THE CONGRESS OF KINGS[41]
[Footnote 41: References: Bittard des Portes: Les
preliminaires de l'entrevue d'Erfurt (1808). In Revue
d'histoire diplomatique, tom. IV, pp. 95-144. Sklower:
Entrevue de Napoleon Ier et de Goethe suivie de notes et
commentaires.]
Forebodings -- Napoleon and Maria Louisa -- The Czar's Ultimatum
and the Emperor's Choice -- Napoleon's Last Diplomatic Move --
The Imperial Court at Dresden -- Napoleon and Poland -- The
Health of Napoleon -- His Strategic Powers Undiminished.
[Sidenote: 1812]
Ready--at least to outward appearance, Napoleon was in truth ready as
far as equipment, organization, commissariat, strategic plan, and every
nice detail of official forethought could go. But how about the
efficiency and zeal of men and officers? There had been murmurings for
some years past. It was remarked that Napoleon's studies in 1808 were
the campaigns of Rome against the Parthians from the days of Crassus
onward; from his death-bed Lannes had warned his chief in 1809 how ready
many of his most trusted servants were to betray him if he continued his
career of conquest; Decres, another true friend, expressed his anxiety
in 1810 lest they should all be thrown into a final horrid elemental
crash; and in 1811 Regnault de Saint-Jean-d'Angely exclaimed, "The
unhappy man will undo himself, undo us all, undo everything." The
Emperor heard neither of these last forebodings, but is doubtfully
reported to have himself declared, "I am driven onward to a goal which I
know not." Caulaincourt made no secret of how his anxiety increased as
he knew Russia better. He was recalled because, having learned Russia's
pride and Russia's resources, he made no attempt to conceal his aversion
to the final arbitrament of bloodshed. Poniatowski believed Lithuania
would refuse to rise against her despot; Segur and Duroc foresaw that
France, if degraded to be but one province of a great empire, would lose
her enthusiasm; even Fouche, having been permitted, on the plea of
ill-health, to return from his exile in Italy, ventured to draw up a
vigorous and comprehensive memorial against war, and instanced the fate
of Charles XII. The contents of Fouche's paper were divulged to Napoleon
by a spy, and when the author presented it he was met by contemptuous
sarcasm. The Emperor believed Prussia to be helpless, chiding Davout for
his doleful reports of the new temper which had been developed. Jomini
declared, but long afterward, that the great captain had avowed to a
confidential friend his eagerness for the excitement of battle.
But in spite of the anxiety felt by a few leading Frenchmen, there was
general confidence, and it was not until after the catastrophe that
details like those enumerated were recalled. It is customary to
attribute Napoleon's zeal for war to the fiery counsels of Maret. But
there is no necessity to seek any scapegoat. In reality the outlook in
1812 was better than in 1809. Napoleon's spirits were higher, his
conscripts were not visibly worse than any drafted since the beginning
of the Consulate, and the veteran Coignet's remark concerning the
march to Russia is that "Providence and courage never abandon the good
soldier." As to the commander-in-chief, he had largely forsaken his
licentious courses, partly from reasons of policy, partly because of
his sincere attachment to wife and child. Throughout the years of
youth and early manhood he had indulged his amorous passions, but
until his second marriage not a single woman had been preferred to
power, not even Josephine. Maria Louisa, however, was an imperial
consort, for whom no attention, no elevation, was too great. Pliant
while an Austrian archduchess, she remained so as empress, apparently
without will or enterprise. Men felt, nevertheless, that, remaining an
Austrian externally, she was probably still one at heart, perhaps a
mere lure thrown out to keep the hawk from other quarry. There was
much in her subsequent conduct to justify such suspicions, but the
utter shamelessness of her later years argues rather the
self-abandonment of one in revolt against the rigid social restraints
and personal annihilation of early life. The hours which Napoleon
spent with her were so many that he laid himself open to the charge of
uxoriousness. The physician attendant at the birth of the infant King
of Rome declared that the mother would succumb to a second
confinement, and the father exercised a self-restraint consonant with
the consideration he had displayed at the birth of his heir. He was
the squire and constant attendant of his spouse, her riding-master
even, and often her playfellow in the romps of which she was still
fond. Scenes of idyllic bliss were daily observed by the keen eyes of
the attendants. The choice of governesses, tutors, and servants for
the little prince was personally superintended by his sire, and every
detail of the feeding, dressing, and airing of the prospective emperor
was the subject of minute inquiry and regulation. When it was clear
that war was imminent, Napoleon seemed for the first time ready to
abandon his abhorrence for female governance. Certainly his domestic
happiness had not sapped his moral power; possibly it rendered him
over-anxious at times, and, perhaps in revulsion from anxiety,
over-confident.
During two years of diplomatic fencing the initiative had been
Russian, the instigation French. For the war which followed no single
cause can be assigned. Some blamed Napoleon, claiming that with his
scheme of universal empire it was inevitable; Metternich said Russia
had brought on war in an unpardonable manner. The Tilsit alliance was
personal; the separation of the contracting parties inevitably
weakened it. The affiliations of the Russian aristocracy with the
Austrian; the smart of both under the Continental System, which
rendered their agriculture unprofitable; England's stand under
Castlereagh; the Oldenburg question--all these were cumulative in
their effect. With Alexander, Poland and the Continental System were
the real difficulties; the marriage question was only secondary. On
January twelfth, 1812, the Czar with mournful and solemn mien declared
his hands clean of blood-guiltiness and laid down his ultimatum. To
the concentration of Russian troops Napoleon had replied by sending
his own to Erfurt and Magdeburg. Alexander formally stated his
readiness to take back his own move if the Emperor would withdraw the
French soldiers; he would even accept Erfurt for Oldenburg, and permit
Warsaw to be capital of a Saxon province. But he said not a word about
the Continental System, being fully determined not to yield one jot,
and for Napoleon this was the primary matter. Alexander's ultimatum by
its clever form compelled his ally either to abandon the scheme of
Western empire or to fight. Both parties to the Tilsit alliance
understood that with European harbors shut to English trade, Great
Britain must cease to support the Spanish insurrection, which in that
case a few thousand troops could hold in check. Then the great scheme
of revolutionary extension which had been inaugurated by the
Convention and logically developed by Napoleon step by step in every
war and treaty since Campo Formio would in a few short years be
complete. But two real powers would thus remain in continental
Europe--France and Russia. They could by united action crush British
power both by land and by sea. To dash this brimming cup from his lips
was for Napoleon an insupportable thought. With the hope, apparently,
of securing from the Czar the last essential concession, he set his
troops in motion toward the Vistula on the very day after his treaty
with Prussia was signed.
The natural counter-move to Napoleon's advance would be the invasion
of Warsaw; although the new Poland was fortified for defense, yet it
might be overwhelmed before assistance could reach the garrisons.
Moreover, there were ominous signs in France at the opening of 1812.
Food supplies were scarce, and speculators were buying such as there
were. Napoleon felt he must remain yet a little while to check such an
outrage and to strengthen public confidence. Ostensibly to avoid a
final rupture, but really to prevent the premature opening of war, he
therefore summoned Czernicheff, the Czar's aide-de-camp, who, as a
kind of licensed spy, had been hovering near him for three years past,
and offered to accept every item of the Russian ultimatum, if only an
equitable treaty of commerce could be substituted for the ukase of
December, 1810; in other words, if Alexander would agree to observe
the letter and spirit of the Continental System. During the two months
intervening before the Czar's reply not a Cossack set foot on Polish
soil, while day by day Napoleon's armies flowed onward across Europe
toward the plains of Russia, and a temporary remedy for the economic
troubles of France was found. When, late in April, the answer came, it
was, as expected, a declaration that without the neutral trade Russia
could not live; she would modify the ukase somewhat, but, as a
condition antecedent to peace, France must evacuate Prussia and make
better terms with Sweden. On May first the French army reached the
Vistula; on May ninth Napoleon and his consort started for Dresden,
whither all the allied sovereigns had been summoned to pay their court
as vassals to the second Charles the Great.
The surge of German patriotism had nearly drowned Napoleon in 1809,
but for manifest reasons it had again receded. The Austrian marriage
had withdrawn the house of Hapsburg from the leadership of Germany;
the imperial progress to Dresden and the high imperial court held
there were intended to dazzle the masses of Europe, possibly to
intimidate the Czar. The French were genuinely enthusiastic; the
Germans displayed no spite; princes, potentates, and powers swelled
the train; all the monarchs of the coalition, under Francis as dean of
the corps, stood in array to receive the august Emperor. From the
spectacular standpoint Dresden is the climax of the Napoleonic drama.
Surrounded by men who at least bore the style of sovereigns, the
Corsican victor stood alone in the focus of monarchical splendor. At
his side, and resplendent, not in her own but in his glory, was the
daughter of the Caesars, the child of a royal house second to none in
antiquity or majesty, his wife, his consort, his defiance to a passing
system. Maria Louisa was as haughty as the Western Empress should be,
patronizing her father and stepmother, and boasting how superior the
civilization of Paris was to that of Vienna. It was during these days
that she first saw Neipperg, the Austrian chamberlain, who was later
her morganatic husband. Napoleon appeared better: self-possessed,
moderate, and genial. His vassals and his relatives, his marshals and
his generals, all seemed content, and even merry. The King of Prussia
had lost his beautiful and unfortunate queen; he alone wore a sad
countenance. Yet it was rumored that the Prussian crown prince was a
suitor for one of Napoleon's nieces. Beneath the gay exterior were
many sad, bitter, perplexed hearts. The Emperor was seldom seen except
as a lavish host at public entertainments; most of the time he spent
behind closed doors with the busy diplomats. As a last resort,
Narbonne was sent to Russia, ostensibly to invite Alexander's presence
in the interest of peace; actually, of course, to get a final glimpse
of his preparations. The Abbe de Pradt was despatched into Poland to
fan the enthusiasm for France.
This unparalleled court was dismissed on May twenty-eighth, the
Empress returning by way of Prague to Paris, Napoleon hastening by
Posen and Warsaw to Thorn. The Poles were exuberant in their delight;
they little knew that their supposed liberator had bargained away
Galicia to Francis in return for Austrian support. For this betrayal,
and his general contempt of the Poles, he was to pay dearly. Had he
labored sincerely to organize a strong nucleus of Polish nationality,
a coalition of Russia, Prussia, and Austria such as finally
overwhelmed him would have been difficult, perhaps impossible. But the
founder of an imperial dynasty could not trust a Polish democracy.
When the Diet, sitting at Warsaw, besought him to declare the
existence of Poland, he criticized the taste which made them compose
their address in French instead of Polish, and gave a further inkling
of his temper by sending his Austrian contingent to serve in Volhynia,
so that neither French nor Polish enthusiasm might rouse the Russian
Poles. When he reached Vilna he found that the impassive Lithuanians
had no intention of rising against Russia, and no attempt was made to
rouse them. If, as appears, his first intention had been to wage a
frontier campaign, that plan was quickly changed. Retaining Venice
and Triest for use against the Orient, with Austria virtually a member
of his system, he determined to force Russia back on to the confines
of Europe, perhaps into Asia, and then--Who can say? It seems as if
Poland was to have been divided into French departments instead of
being erected into another troublesome nation, vassal state, or
semi-autonomous power.
At the opening of the Russian campaign the gradual change which had
been steadily going on in Napoleon's physique was complete. He was now
plethoric, and slow in all his movements. Occasionally there were
exhibitions of quickened sensibility, which have been interpreted as
symptoms of an irregular epilepsy; but in general his senses, like his
expression, were dull. He had premonitions of a painful disease
(dysuria), which soon developed fully. His lassitude was noticeable,
and when he roused himself it was often for trivialities. In other
campaigns he had stolen away from Paris in military simplicity; this
time he had brought the pomp of a court. He planned, too, to bring
theater companies and opera troupes to the very seat of war. Above
all, he was deeply concerned with his imperial state, having in his
trunks the baubles and dress he had worn at his coronation in Notre
Dame. His bearing was proud, but there was no sparkle in his eye; he
seemed spiritless and ailing; he showed no confidence in his
magnificent army.
The haughty, exacting mien of 1812 was very different from the
half-jocular, half-sarcastic curl of the lip and sparkle of the eye
which had inspired his followers in former days quite as much as his
stirring, incisive harangues. Yet careful study will prove that his
sagacity as a great captain was in no way dimmed; his military
combinations were greater than any he had ever formed. As no parallel
to the numbers engaged in this enterprise can be found in European
story, nothing comparable to its organization can be found in the
history of any land or age. Every corps had its ammunition-train, and
great reserves of supplies were stored in Modlin, Thorn, Pillau,
Dantzic, and Magdeburg. In the two last-named arsenals were
siege-trains for beleaguering Duenaburg and Riga. There were pontoons
and bridge material in abundance; one thousand three hundred and fifty
field-pieces, and eighteen thousand horses to draw them. The
commissary stores were prodigious, and there were thousands of
ox-wagons to transport them. The cattle were eventually to be
slaughtered and eaten. In various convenient strongholds there were,
besides, stores for four hundred thousand men for fifty days. Knowing
Russia, he had prepared to conquer streams and morasses, to feed the
army without fear of a devastating population, and to trust the seat
of war for nothing except forage. His strategic plan was amazing,
containing, as it did, the old elements of unexpected concentration,
of breaking through the opposing line, of conclusive victory, and
occupation of the enemy's capital. It was carried also to successful
completion, and in one respect the execution was fine. The obstacles
to be surmounted made every movement slow, and while a vast,
complicated military organization may be reliable for weeks, to make
it work for months requires qualities of greatness which increase in
geometrical ratio according to the extension of time. Twice Napoleon
bared his inmost thought, once to Metternich in Dresden, once to
Jomini at a dinner company in Vilna. The first season he intended to
seize Minsk and Smolensk, winter there, and organize his conquests. If
this should not produce a peace, he would advance in the following
season into the heart of the country, and there await the Czar's
surrender. To his army he issued an address as direct and ringing as
that which had echoed sixteen years before across the plains of
Lombardy. Its substance is that the second Polish war would bring the
same renown to French arms as the first, but the peace would be such
as should end forever the haughty interference of Russia in European
affairs. It seemed to those who heard it as if Russia's hour had
struck.