The curtain was about to rise upon a new tragedy,--the martyrdom of
Spain. At this dramatic spectacle the United States government and
people might have looked with composure and without regret, for they
hardly felt so deep an interest in history, literature, or art as to
care greatly what was to become of the land which had once produced
Cortes, Cervantes, and Murillo; but in the actual condition of European
politics their own interests were closely entwined with those of Spain,
and as the vast designs of Napoleon were developed, the fortunes of
the Spanish empire more and more deeply affected those of the American
Union.
General Armstrong waited impatiently at Paris while Napoleon carried
on his desperate struggle with the Emperor Alexander amid the ice and
snows of Prussia. After the battle of Eylau the American minister
became so restless that in May, 1807, he demanded passports for
Napoleon’s headquarters, but was refused. Had he gone as he wished, he
might have seen the great battle of Friedland, June 14, and witnessed
the peace of Tilsit, signed July 7, which swept away the last obstacle
to Napoleon’s schemes against Spain and America. After the peace of
Tilsit, Armstrong could foresee that he should have to wait but a short
time for the explanations so mysteriously delayed.
Except Denmark and Portugal, every State on the coast of Europe from
St. Petersburg to Trieste acknowledged Napoleon’s domination. England
held out; and experience proved that England could not be reached by
arms. The next step in the Emperor’s system was to effect her ruin by
closing the whole world to her trade. He began with Portugal. From
Dresden, July 19, he issued orders[81] that the Portuguese ports should
be closed by September 1 against English commerce, or the kingdom of
Portugal would be occupied by a combined French and Spanish army. July
29 he was again in Paris. July 31 he ordered Talleyrand to warn the
Prince Royal of Denmark that he must choose between war with England
and war with France. That the turn would next come to the United States
was evident; and Armstrong was warned by many signs of the impending
storm. August 2, at the diplomatic audience, the brunt of Napoleon’s
displeasure fell on Dreyer, the Danish minister, and on his colleague
from Portugal; but Armstrong could see that he was himself expected to
profit by the lesson. He wrote instantly to the Secretary of State.[82]
“We had yesterday our first audience of the Emperor since his return
to Paris. Happening to stand near the minister of Denmark, I overheard
his Majesty say to that minister: ‘So, M. Baron, the Baltic has been
violated!’ The minister’s answer was not audible to me; nor did it
appear to be satisfactory to the Emperor, who repeated, in a tone of
voice somewhat raised and peremptory, ‘But, sir, the Baltic has been
violated!’ From M. Dreyer he passed to myself and others, and lastly
to the ambassador of Portugal, to whom, it is said, he read a very
severe lecture on the conduct of his Court. These circumstances go
far to justify the whispers that begin to circulate, that an army
is organizing to the south for the purpose of taking possession of
Portugal, and another to the north for a similar purpose with regard
to Denmark; and generally, that, having settled the business of
belligerents, with the exception of England, very much to his own
liking, he is now on the point of settling that of neutrals in the
same way. It was perhaps under the influence of this suggestion that
M. Dreyer, taking me aside, inquired whether any application had
been made to me with regard to a projected union of all commercial
States against Great Britain, and on my answering in the negative, he
replied: ‘You are much favored, but it will not last!’”
A few days afterward another rumor ran through Paris. The Prince of
Benevento was no longer Minister of Foreign Affairs, and his successor
was to be M. de Champagny, hitherto Minister of the Interior. At first
Armstrong would not believe in Talleyrand’s disgrace. “It is not
probable that this is very serious, or that it will be very durable,”
he wrote.[83] “A trifling cause cannot alienate such a master from
such a minister; and a grave one could not fail to break up all
connections between them.” Reasonable as this theory seemed, it was
superficial. The master and the minister had not only separated, but
had agreed to differ and to remain outwardly friends. Their paths could
no longer lie together; and the overwhelming power of Bonaparte--who
controlled a million soldiers with no enemy to fight--made cabals
and Cabinet opposition not only useless but ridiculous. Yet with all
this, Talleyrand stood in silent and cold disapproval of the Emperor’s
course; and since Talleyrand represented intelligent conservatism, it
was natural to suppose that the Emperor meant to be even more violent
in the future than in the past. The new minister, Champagny, neither
suggested a policy of his own, nor presumed, as Talleyrand sometimes
dared, to argue or remonstrate with his master.
Toward the end of August Dreyer’s prophecy became true. Napoleon’s
orders forced the King of Denmark and King Louis of Holland to seize
neutral commerce and close the Danish and Dutch ports. The question
immediately rose whether United States ships and property were still to
be treated as exempt from the operation of the Berlin Decree by virtue
of the treaty of 1800; and the Emperor promptly decided against them.
“In actual circumstances,” he wrote to Decrès,[84] “navigation offers
all sorts of difficulties. France cannot regard as neutral flags which
enjoy no consideration. That of America, however exposed it may be to
the insults of the English, has a sort of existence, since the English
still keep some measure in regard to it, and it imposes on them. That
of Portugal and that of Denmark exist no longer.”
This opinion was written before the British ministry touched the Orders
in Council; and the “sort of existence” which Napoleon conceded to
the United States was already so vague as to be not easily known from
the extinction which had fallen upon Portugal and Denmark. A few days
afterward General Armstrong received officially an order[85] from the
Emperor which expressly declared that the Berlin Decree admitted of no
exception in favor of American vessels; and this step was followed by a
letter[86] from Champagny, dated October 7, to the same effect. At the
same time the Council of Prizes pronounced judgment in the case of the
American ship “Horizon,” wrecked some six months before near Morlaix.
The Court decreed that such part of the cargo as was not of English
origin should be restored to its owners; but that the merchandise
which was acknowledged to be of English manufacture or to come from
English territory should be confiscated under the Berlin Decree. To
this decision Armstrong immediately responded in a strong note[87]
of protest to Champagny, which called out an answer from the Emperor
himself.
“Reply to the American minister,” wrote Napoleon[88] to Champagny
November 15, “that since America suffers her vessels to be searched,
she adopts the principle that the flag does not cover the goods.
Since she recognizes the absurd blockades laid by England, consents
to having her vessels incessantly stopped, sent to England, and so
turned aside from their course, why should the Americans not suffer
the blockade laid by France? Certainly France is no more blockaded
by England than England by France. Why should Americans not equally
suffer their vessels to be searched by French ships? Certainly France
recognizes that these measures are unjust, illegal, and subversive
of national sovereignty; but it is the duty of nations to resort to
force, and to declare themselves against things which dishonor them
and disgrace their independence.”
Champagny wrote this message to Armstrong November 24, taking the
ground that America must submit to the Berlin Decree because she
submitted to impressments and search.[89]
As a matter of relative wrong, Napoleon’s argument was more
respectable than that of Spencer Perceval and George Canning. He
could say with truth that the injury he did to America was wholly
consequential on the injury he meant to inflict on England. He had
no hidden plan of suppressing American commerce in order to develop
the commerce of France; as yet he was not trying to make money by
theft. His Berlin Decree interfered in no way with the introduction
of American products directly into France; it merely forbade the
introduction of English produce or the reception of ships which came
from England. Outrageous as its provisions were, “unjust, illegal, and
subversive of national sovereignty,” as Napoleon himself admitted and
avowed, they bore their character and purpose upon their face, and
in that sense were legitimate. He had no secrets on this point. In
a famous diplomatic audience at Fontainebleau October 14, Armstrong
witnessed a melodramatic scene, in which the Emperor proclaimed to the
world that his will was to be law.[90] “The House of Braganza shall
reign no more,” said he to the Portuguese minister; then turning to
the representative of the Queen of Etruria,--the same Spanish princess
on whose head he had five years before placed the shadowy crown of
Tuscany,--
“Your mistress,” he said, “has her secret attachments to Great
Britain,--as you, Messieurs Deputies of the Hanse Towns are also
said to have; but I will put an end to this. Great Britain shall be
destroyed. I have the means of doing it, and they shall be employed.
I have three hundred thousand men devoted to this object, and an
ally who has three hundred thousand to support them. I will permit
no nation to receive a minister from Great Britain until she shall
have renounced her maritime usages and tyranny; and I desire you,
gentlemen, to convey this determination to your respective sovereigns.”
Armstrong obeyed the order; and in doing so he might easily have
pointed out the machinery by which Napoleon expected to insure the
co-operation of America in securing the destruction of England. He
could combine the Berlin Decree with the baffled negotiations for
Florida, and could understand why the Emperor at one moment dangled
the tempting bait before Jefferson’s eyes, and the next snatched it
away. This diplomatic game was one which Napoleon played with every
victim he wished to ensnare, and the victim never showed enough force
of character to resist temptation. German, Italian, Russian, Spaniard,
American, had all been lured by this decoy; one after another had
been caught and devoured, but the next victim never saw the trap, or
profited by the cries of the last unfortunate. Armstrong knew that
whenever Napoleon felt the United States slipping through his fingers,
Florida would again be offered to keep Jefferson quiet; yet even
Armstrong, man of the world as he was, tried to persuade himself that
Napoleon did not know his own mind. One of his despatches at this
crisis related a curious story, which he evidently believed to be true,
and to prove the vacillating temper of Napoleon’s Florida negotiation.
November 15 Armstrong wrote that the Emperor had left Fontainebleau for
Italy; that great changes were predicted, among which it was rumored
“that Portugal, taken from the Braganzas, may be lent to the children
of the Toscan House, and that the Bourbons of Spain are at last to make
way for Lucien Bonaparte, who, in atonement or from policy, is to marry
the Queen Regent of Etruria.” That the American minister should at that
early day have been so well informed about projects as yet carefully
concealed, was creditable to his diplomacy. Not till nearly a month
later did Lucien himself, in his Italian banishment, receive notice of
the splendid bribe intended for him.
In the same despatch of November 15 Armstrong discussed the Emperor’s
plans in their bearing on Florida. “We are, it seems, to be invited
to make common cause against England, and to take the guaranty of the
Continent for a maritime peace which shall establish the principle of
‘free ships, free goods.’” Armstrong argued that it was wiser to act
alone, even in case of war with England; in regard to Florida, France
had done all that was to be expected from her, and had latterly become
sparing even of promises. Finally, he told the anecdote already alluded
to:--
“The fact appears to be, which I communicate with the most intimate
conviction of its truth, that some sycophant, entering into the
weakness of the Emperor, and perceiving that he was only happy in
giving a little more circumference to the bubble, seized the moment
of Izquierdo’s nomination, and pointing to the United States, said:
‘These are destined to form the last labor of the modern Hercules.
The triumph over England cannot be complete so long as the commerce
and republicanism of this country be permitted to exist. Will it then
be wise to insulate it,--to divest yourselves or your allies of those
points which would place you at once in the midst of it? With what
view was it that after selling Louisiana, attempts were made by France
to buy the Floridas from Spain? Was it not in the anticipation of
events which may make necessary to you a place in the neighborhood of
these States,--a point on which to rest your political lever? Remember
that Archimedes could not move the world without previously finding a
resting-place for his screw. Instead, therefore, of parting with the
Floridas, I would suggest whether we should not make the repossession
of Canada a condition of a peace with England.’ The conception itself,
and the manner in which it was presented, struck the Emperor forcibly.
He mused a moment upon it, and then in the most peremptory manner
ordered that the negotiation should not go on.”
Armstrong regarded this anecdote as important. Perhaps he had it,
directly or indirectly, from Talleyrand, who used more freedom of
speech than was permitted to any other man in France; but the task
of penetrating the depths of Napoleon’s mind was one which even
Talleyrand attempted in vain. From the first, Florida had been used by
Napoleon as a means of controlling President Jefferson. “To enlarge the
circumference of his bubble” was a phrase keen and terse enough to have
come from Talleyrand himself; but this was not the purpose for which
Florida had hitherto been used in Napoleon’s diplomacy, and in ordering
that the negotiation should be stopped, the Emperor might well have
other motives, which he preferred keeping to himself.
An observer far less intelligent than Armstrong might have seen that
in face of the great changes which his despatch announced for Italy,
Portugal, and Spain, the time when Napoleon would need support from the
United States had not yet come. The critical moment was still in the
future. Perhaps America might be forced into war by the “Chesapeake”
outrage; at all events, she was further than ever from alliance with
England, and the Emperor could safely wait for her adhesion to the
continental system until his plans for consolidating his empire were
more mature. For the present, Don Carlos IV. and the Prince of Peace
were the chief objects of French diplomacy.
The story of Toussaint and St. Domingo was about to be repeated in
Spain. Even while Armstrong wrote these despatches, the throne of Don
Carlos IV. crumbled, almost without need of a touch from without.
France had drawn from Spain everything she once possessed,--her navy,
sacrificed at Trafalgar to Napoleon’s orders; her army, nearly half
of which was in Denmark; her treasures, which, so far as they had not
been paid in subsidies to Napoleon, were shut up in Mexico. Nothing
but the shell was left of all that had made Spain great. This long
depletion had not been effected without extreme anxiety on the part of
the Spanish government. At any time after the Prince of Peace returned
to power in 1801, he would gladly have broken with France, as he proved
in 1806; but he stood in much the same position as Jefferson, between
the selfishness of England and the immediate interests of Spain. King
Charles, anxious beyond measure for his own repose and for the safety
of his daughter the Queen of Etruria, shrank from every strong measure
of resistance to Napoleon’s will, yet was so helpless that only a
traitor or a coward could have deserted him; and Godoy, with all his
faults, was not so base as to secure his own interests by leaving
the King to Napoleon’s mercy. For a single moment the King yielded
to Godoy’s entreaties. When the fourth European coalition was formed
against Napoleon, and Prussia declared war, the Prince of Peace was
allowed to issue, Oct. 6, 1806, a proclamation calling the Spanish
people to arms. October 14 the battle of Jena was fought, and the news
reaching Madrid threw the King and court into consternation; Godoy’s
influence was broken by the shock; the proclamation was recalled, and
the old King bowed his head to his fate. Had he held firm, and thrown
in his fortunes with those of England, Russia, and Prussia, the battle
of Eylau might have stopped Napoleon’s career; and in any case the fate
of Spain could not have been more terrible than it was.
The Prince of Peace begged in vain that King Charles would dismiss
him and form a new ministry; the King could not endure a change.
Napoleon laughed at the proclamation, but he knew Godoy to be his only
serious enemy at Madrid. He took infinite pains, and exhausted the
extraordinary resources of his cunning, in order to get possession
of Spain without a blow. To do this, he forced Portugal into what he
called a war. Without noticing Godoy’s offence, immediately after
the peace of Tilsit, as has been already told, the Emperor ordered
the King of Portugal to execute the Berlin Decree. Unable to resist,
Portugal consented to shut her ports to English commerce, but objected
to confiscating British property. Without a moment’s delay, Napoleon,
October 12,[91] ordered General Junot, with an army of twenty thousand
men, to enter Spain within twenty-four hours, and march direct to
Lisbon; simultaneously he notified[92] the Spanish government that his
troops would be at Burgos, November 1; and that this time “it was not
intended to do as was done in the last war,--he must march straight to
Lisbon.”
After the peace of Tilsit, no Power in Europe pretended to question
Napoleon’s will, and for Spain to do so would have been absurd. King
Charles had to submit, and he sent an army to co-operate with Junot
against Portugal. The Emperor, who might at a single word have driven
King Charles as well as the King of Portugal from the throne, did not
say the word. Godoy’s proclamation had given France cause for war;
but Napoleon took no notice of the proclamation. He did not ask for
the punishment of Godoy; he not only left the old King in peace, but
took extraordinary care to soothe his fears. On the same day when he
ordered Junot to march, he wrote personally to reassure the King:[93]
“I will concert with your Majesty as to what shall be done with
Portugal; in any case the suzerainty shall belong to you, as you have
seemed to wish.” Yet four days later he ordered[94] another army of
thirty thousand men to be collected at Bayonne, to support Junot, who
had no enemy to fear. That his true campaign was against Spain, not
against Portugal, never admitted of a doubt; his orders to Junot hardly
concealed his object:[95]--
“Cause descriptions to be made for me of all the provinces through
which you pass,--the roads, the nature of the ground; send me
sketches. Charge engineer officers with this work, which it is
important to have; so that I can see the distance of the villages,
the nature of the country, the resources it offers.... I learn this
moment that Portugal has declared war on England and sent away the
English ambassador: this does not satisfy me; continue your march; I
have reason to believe that it is agreed upon with England in order to
give time for the English troops to come from Copenhagen. You must be
at Lisbon by December 1, as friend or as enemy. Maintain the utmost
harmony with the Prince of Peace.”
Junot entered Spain October 17, the same day that these orders were
written, while Napoleon at Fontainebleau forced on the Spanish agent
Izquierdo a treaty which might keep King Charles and Godoy quiet a
little longer. This document, drafted by Napoleon himself, resembled
the letter to Toussaint and the proclamation to the negroes of St.
Domingo, with which Leclerc had been charged;[96] its motive was
too obvious, and its appeal to selfishness too gross to deceive. It
declared[97] that Portugal should be divided into three parts. The most
northerly, with Oporto for a capital and a population of eight hundred
thousand souls, should be given to the Queen of Etruria in place of
Tuscany, which was to be swallowed up in the kingdom of Italy. The next
provision was even more curious. The southern part of Portugal, with
a population of four hundred thousand souls, should be given to the
Prince of Peace as an independent sovereignty. The central part, with a
population of two millions, and Lisbon for a capital, should be held by
France subject to further agreement. By a final touch of dissimulation
worthy of Shakespeare’s tragic invention, Napoleon, in the last article
of this treaty, promised to recognize Don Carlos IV. as Emperor of the
two Americas.
The so-called treaty of Fontainebleau was signed Oct. 27, 1807. That
it deceived Godoy or King Charles could hardly be imagined, but the
internal and external difficulties of Spain had reached a point where
nothing but ruin remained. In the whole of Spain hardly twenty thousand
troops could be assembled; barely half-a-dozen frigates were fit for
sea; the treasury was empty; industry was destroyed. Napoleon himself
had no idea how complete was the process by which he had sucked the
life-blood of this miserable land. Even in the court at Madrid and
among the people signs of an immediate catastrophe were so evident that
Napoleon could afford to wait until chaos should call for his control.
Meanwhile Junot marched steadily forward. He was at Burgos on the day
fixed by Napoleon; he established permanent French depots at Valladolid
and at Salamanca. Leaving Salamanca November 12, he advanced to Ciudad
Rodrigo, and after establishing another depot there, he made a rapid
dash at Lisbon. The march was difficult, but Junot was ready to
destroy his army rather than fail to carry out his orders; and on the
morning of November 30 he led a ragged remnant of fifteen hundred men
into the city of Lisbon. He found it without a government. The Prince
Regent of Portugal, powerless to resist Napoleon, had gone on board
his ships with the whole royal family and court, and was already on
his way to found a new empire at Rio Janeiro. Of all the royal houses
of Europe, that of Portugal was the first to carry out a desperate
resolution.
Napoleon’s object was thus gained. Dec. 1, 1807, Junot was in peaceable
possession of Lisbon, and French garrisons held every strategical point
between Lisbon and Bayonne. In regard to Portugal Junot’s orders were
precise:[98]--
“So soon as you have the different fortified places in your hands, you
will put French commandants in them, and will make yourself sure of
these places. I need not tell you that you must not put any fortress
in the power of the Spaniards, especially in the region which is to
remain in my hands.”
November 3, without the knowledge of Spain, the Emperor gave orders[99]
that the army of reserve at Bayonne, under General Dupont, shall be
ready to march by December 1; and November 11 he ordered[100] that the
frontier fortresses on the Spanish border should be armed and supplied
with provisions:--
“All this is to be done with the utmost possible secrecy, especially
the armament of the places on the Spanish frontier on the side of the
eastern Pyrenees. Give secret instructions, and let the corps march in
such a manner that the first ostensible operations be not seen in that
country before November 25.”
At the same time a new army of some twenty thousand men was hurried
across France to take the place, at Bayonne, of Dupont’s army, which
was to enter Spain. November 13, the Emperor ordered Dupont to move his
first division across the frontier to Vittoria; and on the same day
he despatched M. de Tournon, his chamberlain, with a letter to King
Charles at Madrid, and with secret instructions[101] that revealed the
reasons for these movements so carefully concealed from Spanish eyes:--
“You will also inform yourself, without seeming to do so, of the
situation of the places of Pampeluna and of Fontarabia; and if you
perceive armaments making anywhere, you will inform me by courier. You
will be on the watch at Madrid to see well the spirit which animates
that city.”
Napoleon’s orders were in all respects exactly carried out. Dec. 1,
1807, Junot was in possession of Portugal; Dupont was at Vittoria;
twenty-five thousand French troops would, by December 20, hold the
great route from Vittoria to Burgos, and in two days could occupy
Madrid.[102] The Spanish army was partly in Denmark, partly in
Portugal. The Prince of Peace heard what was going on, and asked for
explanations; but the moment for resistance had long passed. He had no
choice but submission or flight, and Don Carlos was too weak to fly.
In Armstrong’s despatch of November 15, already quoted, one more
paragraph was worth noting. At the moment he wrote, Napoleon had just
given his last orders; General Dupont had not yet received them, and
neither Don Carlos IV. nor Lucien Bonaparte knew the change of plan
that was intended. Only men like Talleyrand and Duroc could see that
from the moment of the peace at Tilsit, Napoleon’s movements had been
rapidly and irresistibly converging upon Madrid,--until, by the middle
of November, every order had been given, and the Spanish Peninsula lay,
as the Emperor told Lucien, “in the hollow of his hand.” Armstrong,
writing a fortnight before the royal family of Portugal had turned
their vessels’ prows toward Brazil, asked a question which Napoleon
himself would hardly have dared to answer:
“What will become of the royal houses of Portugal and Spain? I know
not. By the way, I consider this question as of no small interest to
the United States. If they were sent to America, or are even permitted
to withdraw thither, we may conclude that the colonies which excite
the imperial longing, and which are in its opinion necessary to
France, are not on our side of the Atlantic. If on the other hand they
are retained in Europe, it will only be as hostages for the eventual
delivery of their colonies; and then, at the distance of three
centuries, may be acted over again the tragedy of the Incas, with some
few alterations of scenery and names.”
All these measures being completed by November 15, the day when
Armstrong wrote his despatch, the Emperor left Fontainebleau and went
to Italy. He passed through Milan and Verona to Venice; and on his
return, stopped a few hours at Mantua,[103] on the night of December
13, to offer Lucien the throne of Spain.
Lucien’s story[104] was that being summoned from Rome to an interview,
he found his brother alone, at midnight of December 13, seated in a
vast room in the palace at Mantua, before a great round table, almost
entirely covered by a very large map of Spain, on which he was marking
strategical points with black, red, and yellow pins. After a long
interview, in which the Emperor made many concessions to his brother’s
resistance, Napoleon opened his last and most audacious offer:--
“‘As for you, choose!’ As he pronounced these words,” continued
Lucien, “his eyes sparkled with a flash of pride which seemed to me
Satanic; he struck a great blow with his hand, spread out broadly in
the middle of the immense map of Europe which was extended on the
table by the side of which we were standing. ‘Yes, choose!’ he said;
‘you see I am not talking in the air. All this is mine, or will soon
belong to me; I can dispose of it already. Do you want Naples? I will
take it from Joseph, who, by the bye, does not care for it; he prefers
Morfontaine. Italy,--the most beautiful jewel in my imperial crown?
Eugene is but viceroy, and far from despising it he hopes only that I
shall give it to him, or at least leave it to him if he survives me:
he is likely to be disappointed in waiting, for I shall live ninety
years; I must, for the perfect consolidation of my empire. Besides,
Eugene will not suit me in Italy after his mother is repudiated.
Spain? Do you not see it falling into the hollow of my hand, thanks
to the blunders of your dear Bourbons, and to the follies of your
friend the Prince of Peace? Would you not be well pleased to reign
there where you have been only ambassador? Once for all, what do you
want? Speak! Whatever you wish, or can wish, is yours, if your divorce
precedes mine.’”
Lucien refused a kingdom on such terms, and Napoleon continued his
journey, reaching Milan December 15. At that time his mind was intent
on Spain and the Spanish colonies, with which the questions of English
and American trade were closely connected. Spencer Perceval’s Orders in
Council had appeared in the “London Gazette” of November 14, and had
followed the Emperor to Italy. Some weeks afterward war was declared
between England and Russia. No neutral remained except Sweden, which
was to be crushed by Russia, and the United States of America, which
Napoleon meant to take in hand. December 17, from the royal palace at
Milan, in retaliation for the Orders in Council, and without waiting
to consult President Jefferson, Napoleon issued a new proclamation,
compared with which the Berlin Decree of the year before was a model of
legality.
“Considering,” began the preamble,[105] “that by these acts the
English government has denationalized the ships of all the nations
of Europe; that it is in the power of no government to compound its
own independence and its rights,--all the sovereigns in Europe being
jointly interested in the sovereignty and independence of their flag;
that if by an inexcusable weakness, which would be an ineffaceable
stain in the eyes of posterity, we should allow such a tyranny to pass
into a principle and to become consecrated by usage, the English would
take advantage of it to establish it as a right, as they have profited
by the tolerance of governments to establish the infamous principle
that the flag does not cover the goods, and to give to their right of
blockade an arbitrary extension, contrary to the sovereignty of all
States,”--
Considering all these matters, so important to States like Denmark,
Portugal, and Spain, whose flags had ceased to exist, and of whose
honor and interests this mighty conqueror made himself champion,
Napoleon decreed that every ship which should have been searched by an
English vessel, or should have paid any duty to the British government,
or should come from or be destined for any port in British possession
in any part of the world, should be good prize; and that this rule
should continue in force until England should have “returned to the
principles of international law, which are also those of justice and
honor.”
FOOTNOTES:
[81] Napoleon to Talleyrand, July 19, 1807; Correspondance, xv. 433.
[82] Armstrong to Madison, Aug. 3, 1807; State Papers, iii. 243.
[83] Armstrong to Madison, Aug. 11, 1807; MSS. State Department
Archives.
[84] Napoleon to Decrès, Sept. 9, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 20.
[85] M. Regnier to the Procureur Général, Sept. 18, 1807; State Papers,
iii. 244.
[86] Champagny to Armstrong, Oct. 7, 1807; State Papers, iii. 245.
[87] Armstrong to Champagny, Nov. 12, 1807; State Papers, iii. 245.
[88] Napoleon to Champagny, Nov. 15, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 165.
[89] Champagny to Armstrong, Nov. 24, 1807; State Papers, iii. 247.
[90] Armstrong to Madison, Oct. 15, 1807; MSS. State Department
Archives.
[91] Napoleon to General Clarke, Oct. 12, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 80.
[92] Napoleon to Champagny, Oct. 12, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 79.
[93] Napoleon to Charles IV., Oct. 12, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 83.
[94] Napoleon to General Clarke, Oct. 16, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 91.
[95] Napoleon to Junot, Oct. 17, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 98.
[96] See History of First Administration, i. 392.
[97] Correspondance de Napoleon I.; Projet de Convention, Oct. 23,
1807, xvi. 111.
[98] Napoleon to Junot, October 31, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 128.
[99] Napoleon to General Clarke, Nov. 3, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 136.
[100] Napoleon to General Clarke, Nov. 11, 1807; Correspondance, xvi.
149.
[101] Napoleon to M. de Tournon, Nov. 13, 1807; Correspondance, xvi.
159.
[102] Napoleon to General Clarke, Dec. 6, 1807; Correspondance, xvi.
183.
[103] Napoleon to Joseph, Dec. 17, 1807; Correspondance, xvi. 198.
[104] Lucien Bonaparte, Th. Jung. iii. 83, 113.
[105] Correspondance de Napoleon, xvi. 192; American State Papers,
iii. 90.