CHAPTER XXXVI.

_Retrospect of the Partition of Poland--Napoleon receives addresses

from Poland, which he evades--He advances into Poland, Bennigsen

retreating before him--Character of the Russian Soldiery--The

Cossacks--Engagement at Pultusk, on 26th November, terminating to

the disadvantage of the French--Bennigsen continues his retreat--The

French go into winter quarters--Bennigsen appointed

Commander-in-chief in the place of Kaminskoy, who shows symptoms of

insanity--He resumes offensive operations--Battle of Eylau, 8th

February, 1807--Claimed as a victory by both parties--The loss on

both sides amounts to 50,000 men killed, the greater part

Frenchmen--Bennigsen retreats upon Königsberg--Napoleon offers

favourable terms for an Armistice to the King of Prussia, who

refuses to treat, save for a general Peace--Napoleon falls back to

the line of the Vistula--Dantzick is besieged, and

surrenders--Russian army is poorly recruited--the French

powerfully--Actions during the Summer--Battle of Heilsberg, and

retreat of the Russians--Battle of Friedland, 14th June--An

Armistice takes place on the 23d._

[Sidenote: POLAND.]

Napoleon was politically justified in the harsh terms which he was

desirous to impose on Prussia, by having now brought his victorious

armies to the neighbourhood of Poland in which he had a good right to

conceive himself sure to find numerous followers and a friendly

reception.

The partition of this fine kingdom by its powerful neighbours, Russia,

Austria, and Prussia, was the first open and audacious transgression of

the law of nations, which disgraced the annals of civilized Europe. It

was executed by a combination of three of the most powerful states of

Europe against one too unhappy in the nature of its constitution, and

too much divided by factions to offer any effectual resistance. The

kingdom subjected to this aggression had appealed in vain to the code of

nations for protection against an outrage, to which, after a desultory

and uncombined, and therefore a vain defence, she saw herself under the

necessity of submitting. The Poles retained, too, a secret sense of

their fruitless attempt to recover freedom in 1791, and an animated

recollection of the violence by which it had been suppressed by the

Russian arms. They waited with hope and exultation the approach of the

French armies; and candour must allow, that, unlawfully subjected as

they had been to a foreign yoke, they had a right to avail themselves of

the assistance, not only of Napoleon, but of Mahomet, or of Satan

himself, had he proposed to aid them in regaining the independence of

which they had been oppressively and unjustly deprived.[258]

This feeling was general among the middling classes of the Polish

aristocracy, who recollected with mortified pride the diminution of

their independent privileges, the abrogation of their Diets, and the

suppression of the _Liberum Veto_, by which a private gentleman might

render null the decision of a whole assembly, unless unanimity should be

attained, by putting the dissentient to death upon the spot.[259] But

the higher order of nobility, gratified by the rank they held, and the

pleasures they enjoyed at the courts of Berlin, Vienna, and especially

at Petersburgh, preferred in general the peaceful enjoyment of their

immense estates to the privileges of a stormy independence, which raised

the most insignificant of the numerous aristocracy to a rank and

importance nearly resembling their own. They might, too, with some

justice, distrust the views of Napoleon, though recommended by the most

specious promises. The dominion of Russia, in particular, from

similarity of manners, and the particular attention paid to their

persons and interests, was not so unpopular among the higher branches of

the aristocracy as might have been expected, from the unjust and

arbitrary mode in which she had combined to appropriate so large a part

of their once independent kingdom. These did not, therefore, so

generally embrace the side of France as the minor nobles or gentry had

done. As for the ordinary mass of the population, being almost all in

the estate of serfage, or villanage, which had been general over Europe

during the prevalence of the feudal system, they followed their

respective lords, without pretending to entertain any opinion of their

own.

[Sidenote: ADDRESSES FROM POLAND.]

While Russia was marching her armies hastily forward, not only to

support, or rather raise up once more, her unfortunate ally the King of

Prussia, but to suppress any ebullition of popular spirit in Poland,

Buonaparte received addresses from that country, which endeavoured to

prevail on him to aid them in their views of regaining their

independence. Their application was of a nature to embarrass him

considerably. To have declared himself the patron of Polish

independence, might have, indeed, brought large forces to his

standard--might have consummated the disasters of Prussia, and greatly

embarrassed even Russia herself; and so far policy recommended to

Napoleon to encourage their hopes of her restored independence. But

Austria had been a large sharer in the various partitions of Poland, and

Austria, humbled as she had been, was still a powerful state, whose

enmity might have proved formidable, if, by bereaving her of her Polish

dominions, or encouraging her subjects to rebel, Buonaparte had provoked

her to hostilities, at the time when he himself and the best part of his

forces were engaged in the North of Europe. The same attempt would have

given a very different character to the war, which Russia at present

waged only in the capacity of the auxiliary of Prussia. The safety and

integrity of the Russian empire, south of the Volga, depends almost

entirely upon the preservation of those territories which she has

acquired in Poland; and, if she had engaged in the war as a principal,

Buonaparte was scarcely yet prepared to enter upon a contest with the

immense power of that empire, which must be waged upon the very frontier

of the enemy, and as near to their resources as he was distant from his

own. It might have been difficult, also, to have stated any consistent

grounds, why he, who had carved out so many new sovereignties in Europe

with the point of the sword, should reprobate the principle of the

partition of Poland. Influenced by these motives, the modern setter-up

and puller-down of kings abstained from re-establishing the only

monarchy in Europe, which he might have new-modelled to his mind, in the

character not of a conqueror, but a liberator.

While Napoleon declined making any precise declaration, or binding

himself by any express stipulations to the Polish delegates, the

language he used to them was cautiously worded, so as to keep up their

zeal and animate their exertions. Dombrowski,[260] a Polish exile in the

French army, was employed to raise men for Napoleon's service, and the

enthusiasm of those who entered, as well as the expectations of the

kingdom at large, were excited by such oracular passages as the

following, which appeared in the thirty-sixth bulletin:--"Is the throne

of Poland to be re-established, and will that great nation regain her

existence and independence? Will she be recalled to life, as if summoned

to arise from the tomb?--God only, the great disposer of events, can be

the arbiter of this great political problem."[261]

The continuance of war was now to be determined upon; a war to be waged

with circumstances of more than usual horror, as it involved the

sufferings of a winter campaign in the northern latitudes. The French,

having completely conquered the Prussian estates to the east of the

Oder, had formed the sieges of Great Glogau, of Breslau, and of

Graudentz, and were at the same time pushing westward to occupy Poland.

The Russian general, Bennigsen, had on his side pressed forward for the

purpose of assisting the Prussians, and had occupied Warsaw. But finding

that their unfortunate allies had scarcely the remnant of an army in the

field, the Russian general retreated after some skirmishes, and

recrossed the Vistula, while the capital of Poland, thus evacuated, was

entered on the 28th November by Murat, at the head of the French

vanguard.

About the 25th, Napoleon, leaving Berlin, had established himself at

Posen, a central town of Poland, which country began to manifest an

agitation, partly the consequence of French intrigues, partly arising

from the animating prospect of restored independence. The Poles resumed

in many instances their ancient national dress and manners, and sent

deputies to urge the decision of Buonaparte in their favour. The

language in which they entreated his interposition, resembled that of

Oriental idolatry. "The Polish nation," said Count Radyiminiski, the

Palatine of Gnesna, "presents itself before your Majesty, groaning still

under the yoke of German nations, and salutes with the purest joy the

regenerator of their dear country, the legislator of the universe. Full

of submission to your will, they adore you, and repose on you with

confidence all their hopes, as upon him who has the power of raising

empires and destroying them, and of humbling the proud." The address of

the President of the Judicial Council-Chamber of the Regency of Poland,

was not less energetic. "Already," he said, "we see our dear country

saved; for in your person we adore the most just and the most profound

Solon. We commit our fate and our hopes into your hands, and we implore

the mighty protection of the most august Cæsar."

Not even these Eastern hyperboles could extort any thing from Buonaparte

more distinctly indicative of his intentions, than the obscure hints we

have already mentioned.

In the meanwhile, Warsaw was put into a state of defence, and the

auxiliary forces of Saxony and the new confederates of the Rhine were

brought up by forced marches, while strong reinforcements from France

repaired the losses of the early part of the campaign.

The French army at length advanced in full force, and crossed

successively the rivers Vistula and Bug, forcing a passage wherever it

was disputed. But it was not the object of Bennigsen to give battle to

forces superior to his own, and he therefore retreated behind the Wkra,

and was joined by the large bodies of troops commanded by Generals

Buxhowden and Kaminskoy. The latter took the general command. He was a

contemporary of Suwarrow, and esteemed an excellent officer, but more

skilled in the theory than the practice of war. "Kaminskoy," said

Suwarrow, "knows war, but war does not know him--I do not know war, but

war knows me." It appears also, that during this campaign Kaminskoy was

afflicted with mental alienation.

On the 23d December, Napoleon arrived in person upon the Wkra, and

ordered the advance of his army in three divisions. Kaminskoy, when he

saw the passage of this river forced, determined to retreat behind the

Niemen, and sent orders to his lieutenants accordingly. Bennigsen,

therefore, fell back upon Pultusk, and Prince Galitzin upon Golymin,

both pursued by large divisions of the French army. The Russian Generals

Buxhowden and D'Anrep also retreated in different directions, and

apparently without maintaining a sufficiently accurate communication

either with Bennigsen, or with Galitzin. In their retrograde movements

the Russians sustained some loss, which the bulletins magnified to such

an extent, as to represent their army as entirely disorganised, their

columns wandering at hazard in unimaginable disorder, and their safety

only caused by the shortness of the days, the difficulties of a country

covered with woods and intersected with ravines, and a thaw which had

filled the roads with mud to the depth of five feet. It was, therefore,

predicted, that although the enemy might possibly escape from the

position in which he had placed himself, it must necessarily be effected

at the certain loss of his artillery, his carriages, and his

baggage.[262]

[Sidenote: THE RUSSIAN SOLDIERY.]

These were exaggerations calculated for the meridian of Paris. Napoleon

was himself sensible, that he was approaching a conflict of a different

kind from that which he had maintained with Austria, and more lately

against Prussia. The common soldier in both those services was too much

levelled into a mere moving piece of machinery, the hundred-thousandth

part of the great machine called an army, to have any confidence in

himself, or zeal beyond the mere discharge of the task intrusted to him

according to the word of command. These troops, however highly

disciplined, wanted that powerful and individual feeling, which in

armies possessing a strong national character, (by which the Russians

are peculiarly distinguished,) induces the soldier to resist to the last

moment, even when resistance can only assure him of revenge. They were

still the same Russians, of whom Frederick the Great said, "that he

could kill, but could not defeat them;"--they were also strong of

constitution, and inured to the iron climate in which Frenchmen were now

making war for the first time;--they were accustomed from their earliest

life to spare nourishment and hardship;--in a word, they formed then, as

they do now, the sole instance in Europe of an army, the privates of

which are semi-barbarians, with the passions, courage, love of war, and

devotion to their country, which is found in the earlier periods of

society, while the education received by their superior officers places

them on a level with those of any other nation. That of the inferior

regimental officers is too much neglected; but they are naturally brave,

kind to the common soldier, and united among themselves like a family

of brothers,--attributes which go far to compensate the want of

information. Among the higher officers, are some of the best informed

men in Europe.

The Russian army was at this period deficient in its military staff, and

thence imperfect in the execution of combined movements; and their

generals were better accustomed to lead an army in the day of actual

battle, than to prepare for victory by a skilful combination of previous

manœuvres. But this disadvantage was balanced by their zealous and

unhesitating devotion to their Emperor and their country. There scarcely

existed a Russian, even of the lowest rank, within the influence of

bribery; and an officer, like the Prussian commandant of Hamelen, who

began to speculate upon retaining his rank in another service, when

surrendering the charge intrusted to him by his sovereign, would have

been accounted in Russia a prodigy of unexampled villany. In the mode of

disciplining their forces, the Russians proceeded on the system most

approved in Europe. Their infantry was confessedly excellent, composed

of men in the prime of life, and carefully selected as best qualified

for military service. Their artillery was of the first description, so

far as the men, guns, carriages, and appointments were concerned; but

the rank of General of Artillery had not the predominant weight in the

Russian army, which ought to be possessed by those particularly

dedicated to the direction of that arm, by which, according to Napoleon,

modern battles must be usually decided. The direction of their guns was

too often intrusted to general officers of the line. The service of

cavalry is less natural to the Russians than that of the infantry, but

their horse regiments are nevertheless excellently trained, and have

uniformly behaved well.

[Sidenote: COSSACKS--ACTION OF PULTUSK.]

But the Cossacks are a species of force belonging to Russia exclusively;

and although subsequent events have probably rendered every reader in

some degree acquainted with their national character, they make too

conspicuous a figure in the history of Napoleon, to be passed over

without a brief description here.

The natives on the banks of the Don and the Volga hold their lands by

military service, and enjoy certain immunities and prescriptions, in

consequence of which each individual is obliged to serve four years in

the Russian armies. They are trained from early childhood to the use of

the lance and sword, and familiarized to the management of a horse

peculiar to the country--far from handsome in appearance, but tractable,

hardy, swift, and surefooted, beyond any breed perhaps in the world. At

home, and with his family and children, the Cossack is kind, gentle,

generous, and simple; but when in arms, and in a foreign country, he

resumes the predatory, and sometimes the ferocious habits of his

ancestors, the roving Scythians. As the Cossacks receive no pay, plunder

is generally their object; and as prisoners were esteemed a useless

encumbrance, they granted no quarter, until Alexander promised a ducat

for every Frenchman whom they brought in alive. In the actual field of

battle, their mode of attack is singular. Instead of acting in line, a

body of Cossacks about to charge, disperse at the word of command, very

much in the manner of a fan suddenly flung open, and, joining in a loud

yell, or _hourra_, rush, each acting individually, upon the object of

attack, whether infantry, cavalry, or artillery, to all of which they

have been, in this wild way of fighting, formidable assailants. But it

is as light cavalry that the Cossacks are perhaps unrivalled. They and

their horses have been known to march one hundred miles in twenty-four

hours without halting. They plunge into woods, swim rivers, thread

passes, cross deep morasses, and penetrate through deserts of snow,

without undergoing material loss, or suffering from fatigue. No Russian

army, with a large body of Cossacks in front, can be liable to surprise;

nor, on the other hand, can an enemy surrounded by them ever be

confident against it. In covering the retreat of their own army, their

velocity, activity and courage, render pursuit by the enemy's cavalry

peculiarly dangerous; and in pursuing a flying enemy, these qualities

are still more redoubtable. In the campaign of 1806-7, the Cossacks took

the field in great numbers, under their celebrated Hettman, or Attaman,

Platow, who, himself a Cossack, knew their peculiar capacity for

warfare, and raised their fame to a pitch which it had not attained in

former European wars.

The Russians had also in their service Tartar tribes, who in

irregularity resembled the Cossacks, but were not to be compared with

them in discipline or courage, being, in truth, little better than

hordes of roving savages.

It remains only to be mentioned, that at this time the Russian

commissariat was very indifferent, and, above all, deficient in funds.

The funds of the Imperial treasury were exhausted, and an aid, amounting

only to eighty thousand pounds, was obtained from England with

difficulty. In consequence of these circumstances, the Russians were

repeatedly, during the campaign, obliged to fight at disadvantage for

want of provisions.--We return to the progress of the war.

On the 25th of December, the Russian army of Bennigsen, closely

concentrated, occupied a position behind Pultusk; their left, commanded

by Count Ostermann, resting upon the town, which is situated on the

river Narew. A corps occupied the bridge, to prevent any attack from

that point. The right, under Barclay de Tolly, was strongly posted in a

wood, and the centre was under the orders of General Zachen. A

considerable plain extended between the town of Pultusk and the wood,

which formed the right of the Russian position. They had stationed a

powerful advanced guard, had occupied the plain with their cavalry, and

established a strong reserve in their rear. On the 26th, the Russian

position was attacked by the French divisions of Lannes and Davoust,

together with the French guards. After skirmishing some time in the

centre, without making the desired impression, the battle appeared

doubtful, when, suddenly assembling a great strength on their own left,

the French made a decisive effort to overwhelm the Russians, by turning

their right wing. The attack prevailed to a certain extent. The

accumulated and superior weight of fire determined Barclay de Tolly to

retreat on his reserves, which he did without confusion, while the

French seized upon the wood, and took several Russian guns. But

Bennigsen, in spite of Kaminskoy's order to retreat, was determined to

abide the brunt of battle, and to avail himself of the rugged

intrepidity of the troops which he commanded. Ordering Barclay de Tolly

to continue his retreat, and thus throwing back his right wing, he

enticed the French, confident in victory, to pursue their success, until

the Russian cavalry, which had covered the manœuvre, suddenly

withdrawing, they found themselves under a murderous and well-directed

fire from one hundred and twenty guns, which, extending along the

Russian front, played on the French advancing columns with the utmost

success. The Russian line at the same time advanced in turn, and,

pushing the enemy before them, recovered the ground from which they had

been driven. The approach of night ended the combat, which had been both

obstinate and bloody. The French lost near eight thousand men, killed

and wounded, including General Lannes and five other general officers

among the latter. The Russian loss amounted to five thousand. The French

retreated after nightfall with such rapidity, that on the next day the

Cossacks could not find a rear-guard in the vicinity of Pultusk.[263]

The action of Pultusk raised the reputation of Bennigsen, and the

character as well as the spirits of the Russian army; but its moral

effect on the soldiers was its only important consequence. Had Bennigsen

been joined during the action by the division of Buxhowden or D'Anrep,

of whom the former was only eight miles distant, the check might have

been converted into a victory, highly influential on the issue of the

campaign. But either the orders of Kaminskoy, or some misunderstanding,

prevented either of these corps from advancing to support the efforts of

Bennigsen. It became impossible for him, therefore, notwithstanding the

advantages he had obtained, to retain his position at Pultusk, where he

must have been surrounded. He accordingly fell back upon Ostrolenka,

where he was joined by Prince Galitzin, who had been engaged in action

at Golymin upon the day of the battle of Pultusk; had, like Bennigsen,

driven back the enemy, and like him had retreated for the purpose of

concentrating his forces with those of the grand army. The French

evinced a feeling of the unusual and obstinate nature of the contest in

which they had been engaged at Pultusk and Golymin. Instead of pressing

their operations, they retreated into winter quarters; Napoleon

withdrawing his guard as far as Warsaw,[264] while the other divisions

were cantoned in the towns to the eastward, but without attempting to

realize the prophecies of the bulletins concerning the approaching fate

of the Russian army.

The conduct of Kaminskoy began now to evince decided tokens of insanity.

He was withdrawn from the supreme command, which, with the general

approbation of the soldiers, was conferred upon Bennigsen. This general

was not equal in military genius to Suwarrow, but he seems to have been

well fitted to command a Russian army. He was active, hardy, and

enterprising, and showed none of that peculiarly fatal hesitation, by

which officers of other nations opposed to the French generals, and to

Buonaparte in particular, seem often to have been affected, as with a

sort of moral palsy, which disabled them for the combat at the very

moment when it seemed about to commence. On the contrary, Bennigsen

finding himself in a supreme command of ninety thousand men, was

resolved not to wait for Buonaparte's onset, but determined to

anticipate his motions; wisely concluding, that the desire of desisting

from active operations, which the French Emperor had evinced by

cantoning his troops in winter quarters, ought to be a signal to the

Russians again to take the field.

[Sidenote: ACTION OF MOHRUNGEN.]

The situation of the King of Prussia tended to confirm that

determination. This unfortunate monarch--well surely did Frederick

William then deserve that epithet--was cooped up in the town of

Königsberg, only covered by a small army of a few thousand men, and

threatened by the gradual approach of the divisions of Ney and

Bernadotte; so that the King's personal safety appeared to be in

considerable danger. Graudentz, the key of the Vistula, continued indeed

to hold out, but the Prussian garrison was reduced to distress, and the

hour of surrender seemed to be approaching. To relieve this important

fortress, therefore, and at the same time protect Königsberg, were

motives added to the other reasons which determined Bennigsen to resume

offensive operations. A severe and doubtful skirmish was fought near

Mohrungen,[265] in which the French sustained considerable loss. The

Cossacks spread abroad over the country, making numerous prisoners; and

the scheme of the Russian general succeeded so well, as to enable the

faithful L'Estocq to relieve Graudentz with reinforcements and

provisions.

By these daring operations, Buonaparte saw himself forced into a winter

campaign, and issued general orders for drawing out his forces, with the

purpose of concentrating them at Willenberg, in the rear of the

Russians, (then stationed at Mohrungen,) and betwixt them and their own

country. He proposed, in short, to force his enemies eastward towards

the Vistula, as at Jena he had compelled the Prussians to fight with

their rear turned to the Rhine. Bernadotte had orders to engage the

attention of Bennigsen upon the right, and detain him in his present

situation, or rather, if possible, induce him to advance eastward

towards Thorn, so as to facilitate the operation he meditated.

The Russian general learned Buonaparte's intention from an intercepted

despatch,[266] and changed his purpose of advancing on Ney and

Bernadotte. Marches and counter-marches took place, through a country at

all times difficult, and now covered with snow. The experience and

dexterity of the French secured some advantages; but these were fully

counterbalanced by the daily annoyance and loss which they in turn

sustained from Platow and his Cossacks. In cases where the French

retreated, the Scythian lances were always on their rear; and when the

Russians retired in turn, and were pursued by the French, with the same

venturous spirit which they had displayed against others, the latter

seldom failed to suffer for their presumption. There was found in the

spearmen of the Don and Wolga a natural and instinctive turn for

military stratagem, ambuscade, and sudden assault, which compelled the

French light troops to adopt a caution, very different from their usual

habits of audacity.

Bennigsen was aware that it was the interest of Russia to protract the

campaign in this manner. He was near his reinforcements, the French were

distant from theirs; every loss, therefore, told more in proportion on

the enemy, than on his army. On the other hand, the Russian army,

impatient of protracted hostilities, became clamorous for battle; for

the hardships of their situation were such as to give them every desire

to bring the war to a crisis. We have noticed the defects of the Russian

Commissariat. They were especially manifest during those campaigns, when

the leader was obliged more than once, merely from want of provisions,

to peril the fate of the war upon a general battle, which prudence would

have induced him to avoid. In those northern latitudes, and in the month

of February, the troops had no resource but to prowl about, and dig for

the hoards of provision concealed by the peasants. This labour, added to

their military duty, left them scarcely time to lie down; and when they

did so, they had no bed but the snow, no shelter but the wintry heaven,

and no covering but their rags.[267] The distresses of the army were so

extreme, that it induced General Bennigsen, against his judgment, to

give battle at all risks, and for this purpose to concentrate his forces

at Preuss-Eylau, which was pitched on as the field on which he proposed

to await Buonaparte.

[Sidenote: BATTLE OF PREUSS-EYLAU.]

In marching through Landsberg to occupy the selected ground, the Russian

rear-guard was exposed to a serious attack by the French, and was only

saved from great loss by the gallantry of Prince Bagration, who

redeemed, by sheer dint of fighting, the loss sustained by want of

conduct in defiling through the streets of a narrow village, while

pursued by an enterprising enemy. The Russian army lost 3000 men. On the

7th February, the same gallant prince, with the Russian rear-guard,

gained such decided advantages over the French van as nearly balanced

the loss at Landsberg, and gave time for the whole army to march through

the town of Preuss-Eylau, and to take up a position behind it. It had

been intended to maintain the town itself, and a body of troops had been

left for that purpose; but in the confusion attending the movement of so

large an army, the orders issued had been misunderstood, and the

division designed for this service evacuated the place so soon as the

rear-guard had passed through it.

A Russian division was hastily ordered to re-occupy Preuss-Eylau. They

found the French already in possession, and, although they dislodged

them, were themselves driven out in turn by another division of French,

to whom Buonaparte had promised the plunder of the town. A third

division of Russians was ordered to advance; for Bennigsen was desirous

to protract the contest for the town until the arrival of his heavy

artillery, which joined him by a different route. When it came up, he

would have discontinued the struggle for possession of Preuss-Eylau, but

it was impossible to control the ardour of the Russian columns, who

persevered in advancing with drums beating, rushed into the town, and

surprising the French in the act of sacking it, put many of them to the

bayonet, even in the acts of license which they were practising.

Preuss-Eylau, however, proved no place of shelter. It was protected by

no works of any kind; and the French, advancing under cover of the

hillocks and broken ground which skirt the village, threw their fire

upon the streets, by which the Russians sustained some loss. General

Barclay de Tolly was wounded, and his forces again evacuated the town,

which was once more and finally occupied by the French. Night fell, and

the combat ceased, to be renewed with treble fury on the next day.

The position of the two armies may be easily described. That of Russia

occupied a space of uneven ground, about two miles in length and a mile

in depth, with the village of Serpallen on their left; in the front of

their army lay the town of Preuss-Eylau, situated in a hollow, and in

possession of the French. It was watched by a Russian division; which,

to protect the Russian centre from being broken by an attack from that

quarter, was strongly reinforced, though by doing so the right wing was

considerably weakened. This was thought of the less consequence, that

L'Estocq, with his division of Prussians, was hourly expected to join

the Russians on that point. The French occupied Eylau with their left,

while their centre and right lay parallel to the Russians, upon a chain

of heights which commanded in a great measure the ground possessed by

the enemy. They also expected to be reinforced by the division of Ney,

which had not come up, and which was destined to form on the extreme

left.

The space betwixt the hostile armies was open and flat, and intersected

with frozen lakes. They might trace each other's position by the pale

glimmer of the watch-lights upon the snow. The difference of numerical

force was considerably to the advantage of the French. Sir Robert Wilson

rates them at 90,000 men, opposed to 60,000 only; but the disproportion

is probably considerably over-rated.[268]

The eventful action commenced with daybreak on the 8th of February. Two

strong columns of the French advanced, with the purpose of turning the

right, and storming the centre, of the Russians, at one and the same

time. But they were driven back in great disorder by the heavy and

sustained fire of the Russian artillery. An attack on the Russian left

was equally unsuccessful. The Russian infantry stood like stone

ramparts--they repulsed the enemy--their cavalry came to their support,

pursued the retiring assailants, and took standards and eagles. About

mid-day, a heavy storm of snow began to fall, which the wind drove right

in the face of the Russians, and which added to the obscurity caused by

the smoke of the burning village of Serpallen, that rolled along the

line.

Under cover of the darkness, six columns of the French advanced with

artillery and cavalry, and were close on the Russian position ere they

were opposed. Bennigsen, at the head of his staff, brought up the

reserves in person, who, uniting with the first line, bore the French

back at the point of the bayonet. Their columns, partly broken, were

driven again to their own position, where they rallied with difficulty.

A French regiment of cuirassiers, which, during this part of the action,

had gained an interval in the Russian army, were charged by the

Cossacks, and found their defensive armour no protection against the

lance. They were all slain except eighteen.[269]

At the moment when victory appeared to declare for the Russians, it was

on the point of being wrested from them. Davoust's division had been

manœuvring since the beginning of the action to turn the left, and

gain the rear, of the Russian line. They now made their appearance on

the field of battle with such sudden effect, that Serpallen was lost,

the Russian left wing, and a part of their centre, were thrown into

disorder, and forced to retire and change their front, so as to form

almost at right angles with the right, and that part of the centre which

retained their original position.

At this crisis, and while the French were gaining ground on the rear of

the Russians, L'Estocq, so long expected, appeared in his turn suddenly

on the field, and, passing the left of the French, and the right of the

Russians, pushed down in three columns to redeem the battle on the

Russian centre and rear. The Prussians, under that loyal and gallant

leader, regained in this bloody field their ancient military reputation.

They never fired till within a few paces of the enemy, and then used the

bayonet with readiness and courage. They redeemed the ground which the

Russians had lost, and drove back in their turn the troops of Davoust

and Bernadotte, who had been lately victorious.

Ney, in the meanwhile, appeared on the field, and occupied Schloditten,

a village on the road to Königsberg. As this endangered the

communication of the Russians with that town, it was thought necessary

to carry it by storm--a gallant resolution, which was successfully

executed.[270] This was the last act of the bloody day. It was ten

o'clock at night, and the combat was ended.[271]

Fifty thousand men perished in this dreadful battle--the best contested

in which Buonaparte had yet engaged, and by far the most unsuccessful.

He retired to the heights from which he had advanced in the morning,

without having gained one point for which he had struggled, and after

having suffered a loss considerably greater than that which he had

inflicted on the enemy. But the condition of the Russian army was also

extremely calamitous. Their generals held a council of war upon the

field of battle, and without dismounting from their horses. The general

sentiment which prevailed among them was, a desire to renew the battle

on the next day, at all hazards. Tolstoy undertook to move forward on

the French lines--L'Estocq urged the same counsel. They offered to

pledge their lives, that, would Bennigsen advance, Napoleon must

necessarily retire; and they urged the moral effect which would be

produced, not on their army only, but on Germany and on Europe, by such

an admission of weakness on the part of him who had never advanced but

to victory. But Bennigsen conceived that the circumstances of his army

did not permit him to encounter the hazard of being cut off from

Königsberg, and endangering the person of the King of Prussia; or that

of risking a second general action, with an army diminished by at least

20,000 killed and wounded, short of ammunition, and totally deprived of

provisions. The Russians accordingly commenced their retreat on

Königsberg that very night. The division of Count Ostermann did not move

till the next morning, when it traversed the field in front of

Preuss-Eylau, without the slightest interruption from the French, who

still occupied the town.[272]

The battle of Preuss-Eylau was claimed as a victory by both parties,

though it was very far from being decided in favour of either. Bennigsen

had it to boast, that he had repelled the attacks of Buonaparte along

the whole of his line, and that the fighting terminated unfavourably to

the French. He could also exhibit the unusual spectacle of twelve

imperial eagles of France, taken in one action. For many days after the

battle, also, the Cossacks continued to scour the country, and bring

into Königsberg great numbers of French prisoners. On the other hand,

the subsequent retreat of the Russians was interpreted by the French

into an acknowledgment of weakness; and they appealed to their own

possession of the field of battle, with the dead and wounded, as the

usual testimonials of victory.

But there were two remarkable circumstances by which Napoleon virtually

acknowledged that he had received an unusual check. On the 13th

February, four days after the battle, a message was despatched to the

King of Prussia by Buonaparte, proposing an armistice, on grounds far

more favourable to the Prince than those Frederick William might have

been disposed to accept, or which Buonaparte would have been inclined to

grant, after the battle of Jena. It was even intimated, that in case of

agreeing to make a separate peace, the Prussian King might obtain from

the French Emperor the restoration of his whole dominions. True to his

ally the Emperor of Russia, Frederick William, even in the extremity of

his distress, refused to accede to any save a general peace. The

proposal of an armistice was also peremptorily refused, and the ground

on which it was offered was construed to indicate Buonaparte's conscious

weakness.

Another decisive proof of the loss which Napoleon had sustained in the

battle of Preuss-Eylau, was his inactivity after the battle. For eight

days he remained without making any movement, excepting by means of his

cavalry, which were generally worsted, and on the 19th February he

evacuated the place, and prepared himself to retreat upon the Vistula,

instead of driving the Russians, as he had threatened, behind the

Pregel. Various actions took place, during his retreat, with different

fortunes, but the Russian Cossacks and light troops succeeded in making

numbers of prisoners, and collecting much spoil.

[Sidenote: DANTZIC.]

The operations of Napoleon, when he had again retired to the line of the

Vistula, intimated caution, and the sense of a difficult task before

him. He appeared to feel, that the advance into Poland had been

premature, while Dantzic remained in the hands of the Prussians, from

whence the most alarming operations might take place in his rear, should

he again advance to the Vistula without subduing it. The siege of

Dantzic was therefore to be formed without delay. The place was defended

by General Kalkreuth to the last extremity. After many unsuccessful

attempts to relieve it, Dantzic finally surrendered in the end of May

1807, after trenches had been opened before it for fifty-two days.[273]

If the season of the year had admitted, a British expedition to Dantzic

might, if ably conducted, have operated in the rear of the Emperor

Napoleon the relief of Prussia, and perhaps effected the liberation of

Europe.

The utmost care was also taken to supply the loss which Napoleon's

armies had sustained in these hard-fought campaigns. He raised the siege

of Colberg, drew the greater part of his forces out of Silesia, ordered

a new levy in Switzerland, urged the march of bodies of troops from

Italy, and, to complete his means, demanded a new conscription of the

year 1808, which was instantly complied with by the Senate as a matter

of course. At length, as summer approached, the surrender of Dantzic

enabled him to unite the besieging division, twenty-five thousand

strong, to his main army, and to prepare to resume offensive operations.

A large levy of Poles was made at the same time; and they, with other

light troops of the French, were employed in making strong

reconnoissances, with various fortune, but never without the exchange of

hard blows. It became evident to all Europe, that whatever might be the

end of this bloody conflict, the French Emperor was contending with a

general and troops, against whom it was impossible to gain those

overpowering and irresistible advantages, which characterised his

campaigns in Italy and Germany. The bulletins, it is true, announced new

successes from day to day; but as the geographical advance upon the

Polish territory was by no means in proportion to the advantages

claimed, it was plain that Napoleon was as often engaged in parrying as

in pushing, in repairing losses as in improving victories. The Russian

generals composed plans with skill, and executed them with activity and

spirit, for cutting off separate divisions, and disturbing the French

communications.

The Russian army had received reinforcements; but they were deficient in

numerical amount, and only made up their strength, at the utmost, to

their original computation of 90,000 men. This proved unpardonable

negligence in the Russian Government, considering the ease with which

men can there be levied to any extent by the mere will of the Emperor,

and the vital importance of the war which they were now waging. It is

said, however, that the poverty of the Russian Administration was the

cause of this failure to recruit their forces; and that the British

being applied to, to negotiate a loan of six millions, and advance one

million to account, had declined the transaction, and thereby given

great offence to the Emperor Alexander.

Napoleon, so much more remote from his own territories, had already, by

exertions unparalleled in the history of Europe, assembled two hundred

and eighty thousand men between the Vistula and Memel, including the

garrison of Dantzic. With such unequal forces the war recommenced.

The Russians were the assailants, making a combined movement on Ney's

division, which was stationed at Gutstadt, and in the vicinity. They

pursued him as far as Deppen, where there was some fighting; but upon

the 8th of June, Napoleon advanced in person to extricate his marshal,

and Bennigsen was obliged to retreat in his turn. He was hardly pressed

on the rear by the Grand Army of France. But even in this moment of

peril, Platow, with his Cossacks, made a charge, or, in their phrase, a

hourra, upon the French, with such success, that they not only dispersed

the skirmishers of the French vanguard, and the advanced troops destined

to support them, but compelled the infantry to form squares, endangered

the personal safety of Napoleon, and occupied the attention of the whole

French cavalry, who bore down on them at full speed. Musketry and

artillery were all turned on them at once, but to little or no purpose;

for, having once gained the purpose of checking the advance, which was

all they aimed at, the cloud of Cossacks dispersed over the field, like

mist before the sun, and united behind the battalions whom their

demonstration had protected.

By this means Platow and his followers had got before the retreating

division of the Russian army under Bagration, which they were expected

to support, and had reached first a bridge over the Aller. The Cossacks

were alarmed by the immense display of force demonstrated against them,

and showed a disposition to throw themselves confusedly on the bridge,

which must certainly have been attended with the most disastrous

consequences to the rear-guard, who would thus have been impeded in

their retreat by the very troops appointed to support them. The courage

and devotion of Platow prevented that great misfortune. He threw himself

from his horse. "Let the Cossack that is base enough," he exclaimed,

"desert his Hettman!" The children of the wilderness halted around him,

and he disposed them in perfect order to protect the retreat of

Bagration and the rear-guard, and afterwards achieved his own retreat

with trifling loss.[274]

[Sidenote: ACTION OF HEILSBERG.]

The Russian army fell back upon Heilsberg, and there concentrating their

forces made a most desperate stand. A very hard-fought action [10th

June] here took place. The Russians, overpowered by superior numbers,

and forced from the level ground, continued to defend with fury their

position on the heights, which the French made equally strenuous efforts

to carry by assault. The combat was repeatedly renewed, with cavalry,

infantry, and artillery, but without the fiery valour of the assailants

making any effectual impression on the iron ranks of the Russians.[275]

The battle continued, till the approach of midnight, upon terms of

equality; and when the morning dawned, the space of ground between the

position of the Russians and that of the French, was not merely strewed,

but literally sheeted over, with the bodies of the dead and

wounded.[276] The Russians retired unmolested after the battle of

Heilsberg, and crossing the river Aller, placed that barrier betwixt

them and the army of Buonaparte, which, though it had suffered great

losses, had, in consequence of the superiority of numbers, been less

affected by them than the Russian forces. In the condition of

Bennigsen's army, it was his obvious policy to protract the war,

especially as reinforcements, to the number of thirty thousand men, were

approaching the frontier from the interior of the empire. It was

probably with this view that he kept his army on the right bank of the

Aller, with the exception of a few bodies of cavalry, for the sake of

observation and intelligence.

On the 13th, the Russian army reached Friedland, a considerable town on

the west side of the Aller, communicating with the eastern, or right

bank of the river, by a long wooden bridge. It was the object of

Napoleon to induce the Russian general to pass by this narrow bridge to

the left bank, and then to decoy him into a general action, in a

position where the difficulty of defiling through the town, and over the

bridge, must render retreat almost impossible. For this purpose he

showed such a proportion only of his forces, as induced General

Bennigsen to believe that the French troops on the western side of the

Aller consisted only of Oudinot's division, which had been severely

handled in the battle of Heilsberg, and which he now hoped altogether to

destroy. Under this deception he ordered a Russian division to pass the

bridge, defile through the town, and march to the assault. The French

took care to offer no such resistance as should intimate their real

strength. Bennigsen was thus led to reinforce this division with

another--the battle thickened, and the Russian general at length

transported all his army, one division excepted, to the left bank of the

Aller, by means of the wooden bridge and three pontoons, and arrayed

them in front of the town of Friedland, to overpower, as he supposed,

the crippled division of the French, to which alone he believed himself

opposed.[277]

[Sidenote: BATTLE OF FRIEDLAND.]

But no sooner had he taken this irretrievable step than the mask was

dropped. The French skirmishers advanced in force; heavy columns of

infantry began to show themselves; batteries of cannon were got into

position; and all circumstances concurred, with the report of prisoners,

to assure Bennigsen, that he, with his enfeebled forces, was in presence

of the grand French army. His position, a sort of plain, surrounded by

woods and broken ground, was difficult to defend; with the town and a

large river in his rear, it was dangerous to attempt a retreat, and to

advance was prevented by the inequality of his force. Bennigsen now

became anxious to maintain his communication with Wehlau, a town on the

Pregel, which was the original point of retreat, and where he hoped to

join with the Prussians under General L'Estocq. If the enemy should

seize the bridge at Allerberg, some miles lower down the Aller than

Friedland, this plan would become impossible, and he found himself

therefore obliged to diminish his forces, by detaching six thousand men

to defend that point. With the remainder of his force he resolved to

maintain his present position till night.

The French advanced to the attack about ten o'clock. The broken and

wooded country which they occupied, enabled them to maintain and renew

their efforts at pleasure, while the Russians, in their exposed

situation, could not make the slightest movement without being observed.

Yet they fought with such obstinate valour, that at noon the French

seemed sickening of the contest, and about to retire. But this was only

a feint, to repose such of their forces as had been engaged, and to

bring up reinforcements. The cannonade continued till about half past

four, when Buonaparte brought up his full force in person, for the

purpose of one of those desperate and generally irresistible efforts to

which he was wont to trust the decision of a doubtful day. Columns of

enormous power, and extensive depth, appeared partially visible among

the interstices of the wooded country, and, seen from the town of

Friedland, the hapless Russian army looked as if surrounded by a deep

semicircle of glittering steel. The attack upon all the line, with

cavalry, infantry, and artillery, was general and simultaneous, the

French advancing with shouts of assured victory; while the Russians,

weakened by the loss of at least twelve thousand killed and wounded,

were obliged to attempt that most dispiriting and dangerous of

movements--a retreat through encumbered defiles, in front of a superior

enemy. The principal attack was on the left wing, where the Russian

position was at length forced. The troops which composed it streamed

into the town, and crowded the bridge and pontoons; the enemy thundered

on their rear, and without the valour of Alexander's Imperial Guard, the

Russians would have been utterly destroyed. These brave soldiers charged

with the bayonet the corps of Ney, who led the French vanguard,

disordered his column, and, though they were overpowered by numbers,

prevented the total ruin of the left wing.

Meanwhile, the bridge and pontoons were set on fire, to prevent the

French, who had forced their way into the town, from taking possession

of them. The smoke rolling over the combatants, increased the horror and

confusion of the scene; yet a considerable part of the Russian infantry

escaped through a ford close by the town, which was discovered in the

moment of defeat. The Russian centre and right, who remained on the west

bank of the Aller, effected a retreat by a circuitous route, leaving on

the right the town of Friedland, with its burning bridges, no longer

practicable for friend or foe, and passing the Aller by a ford

considerably farther down the river. This also was found out in the very

moment of extremity--was deep and dangerous, took the infantry up to the

breast, and destroyed what ammunition was left in the tumbrils.

Thus were the Russians once more united on the right bank of the Aller,

and enabled to prosecute their march towards Wehlau. Amid the calamities

of defeat, they had saved all their cannon except seventeen, and

preserved their baggage. Indeed, the stubborn character of their defence

seems to have paralysed the energies of the victor, who, after carrying

the Russian position, showed little of that activity in improving his

success, which usually characterised him upon such occasions. He pushed

no troops over the Aller in pursuit of the retreating enemy, but

suffered Bennigsen to rally his broken troops without interruption.

Neither, when in possession of Friedland, did he detach any force down

the left bank, to act upon the flank of the Russian centre and right,

and cut them off from the river. In short, the battle of Friedland,

according to the expression of a French general, was a battle gained,

but a victory lost.[278]

Yet the most important consequences resulted from the action, though the

French success had been but partially improved. Königsberg,[279] which

had been so long the refuge of the King of Prussia, was evacuated by his

forces, as it became plain his Russian auxiliaries could no longer

maintain the war in Poland.[280] Bennigsen retreated to Tilsit, towards

the Russian frontiers. But the moral consequences of the defeat were of

far greater consequence than could have been either the capture of guns

and prisoners, or the acquisition of territory. It had the effect,

evidently desired by Napoleon, of disposing the Emperor Alexander to

peace. The former could not but feel that he was engaged with a more

obstinate enemy in Russia, than any he had yet encountered. After so

many bloody battles, he was scarce arrived on the frontiers of an

immense empire, boundless in its extent, and almost inexhaustible in

resources; while the French, after suffering extremely in defeating an

army that was merely auxiliary, could scarce be supposed capable of

undertaking a scheme of invasion so gigantic, as that of plunging into

the vast regions of Muscovy.

Such an enterprise would have been peculiarly hazardous in the situation

in which the French Emperor now stood. The English expedition to the

Baltic was daily expected. Gustavus was in Swedish Pomerania, at the

head of a considerable army which had raised the siege of Stralsund. A

spirit of resistance was awakening in Prussia, where the resolute

conduct of Blucher had admirers and imitators, and the nation seemed to

be reviving from the consternation inflicted by the defeat of Jena. The

celebrated Schill, a partisan of great courage and address, had gained

many advantages, and was not unlikely, in a nation bred to arms, to

acquire the command of a numerous body of men. Hesse, Hanover,

Brunswick, and the other provinces of Germany, deprived of their ancient

princes, and subjected to heavy exactions by the conquerors, were ripe

for insurrection. All these dangers were of a nature from which little

could be apprehended, while the Grand Army was at a moderate distance;

but were it to advance into Russia, especially were it to meet with a

check there, these sparks of fire, left in the rear, might be expected

to kindle a dreadful conflagration.

Moved by such considerations, Napoleon had fully kept open the door for

reconciliation betwixt the Czar and himself, abstaining from all those

personal reflections against him, which he usually showered upon those

who thwarted his projects, and intimating more than once, by different

modes of communication, that a peace, which should enable Russia and

France to divide the world betwixt them, should be placed within

Alexander's reach so soon as he was disposed to accept it.

[Sidenote: ARMISTICE.]

The time was now arrived when the Emperor of Russia was disposed to

listen to terms of accommodation with France. He had been for some time

dissatisfied with his allies. Against Frederick William, indeed, nothing

could be objected, save his bad fortune; but what is it that so soon

deprives us of our friends as a constant train of bad luck, rendering us

always a burden more than an aid to them? The King of Sweden was a

feeble ally at best, and had become so unpopular with his subjects, that

his dethronement was anticipated; and it was probably remembered, that

the Swedish province of Finland extended so near to St. Petersburgh, as

to be a desirable acquisition, which, in the course of a treaty with

Buonaparte, might be easily attained.

The principal ally of the Czar had been Britain. But he was displeased,

as we have already noticed, with the economy of the English Cabinet, who

had declined, in his instance, the loans and subsidies, of which they

used to be liberal to allies of far less importance. A subsidy of about

eighty thousand pounds, was all which he had been able to extract from

them. England had, indeed, sent an army into the north to join the

Swedes, in forming the siege of Stralsund; but this was too distant an

operation to produce any effect upon the Polish campaign. Alexander was

also affected by the extreme sufferings of his subjects. His army had

been to him, as to most young sovereigns, a particular object of

attention; and he was justly proud of his noble regiments of Guards,

which, maltreated as they had been in the desperate actions of which we

have given some account, remained scarce the shadow of themselves, in

numbers and appearance. His fame, moreover, suffered little in

withdrawing from a contest in which he was engaged as an auxiliary only;

and Alexander was no doubt made to comprehend, that he might do more in

behalf of the King of Prussia, his ally, by negotiation, than by

continuation of the war. The influence of Napoleon's name, and the

extraordinary splendour of his talents and his exploits, must also have

had an effect upon the youthful imagination of the Russian Emperor. He

might be allowed to feel pride (high as his own situation was) that the

Destined Victor, who had subdued so many princes, was willing to

acknowledge an equality in his case; and he might not yet be so much

aware of the nature of ambition, as to know that it holds the world as

inadequate to maintain two co-ordinate sovereigns.

The Russian Emperor's wish of an armistice was first hinted at by

Bennigsen, on the 21st of June, was ratified on the 23d of the same

month, and was soon afterwards followed, not only by peace with Russia

and Prussia, on a basis which seemed to preclude the possibility of

future misunderstanding, but by the formation of a personal intimacy

and friendship between Napoleon and the only sovereign in Europe, who

had the power necessary to treat with him on an equal footing.

The negotiation for this important pacification was not conducted in the

usual style of diplomacy, but in that which Napoleon had repeatedly

shown a desire to substitute for the conferences of inferior agents, by

the intervention, namely, of the high-contracting parties in person.

The armistice was no sooner agreed upon, than preparations were made for

a personal interview betwixt the two Emperors.[281] It took place upon a

raft prepared for the purpose, and moored in the midst of the river

Niemen, which bore an immense tent or pavilion. At half-past nine, 25th

June, 1807, the two Emperors, in the midst of thousands of spectators,

embarked at the same moment from the opposite banks of the river.

Buonaparte was attended by Murat, Berthier, Bessières, Duroc, and

Caulaincourt; Alexander, by his brother the Archduke Constantine,

Generals Bennigsen and Ouwarrow, with the Count de Lieven, one of his

aides-de-camp. Arriving on the raft, they disembarked and embraced, amid

the shouts and acclamations of both armies, and entering the pavilion

which had been prepared, held a private conference of two hours. Their

officers, who remained at a distance during the interview, were then

reciprocally introduced, and the fullest good understanding seemed to be

established between the sovereigns, who had at their disposal so great a

portion of the universe.[282] It is not to be doubted, that on this

momentous occasion Napoleon exerted all those personal powers of

attraction, which, exercised on the part of one otherwise so

distinguished, rarely failed to acquire the good-will of all with whom

he had intercourse, when he was disposed to employ them.[283] He

possessed also, in an eminent degree, the sort of eloquence which can

make the worse appear the better reason, and which, turning into

ridicule the arguments derived from general principles of morality or

honesty, which he was accustomed to term idiosyncrasy, makes all

reasoning rest upon existing circumstances. Thus, all the maxims of

truth and honour might be plausibly parried by those arising out of

immediate convenience; and the direct interest, or what seemed the

direct interest, of the party whom he wished to gain over, was put in

immediate opposition to the dictates of moral sentiment, and of princely

virtue. In this manner he might plausibly represent, in many points,

that the weal of Alexander's empire might require him to strain some of

the maxims of truth and justice, and to do a little wrong in order to

attain a great national advantage.

The town of Tilsit was now declared neutral. Entertainments of every

kind followed each other in close succession, and the French and

Russian, nay, even the Prussian officers, seemed so delighted with each

other's society, that it was difficult to conceive that men, so

courteous and amiable, had been for so many months drenching trampled

snows and muddy wastes with each other's blood. The two Emperors were

constantly together in public and in private, and on those occasions

their intimacy approached to the character of that of two young men of

rank, who are comrades in sport or frolic, as well as accustomed to be

associates in affairs, and upon occasions, of graver moment. They are

well known to have had private and confidential meetings, where gaiety

and even gallantry seemed to be the sole purpose, but where politics

were not entirely forgotten.[284]

[Sidenote: THE KING OF PRUSSIA AT TILSIT.]

Upon the more public occasions, there were guests at the imperial

festivities, for which they contained small mirth. On the 28th, the

unfortunate King of Prussia arrived at Tilsit, and was presented to his

formidable victor. Buonaparte did not admit him to the footing of

equality on which he treated the Emperor Alexander, and made an early

intimation, that it would only be for the purpose of obliging his

brother of the North, that he might consent to relax his grasp on the

Prussian territories. Those in the King's own possession were reduced to

the petty territory of Memel, with the fortresses of Colberg and

Graudentz. It was soon plain, that the terms on which he was to be

restored to a part of his dominions, would deprive Prussia of almost all

the accessions which had been made since 1773, under the system and by

the talents of the Great Frederick, and reduce her at once from a

first-rate power in Europe to one of the second class.

The beautiful and unfortunate Queen, whose high spirit had hastened the

war, was anxious, if possible, to interfere with such weight as female

intercession might use to diminish the calamities of the peace. It was

but on the first day of the foregoing April, that when meeting the

Emperor Alexander at Königsberg, and feeling the full difference

betwixt that interview and those at Berlin which preceded the war,

Alexander and Frederick William had remained locked for a time in each

other's arms; the former shedding tears of compassion, the latter of

grief. On the same occasion, the Queen, as she saluted the Emperor,

could only utter amidst her tears the words, "Dear cousin!" intimating

at once the depth of their distress, and their affectionate confidence

in the magnanimity of their ally. This scene was melancholy, but that

which succeeded it at Tilsit was more so, for it was embittered by

degradation. The Queen, who arrived at the place of treaty some days

after her husband, was now not only to support the presence of Napoleon,

in whose official prints she was personally abused, and who was the

author of all the misfortunes which had befallen her country; but if she

would in any degree repair these misfortunes, it could only be by

exciting his compassion, and propitiating his favour. "Forgive us," she

said, "this fatal war--the memory of the Great Frederick deceived us--we

thought ourselves his equals because we are his descendants--alas, we

have not proved such!" With a zeal for the welfare of Prussia, which

must have cost her own feelings exquisite pain, she used towards

Napoleon those arts of insinuation, by which women possessed of high

rank, great beauty, wit, and grace, frequently exercise an important

influence. Desirous to pay his court, Napoleon on one occasion offered

her a rose of uncommon beauty. The Queen at first seemed to decline

receiving the courtesy--then accepted it, adding the stipulation--"At

least with Magdeburg."[285] Buonaparte, as he boasted to Josephine, was

proof against these lady-like artifices, as wax-cloth is against rain.

"Your Majesty will be pleased to remember," he said, "that it is I who

offer, and that your Majesty has only the task of accepting."[286]

It was discourteous to remind the unfortunate princess how absolutely

she was at the mercy of the victor, and unchivalrous to dispute that a

lady, accepting a courtesy, has a right to conceive herself as

conferring an obligation, and is therefore entitled to annex a

condition. But it is true, on the other hand, as Napoleon himself urged,

that it would have been playing the gallant at a high price, if he had

exchanged towns and provinces in return for civilities. It is not

believed that the Queen of Prussia succeeded, to any extent, in

obtaining a modification of the terms to which her husband was

subjected; and it is certain, that she felt so deeply the distress into

which her country was plunged, that her sense of it brought her to an

untimely grave. The death of this interesting and beautiful Queen,[287]

not only powerfully affected the mind of her husband and family, but the

Prussian nation at large; who, regarding her as having died a victim to

her patriotic sorrow for the national misfortunes, recorded her fate as

one of the many injuries for which they were to call France and Napoleon

to a severe accompting.

[Sidenote: TREATY OF TILSIT.]

The terms imposed on Prussia by the treaty of Tilsit,[288] were briefly

these:--

That portion of Poland acquired by Prussia in the partition of 1772, was

disunited from that kingdom, and erected into a separate territory, to

be called the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. It was to be held by the King of

Saxony, under the character of Grand Duke; and it was stipulated that he

was to have direct communication with this new acquisition by means of a

military road across Silesia, a privilege likely to occasion constant

jealousy betwixt the courts of Berlin and Warsaw. Thus ended the hope of

the Poles to be restored to the condition of an independent nation. They

merely exchanged the dominion of one German master for another--Prussia

for Saxony, Frederick William for Augustus--the only difference being,

that the latter was descended from the ancient Kings of Poland. They

were, however, subjected to a milder and more easy yoke than that which

they had hitherto borne; nor does it appear that the King (as he had

been created) of Saxony derived any real addition of authority and

consequence from the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. It seems, indeed, probable,

that the erection of this sovereignty was the effect of a composition

between the Emperors; Napoleon, on the one hand, renouncing all attempts

at the liberation of Poland, which he could not have persevered in

without continuing the war with Russia, and perhaps with Austria also;

and Alexander consenting that Prussia should be deprived of her Polish

dominions, under the stipulation that they were to be transferred to

Saxony, from whose vicinity his empire could apprehend little danger.

The constitution arranged for the Grand Duchy, also, was such as was not

liable to lead to disturbances among those provinces of Poland which

were united with Austria and Russia. Slavery was abolished, and the

equality of legal rights among all ranks of citizens was acknowledged.

The Grand Duke held the executive power. A Senate, or Upper House, of

eighteen members, and a Lower House of nuncios, or deputies, amounting

to a hundred, passed into laws, or rejected at their pleasure, such

propositions as the Duke laid before them. But the Diets, the Pospolite,

the _Liberum Veto_, and all the other turbulent privileges of the Polish

nobles, continued abolished, as they had been under the Prussian

government.

Buonaparte made it his boast that he had returned the Prussian

territories, not to the House of Brandenburgh, but to Alexander; so that

if Frederick William yet reigned, it was only, he said, by the

friendship of Alexander,--"a term," he added, "which he himself did not

recognise in the vocabulary of sovereigns, under the head of state

affairs." Alexander, however, was not altogether so disinterested as

Buonaparte, with something like a sneer, thus seemed to insinuate. There

was excepted from the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, and added to the territory

of Russia at the expense of Prussia, the province of Bialystock, serving

materially to improve the frontier of the empire. Thus the Czar, in some

degree, profited by the distress of his ally. The apology for his

conduct must rest, first, on the strength of the temptation to stretch

his empire towards the Vistula, as a great natural boundary; secondly,

on the plea, that if he had declined the acquisition from a point of

delicacy, Saxony, not Prussia would have profited by his self-denial, as

the territory of Bialystock would, in that event, have gone to augment

the Duchy of Warsaw. Russia ceded the lordship of Jever to Holland, as

an ostensible compensation for her new acquisition.[289]

Dantzic, with a certain surrounding territory, was, by the treaty of

Tilsit, recognised as a free city, under the protection of Prussia and

Saxony. There can be little doubt, that the farther provision, that

France should occupy the town until the conclusion of a maritime peace,

was intended to secure, for the use of Napoleon, a place of arms, so

important in case of a new breach betwixt him and Russia.

It followed, as a matter of course, that the Emperor Alexander and the

King of Prussia ratified all the changes which Napoleon had wrought on

Europe, acknowledged the thrones which he had erected, and recognised

the leagues which he had formed. On the other hand, out of deference to

the Emperor, Buonaparte consented that the Dukes of Saxe-Coburg,

Oldenburg, and Mecklenburg-Schwerin, German princes connected with

Alexander, should remain in possession of their territories; the French,

however, continuing to occupy the seaports of the two countries last

named, until a final peace betwixt France and England.

While these important negotiations were proceeding, a radical change

took place in the councils of the British nation; what was called the

Fox and Grenville administration being dissolved, and their place

supplied by one formed under the auspices of the Duke of Portland, and

comprehending Lords Liverpool, Castlereagh, Mr. Canning, and other

statesmen, professing the principles of the late William Pitt. It was an

anxious object with the new cabinet to reconcile the Czar to the

alliance of England, and atone for the neglect with which he considered

himself as having been treated by their predecessors. With this purpose,

Lord Leveson Gower[290] was despatched with power to make such offers of

conciliation as might maintain or renew an amicable intercourse between

Britain and Russia. But the Emperor Alexander had taken his part, at

least for the present; and, being predetermined to embrace the course

recommended by his new ally Buonaparte, he avoided giving audience to

the British ambassador, and took his measures at Tilsit, without

listening to the offers of accommodation which Lord Gower was empowered

to propose.

By the treaty of Tilsit, so far as made public, Russia offered her

mediation betwixt Britain and France, on condition that the first named

kingdom should accept the proffer of her interference within a month. So

far, therefore, the Czar appeared to a certain extent careful of the

interest of his late ally. But it is now perfectly well understood, that

among other private articles of this memorable treaty, there existed one

by which the Emperor bound himself, in case of Britain's rejecting the

proposed mediation, to recognise and enforce what Buonaparte called the

Continental System, by shutting his ports against British vessels, and

engaging the Northern Courts in a new coalition, having for its object

the destruction of English maritime superiority. In a word, the armed

Northern Neutrality, originally formed under the auspices of Catherine,

and in an evil hour adopted by the unfortunate Paul, was again to be

established under the authority of Alexander. Denmark, smarting under

the recollections of the battle of Copenhagen, only waited, it was

thought, the signal to join such a coalition, and would willingly

consent to lend her still powerful navy to its support; and Sweden was

in too weak and distracted a state to resist the united will of France

and Russia, either regarding war with Britain, or any other stipulations

which it might be intended to impose upon her. But as there is no

country of Europe to which the commerce of England is so beneficial as

Russia, whose gross produce she purchases almost exclusively, it was

necessary to observe strict secrecy upon these further objects. The

ostensible proposal of mediation was therefore resorted to, less in the

hope, perhaps, of establishing peace betwixt France and England, than in

the expectation of affording a pretext, which might justify in the eye

of the Russian nation a rupture with the latter power. But in spite of

every precaution which could be adopted, the address of the British

ambassador obtained possession of the secret which France and Russia

deemed it so important to conceal; and Lord Gower was able to transmit

to his court an exact account of this secret article, and particularly

of the two Emperors having resolved to employ the Danish fleet in the

destruction of the maritime rights of Britain, which had been so lately

put upon a footing, that, to Alexander at least, had, till his recent

fraternization with Buonaparte, seemed entirely satisfactory.

There were, no doubt, other secret articles named in the treaty of

Tilsit, by which it seems to have been the object of these two great

Emperors, as they loved to term themselves, of the North and of the

South, to divide the civilized world between them.[291] It may be

regarded as certain, that Buonaparte opened to Alexander the course of

unprincipled policy which he intended to pursue respecting the kingdom

of Spain, and procured his acquiescence in that daring usurpation. And

it has been affirmed, that he also stipulated for the aid of Russia to

take Gibraltar, to recover Malta and Egypt, and to banish the British

flag from the Mediterranean. All these enterprises were more or less

directly calculated to the depression, or rather the destruction of

Great Britain, the only formidable enemy who still maintained the strife

against France, and so far the promised co-operation of Russia must have

been in the highest degree grateful to Napoleon. But Alexander, however

much he might be Buonaparte's personal admirer, did not follow his

father's simplicity in becoming his absolute dupe, but took care, in

return for his compliance with the distant, and in some degree visionary

projects of Buonaparte's ambition, to exact his countenance and

co-operation in gaining certain acquisitions of the highest importance

to Russia, and which were found at a future period to have added

powerfully to her means of defence, when she once more matched her

strength with that of France. To explain this, we must look back to the

ancient policy of France and of Europe, when, by supporting the weaker

states, and maintaining their dependence, it was the object to prevent

the growth of any gigantic and over-bearing power, who might derange the

balance of the civilized world.

The growing strength of Russia used in former times to be the natural

subject of jealousy to the French Government, and they endeavoured to

counterbalance these apprehensions by extending the protection of France

to the two weaker neighbours of Russia, the Porte and the kingdom of

Sweden, with which powers it had always been the policy of France to

connect herself, and which connexion was not only honourable to that

kingdom, but useful to Europe. But, at the treaty of Tilsit, and in

Buonaparte's subsequent conduct relating to these powers, he lost sight

of this national policy, or rather sacrificed it to his own personal

objects.

One of the most important private articles of the treaty of Tilsit seems

to have provided, that Sweden should be despoiled of her provinces of

Finland in favour of the Czar, and be thus, with the consent of

Buonaparte, deprived of all effectual means of annoying Russia. A single

glance at the map will show how completely the possession of Finland put

a Swedish army, or the army of France as an ally of Sweden, within a

short march of St. Petersburgh; and how, by consenting to Sweden's being

stripped of that important province, Napoleon relinquished the grand

advantage to be derived from it, in case of his ever being again obliged

to contend with Russia upon Russian ground. Yet there can be no doubt,

that at the treaty of Tilsit he became privy to the war which Russia

shortly after waged against Sweden, in which Alexander deprived that

ancient kingdom of her frontier province of Finland, and thereby

obtained a covering territory of the last and most important consequence

to his own capital.

The Porte was no less made a sacrifice to the inordinate anxiety, which,

at the treaty of Tilsit, Buonaparte seems to have entertained, for

acquiring at any price the accession of Russia to his extravagant desire

of destroying England. By the public treaty, indeed, some care seems to

have been taken of the interests of Turkey, since it provides that

Turkey was to have the benefit of peace under the mediation of France,

and that Russia was to evacuate Moldavia and Wallachia, for the

acquisition of which she was then waging an unprovoked war. But by the

secret agreement of the two Emperors, it was unquestionably understood,

that Turkey in Europe was to be placed at the mercy of Alexander, as

forming naturally a part of the Russian Empire, as Spain, Portugal, and

perhaps Great Britain, were, from local position, destined to become

provinces of France. At the subsequent Congress betwixt the Emperors at

Erfurt, their measures against the Porte were more fully adjusted.

It may seem strange, that the shrewd and jealous Napoleon should have

suffered himself to be so much over-reached in his treaty with

Alexander, since the benefits stipulated for France, in the treaty of

Tilsit, were in a great measure vague, and subjects of hope rather than

certainty. The British naval force was not easily to be

subdued--Gibraltar and Malta are as strong fortresses as the world can

exhibit--the conquest of Spain was at least a doubtful undertaking, if

the last war of the Succession was carefully considered. But the Russian

objects were nearer, and were within her grasp. Finland was seized on

with little difficulty, nor did the conquest even of Constantinople

possess any thing very difficult to a Russian army, if unopposed save by

the undisciplined forces of the Turkish empire. Thus it is evident,

that Napoleon exchanged, for distant and contingent prospects, his

acquiescence in the Russian objects, which were near, essential, and, in

comparison, of easy attainment. The effect of this policy we shall

afterwards advert to. Meanwhile, the two most ancient allies of France,

and who were of the greatest political importance to her in case of a

second war with Russia, were most unwisely abandoned to the mercy of

that power, who failed not to despoil Sweden of Finland, and, but for

intervening causes, would probably have seized upon Constantinople with

the same ease.

If the reader should wonder how Buonaparte, able and astucious as he

was, came to be overreached in the treaty of Tilsit, we believe the

secret may be found in a piece of private history. Even at that early

period Napoleon nourished the idea of fixing, as he supposed, the fate

of his own family, or dynasty, by connecting it by marriage with the

blood of one of the established monarchies of Europe. He had hopes, even

then, that he might obtain the hand of one of the Archduchesses of

Russia, nor did the Emperor throw any obstacle in the way of the scheme.

It is well known that his suit was afterwards disappointed by the

Empress Mother, who pleaded the difference of religion; but at the time

of the treaty of Tilsit, Napoleon was actually encouraged, or deceived

himself into an idea that he received encouragement, to form a perpetual

family connexion with Russia.[292] This induced him to deal easily with

Alexander in the matters which they had to discuss together, and to act

the generous, almost the prodigal friend. And this also seems to have

been the reason why Napoleon frequently complained of Alexander's

insincerity, and often termed him _The Greek_, according to the Italian

sense of the name, which signifies a trickster or deceiver.

But we must return from the secret articles of the Tilsit treaty, which

opened such long vistas in futurity, to the indisputable and direct

consequences of that remarkable measure.

The treaty betwixt Russia and France was signed upon the 7th--that

betwixt France and Prussia on the 9th July.[293] Frederick William

published upon the 24th of the same month one of the most dignified, and

at the same time the most affecting proclamations, that ever expressed

the grief of an unfortunate sovereign.

"Dear inhabitants of faithful provinces, districts, and towns," said

this most interesting document, "my arms have been unfortunate. The

efforts of the relics of my army have been of no avail. Driven to the

extreme boundaries of my empire, and having seen my powerful ally

conclude an armistice, and sign a peace, no choice remained for me save

to follow his example. That peace was necessarily purchased upon terms

corresponding to imperious circumstances. It has imposed on me, and on

my house--it has imposed upon the whole country, the most painful

sacrifices. The bonds of treaties, the reciprocalities of love and duty,

the work of ages, have been broken asunder. My efforts have proved in

vain. Fate ordains it, and a father parts from his children. I release

you completely from your allegiance to myself and to my house. My most

ardent prayers for your welfare will always attend you in your relations

to your new sovereign. Be to him what you have ever been to me. Neither

force nor fate shall ever efface the remembrance of you from my heart."

To trace the triumphant return of the victor is a singular contrast to

those melancholy effusions of the vanquished monarch. The treaty of

Tilsit had ended all appearance of opposition to France upon the

Continent. The British armament, which had been sent to Pomerania too

late in the campaign, was re-embarked, and the King of Sweden,

evacuating Stralsund, retired to the dominions which he was not very

long destined to call his own. After having remained together for twenty

days, during which they daily maintained the most friendly intercourse,

and held together long and secret conferences, the two Emperors at last

separated, with demonstrations of the highest personal esteem, and each

heaping upon the other all the honours which it was in his power to

bestow. The congress broke up on the 9th July; and on his return to

France, Napoleon visited Saxony, and was there met at Bautzen (doomed

for a very different reason to be renowned in his history) by King

Augustus, who received him with the honours due to one who had, in

outward appearance at least, augmented the power which he might have

overthrown.

[Sidenote: PARIS.]

On 29th July, Napoleon, restored to his palace at St. Cloud, received

the homage of the Senate, and other official and constitutional bodies.

The celebrated naturalist Lacepède, as the organ of the former body,

made a pompous enumeration of the miracles of the campaign; and avowed,

that the accomplishment of such wonderful actions as would seemingly

have required ages, was but to Napoleon the work of a few months; while

at the same time his ruling genius gave motion to all the domestic

administration of his vast empire, and, although four hundred leagues

distant from the capital, was present with and observant of the most

complicated as well as extensive details. "We cannot," concludes the

orator, "offer to your Majesty praises worthy of you. Your glory is too

much raised above us. It will be the task of posterity, removed at a

distance from your presence, to estimate with greater truth its real

degree of elevation. Enjoy, sire, the recompense the most worthy of the

greatest of monarchs, the happiness of being beloved by the greatest of

nations, and may our great-grandchildren be long happy under your

Majesty's reign."

So spoke the President of the French Senate; and who, that wished to

retain the name of a rational being, dared have said, that, within the

period of seven years, the same Senate would be carrying to the

downfallen and dejected King of Prussia their congratulations on his

share in the overthrow of the very man whom they were now adoring as a

demigod!

The fortunes and fame of Napoleon were, indeed, such as to excite in the

highest degree the veneration with which men look upon talents and

success. All opposition seemed to sink before him, and Fortune appeared

only to have looked doubtfully upon him during a part of the last

campaign, in order to render still brighter the auspicious aspect under

which she closed it. Many of his most confirmed enemies, who, from their

proved attachment to the House of Bourbon, had secretly disowned the

authority of Buonaparte, and doubted the continuance of his success,

when they saw Prussia lying at his feet, and Russia clasping his hand in

friendship, conceived they should be struggling against the decrees of

Providence, did they longer continue to resist their predestined master.

Austerlitz had shaken their constancy; Tilsit destroyed it: and with few

and silent exceptions, the vows, hopes, and wishes of France, seemed

turned on Napoleon as her Heir by Destiny. Perhaps he himself, only,

could finally have disappointed their expectations. But he was like the

adventurous climber on the Alps, to whom the surmounting the most

tremendous precipices, and ascending to the most towering peaks only

shows yet dizzier heights and higher points of elevation.

FOOTNOTES:

[258] "We have here a critique upon the policy of Napoleon towards

Poland, which I shall not stop to examine. It is but too easy to

criticise the actions of statesmen, when time, in its rapid course, has

unveiled the causes and effects of events: when the game is finished,

the spectators have no longer any credit in discovering what the players

ought to have done."--LOUIS BUONAPARTE, p. 53.

[259] Most readers must be so far acquainted with the ancient form of

Polish Diets as to know, that their resolutions were not legally valid

if there was one dissenting voice, and that in many cases the most

violent means were resorted to, to obtain unanimity. The following

instance was related to our informer, a person of high rank:--On some

occasion, a provincial Diet was convened for the purpose of passing a

resolution which was generally acceptable, but to which it was

apprehended one noble of the district would oppose his veto. To escape

this interruption, it was generally resolved to meet exactly at the hour

of summons, to proceed to business upon the instant, and thus to elude

the anticipated attempt of the individual to defeat the purpose of their

meeting. They accordingly met at the hour, with most accurate precision,

and shut and bolted the doors of their place of meeting. But the

dissentient arrived a few minutes afterwards, and entrance being

refused, under the excuse that the Diet was already constituted, he

climbed upon the roof of the hall, and, it being summer time, when no

fires were lighted, descended through the vent into the stove by which,

in winter, the apartment was heated. Here he lay perdu, until the vote

was called, when, just as it was about to be recorded as unanimous in

favour of the proposed measure, he thrust his head out of the stove,

like a turtle protruding his neck from his shell, and pronounced the

fatal _veto_. Unfortunately for himself, instead of instantly

withdrawing his head, he looked around for an instant with exultation,

to remark and enjoy the confusion which his sudden appearance and

interruption had excited in the assembly. One of the nobles who stood by

unsheathed his sabre, and severed at one blow the head of the

dissentient from his body. Our noble informer, expressing some doubt of

a story so extraordinary, was referred for its confirmation to Prince

Sobieski, afterwards King of Poland, who not only bore testimony to the

strange scene, as what he had himself witnessed, but declared that the

head of the Dietm rolled over on his own foot almost as soon as he heard

the word _veto_ uttered. Such a constitution required much amelioration;

but that formed no apology for the neighbouring states, who dismembered

and appropriated to themselves an independent kingdom, with the faults

or advantages of whose government they had not the slightest title to

interfere.--S.

[260] "Napoleon had sent to Italy for the Polish General, Dombrowski,

who joined us at Potsdam. This was an indication of his intentions,

though as yet he had not allowed a word on the subject to transpire in

Poland. It was not until after the final refusal of the King of Prussia

to negotiate, that he appealed to the patriotism of the Poles to augment

his force. With a view to this object, the mere presence of Dombrowski

was of great advantage."--SAVARY, tom. ii., p. 212.

[261] This bulletin was dated, Imperial Headquarters at Posen, December

1. On the next day, Napoleon issued the following proclamation to the

army:--"Soldiers! a year ago, at the same hour, you were on the

memorable field of Austerlitz. The sacred cohorts of Russia fled,

defeated, before you; or, surrounded, laid down their arms at the feet

of their conquerors. To the moderation, and, perhaps, blameable

generosity, which overlooked the third coalition, the formation of a

fourth may be ascribed. But the ally on whose military skill their

principal hope rested, is already no more. His principal towns, his

fortresses, his forage, and ammunition, magazines, 280 standards, 700

pieces of cannon, are in our power. Neither the Oder, nor Warta, the

deserts of Poland, nor the rude season of winter, have been capable of

arresting, for a moment, our progress. You have braved all dangers,

surmounted them all, and every enemy has fled on your approach. In vain

did the Russians wish to defend the capital of ancient and illustrious

Poland. The French eagles hover over the Vistula. The unfortunate, but

brave Poles, on contemplating you, fancy they behold the celebrated

legions of their great Sobieski returning from a military expedition."

[262] Forty-fifth, forty-sixth, and forty-seventh Bulletins of the Grand

Army.

[263] Forty-seventh Bulletin of the Grand Army; Jomini, tom. ii., pp.

334, 343; Savary, tom. ii., p. 15.

[264] "The Emperor established himself at Warsaw on the 1st January,

1807. He calculated on remaining there until the return of spring. Our

halt was delightful. With the exception of theatres, the city presented

all the gaieties of Paris. Twice a-week the Emperor gave a concert;

after which a court was held, which led again to numerous meetings in

private parties. On these occasions, the personal beauty and graceful

manners of the Polish ladies were conspicuous. While time passed away

thus agreeably, duty was not neglected. The Emperor made every exertion

to revictual and provide for his army."--SAVARY, tom. ii., p. 17.

[265] Fifty-fifth Bulletin of the Grand Army; Savary, tom. ii., p. 25;

Jomini, tom. ii., p. 353.

[266] "As ill luck would have it, the officer despatched to Bernadotte

was a young man of no experience, who proceeded straight towards the

place of his destination, without making any inquiries as to what might

be on the road. The consequence was, he fell into the hands of some

Cossacks, who carried him and his despatch to the Russian

general-in-chief. This trifling accident was attended with serious

consequences. But for the capture of this officer, the Russian army must

inevitably have been destroyed, and peace would have been immediately

concluded."--SAVARY, tom. ii., p. 30.

[267] Sir Robert Wilson's Sketches of the Campaigns in Poland, in 1806

and 1807, p. 94.--S.

[268] Jomini, tom. ii., p. 359, states the Russian army to have been

80,000 strong.

[269] "When the French cuirassiers made their desperate charge on the

Russian centre, and passed through an interval, the Cossacks bore down

on them, speared them, unhorsed them, and in a few moments 530 Cossacks

reappeared on the field, equipped with the spoil of the slain."--SIR R.

WILSON, p. 27.

[270] Fifty-eighth Bulletin of the Grand Army; Savary, tom. ii., p. 30;

Jomini, tom. ii., p. 357.

[271] "One day, during dinner, the conversation turned on various deeds

of arms. The grand marshal said, that what had most struck him in the

life of Napoleon happened at Eylau, when, attended only by some officers

of his staff, a column of four or five thousand Russians came almost in

contact with him. The Emperor was on foot; Berthier instantly ordered up

the horses: the Emperor gave him a reproachful look; then sent orders to

a battalion of his guard to advance, which was a good way behind, and

standing still. As the Russians advanced, he repeated several times,

'What audacity! what audacity!' At the sight of the grenadiers of the

guard, the Russians stopped short. It was high time for them to do so,

as Bertrand said. The Emperor had never stirred; all who surrounded him

had been much alarmed."--LAS CASES, tom. i., p. 143.

[272] Sir Robert Wilson's Sketch of the Campaigns in Poland, p. 29.

[273] Seventy-seventh Bulletin of the Grand Army; Jomini, tom. ii., p.

396; Savary, tom. ii., p. 48. Dantzic surrendered on the 24th of May,

and, four days after, Napoleon conferred on Marshal Lefebvre the title

of Duke of Dantzic.

[274] Sir Robert Wilson's Campaigns in Poland, p. 30.

[275] Seventy-eighth Bulletin of the Grand Army; Jomini, tom. ii., p.

408; Savary, tom. ii., p. 52.

[276] "Next day, June 11, the Russians stopped all day in front of

Heilsberg: both parties removed their wounded; and we had as many as

though we had fought a great battle. The Emperor was very

dissatisfied."--SAVARY, tom. ii., p. 53.

[277] "The Emperor ordered me to advance alone, along the wood on our

right, to seek a point whence the bridge of Friedland was visible; and

after observing whether the Russians were crossing over to our bank or

recrossing to the right, I returned to inform him, that the Russians,

instead of retiring, were all crossing to our bank of the river, and

that their masses were sensibly augmenting. 'Well,' said the Emperor, 'I

am ready now. I have an hour's advantage of them, and will give them

battle since they wish it: this is the anniversary of Marengo, and

to-day fortune is with me.'"--SAVARY, tom. ii., p. 56.

[278] Seventy-ninth Bulletin of the Grand Army; Savary, tom. ii., p. 56;

Jomini, tom. ii., p. 411.

[279] Eightieth Bulletin of the Grand Army.

[280] Three days after the battle, the unfortunate Queen of Prussia

wrote thus to her father, the elector of Baden:--"By the unfortunate

battle of Friedland, Königsberg fell into the hands of the French. We

are closely pressed by the enemy, and if the danger should become in any

degree more imminent, I shall be compelled to leave Memel with my

children. I shall go to Riga, should the aspect of affairs become more

alarming. God will give me the power to survive the moment when I shall

cross the borders: all my firmness will then be required, but I look to

Heaven for support, from whence comes all good and evil; and it is my

firm belief, that no more is imposed upon us than we are able to bear."

[281] "I saw in the hands of M. de Talleyrand, who had just arrived at

Königsberg, the letter in which the Emperor directed him to come to

Tilsit, and which contained this observation, 'If peace be not concluded

in a fortnight, I cross the Niemen.' At the same time, I received orders

to prepare the bridge-equipage. I mentioned this circumstance to M. de

Talleyrand. 'Do not hurry yourself,' replied he: 'where is the utility

of going beyond the Niemen? What are we to find beyond that river? the

Emperor must renounce his views respecting Poland: that country is good

for nothing: we can only organize disorder there: we have now a

favourable opportunity of making an end of this business, and we must

not let it escape.' At first I was at a loss to comprehend all this; and

it was not until our diplomatist unfolded his projects with respect to

_Spain_, that I understood the hints he had thrown out."--SAVARY, tom.

ii., p. 74.

[282] Eighty-sixth Bulletin of the Grand Army; Savary, tom. ii., p. 75;

Jomini, tom. ii., p. 423.

[283] The impression which Buonaparte's presence and conversation, aided

by the preconceived ideas of his talents, made on all who approached his

person, was of the most striking kind. The captain of a British

man-of-war, who was present at his occupying the island of Elba,

disturbed on that occasion the solemnity and gravity of a levee, at

which several British functionaries attended, by bearing a homely, but

certainly a striking testimony to his powers of attraction, while he

exclaimed, that "Boney was a d--d good fellow, after all!"--S.

[284] Las Cases, tom. iv., p. 218.

[285] "The Queen often called to her recollection that part of English

history which states that Mary, the daughter of Henry VIII., after the

taking of Calais, which had so long been an appanage to the English

crown, and which had often been attempted in vain by the Duke of Guise,

during her reign, and its subsequent cession to France,--was accustomed

to say, 'That if her heart could be opened, the name of Calais would be

found traced there in letters of blood.' The same might be said of the

Queen of Prussia in regard to Magdeburg."--MAD. DE BERG.

[286] Las Cases, tom. iv., p. 213.

[287] The Queen of Prussia died on the 19th July, 1810. The following

letter was written by her a few days after the signing of the treaty of

Tilsit:--"Peace is concluded; but at how painful a price! Our frontiers

will not henceforth extend beyond the Elbe: the King, however, after

all, has proved himself a greater man than his adversary. He has been

compelled by necessity to negotiate with his enemy, but no alliance has

taken place between them. This will one day or other bring a blessing

upon Prussia. Again, I say, the King's just dealing will bring good

fortune to Prussia; this is my firm belief."

[288] For a copy of the Treaty of Tilsit, see Annual Register, vol.

xlix., p. 720.

[289] "This does not appear to me to be correct: according to the terms

of the treaty, this country was ceded personally to me, and my first act

was to unite it to Holland. I establish this fact merely for the sake of

truth."--LOUIS BUONAPARTE, p. 53.

[290] Now Earl Granville.

[291] "In the secret treaty, Alexander and Napoleon shared between them

the continental world: all the south was abandoned to Napoleon, already

master of Italy and arbiter of Germany, pushing his advanced post as far

as the Vistula, and making Dantzic one of the most formidable

arsenals."--FOUCHÉ, tom. i., p. 310.

[292] "It was perhaps a misfortune to me that I had not married a sister

of the Emperor Alexander, as proposed to me by Alexander himself at

Erfurth. But there were inconveniences in that union arising from her

religion. I did not like to allow a Russian priest to be the confessor

of my wife, as I considered that he would have been a spy in the

Tuileries for Alexander."--NAPOLEON, _Voice_, &c., vol. ii., p. 150.

[293] See the treaty between Prussia and France, Annual Register, vol.

xlix., p. 714.