight which they merited from their disinterestedness.
Great Britain was in a very strong position. She had borne the brunt of the struggle before the present coalition took shape: apart from some modest gains to Hanover, she was about to take no part in the ensuing territorial scramble: she even offered to give up many of her oceanic conquests, provided that the European settlement would be such as to guarantee a lasting peace.[405] And this, the British Minister came to see, could not be attained while Napoleon reigned over a Great France: the only sure pledge of peace would be the return of that country to its old frontiers, and preferably to its ancient dynasty.
On the question of boundaries the Czar"s views were not clearly defined; they were personal rather than territorial. He was determined to get rid of Napoleon; but he would not, as yet, hear of the re-establishment of the Bourbons. He disliked that dynasty in general, and Louis XVIII. in particular. Bernadotte seemed to him a far fitter successor to Napoleon than the gouty old gentleman who for three and twenty years had been morosely flitting about Europe and issuing useless proclamations.
Here, indeed, was Napoleon"s great chance: there was no man fit to succeed him, and he knew it. Scarcely anyone but Bernadotte himself agreed with the Czar as to the fitness of the choice just named. To the allies the Prince Royal of Sweden was suspect for his loiterings, and to Frenchmen he seemed a traitor. We find that Stein disagreed with the Czar on this point, and declared that the Bourbons were the only alternative to Napoleon. a.s.suredly, this was not because the great German loved that family, but simply because he saw that their very mediocrity would be a pledge that France would not again overflow her old limits and submerge Europe.
Here, then, was the strength of Castlereagh"s position. Amidst the warping disputes and underhand intrigues his claims were clear, disinterested, and logically tenable. Besides, they were so urged as to calm the disputants. He quietly a.s.sured Metternich that Britain would resist the absorption of the whole of Poland and Saxony by Russia and Prussia; and on his side the Austrian statesman showed that he would not oppose the return of the Bourbons to France "from any family considerations," provided that that act came as the act of the French nation.[406] And this was a proviso on which our Government and Wellington already laid great stress.
Castlereagh"s straightforward behaviour had an immense influence in leading Metternich to favour a more drastic solution of the French question than he had previously advocated. The Frankfurt proposals were now quietly waived, and Metternich came to see the need of withdrawing Belgium from France and intrusting it to the House of Orange. Still, the Austrian statesman was for concluding peace with Napoleon as soon as might be, though he confessed in his private letters that peace did not depend on the Chatillon parleys. Some persons, he wrote, wanted the Bourbons back: still more wished for a Regency (_i.e._, Marie Louise as Regent for Napoleon II.): others said: "Away with Napoleon, no peace is possible with him": the ma.s.ses cried out for peace, so as to end the whole affair: but added Metternich: "The riddle will be solved before or in Paris."[407] There spoke the discreet opportunist, always open to the logic of facts and the persuasion of Castlereagh.
Our Minister found the sovereigns of Russia and Prussia far less tractable; and he only partially succeeded in lulling their suspicions that Metternich was hand and glove with Napoleon. So deep was the Czar"s distrust of the Austrian statesman and commander-in-chief that he resolved to brush aside Metternich"s diplomatic _pourparlers_, to push on rapidly to Paris, and there dictate peace.[408]
But it was just this eagerness of the Czar and the Prussians to reach Paris which kept alive Austrian fears. A complete triumph to their arms would seal the doom of Poland and Saxony; and it has been thought that Schwarzenberg, who himself longed for peace, not only sought to save Austrian soldiers by keeping them back, but that at this time he did less than his duty in keeping touch with Blucher. Several times during the ensuing days the charge of treachery was hurled by the Prussians against the Austrians, and once at least by Frederick William himself. But it seems more probable that Metternich and Schwarzenberg held their men back merely for prudential motives until the resumption of the negotiations with France should throw more light on the tangled political jungle through which the allies were groping.
It is significant that while Schwarzenberg cautiously felt about for Napoleon"s rearguard, of which he lost touch for two whole days, Metternich insisted that the peace Congress must be opened.
Caulaincourt had for several days been waiting near the allied head-quarters; and, said the Austrian Minister, it would be a breach of faith to put him off any longer now that Castlereagh had arrived.
Only when Austria threatened to withdraw from the Coalition did Alexander concede this point, and then with a very bad grace; for the resumption of the negotiations virtually tied him to the neighbourhood of Chatillon-sur-Seine, the town fixed for the Congress, while Blucher was rapidly moving towards Paris with every prospect of s.n.a.t.c.hing from the imperial brow the coveted laurel of a triumphal entry.
To prevent this interference with his own pet plans, the susceptible autocrat sent off from Bar-sur-Seine (February 7th) an order that Blucher was not to enter Paris, but must await the arrival of the sovereigns. The order was needless. Napoleon, goaded to fury by the demands which the allies on that very day formulated at Chatillon, flung himself upon Blucher and completely altered the whole military situation. But before describing this wonderful effort, we must take a glance at the diplomatic overtures which spurred him on.
The Congress of Chatillon opened on February 5th, and on that day Castlereagh gained his point, that questions about our maritime code should be completely banished from the discussions. Two days later the allies declared that France must withdraw within the boundaries of 1791, with the exception of certain changes made for mutual convenience and of some colonial retrocessions that England would grant to France. The French plenipotentiary, Caulaincourt, heard this demand with a quiet but strained composure: he reminded them that at Frankfurt they had proposed to leave France the Rhine and the Alps; he inquired what colonial sacrifices England was prepared to make if she cooped up France in her old limits in Europe. To this our plenipotentiaries Aberdeen, Cathcart, and Stewart refused to reply until he a.s.sented to the present demand of the allies. He very properly refused to do this; and, despite his eagerness to come to an arrangement and end the misfortunes of France, referred the matter to his master.[409]
What were Napoleon"s views on these questions? It is difficult to follow the workings of his mind before the time when Caulaincourt"s despatch flashed the horrible truth upon him that he might, after all, leave France smaller and weaker than he found her. Then the lightnings of his wrath flash forth, and we see the tumult and anguish of that mighty soul: but previously the storm-wrack of pa.s.sion and the cloud-bank of his clinging will are lit up by few gleams of the earlier piercing intelligence. On January the 4th he had written to Caulaincourt that the policy of England and the personal rancour of the Czar would drag Austria along. If Fortune betrayed him (Napoleon) he would give up the throne: never would he sign any shameful peace.
But he added: "You must see what Metternich wants: it is not to Austria"s interest to push matters to the end." In the accompanying instructions to his plenipotentiary, he seems to a.s.sent to the Alpine and Rhenish frontiers, but advises him to sign the preliminaries as vaguely as possible, "_as we have everything to gain by delay_." The Rhine frontier must be so described as to leave France the Dutch fortresses: and Savona and Spezzia must also count as on the French side of the Alps. These, be it observed, are his notions when he has not heard of the defection of Murat, or the rejection of his Spanish bargain by the Cortes.
Twelve days later he proposes to Metternich an armistice, and again suggests that it is not to Austria"s interest to press matters too far. But the allies are too wary to leave such a matter to Metternich: at Teplitz they bound themselves to common action; and the proposal only shows them the need of pushing on fast while their foe is still unprepared. Once more his old optimism a.s.serts itself. The first French success, that at Brienne, leads him to hope that the allies will now be ready to make peace. Even after the disaster at La Rothiere, he believes that the mere arrival of Caulaincourt at the allied headquarters will foment the discords which there exist.[410]
Then, writing amidst the unspeakable miseries at Troyes (February 4th), he upbraids Caulaincourt for worrying him about "powers and instructions when it is still doubtful if the enemy wants to negotiate. His terms, it seems, are determined on beforehand. As soon as you have them, you have the power to accept them or to refer them to me within twenty-four hours."
After midnight, he again directs him to accept the terms, if acceptable: "in the contrary case we will run the risks of a battle; even the loss of Paris, and all that will ensue." Later on that day he allows Maret to send a despatch giving Caulaincourt "carte blanche" to conclude peace.[411] But the plenipotentiary dared not take on himself the responsibility of accepting the terms offered by the allies two days later. The last despatch was too vague to enable him to sign away many thousands of square miles of territory: it contradicted the tenor of Napoleon"s letters, which empowered him to a.s.sent to nothing less than the Frankfurt terms. And thus was to slip away one more chance of bringing about peace--a peace that would strip the French Empire of frontier lands and alien peoples, but leave it to the peasants" ruler, Napoleon.
In truth, the Emperor"s words and letters breathed nothing but warlike resolve. Famine and misery accompany him on his march to Nogent, and there, on the 7th, he hears tidings that strike despair to every heart but his. An Anglo-German force is besieging the staunch old Carnot in Antwerp; Bulow has entered Brussels; Belgium is lost: Macdonald"s weak corps is falling back on Epernay, hard pressed by Yorck, while Blucher is heading for Paris. Last of all comes on the morrow Caulaincourt"s despatch announcing that the allies now insist on France returning to the limits of 1791.