THE PALE EMPEROR
HIS “EXPLANATION”: WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.
The whole House was on its feet, threatening, shaking its fists at
a man with a waxen face who protested against this last humiliation
inflicted on his master. Like the Jews demanding of Pilate that he
should deliver Jesus to them, we cried to posterity at the top of
our voices: “Crucifige, crucifige eum!”
I do not know which of the two attitudes has left the more painful
impression on my mind--that of Conti [the Emperor’s former
Secretary], surrounded, almost struck, but meeting these threats
with the most magnificent coolness; or that of the seven hundred
and fifty representatives of the French nation, raging against a
man who for six months had been little more than a corpse. He had
been very guilty; but we, in our turn, were very cruel.[114]
The visit of the Emperor and Empress to Queen Victoria and the Prince
Consort in 1855 was heralded by the issue of a placard thus conceived:
England’s disgrace. The Real Day of Humiliation.[115] Louis
Napoleon, the Murderer, the Oath-Breaker, is coming to England.
Englishmen, do your duty!
The Empress had, we know, complained to Queen Victoria of the bitter
attacks rained upon the Emperor by our newspapers, and was scarcely
comforted by the Queen’s assurance that the English Press was free and
could not be censored.
Bismarck, who, when he was Prussian Minister to France, professed the
warmest friendship for Napoleon III., and became a favourite of the
Empress and the Court, soon turned against the Emperor, speaking of him
slightingly, if not contemptuously, and deprecating Napoleon’s
suggestion of a Franco-Prussian alliance.
To Vambéry Napoleon III. was “this thick-set man, with his flabby
features and pale, faded eyes.” Vambéry[116] could not discern in the
Emperor a trace of the greatness of which he had heard so much. “His
pale eyes and artificial speech soon betrayed the adventurer who had
been elevated to his exalted position by the inheritance of a great name
and the wantonness of the nation.”
Mme. Cornu, Louis Napoleon’s foster-sister, who had had a sincere
affection for him prior to the coup d’état, execrated him for that act,
declined to see him when he called upon her, and, as he stood at the
bottom of the stairs, shouted to him from above that she would have
nothing to do with “a man whose hands were covered with blood.” Her
resentment continued for years; then, one day, she went to the
Tuileries, saw the Emperor and Empress, took the little Prince in her
arms, and “made it up.”
I would fain hope that we may find the “true truth” in these eloquent
words of the statesman who knew the real Louis Napoleon better, perhaps,
than most men, excepting De Morny, De Persigny, Fleury, Conti, and, I
will add, Franceschini Pietri--I mean, as will have been guessed, M.
Émile Ollivier:
Despite all that has been written on the Emperor Napoleon III., no
personage is less known. He has been described as un esprit
nébuleux; in reality, no one had a clearer mind. He has been called
an egotistical calculator: no one was more disinterested or more
preoccupied with the national grandeur. But he placed that grandeur
very high. He believed that France was the soldier of God; that his
mission was not to gratify miserable cupidities, but to work for
the freedom and happiness of peoples. He did nothing on behalf of
dynastic interests, but he neglected no opportunity of advancing
the principle of nationalities, which is that of justice, peace,
and civilization. And that will be his immortal glory in the
future. He would not have sent the French fleet to prevent the
brave Cretans from uniting themselves with Greece, if they desired
to do so. He would not have made France the synonym for egotism and
platitudes. All his dreams were those of one of the most beautiful
minds which ever ruled over men since the days of the
Antonines.[117]
The value of that glowing tribute, that certificate of character,
depends upon the impartiality and capacity of the person who penned it.
I myself consider M. Émile Ollivier--Napoleon’s last Prime Minister,
upon whom and his colleagues was imposed the dire duty of declaring
war--an impartial witness. He may not--I fear he will not--be accepted
as such by all. Is he not the Minister who said he entered upon the war
“with a light heart”? He is the selfsame man; only it is too often
forgotten that he qualified that expression at the moment he uttered it
by explaining that he was “light-hearted” because of “his conviction
that Prussia was in the wrong and was deliberately attacking
France.”[118]
It must be remembered that while M. Ollivier was devoted to Napoleon
III. he was regarded with not over-friendly eyes by the Empress Eugénie.
He necessarily had frequent formal and informal audiences of the
Emperor, and that some of these interviews took place unknown to the
imperial lady we know from the Emperor’s letter asking the statesman to
enter the Tuileries on a certain occasion by “the little door” in the
garden, in order that the Empress might not know he was in the Palace!
M. Ollivier, as the historian of “L’Empire Libéral,” intends to be
absolutely unbiassed and impartial. He has taken upon himself the
Herculean task of defending that Liberal Empire, the Liberal Emperor,
and the Liberal Premier of 1870 (himself), and he has had to make the
best case possible for all three. His work is a monument of research,
memory, and industry. His fifteen great volumes are for the world’s
criticism; some may see in them only a brilliant plaidoirie, admirably
conceived and ingeniously executed--the whole a phenomenal literary
performance, yet, of course, written with parti pris, and as such
challenging critical comment. But may we not accept without carping, and
with faith in his sincerity, his estimate of the Man Napoleon III., the
Pale Emperor, in whose words, “The crown has thorns, and often some of
them sink deeply into the head,”[119] we seem to see the epitaph he
would have wished?
The responsibility for the war of 1870 has been laid, firstly, to the
charge of the Empress Eugénie, and, secondly, to that of the Emperor. In
a previous volume I printed the complete text of what, since its
publication in that work, has become known as “the Empress’s Case”--Her
Imperial Majesty’s Reply to her Accusers. One of my numerous very
appreciative American critics took occasion to remark that, in order to
prove the Empress’s blamelessness, something more was required than the
mere word of M. Gaston Calmette.[120] To remove all misapprehension, I
now put it on record that the document in question contained the Empress
Eugénie’s ipsissima verba; otherwise it neither could nor would have
been published.
I pass on to a consideration of the measure of the Emperor Napoleon’s
responsibility for the war with Germany.
Those who have taken the trouble, and who have the competency, to
investigate the numerous causes which were the genesis of the war have
satisfied themselves that, to employ a colloquialism, Napoleon III. was
“dead against” entering into a conflict with Prussia. These
investigators now know, although they may not all have known it twenty,
or ten, or even five years ago, that the Emperor was forced into the
field, partly by the diplomacy of the then Count Bismarck (other
diplomatists aiding), partly (and to a greater extent) by the
practically unanimous voice of his own subjects.
Let there be no longer any doubt about this: the French themselves, not
primarily, but ultimately, were responsible for the war. It was not
Paris this time, but the entire nation, and, with very few exceptions,
the Press, which made it impossible for the Emperor and his Government
to refrain from throwing down the gauntlet. That the Empress should have
sided with the “war party” is not surprising, for the “war party” was
the country, and she would have been voted anti-patriotic (and we know
what that means) had she not fallen into line with those millions who
professed their anxiety to get “to Berlin,” although they knew no more
how they were to get there than they knew how to reach the planet Mars.
We forget the vacillations of the Emperor, we forget his moral lapses,
we forget the coup d’état, we can even forget the hideous Mexican
blunder, when we remember his noble hesitancy to plunge the country into
a war which he knew could have but one ending--disaster. He knew it from
Stoffel and he knew it from Niel. As Baron de Mackau has most truly
said, Napoleon III. “_submitted_ to the war.” There is the whole matter
crystallized into four words. The Emperor sanctioned the war because he
had no alternative. He had to submit to pressure from within and
pressure from without. If ever a Sovereign was driven into making war it
was that most unfortunate of men the Emperor Napoleon III.
Baron de Mackau was one of the Emperor’s most intimate friends, and
after the battle of Solferino he was entrusted with the duty of
presenting Niel with his Marshal’s epaulettes. The Baron says:
The Emperor did not wish for war. It is only just to him to say
that he submitted to it. It would be equitable to seek for the
reasons of the defeat of France in the refusal of Parliament to
contribute, during the years preceding the war, to the work of
national defence proposed by Marshal Niel. In 1867, after the
Italian war, Niel, as Minister of War, demanded the modification of
the military law and the creation of reservists. He was not allowed
to finish his speech. The Magnins, the Favres, the Simons, and all
those who formed the Opposition at that date, prevented the vote.
They said to the Marshal: “You want to make France a vast
entrenched camp.” I heard the Marshal reply, with a gravity well
calculated to move those who were present: “May you, gentlemen, not
make it a huge cemetery.”
On the day following the declaration of war, when the Delegates of the
Corps Législatif took leave of Napoleon III., His Majesty said to them:
“Ah, gentlemen, we are undertaking a heavy task!” As he left the
Emperor’s study at St. Cloud, Baron de Mackau said to his colleagues:
“We are done for!”
The Baron continues:
The eagerness with which, a few days previously, people had heard
of the possibility of avoiding war; then the order given suddenly
by Marshal Lebœuf, the Emperor’s friend and confidant, to stop all
preparations; the Marshal’s resignation when, at the last night
council, war was decided upon--these things have been always, to
me, proofs that the Emperor only submitted to the war. The truth is
that public opinion in France, grievously over-excited, urged on
the war; and that the Left, represented by those whose names are
noted above, and always taking heed of outside rumours, followed
the current of public opinion, as did, later, Marshal Bazaine. The
Right, as a whole, advanced hesitatingly and defiantly, animated by
the desire to weaken the Emperor’s Government abroad, and only made
up its mind when our colleague, Talhouët, a member of the
delegation to whom the secret documents had been communicated,
declared at the Chamber that, as a matter of honour, war was
inevitable.
While the Emperor was in his “prison” at Wilhelmshöhe (September, 1870,
to March, 1871) he spent the greater part of his time at his desk.[121]
In this former palace of his uncle, Jérôme, King of Westphalia, Napoleon
III. wrote, from memory, aided by extracts from State papers which
someone copied for him, an elaborate statement of his policy during his
eighteen years’ reign, so far as it regarded Germany. This very frank
apologia (De Persigny having refused to figure as its “author”) was
fathered by his old friend, the Marquis de Gricourt, who had been his
companion in London when he was awaiting the call which came to him in
1848. That the statement was written by the Emperor himself is
guaranteed, in his Memoirs, by General Count von Monts, to whose custody
at Wilhelmshöhe the august captive was confided by King William.[122]
General von Monts writes:
“The Press had obtained excessive liberty; the Republican party, the
Empress, and the clergy had too much power for the welfare of the
Dynasty; and the Emperor damaged himself by obeying the suggestions of
several French Ambassadors abroad. That Napoleon himself was also
culpable for the war against us [Germany] is a fact which cannot be
disputed, inasmuch as we know his letter of July 12, 1870, addressed to
Gramont, in which he formulated his exigencies in respect of Prussia,
and begged Gramont to explain them to Benedetti. Napoleon never, in my
presence, alluded to this letter, but he recognized his culpability by
writing, in his brochure, ‘Les Relations de France et Germany sous
Napoléon III.’:
‘Toutefois, nous le disons franchement, le devoir de l’Empereur
était d’être plus sage que la nation, et d’empêcher la guerre, même
au prix de sa couronne.’
“The cover of the brochure gave the name of the Marquis de Gricourt as
the author; _but I know for certain that the Emperor was the author of
it, for he wrote it during his captivity at Wilhelmshöhe, and gave me a
copy of it_.”
This highly-interesting document is so little known--I will venture to
say it is unknown--that I will quote some of its principal paragraphs in
full, fortified by the conviction that I shall be thereby clearing the
Emperor’s memory (as I have already cleared that of the Empress) from
many reproaches and sneers which have been accepted as gospel by all who
have not waded through M. Ollivier’s fifteen volumes, which are not
likely to be translated into English, although possibly they may be
issued in German; but even that is doubtful, for the author of “L’Empire
Libéral” is a very outspoken historian.
The Emperor wisely says: “We must not judge of things as they are, but
as they _might have been_. Certainly, since Königsgrätz the power of
Prussia has increased amazingly; hence her crushing France with
considerable forces, outnumbering her own by hundreds of thousands....
Before 1866 there was no possibility of forming an alliance in the
centre of Europe. Austria was irrevocably joined to Germany, and Italy
did not then exist as a Power. But might it not likewise be argued that
in 1870, also, France remained alone? Central Europe then permitted her
to form alliances. The Austro-Hungarian Empire might have been won over,
and Italy, reconstituted, led to join in the war. Had these events taken
place, the policy of the Second Empire doubtless would have triumphed;
for facts could have proved that, in spite of the augmentation of
Prussia, there existed in Europe a serious counterpoise to her gigantic
power.... From January 2, 1870, France[123] became entire mistress of
her own destinies. And what use did she then make of the liberties so
largely accorded to her? The country desired peace; the Chambers and
Government desired peace; and yet the climax to the situation was War.”
With these preliminary words Napoleon III. proceeds:
* * * * *
When M. Émile Ollivier accepted the task of forming a Ministry, his
programme--as submitted to the Emperor--frankly acknowledged the
principle of nationalities,[124] recognizing the right of Germany to
reconstitute herself in a manner thought best suitable to her. He
likewise expressed the most pacific intentions.[125] Soon after the
installation of the Ministers on January 2, 1870, Comte Daru, Minister
for Foreign Affairs, proposed to Prussia, through the intervention of
England, a general disarmament. To support this demand, it was
suggested, in the Chambers, to reduce the annual contingent by 10,000
men. This last measure was adopted; but as to the proposition of Comte
Daru only a formal and evasive answer was returned. Nevertheless, it may
be said that the year 1870 began under favourable auspices. Nothing
seemed to threaten the repose then enjoyed by Europe. The only thought
in France was to develop, under a Liberal Government, the moral and
material resources of the country.[126]
But it has often been said, “He who sows the whirlwind shall reap the
tempest.” For four years the Opposition--including all sections--had
caused the Tribune and the Press to resound with most bitter
lamentations on the increase of Prussian power.... These constant
assertions, these perpetual attacks, had penetrated to the remotest
parts of the country. The army, even, had not remained insensible to the
reproaches of weakness hurled at the Government; it felt humbled by the
successes of Prussia, as if those very successes had been obtained
against itself.
Again, when the news reached France of the likelihood of a Prussian
Prince becoming King of Spain, it had the effect of a spark falling on
inflammable matter; all hatred, jealousies, and envyings were at once
aroused. This incident, which at another time would only have provoked
an exchange of diplomatic Notes, now fired the whole nation.
The Ministry, it must be owned, committed the serious fault of carrying
to the tribune a sort of challenge, which rendered any diplomatic
arrangement difficult. Nevertheless, on the Prince of Hohenzollern
withdrawing his son’s name as candidate for the Spanish throne, it was
hoped that peace might still have been maintained; but public opinion
had been too violently agitated: it spurned all conciliatory measures.
The journals of nearly every shade of opinion cried out for war. The
provinces partook of the exultations of the capital. Whatever may be
said of the confidential messages sent by the Préfets, and of which only
garbled accounts had been given, the majority of these high
functionaries announced, in the aggregate, that in the Departments the
public mind was animated beyond precedent; conditions of peace, however
honourable, would in no way satisfy them. Of this we need no further
proof than the following despatches, found by the Prussians in the
Palace of St. Cloud, and published in the “North German Gazette”:[127]
“PERPIGNAN, _July 15, 1870_.--The Préfet to the Minister of the
Interior, Paris. In consequence of the last news we have had great
excitement here. The idea of war with Prussia is warmly received by
the bulk of the population. Even the Radicals say that in a week’s
time hostilities will commence, and that by August 15 our soldiers
will celebrate the Emperor’s fête at Berlin. No one, for one
moment, doubts the results of the war. Everywhere, in town and
village, there is the same confidence shown.”
“MARSEILLES, _July 16, 1870_.--The Préfet to the Minister of the
Interior, Paris. There has just been a great manifestation here, a
torchlight procession parading the streets of our town, followed by
10,000 to 15,000 people, singing ‘La Reine Hortense’ and the
‘Marseillaise.’ The cries of ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ ‘A bas la Prusse!’
‘À Berlin!” resounding on all sides. The crowd is full of
enthusiasm, and no disorder.”
These sentiments found expression, nearly as energetic, in language
uttered by the representatives of the country. The wish of the Corps
Législatif was no longer doubtful. It appears that there had been a
moment when the Ministers inclined towards peace. An order of the day by
MM. Clément-Duvernois and Jérôme David--the latter Vice-President of the
Chamber[128]--nearly overturned the Cabinet. This occurred on July 13.
Two days later the Chamber was called upon definitively to pronounce on
the conclusions drawn up in conformity to the Commission of which M. de
Kératry was a member, and which had been unanimously approved of. _The
vote was for War!_ The majority numbered 247 against 10. Seven members
only were absent. The Radical Opposition was divided in opinion. To use
the words of M. Thiers: “This was, in truth, the expression of an
overwhelming approval of the country; the Legislative Body siding with
the people.”
When the Emperor, in his proclamation to the French army, foretold the
difficulties of the enterprise, so certain appeared success to all that
the sober “Journal des Débats” expressed an opinion that His Majesty
“showed too much diffidence in his address to his troops.”
* * * * *
Every soldier in the streets was made the subject of popular ovation. In
the theatres public feeling manifested itself by the noisiest
demonstrations. Who can forget that representation at the Opera when the
whole audience rose to a man and thundered out the “Marseillaise”?
In Paris such was the enthusiasm felt that the Emperor could not leave
his Palace without being cheered by an immense mob, crying out, “Vive la
guerre!” At the moment of his departure for the army His Majesty
purposely refrained from driving through the capital owing to reports
that the populace would indulge in wild demonstrations, intending to
unharness the horses from his carriage and drag it themselves in triumph
to the railway station. This same people, one month later, destroyed the
emblems of the Empire and broke the statues of their Ruler![129]
If we have recalled facts known to all, it is not to exonerate the
Emperor from the responsibilities he assumed, but to prove what was then
the state of public opinion in France.
On Sunday, July 19, 1870, Napoleon III. held, at the Tuileries, a
Council of War, which lasted several hours. The Emperor and his
Ministers agreed, without exception, after mature deliberation, that a
declaration should be made rendering peace still possible. But the same
evening the Ministers repaired to St. Cloud and amended their resolution
of the morning, M. Ollivier informing His Majesty that if the document
agreed upon at their last meeting had been published the disappointment
would have been such that “the Ministers would have been received with
hisses and their carriages pelted with mud.”
Certainly, although the Chief of the State was a Constitutional
Sovereign, he might have prevented the war, but at the cost of his own
popularity. They would again have reproached him--as they already
had--for being humble to the strong and arrogant to the weak. His
conduct would have been for ever denounced by a malevolent Opposition as
basely culpable towards a designing adversary.
At the same time, we own that the duty of the Emperor was to have shown
himself wiser than the nation, and avoided war even at the cost of his
crown.
His excuse is that he accepted the contest, but without ardour, as a man
who engages in a duel because his honour and duty demand it, not
considering that his opponent may be stronger than himself. Doubtless,
he may have been carried away at the moment by national élan; by
unlimited confidence in the power of his army; and that dreams of
military glory, perhaps even of territorial aggrandizement, then stifled
in his breast the calm reasoning of the statesman.
Without, however, ignoring the responsibility of His Majesty in recent
events, we cannot admit, as recently stated by M. Jules Favre, that the
Emperor made war of his own accord and in the interests of his Dynasty.
Who could believe that, after receiving a new consecration by universal
suffrage, when 7,000,000 voices freshly ratified former Plébiscites, and
showed the most incredulous how deep-rooted the Empire was, Napoleon
III. should have thought it necessary, two months later, to have
recourse to such a terrible expedient as war to sustain his power and
strengthen his Dynasty? Why, even successful warfare would in no way
have added to the security of the Empire. Alas! it could only lead to
the disturbing of everything. The Emperor led the élite of his army,
leaving behind him his wife, with no armed force, no tried and daring
military chief, to guard her, in an immense capital always in agitation,
imbued with Republican ideas, worked upon by SOCIALISM, a prey to 700
journals, and invested with the rights of public political meeting. On
the least reverse of arms, disorders, riotings, perhaps even a
revolution, had to be dreaded.
It is quite evident, then, that war, taken all in all, was palpably
against the interests of his Dynasty, and it cannot be just to Napoleon
III. to say that he either desired or imposed it on the country.
Furthermore, a Vice-President of the Government of Defence, had he not
always upheld the institution of Ministerial Responsibility as a wise
and efficient system? Why, then, be false to his principles now? Why
impute to the Emperor alone the errors that have been committed in the
management of State affairs? Surely his Ministers were equally
blameable. The honest truth is that the country desired the contest, and
that His Majesty, unfortunately, did not resist the overwhelming
enthusiasm of the nation.
In conclusion, let us remark with what care Napoleon III. endeavoured,
from the commencement, to show how consistent his conduct had been with
national sentiment.
In his Proclamation to the French people[130] he says:
“Frenchmen! There are moments most solemn in the life of
nations--when the national honour, violently excited, with
irresistible force commands all interests and directs the destinies
of the country. One of these decisive hours has just struck for
France.
“Against the new pretensions of Prussia our objections made
themselves heard. They have been evaded, and followed by
contemptuous proceedings. At this our country has felt a profound
irritation; and immediately a warcry resounded from one end of
France to the other. Nothing is now left us but to confide our
destinies to the fate of arms.”
When, on July 23, the Legislative Body took leave of the Emperor, he
answered the President’s address in these words:
“_We have done all we could to avoid war. We can now say that it is
the whole nation which, by its irresistible élan, dictated our
resolutions._”
Thus, then, in accepting the responsibility which devolved upon him, the
Emperor--before, as since, his overthrow--desired to establish before
the world the following simple fact: that he did not launch the country
into a perilous enterprise on account of contemptible motives, but felt
himself encouraged, if not compelled to it, by the determined
manifestations of public opinion.
The reader who has followed the above recital of the principal events of
the reign of Napoleon III. must be convinced that he who became a
prisoner at Wilhelmshöhe employed eighteen years of undisputed power in
making France the most flourishing country in Europe, in allaying
international hatred, and in protecting the independence of foreign
States. When his personal efforts appeared to him unequal to realize all
he meditated for the universal welfare, he voluntarily gave up Authority
and called on the representatives of the people to take the most active
part in the direction of affairs, thus establishing in France the widest
and most complete system of liberty.
And now, because fortune has abandoned him, this great man is only
considered by some in the light of a tyrant, who, to establish a
Dynasty, ruthlessly precipitated his country into all the horrors of a
merciless war.
We have recorded facts. Posterity will be the judge.
* * * * *
When the Empress read the telegram announcing that the Hohenzollern
candidature was withdrawn, she said, in the presence of General
Bourbaki, “It is infamous! The Empire will fall to rags!” (“L’Empire va
tomber en quenouille!”)[131]
An extraordinary story, told by M. Welschinger, makes one wonder whether
some of those surrounding the Empress in July, 1870, were in their right
minds. It was proposed that the King of Prussia should be asked to write
a letter to Napoleon III. to satisfy the énergumènes (fanatics, “of whom
the Empress was one”), and the Duc de Gramont actually drafted and sent
to the King a note of what His Majesty was to say! King William had been
very pleased when he thought that all danger of war had vanished by the
withdrawal of the Hohenzollern Prince from the Spanish candidature, “and
in so uselessly and gratuitously wounding him the French Cabinet
alienated the only person who could check Bismarck.”
King William was disgusted. “Was there ever such insolence?” he wrote to
Queen Augusta. “They want me to appear before the world as a repentant
sinner.”
When Benedetti asked the King to give “guarantees” that there should be
no renewal of the Hohenzollern candidature, His Majesty said: “You ask
me to make a promise for all time, and that, for every reason, I cannot
do.”
Bismarck did the rest.
“There was neither insulter nor insulted at Ems. There was only the
Chancellor’s manœuvre.” The French Cabinet played into the hands of
Bismarck, whose one desire was that France should be responsible for the
declaration of war. “It was Bismarck who wanted war, and we rendered him
the service of declaring it.” M. Ollivier was pleased at the
Hohenzollern’s withdrawal, and there the affair ought to have ended;
“but,” says M. Welschinger, “a section of Deputies and of the Court--the
Empress in particular--urged war.[132] While the business world was all
in favour of peace, an artificial atmosphere environed the Cabinet--an
atmosphere composed of M.P.s and hot-headed journalists--and accused
Ministers of weakness. The numerical inferiority of the army was not the
fault of the Emperor and his Ministers, but of the elected
representatives of the nation. The Emperor’s health grew worse and
worse, until he could no longer resist the war party.... We had an army
numerically inferior, could not reckon on allies, and were in no way
prepared for war. On July 6, after the Duc de Gramont’s speech, I heard
on all sides, ‘It is war, it is war!’ The Cabinets of Austria and of
England both blamed the declaration of war.”
On the day of the departure from St. Cloud of the Emperor and the Prince
Imperial for “the front” (July 28) gloom prevailed at the château. “One
would believe there was a coffin in the house,” said a lackey. But the
aides-de-camp who were accompanying the Emperor were in boisterous
spirits. They were inclined to say, as Pandore said to his brigadier,
“Majesté [Brigadier], vous avez raison.”[133] The Emperor wore the
uniform of a General of Division de petite tenue; the Prince Imperial
that of a Sous-Lieutenant of Voltigeurs of the Guard. As the boy
strolled about, taking farewell of everybody--his pretty cousins, the
Empress’s nieces, daughters of the Duc and Duchesse d’Albe, were
there--he tapped the scabbard of his sword and gave himself airs, to the
delight of the admiring group. Tears were in his mother’s eyes when, as
the train moved out of the special station, she exclaimed, “Do your
duty, Louis!” “We shall all do it,” answered the Emperor; and to the
Prime Minister he shouted, “Ollivier! Je compte sur vous!” It was their
last meeting.
As the imperial party left the château on their way to the station there
was a shout of “À Berlin!” “Don’t say that,” exclaimed the Emperor
reproachfully; “the war will be a very long one, in any case.” And one
remembers that, a few days before, when the streets of Paris were
paraded daily and nightly by crowds yelling “To Berlin!” the Emperor had
written to the Duc de Gramont, “Enthusiasm is a fine thing, but
sometimes very ridiculous.” If the Empress had illusions, her consort
had none.
We must take it, however, that he had allowed himself to be, I will not
say actually deluded, but, to a certain extent, led away by General
Frossard, the Prince Imperial’s inflexible “governor”--a man of many
“plans.” Plan No. 1 was to “take” Saarbrücken, and five days after the
Emperor left St. Cloud Saarbrücken was duly “taken,” Napoleon III.
assisting (was he not Commander-in-Chief?), and the Prince Imperial
being “baptized” by shells and bullets.
Frossard (we are told by M. Émile Ollivier[134]) was to cross the Saar
on August 2 at daybreak, and take possession of Saarbrücken, supported
by portions of the 2nd and 3rd corps d’armées, while the 4th corps
watched the débouchées of Saarlouis. Bazaine was to command three corps
destined to co-operate in the scheme. As the event proved, Bazaine was
against the occupation of Saarbrücken, and “thus revealed the fatal
inertia which lost himself, the army, and France.”
Even thus early the “hauts chefs,” to fill up time, had sent for their
wives. “The camp was full of them.” Prince Napoleon wrote in his notes,
“Trop de femmes d’officiers.”[135]
M. Émile Ollivier’s exposure of the “désillusion diplomatique” is, it
goes without saying, very illuminating. Prince Napoleon attributed the
check of the alliance “to our wish to save the Temporal Power. It has
become a historical commonplace to say that if we had given Rome to the
Italians we should have had with us Italy and Austria, and we should not
have sacrificed the country by protecting a decrepit Sovereignty.” M.
Ollivier continues:
It was the “Spanish fanatic,” the Empress, who determined our
resolutions. “I prefer,” she is reported to have said, “to see the
Prussians in Paris rather than the Italians in Rome.” De Gramont is
reported to have said: “I could do nothing. I was tied by the
Empress.”
The Empress never used the abominable words attributed to her, and
De Gramont never made the unjust accusation against her that was
put in his mouth. She approved the Cabinet’s refusal of Beust’s
suggestion to give Rome to Italy, but she did not originate that
refusal. The initiative was taken apart from her by De Gramont and
me. If she had been the Ultramontane fanatic she was said to be,
she would not have supported the protestations of Mackau[136] and
his friends that it was necessary to maintain our occupation of
Rome. It was, on the contrary, upon her eloquent demonstration that
the Council of Ministers, taking no heed of the representations of
so many of the Catholic nobility, approved the evacuation of the
Pontifical territory.
In the matter of alliances, as in other matters, the Council did
not adopt the opinion of the Empress, except when it was in accord
with its own Opinion. The Council never submitted to an influence
which the Empress never had over any of its members, and which she
never attempted to exercise. It was the Cabinet, not the Empress,
which must be held responsible for the course followed in this
negotiation.
All this will come as a pleasurable surprise to the Empress’s friends,
and as a disagreeable shock to her critics--or would vilipenders be the
better word? Moreover, the venerable Minister’s clear-cut, incisive,
unanswerable statements amply confirm the Empress’s assertions in her
“Case,” which, in the light of M. Ollivier’s pronouncements, is
immeasurably increased in importance. What is printed above concerning
the precise relations which existed between the members of the last
Imperial Government (for Palikao’s “scratch” Ministry is of little, if
any, account) and the Empress is, I allow myself to say, particularly
satisfactory to one who has been considered, in a few quarters, to have
unduly “bolstered up” the consort of Napoleon III. The American critic
who desired something more than the assertion of a journalist to make
the Empress’s “Case” thoroughly acceptable now has his not unnatural
desire gratified--he has the word of honour of the historian of
“L’Empire Libéral” that the imperial lady’s vehement assertions (which,
until 1910, had been buried in the columns of a newspaper) are true in
substance and in fact, and may no longer be questioned.
But M. Ollivier has more to say on this point:
The Empress and the Duc de Gramont were convinced that, the war
over, it would have been easy for us [the Ollivier Cabinet] to have
established the Papal Sovereignty had it been overthrown by
revolutionaries. The Emperor and the Duc did not realize the
situation in which we should then have found ourselves.... The
withdrawal of our troops, in the circumstances in which it took
place, was equivalent to the abandonment of what remained of the
Temporal Power.
Even had Victor Emmanuel sent troops to our aid, he could not have
done so before the first week in September; consequently, such help
from Italy would not have saved us from Spicheren, Wörth, and
Sedan.
_The real motive of the abstention of Italy was not the refusal to
give up Rome. The Italian Ministers from the first subordinated the
question of participation in the war to the initiative which
Austria might have taken. Italy could do nothing without Austria._
The causes which led Austria to refuse to come to our aid and to
bring Italy with her are infinite. _But the one cause which
dominated all others was the known intention of Russia[137] to put
her army at the service of Prussia if Austria sent her troops to
the assistance of France._
_This is confirmed by King William, who, on the morrow of his
victory, wrote to the Emperor Alexander II._: “NEVER WILL PRUSSIA
FORGET THAT SHE OWES IT TO YOU THAT THE WAR DID NOT TAKE EXTREME
PROPORTIONS. GOD BLESS YOU! YOUR GRATEFUL FRIEND FOR LIFE,
WILLIAM.”
To this outburst of gratitude the Tsar replied: “I am happy to have been
able to show you by the evidence of my sympathies that I am a devoted
friend. May the friendship which unites us assure the happiness and the
glory of the two countries!--ALEXANDER.”
We may not question the sincerity of M. Ollivier’s avowal, extorted from
him by bitter memories of, as Napoleon III. says, “what might have
been”: “_La Russie a beaucoup à réparer à notre égard._”
At this point it is germane to the diplomatic question--which, as we
have seen, was at the root of everything--to recall the doubtless
forgotten fact that on July 24, 1870--five days after France had
declared war--a Conference took place in Paris on the vital question of
the proposed alliance of France, Austria, and Italy. Prince Napoleon and
the Duc de Gramont represented France, Prince de Metternich (husband of
the celebrated Princess Pauline) and Count Vitzthum represented Austria,
and Count Nigra (a great admirer of the Empress) and Count Vimercati
Italy.
The Duc de Gramont produced the draft of a proposed Treaty, which was
agreed to. The Conference was about to break up when Prince de
Metternich and Count Nigra simultaneously introduced a condition making
it a sine quâ non that France should give up Rome to Italy. Prince
Napoleon refused to accept the condition, and the Duc de Gramont
announced that the Conference was at an end. Napoleon III. at once
informed Prince de Metternich and Count Nigra that only in the last
extremity would he agree to a diplomatic conference on the question of
abandoning Rome to the Italian Government.
On August 1--the day before the first engagement at Saarbrücken, when
the Prince Imperial received his “baptism of fire”--the Emperor
Napoleon, at his urgent request, was presented by Austria and Italy with
a new project of alliance, containing these important clauses:
1. The diplomatic campaign projected against Prussia will be commenced
only after September 15 [a fortnight, as it happened, after the French
defeat at Sedan], and only if France shall have already victoriously
invaded South Germany.
2. Austria-Hungary undertakes to effectively support Italy, in order
that that country may obtain conditions favourable to her interests in
the Roman question.
In opposition to Prince Napoleon, the Emperor demanded the withdrawal
from the Treaty of the paragraph relating to Rome and the fixing of a
date for changing the phrase “armed neutrality” into “armed
co-operation.” To this proposal Austria and Italy gave a point-blank
refusal. Thus France was left to carry on the struggle single-handed.
Nevertheless, the military party at Vienna pushed on preparations for
war. The Tsar was highly incensed, and the Austrian Ambassador at St.
Petersburg telegraphed that His Imperial Majesty had spoken to him “very
bitterly” concerning the Austrian preparations. This had its effect at
Vienna, and the war party subsided. The result of the failure of Austria
and Italy to join France was that the Emperor Napoleon, who had
confidently reckoned upon the armed support of those countries, took the
field, with fatal consequences.[138]