But, unfortunately, his latest and most urgent appeal to the Emperor reached the latter just after the Pyrrhic victory at Craonne, which left him more stubborn than ever. Far from meeting the allies halfway, he let fall words that bespoke only injured pride: "If one must receive lashes," he said within hearing of the courier, "it is not for me to offer my back to them." On the morrow he charged Maret to reply to his distressed plenipotentiary that he (Napoleon) knew best what the situation demanded; the demand of the allies that France should retire within her old frontiers was only their first word: Caulaincourt must get to know their ultimatum: if this was their ultimatum, he must reject it. He (Napoleon) would possibly give up Dutch Brabant and the fortresses of Wesel, Castel (opposite Mainz), and Kehl, but would make no substantial changes on the Frankfurt terms. Still, Caulaincourt struggled on. When the session of March 10th was closing, he produced a declaration offering to give up all Napoleon's claims to control lands beyond the natural limits.
The others divined that it was his own handiwork, drawn up in order to spin out the negotiations and leave his master a few days of grace.[434] They respected his intentions, and nine days of grace were gained; but the only answer that Napoleon vouchsafed to Caulaincourt's appeals was the missive of March 17th from Rheims: "I have received your letters of the 13th. I charge the Duke of Bassano to answer them in detail. I give you directly the power to make the concessions which would be indispensable to keep up the activity of the negotiations, and to get to know at last the ultimatum of the allies, it being well understood that the treaty would have for result the evacuation of our territory and the release of all prisoners on both sides." The instructions which he charged the Duke of Bassano to send to Caulaincourt were such as a victor might have dictated. The allies must evacuate his territory and give up all the fortresses as soon as the preliminaries of peace were signed: if the negotiations were to break off they had better break off on this question. He himself would cease to control lands beyond the natural frontiers, and would recognize the independence of Holland: as regards Belgium, he would refuse to cede it to a prince of the House of Orange, but he hinted that it might well go to a French prince as an indemnity—evidently Joseph Bonaparte was meant. If this concession were made, he expected that all the French colonies, including the Ile de France, would be restored. Nothing definite was said about the Rhine frontier.
The courier who carried these proposals from Rheims to Châtillon was twice detained by the Russians, and had not reached the town when the Congress came to an end (March 19th). Their only importance, therefore, is to show that, despite all the warnings in which the Prague negotiations were so fruitful, Napoleon clung to the same threatening and dilatory tactics which had then driven Austria into the arms of his foes. He still persisted in looking on the time limit of the allies as meaningless, on their ultimatum as their first word, from which they would soon shuffle away under the pressure of his prowess—and this, too, when Caulaincourt was daily warning him that the hours were numbered, that nothing would change the resolve of his foes, and that their defeats only increased their exasperation against him.
If anything could have increased this exasperation, it was the discovery that he was playing with them all the time. On the 20th the allied scouts brought to head-quarters a despatch written by Maret the day before to Caulaincourt which contained this damning sentence: "The Emperor's desires remain entirely vague on everything relating to the delivering up of the strongholds, Antwerp, Mayence, and Alessandria, if you should be obliged to consent to these cessions, as he has the intention, even after the ratification of the treaty, to take counsel from the military situation of affairs. Wait for the last moment."[435] Peace, then, was to be patched up for Napoleon's convenience and broken by him at the first seasonable opportunity. Is it surprising that on that same day the Ministers of the Powers decided to have no more negotiations with Napoleon, and that Metternich listened not unfavourably to the emissary of the Bourbons, the Count de Vitrolles, whom he had previously kept at arm's length?
In truth, Napoleon was now about to stake everything on a plan from which other leaders would have recoiled, but which, in his eyes, promised a signal triumph. This was to rally the French garrisons in Lorraine and throw himself on Schwarzenberg's rear. It was, indeed, his only remaining chance. With his band of barely 40,000 men, kept up to that number by the arrival of levies that impaired its solidity, he could scarcely hope to beat back the dense masses now marshalled behind the Aube, the Seine, and the Marne.
A glance at the map will show that behind those rivers the allies could creep up within striking distance of Paris, while from his position north of the Aube he could attack them only by crossing one or other of those great streams, the bridges of which were in their hands. He still held the central position; but it was robbed of its value if he could not attack. Warfare for him was little else than the art of swift and decisive attack; or, as he tersely phrased it, "The art of war is to march twelve leagues, fight a battle, and march twelve more in pursuit." As this was now impossible against the fronts and flanks of the allies, it only remained to threaten the rear of the army which was most likely to be intimidated by such a manoeuvre. And this was clearly the army led by Schwarzenberg. From Blücher and Bülow naught but defiance to the death was to be expected, and their rear was supported by the Dutch strongholds.
But the Austrians had shown themselves as soft in their strategy as in their diplomacy. Everyone at the allied headquarters knew that Schwarzenberg was unequal to the load of responsibility thrust on him, that the incursion of a band of Alsatian peasants on his convoys made him nervous, and that he would not move on Paris as long as his "communications were exposed to a movement by Chalons and Vitry."[436] What an effect, then, would be produced on that timid commander by an "Imperial Vendée" in Alsace, Lorraine, and Franche-Comté!
And such a rising might then have become fierce and widespread. The east and centre were the strongholds of French democracy, as they had been the hotbed of feudal and monarchical abuses; and at this very time the Bourbon princes declared themselves at Nancy and Bordeaux. The tactless Comte d'Artois was at Nancy, striving to whip up royalist feeling in Lorraine, and his eldest son, the Duc d'Angoulême, entered Bordeaux with the British red-coats (March 12th).
To explain how this last event was possible we must retrace our steps. After Soult was driven by Wellington from the mountains at the back of the town of Orthez, he drew back his shattered troops over the River Adour, and then turned sharply to the east in order to join hands with Suchet's corps. This move, excellent as it was in a military sense, left Bordeaux open to the British; and Wellington forthwith sent Beresford northwards with 12,000 troops to occupy that great city. He met with a warm greeting from the French royalists, as also did the Duc d'Angoulême, who arrived soon after. The young prince at once proclaimed Louis XVIII. King of France, and allowed the royalist mayor to declare that the allies were advancing to Paris merely in order to destroy Napoleon and replace him by the rightful monarch. Strongly as Wellington's sympathies ran with the aim of this declaration, he emphatically repudiated it. Etiquette compelled him to do so; for the allies were still negotiating with Napoleon; and his own tact warned him that the Bourbons must never come into France under the cloak of the allies.
The allied sovereigns had as yet done nothing to favour their cause; and the wiser heads among the French royalists saw how desirable it was that the initiative should come from France. The bad effects of the Bordeaux manifesto were soon seen in the rallying of National Guards and peasants to the tricolour against the hated fleur-de-lys; and Beresford's men could do little more than hold their own.[437] If that was the case in the monarchical south, what might not Napoleon hope to effect in the east, now that the Bourbon "chimæra" threatened to become a fact?
The news as to the state of Paris was less satisfactory. That fickle populace cheered royalist allusions at the theatres, hissed off an "official" play that represented Cossack marauders,[438] and caused such alarm to Savary that he wrote to warn his master of the inability of the police to control the public if the war rolled on towards Paris. Whether Savary's advice was honestly stupid, or whether, as Lavalette hints, Talleyrand's intrigues were undermining his loyalty to Napoleon, it is difficult to say. But certainly the advice gave Napoleon an additional reason for flinging himself on Schwarzenberg's rear and drawing him back into Lorraine. He had reason to hope that Augereau, reinforced by some of Suchet's troops, would march towards Dijon and threaten the Austrians on the south, while he himself pressed on them from the north-east. In that case, would not Austria make peace, and leave Alexander and Blücher at his mercy? And might he not hope to cut off the Comte d'Artois, and possibly also catch Bernadotte, who had been angling unsuccessfully for popular support in the north-east?
But, while basing all his hopes on the devotion of the French peasantry and the pacific leanings of Austria, the French Emperor left out of count the eager hatred of the Czar and the Prussians. "Blücher would be mad if he attempted any serious movement," so Napoleon wrote to Berthier on the 20th, apparently on the strength of his former suggestion that Joseph should persuade Bernadotte to desert the allies and attack Blücher's rear.[439] At least, it is difficult to find any other reason for Napoleon's strange belief that Blücher would sit still while his allies were being beaten; unless, indeed, we accept Marmont's explanation that Napoleon's brain now rejected all unpleasing news and registered wishes as facts.
Fortune seemed to smile on his enterprise. Though he failed to take Vitry from the allied garrison, yet near St. Dizier he fell on a Prussian convoy, captured 800 men and 400 wagons filled with stores. Everywhere he ordered the tocsin to proclaim a levée en masse, and sent messengers to warn his Lorraine garrisons to cut their way to his side. His light troops spread up the valley of the Marne towards Chaumont, capturing stores and couriers; and he seized this opportunity, when he pictured the Austrians as thoroughly demoralized, to send Caulaincourt from Doulevant with offers to renew the negotiations for peace (March 25th).[440] But while Napoleon awaits the result of these proposals, his rear is attacked: he retraces his steps, falls on the assailants, and finds that they belong to Blücher. But how can Prussians be there in force? Is not Blücher resting on the banks of the Aisne? And where is Schwarzenberg? The Emperor pushes a force on to Vitry to solve this riddle, and there the horrible truth unfolds itself little by little that he stands on the brink of ruin.
It is a story instinct with an irony like that of the infatuation of King Oedipus in the drama of Sophocles. Every step that the warrior has taken to snatch at victory increases the completeness of the disaster. The Emperor Francis, scared by the approach of the French horsemen, and not wishing to fall into the hands of his son-in-law, has withdrawn with Metternich to Dijon.
Napoleon's letter to him is lost.[441] Metternich, well guarded by Castlereagh, is powerless to meet Caulaincourt's offer, and their flight leaves Schwarzenberg under the influence of the Czar.[442] Moreover, Blücher has not been idle. While Napoleon is hurrying eastwards to Vitry, the Prussian leader drives back Marmont's weak corps, his vanguard crosses the Marne near Epernay on the 23rd, his Cossacks capture a courier bearing a letter written on that day by Napoleon to Marie Louise. It ends thus: "I have decided to march towards the Marne, in order to push the enemy's army further from Paris, and to draw near to my fortresses. I shall be this evening at St. Dizier. Adieu, my friend! Embrace my son." Warned by this letter of Napoleon's plan, Blücher pushes on; his outposts on the morrow join hands with those of Schwarzenberg, and send a thrill of vigour into the larger force.
That leader, held at bay by Macdonald's rearguard, was groping after Napoleon, when the capture of a French despatch, and the news forwarded by Blücher, informed him of the French Emperor's eastward march. A council of war was therefore held at Pougy on the afternoon of the 23rd, when the Czar and the bolder spirits led Schwarzenberg to give up his communications with Switzerland, and stake everything on joining Blücher, and following Napoleon's 40,000 with an array of 180,000 men. But the capture of another French despatch a few hours later altered the course of events once more. This time it was a budget of official news from Paris to Napoleon, describing the exhaustion of the finances, the discontent of the populace, and the sensation caused by Wellington's successes and the capture of Bordeaux. These glad tidings inspired Alexander with a far more incisive plan—to march on Paris. This suggestion had been pressed on him on the 17th by Baron de Vitrolles, a French royalist agent, at the close of a long interview; and now its advantages were obvious. Accordingly, at Sommepuis, on the 24th, he convoked his generals, Barclay, Volkonski, Toll, and Diebitsch, to seek their advice. Barclay was for following Napoleon, but the two last voted for the advance to Paris, Toll maintaining that only 10,000 horsemen need be left behind to screen their movements. The Czar signified his warm approval of this plan; a little later the King of Prussia gave his assent, and Schwarzenberg rather doubtfully deferred to their wishes. Thus the result of Napoleon's incursion on the rear of the allies signally belied his expectations. Instead of compelling the enemy to beat a retreat on the Rhine, it left the road open to his capital.[443]
At dawn on the 25th, then, the allied Grand Army turned to the right-about, while Blücher's men marched joyfully on the parallel road from Chalons. Near La Fère-Champenoise, on that day, a cloud of Russian and Austrian horse harassed Marmont's and Mortier's corps, and took 2,500 prisoners and fifty cannon. Further to the north, Blücher's Cossacks swooped on a division of 4,500 men, mostly National Guards, that guarded a large convoy. Stoutly the French formed in squares, and beat them off again and again. Thereupon Colonel Hudson Lowe rode away southwards, to beg reinforcements from Wrede's Bavarians.
They, too, failed to break that indomitable infantry. The 180 wagons had to be left behind; but the recruits plodded on, and seemed likely to break through to Marmont, when the Czar came on the scene. At once he ordered up artillery, riddled their ranks with grapeshot, and when their commander, Pacthod, still refused to surrender, threatened to overwhelm their battered squares by the cavalry of his Guard. Pacthod thereupon ordered his square to surrender. Another band also grounded arms; but the men in the last square fought on, reckless of life, and were beaten down by a whirlwind of sabring, stabbing horsemen, whose fury the generous Czar vainly strove to curb. "I blushed for my very nature as a man," wrote Colonel Lowe, "at witnessing this scene of carnage." The day was glorious for France, but it cost her, in all, more than 5,000 killed and wounded, 4,000 prisoners, and 80 cannon, besides the provisions and stores designed for Napoleon's army.[444] Nothing but the wreck of Marmont's and Mortier's corps, about 12,000 men in all, now barred the road to Paris. Meeting with no serious resistance, the allies crossed the Marne at Meaux, and on the 29th reached Bondy, within striking distance of the French capital.
In that city the people were a prey, first to sheer incredulity, then to the wildest dismay. To them history was but a melodrama and war a romance. Never since the time of Jeanne d'Arc had a foreign enemy come within sight of their spires. For ramparts they had octroi walls, and in place of the death-dealing defiance of 1792 they now showed only the spasmodic vehemence or ironical resignation of an over-cultivated stock. As M. Charles de Rémusat finely remarks on their varying moods, "The despotism which makes a constant show of prosperity gives men little fortitude to meet adversity." Doubtless the royalists, with Talleyrand as their factotum, worked to paralyze the defence; but they formed a small minority, and the masses would have fought for Napoleon had he been present to direct everything. But he was far away, rushing back through Champagne to retrieve his blunder, and in his place they had Joseph. The ex-King of Spain was not the man for the hour. He was no hero to breathe defiance into a bewildered crowd, nor was he well seconded. Clarke, and Moncey, the commander of the 12,000 National Guards, had not armed one-half of that doubtful militia. Marmont and Mortier were at hand, and, with the garrison and National Guards, mustered some 42,000 men.
But what were these against the trained host of more than 100,000 men now marching against the feeble barriers on the north and east? Moreover, Joseph and the Council of Regency had dispirited the defenders by causing the Empress Regent and the infant King of Rome to leave the capital along with the treasure. In Joseph's defence it should be said that Napoleon had twice warned him to transfer the seat of Government to the south of the Loire if the allies neared Paris, and in no case to allow the Empress and the King of Rome to be captured. "Do not leave the side of my son: I had rather know that he was in the Seine than in the hands of the enemies of France." The Emperor's views as to the effect of the capture of Paris were also well known. In January he remarked to Mollien, the Minister of the Treasure, "My dear fellow, if the enemy reaches the gates of Paris, the Empire is no more."[445]
Oppressed by these gloomy omens, the defenders awaited the onset of the allies at Montreuil, Romainville Pantin, and on the northern plain (March 30th). At some points French valour held up successfully against the dense masses; but in the afternoon Marmont, seeing his thin lines overlapped, and in imminent danger of being cut off at Belleville, sent out a request for a truce, as Joseph had empowered him to do if affairs proved to be irretrievable. At all points resistance was hopeless; Mortier was hard pressed on the north-east; at the Clichy gate Moncey and his National Guards fought only for honour; and so, after a whole day of sanguinary conflicts, the great city surrendered on honourable terms.
And thus ended the great impulse which had gone forth from Paris since 1789, which had flooded the plains of Germany, the plateaux of Spain, the cities of Italy, and the steppes of Russia, levelling the barriers of castes and creeds, and binding men in a new and solid unity. The reaction against that great centrifugal and international movement had now become centripetal and profoundly national. Thanks to Napoleon's statecraft, the peoples of Europe from the Volga to the Tagus were now embattled in a mighty phalanx, and were about to enter in triumph the city that only twenty-five years before had heralded the dawn of their nascent liberties.
And what of Napoleon, in part the product and in part the cause, of this strange reaction? By a strange Nemesis, his military genius and his overweening contempt of Schwarzenberg drew him aside at the very time when the allies could strike with deadly effect at the heart of his centralized despotism. On the 29th he hears of disaffection at Paris, of the disaster at La Fère Champenoise, and of the loss of Lyons by Augereau. He at once sees the enormity of his blunder. His weary Guards and he seek to annihilate space. They press on by the unguarded road by way of Troyes and Fontainebleau, thereby cutting off all chance of the Emperor Francis and Metternich sending messages from Dijon to Paris. By incredible exertions the men cover seventeen leagues on the 29th and reach Troyes.
Napoleon, accompanied by Caulaincourt, Drouot, Flahaut, and Lefebvre, rushes on, wearing out horses at every stage: at Fontainebleau on the 30th he hears that his consort has left Paris; at Essonne, that the battle is raging. Late at night, near Athis, he meets a troop of horse under General Belliard: eagerly he questions this brave officer, and learns that Joseph has left Paris, and that the battle is over. "Forward then to Paris: everywhere where I am not they act stupidly."—"But, sire," says the general, "it is too late: Paris has capitulated."
The indomitable will is not yet broken. He must go on; he will sound the tocsin, rouse the populace, tear up the capitulation, and beat the insolent enemy. The sight of Mortier's troops, a little further on, at last burns the truth into his brain: he sends on Caulaincourt with full powers to treat for peace, and then sits up for the rest of the night, poring over his maps and measuring the devotion of his Guard against the inexorable bounds of time and space. He is within ten miles of Paris, and sees the glare of the enemy's watch-fires all over the northern sky.
On the morrow he hears that the allied sovereigns are about to enter Paris, and Marmont warns him by letter that public opinion has much changed since the withdrawal, first of the Empress, and then of Joseph, Louis, and Jerome. This was true. The people were disgusted by their flight; Blücher now had eighty cannon planted on the heights of Montmartre; and men knew that he would not spare Paris if she hazarded a further effort. And thus, when, on that same morning, the Czar, with the King of Prussia on his right, and Schwarzenberg on his left, rode into Paris at the head of the Russian and Prussian Guards, they met with nothing worse than sullen looks on the part of the masses, while knots of enthusiastic royalists shouted wildly for the Bourbons, and women flung themselves to kiss the boots of the liberating Emperor. The Bourbon party, however, was certainly in the minority; but at places along the route their demonstrations were effective enough to influence an impressionable populace, and to delight the conquerors.—"The white cockade appeared very universally:"—wrote Stewart with suspicious emphasis—"many of the National Guards, whom I saw, wore them."[446]
Fearing that the Elysée Palace had been mined, the Czar installed himself at Talleyrand's mansion, opposite the Place de la Concorde; and forthwith there took place a most important private Council. The two monarchs were present, along with Nesselrode and Napoleon's Corsican enemy, Pozzo di Borgo. Princes Schwarzenberg and Lichtenstein represented Austria; while Talleyrand and Dalberg were there to plead for the House of Bourbon: De Pradt and Baron Louis were afterwards summoned. The Czar opened the deliberations by declaring that there were three courses open, to make peace with Napoleon, to accept Marie Louise as Regent for her son, or to recall the Bourbons.[447] The first he declared to be impossible; the second was beset by the gravest difficulties; and, while stating the objections to the Bourbons, he let it be seen that he now favoured this solution, provided that it really was the will of France. He then called on Talleyrand to speak; and that pleader set forth the case of the Bourbons with his usual skill. The French army, he said, was more devoted to its own glory than to Napoleon. France longed for peace, and she could only find it with due sureties under her old dynasty. If the populace had not as yet declared for the Bourbons, who could wonder at that, when the allies persisted in negotiating with Napoleon? But let them declare that they will no more treat with him, and France would at once show her real desires. For himself, he would answer for the Senate. The Czar was satisfied; Frederick William assented; the Austrian princes said not a word on behalf of the claims of Marie Louise; and the cause of the House of Bourbon easily triumphed.[448]
On the morrow appeared in the "Journal des Débats" a decisive proclamation, signed by Alexander on behalf of all the allied Powers; but we must be permitted to doubt whether the Emperor Francis, if present, would have allowed it to appear, especially if his daughter were present in Paris as Regent. The proclamation set forth that the allies would never again treat with "Napoleon Bonaparte" or any member of his family; that they would respect the integrity of France as it existed under its lawful kings, and would recognize and guarantee the constitution which the French nation should adopt.
Accordingly, they invited the Senate at once to appoint a Provisional Government. Talleyrand, as Grand Elector of the Empire, had the power to summon that guardian of the commonwealth, whose vote would clearly be far more expeditious than the plébiscite on which Alexander had previously set his heart. Of the 140 Senators only 64 assembled, but over them Talleyrand's influence was supreme. He spake, and they silently registered his suggestions. Thus it was that the august body, taught by ten years of despotism to bend gracefully before every breeze, fulfilled its last function in the Napoleonic régime by overthrowing the very constitution which it had been expressly charged to uphold. The date was the 1st of April. Talleyrand, Dalberg, Beurnonville, Jaucourt, and l'Abbé de Montesquiou at once formed a Provisional Government; but the soul of it was Talleyrand. The Czar gave the word, and Talleyrand acted as scene-shifter. The last tableau of this constitutional farce was reached on the following day, when the Senate and the Corps Législatif declared that Napoleon had ceased to reign.
Such was the ex-bishop's revenge for insults borne for many a year with courtly tact, but none the less bitterly felt. Napoleon and he had come to regard each other with instinctive antipathy; but while the diplomatist hid his hatred under the cloak of irony, the soldier blurted forth his suspicions. Before leaving Paris, the Emperor had wound up his last Council-meeting by a diatribe against enemies left in the citadel; and his words became all the hotter when he saw that Talleyrand, who was then quietly conversing with Joseph in a corner, took no notice of the outburst. From Champagne he sent off an order to Savary to arrest the ex-Minister, but that functionary took upon himself to disregard the order. Probably there was some understanding between them. And thus, after steering past many a rock, the patient schemer at last helped Europe to shipwreck that mighty adventurer when but a league or two from port.
But all was not over yet. Napoleon had fallen back on Fontainebleau, in front of which town he was assembling a force of nearly 60,000 men. Marie Louise, with the Ministers, was at Blois, and desired to make her way to the side of her consort. Had she done so, and had her father been present at Paris, a very interesting and delicate situation would have been the result; and we may fancy that it would have needed all Metternich's finesse and Castlereagh's common sense to keep the three monarchs united. But Francis was still at Dijon; and Metternich and Castlereagh did not reach Paris until April 10th; so that everything in these important days was decided by the Czar and Talleyrand, both of them irreconcilable foes of Napoleon. It was in vain that Caulaincourt (April 1st) begged the Czar to grant peace to Napoleon on the basis of the old frontiers. "Peace with him would only be a truce," was the reply.
The victor did not repulse the idea of a Regency so absolutely, and the faithful Minister at once hurried to Fontainebleau to persuade his master to abdicate in favour of his son. Napoleon repulsed the offer with disdain: rather than that, he would once more try the hazards of war. He knew that the Old and the Young Guard, still nearly 9,000 strong in all, burned to revenge the insult to French pride; and at the close of a review held on the 3rd in the great court of the palace, they shouted, "To Paris!" and swore to bury themselves under its ruins. It needed not the acclaim of his veterans to prompt him to the like resolve. When, on April 1st, he received a Verbal Note from Alexander, stating that the allies would no longer treat with him, except on his private and family concerns, he exclaimed to Marmont, at the line of the Essonne, that he must fight, for it was a necessity of his position. He also proposed to that Marshal to cross the Seine and attack the allies, forgetting that the Marne, with its bridges held by them, was in the way. Marmont, endowed with a keen and sardonic intelligence, had already seen that his master was more and more the victim of illusions, never crediting the existence of difficulties that he did not actually witness. And when, on the 3rd, or perhaps earlier, offers came from the royalists, the Marshal promised to help them in the way that will shortly appear.
Napoleon's last overtures to the Czar came late on the following day. On that morning he had a long and heated discussion with Berthier, Ney, Oudinot, and Lefebvre. Caulaincourt and Maret were present as peacemakers. The Marshals upbraided Napoleon with the folly of marching on Paris. Angered by their words Napoleon at last said: "The army will obey me." "No," retorted Ney, "it will obey its commanders."
Macdonald, who had just arrived with his weary corps, took up their case with his usual frankness. "Our horses," he said, "can go no further: we have not enough ammunition for one skirmish, and no means of procuring more. If we fail, as we probably shall, the whole of France will be destroyed. We can still impose on the enemy: let us retain our attitude…. We have had enough of war without kindling civil war." Finally the Emperor gave way, and drew up a declaration couched in these terms: "The allied Powers having proclaimed that the Emperor Napoleon was the sole obstacle to the re-establishment of peace in Europe, the Emperor Napoleon, faithful to his oaths, declares that he is ready to descend from the throne, to leave France, and even give up his life, for the good of the fatherland, inseparable from the rights of his son, of those of the regency of the Empress and of the maintenance of the laws of the Empire."[449]
A careful reading of this document will show that it was not an act of abdication, but merely a conditional offer to abdicate, which would satisfy those undiplomatic soldiers and gain time. Macdonald also relates that, after drawing it up, the Emperor threw himself on the sofa, struck his thigh, and said: "Nonsense, gentlemen! let us leave all that alone and march to-morrow, we shall beat them." But they held him to his promise; and Caulaincourt, Ney, and Macdonald straightway proceeding to Paris, beset the Czar with many entreaties and some threats to recognize the Regency.
In their interview, late at night on the 4th, they seemed to make a great impression, especially when they reminded him of his promise not to force any government on France. Next, the Czar called in the members of the Provisional Government, and heard their arguments that a Regency must speedily give way before the impact of the one masterful will. Yet again Alexander listened to the eloquence of Caulaincourt, and finally to the pleadings of the now anxious provisionals. So the night wore on at Talleyrand's mansion, the Czar finally stating that, after hearing the Prussian monarch's advice, he would give his decision. And shortly before dawn came the news that Marmont's corps had marched over to the enemy. "You see," said Alexander to Pozzo di Borgo, "it is Providence that wills it: no more doubt or hesitation now."[450]
On that same night, in fact, Marmont's corps of 12,000 men was brought from Essonne within the lines of the allies, by the Marshal's generals. Marmont himself was then in Paris, having been induced by Ney and Macdonald to come with them, so as to hinder the carrying out of his treasonable design; but his generals, who were in the secret, were alarmed by the frequency of Napoleon's couriers, and carried out the original plan. Thus, at dawn of the 5th, the rank and file found themselves amidst the columns and squadrons of the allies. It was now too late to escape; the men swore at their leaders with helpless fury; and 12,000 men were thus filched from Napoleon's array.[451]
If this conduct be viewed from the personal standpoint, it must be judged a base betrayal of an old friend and benefactor; and it is usually regarded in that light alone. And yet Marmont might plead that his action was necessary to prevent Napoleon sacrificing his troops, and perhaps also his capital, to a morbid pride and desire for revenge. The Marshal owed something to France. The Chambers had pronounced his master's abdication, and Paris seemed to acquiesce in their decision: Bordeaux and Lyons had now definitely hoisted the white flag: Wellington had triumphed in the south; Schwarzenberg marshalled 140,000 men around the capital; and Marmont knew, perhaps, better than any of the Marshals, the obstinacy of that terrible will which had strewn the roads between Moscow, Paris, and Lisbon with a million of corpses. Was it not time that this should end? And would it end as long as Napoleon saw any chance of snatching a temporary success?
However we may regard Marmont's conduct, there can be no doubt that it helped on Napoleon's fall. The Czar was too subtle a diplomatist to attach much importance to Napoleon's declaration cited above. He must have seen in it a device to gain time. But he himself also wished for a few more hours' respite before flinging away the scabbard; and we may regard his lengthy balancings between the pleas of Caulaincourt and Talleyrand as prompted partly by a wish to sip to the full the sweets of revenge for the occupation of Moscow, but mainly by the resolve to mark time until Marmont's corps had been brought over.
Now that the head was struck off Napoleon's lance, the Czar repulsed all notion of a Regency, but declared that he was ready to grant generous terms to Napoleon if the latter abdicated outright. "Now, when he is in trouble," he said, "I will become once more his friend and will forget the past." In conferences with Napoleon's representatives, Alexander decided that Napoleon must keep the title of Emperor, and receive a suitable pension. The islands of Corfu, Corsica, and Elba were considered for his future abode: the last offered the fewest objections; and though Metternich later on protested against the choice of Elba, the Czar felt his honour pledged to this arrangement.[452]
Napoleon himself now began to yield to the inevitable. On hearing the news of Marmont's defection, he sat for some time as if stupefied, then sadly remarked: "The ungrateful man: well! he will be more unhappy than I." But once more, on the 6th, the fighting instinct comes uppermost. He plans to retire with his faithful troops beyond the Loire, and rally the corps of Augereau, Suchet, and Soult. "Come," he cries to his generals, "let us march to the Alps." Not one of them speaks in reply. "Ah," replies the Emperor to their unspoken thoughts; "you want repose: have it then. Alas! you know not how many disappointments and dangers await you on your beds of down." He then wrote his formal abdication:
"The allied Powers having declared that the Emperor was the sole obstacle to the re-establishment of peace in Europe, the Emperor, faithful to his oaths, declares that he renounces, for himself and his heirs, the thrones of France and Italy, and that there is no sacrifice, not even that of life, which he is not ready to make for the interest of France."
The allies made haste to finish the affair; for even now they feared that the caged lion would burst his bars. Indeed, the trusty secretary Fain asserts that when on Easter Monday, the 11th, Caulaincourt brought back the allies' ratification of this deed, Napoleon's first demand was to retract the abdication. It would be unjust, however, to lay too much stress on this strange conduct; for at that time the Emperor's mind was partly unhinged by maddening tumults.
His anguish increased when he heard the final terms of the allies. They allotted to him the isle of Elba; to his consort and heir, the duchies of Parma, Placentia and Guastalla, and two millions of francs as an annual subsidy, divided equally between himself and her. They were to keep the title of Emperor and Empress; but their son would bear the name of Duke of Parma, etc. The other Bonapartes received an annual subsidy of 2,500,000 francs, this and the former sum being paid by France. Four hundred soldiers might accompany him to Elba. A "suitable establishment" was to be provided for Eugène outside of France.[453] For some hours Napoleon refused to ratify this compact. All hope of resistance was vain, for Oudinot, Victor, Lefebvre, and, finally, Ney and Berthier, had gone over to the royalists: even the soldiery began to waver. But a noble pride held back the mighty conqueror from accepting Elba and signing a money compact. It is not without a struggle that a Cæsar sinks to the level of a Sancho Panza.
He then talked to Caulaincourt with the insight that always illumined his judgments. Marie Louise ought to have Tuscany, he said: Parma would not befit her dignity. Besides, if she had to traverse other States to come to him, would she ever do so? He next talked of his Marshals. Masséna's were the greatest exploits: but Suchet had shown himself the wisest both in war and administration. Soult was able, but too ambitious. Berthier was honest, sensible, the model of a chief of the staff; and "yet he has now caused me much pain." Not a word escaped him about Davoust, still manfully struggling at Hamburg. Not one of his Ministers, he complained, had come from Blois to bid him farewell. He then spoke of his greatest enemy—England. "She has done me much harm, doubtless, but I have left in her flanks a poisoned dart. It is I who have made this debt, that will ever burden, if not crush, future generations." Finally, he came back to the hateful compact which Caulaincourt pressed him in vain to sign. How could he take money from the allies. How could he leave France so small, after receiving her so great!
That same night he sought to end his life. On February the 8th he had warned his brother Joseph that he would do so if Paris were captured. During the retreat from Moscow he had carried about a phial which was said to contain opium, and he now sought to end his miseries. But Caulaincourt, his valet Constant, and the surgeon Ivan were soon at hand with such slight cures as were possible. After violent sickness the Emperor sank into deep prostration; but, when refreshed by tea, and by the cool air of dawning day, he gradually revived. "Fate has decided," he exclaimed: "I must live and await all that Providence has in store for me."[454] He then signed the treaty with the allies, presented Macdonald with the sword of Murad Bey, and calmly began to prepare for his departure.
Marie Louise did not come to see him. Her decision to do so was overruled by her father, in obedience to whose behests she repaired from Blois to Rambouillet.
There, guarded by Cossacks, she saw Francis, Alexander, and Frederick William in turn. What passed between them is not known: but the result was that, on April 23rd, she set out for Vienna, whence she finally repaired to Parma; she manifested no great desire to see her consort at Elba, but soon consoled herself with the Count de Neipperg.
No doubts as to her future conduct, no qualms of conscience as to the destiny of France now ruffled Napoleon's mind. Like a sky cleared by a thunderstorm, once more it shone forth with clear radiance. Those who saw him now were astonished at his calmness, except in some moments when he declaimed at his wife and child being kept from him by Austrian schemes. Then he stormed and wept and declared that he would seek refuge in England, which General Köller, the Austrian commissioner appointed to escort him to Elba, strongly advised him to do. But for the most part he showed remarkable composure. When Bausset sought to soothe him by remarking that France would still form one of the finest of realms, he replied: "with remarkable serenity—'I abdicate and I yield nothing.'"[455] The words hide a world of meaning: they inclose the secret of the Hundred Days.
On the 20th, he bade farewell to his Guard: in thrilling words he told them that his mission thenceforth would be to describe to posterity the wonders they had achieved: he then embraced General Petit, kissed the war-stained banner, and, wafted on his way by the sobs of these unconquered heroes, set forth for the Mediterranean. In the central districts, and as far as Lyons, he was often greeted by the well-known shouts, but, further south, the temper of the people changed.
At Orange they cursed him to his face, and hurled stones at the windows of the carriage; Napoleon, protected by Bertrand, sat huddled up in the corner, "apparently very much frightened." After forcing a way through the rabble, the Emperor, when at a safe distance, donned a plain great coat, a Russian cloak, and a plain round hat with a white cockade: in this or similar disguises he sought to escape notice at every village or town, evincing, says the British Commissioner, Colonel Campbell, "much anxiety to save his life."
By a détour he skirted the town of Avignon, where the mob thirsted for his blood; and by another device he disappointed the people of Orgon, who had prepared an effigy of him in uniform, smeared with blood, and placarded with the words: "Voilà donc l'odieux tyran! Tôt ou tard le crime est puni."[456] In this humiliating way he hurried on towards the coast, where a British frigate, the "Undaunted," was waiting for him. There some suspicious delays ensued, which aroused the fears of the allied commissioners, especially as bands of French soldiers began to draw near after the break-up of Eugène's army.[457]
At last, on the 28th, accompanied by Counts Bertrand and Drouot, he set sail from Fréjus. It was less than fifteen years since he had landed there crowned with the halo of his oriental adventures.
* * * * *
CHAPTER XXXVIII
ELBA AND PARIS
If it be an advantage to pause in the midst of the rush of life and take one's bearings afresh, then Napoleon was fortunate in being drifted to the quiet eddy of Elba. He there had leisure to review his career, to note where he had served his generation and succeeded, where also he had dashed himself fruitlessly against the fundamental instincts of mankind. Undoubtedly he did essay this mental stock-taking. He remarked to the conscientious Drouot that he was wrong in not making peace at the Congress of Prague; that trust in his own genius and in his soldiery led him astray; "but those who blame me have never drunk of Fortune's intoxicating cup." When a turn of her wheel brought him uppermost again, he confessed that at Elba he had heard, as in a tomb, the verdict of posterity; and there are signs that his maturer convictions thenceforth strove to curb the old domineering instincts that had wrecked his life.
Introspection, however, was alien to his being; he was made for the camp rather than the study; his critical powers, if turned in for a time on himself, quickly swung back to work upon men and affairs; and they found the needed exercise in organizing his Liliputian Empire and surveying the course of European politics. In the first weeks he was up at dawn, walking or riding about Porto Ferrajo and its environs, planning better defences, or tracing out new roads and avenues of mulberry trees. "I have never seen a man," wrote Campbell, "with so much activity and restless perseverance: he appears to take pleasure in perpetual movement, and in seeing those who accompany him sink under fatigue." About seven hundred of his Guards were brought over on British transports; and these, along with Corsicans and Tuscans, guarded him against royalist plotters, real or supposed. In a short time he purchased a few small vessels, and annexed the islet of Pianosa. These affairs and the formation of an Imperial Court for the delectation of his mother and his sister Pauline, who now joined him, served to drive away ennui; but he bitterly resented the Emperor Francis's refusal to let his wife and son come to him. Whether Marie Louise would have come is more than doubtful, for her relations to Count Neipperg were already notorious; but the detention of his son was a heartless action that aroused general sympathy for the lonely man. The Countess Walewska paid him a visit for some days, bringing the son whom she had borne him.[458]
Meanwhile Europe was settling down uneasily on its new political foundations. Considering that France had been at the mercy of the allies, she had few just grounds of complaint against them. The Treaties of Paris (May 30th, 1814) left her with rather wider bounds than those of 1791; and she kept the art treasures reft by Napoleon. Perfidious Albion yielded up all her French colonial conquests, except Mauritius, Tobago, and St. Lucia. Britons grumbled at the paltry gains brought by a war that had cost more than £600,000,000: but Castlereagh justified the policy of conciliation. "It is better," said he, "for France to be commercial and pacific than a warlike and conquering State." We insisted on her ceding Belgium to the House of Orange, while we retained the Dutch colonies conquered by us, the Cape, Demerara, and Curaçoa—paying £6,000,000 for them.
The loss of the Netherlands, the Rhineland, and Italy galled French pride. Loud were the murmurs of the throngs of soldiers that came from the fortresses of Germany, or the prisons of Spain, Russia, and England—70,000 crossed over from our shores alone—at the harshness of the allies and the pusillanimity of the Bourbons. The return from war to peace is always hard; and now these gaunt warriors came back to a little France that perforce discharged them or placed them on half-pay. Perhaps they might have been won over by a tactful Court: but the Bourbons, especially that typical émigré, the Comte d'Artois, were nothing if not tactless, witness their shelving of the Old Guard and formation of the Maison du Roi, a privileged and highly paid corps of 6,000 nobles and royalist gentlemen. The peasants, too, were uneasy, especially those who held the lands of nobles confiscated in the Revolution. To indemnify the former owners was impossible in face of the torrent of exorbitant claims that flowed in. And the year 1814, which began as a soul-stirring epic, ended with sordid squabbles worthy of a third-rate farce.
Moreover, at this very time, the former allies seemed on the brink of war. The limits of our space admit only of the briefest glance at the disputes of the Powers at the Congress of Vienna. The storm centre of Europe was the figure of the Czar. To our ambassador at Vienna, Sir Charles Stewart, he declared his resolve to keep western Poland and never to give up 7,000,000 of his "Polish subjects."[459] Strange to say, he ultimately gained the assent of Prussia to this objectionable scheme, provided that she acquired the whole of Saxony, while Frederick Augustus was to be transplanted to the Rhineland with Bonn as capital. To these proposals Austria, England, and France offered stern opposition, and framed a secret compact (January 3rd, 1815) to resist them, if need be, with armies amounting to 450,000 men. But, though swords were rattled in their scabbards, they were not drawn. When news reached Vienna of the activity of Bonapartists in France and of Murat in Italy, the Powers agreed (February 8th) to the Saxon-Polish compromise which took shape in the map of Eastern Europe. The territorial arrangements in the west were evidently inspired by the wish to build up bulwarks against France. Belgium was tacked on to Holland; Germany was huddled into a Confederation, in which the princes had complete sovereign powers; and the Kingdom of Sardinia grew to more than its former bulk by recovering Savoy and Nice and gaining Genoa.
This piling up of artificial barriers against some future Napoleon was to serve the designs of the illustrious exile himself. The instinct of nationality, which his blows had aroused to full vigour, was now outraged by the sovereigns whom it carried along to victory. Belgians strongly objected to Dutch rule, and German "Unitarians," as Metternich dubbed them, spurned a form of union which subjected the Fatherland to Austria and her henchmen. Hardest of all was the fate of Italy. After learning the secret of her essential unity under Napoleon, she was now parcelled out among her former rulers; and thrills of rage shot through the peninsula when the Hapsburgs settled down at Venice and Milan, while their scions took up the reins at Modena, Parma, and Florence.
It was on this popular indignation that Murat now built his hopes. After throwing over Napoleon, he had looked to find favour with the allies; but his movements in 1814 had been so suspicious that the fate of his kingdom remained hanging in the balance. The Bourbons of Paris and Madrid strove hard to effect his overthrow; but Austria and England, having tied their hands early in 1814 by treaties with him, could only wait and watch in the hope that the impetuous soldier would take a false step. He did so in February, 1815, when he levied forces, summoned Louis XVIII. to declare whether he was at war with him, and prepared to march into Northern Italy.
The disturbed state of the peninsula caused the Powers much uneasiness as to the presence of Napoleon at Elba. Louis XVIII. in his despatches, and Talleyrand in private conversations, two or three times urged his removal to the Azores; but, with the exception of Castlereagh, who gave a doubtful assent, the plenipotentiaries scouted the thought of it. Metternich entirely opposed it, and the Czar would certainly have objected to the reversal of his Elba plan, had Talleyrand made a formal proposal to that effect. But he did not do so. The official records of the Congress contain not a word on the subject. Equally unfounded were the newspaper rumours that the Congress was considering the advisability of removing Napoleon to St. Helena. On this topic the official records are also silent; and we have the explicit denial of the Duke of Wellington (who reached Vienna on the 1st of February to relieve Castlereagh) that "the Congress ever had any intention of removing Bonaparte from Elba to St. Helena."[460]
Napoleon's position was certainly one of unstable equilibrium, that tended towards some daring enterprise or inglorious bankruptcy. The maintenance of his troops cost him more than 1,000,000 francs a year, while his revenue was less than half of that sum. He ought to have received 2,000,000 francs a year from Louis XVIII.; but that monarch, while confiscating the property of the Bonapartes in France, paid not a centime of the sums which the allies had pledged him to pay to the fallen House. Both the Czar and our envoy, Castlereagh, warmly reproached Talleyrand with his master's shabby conduct; to which the plenipotentiary replied that it was dangerous to furnish Napoleon with money as long as Italy was in so disturbed a state. Castlereagh, on his return to England by way of Paris, again pressed the matter on Louis XVIII., who promised to take the matter in hand. But he was soon quit of it: for, as he wrote to Talleyrand on March 7th, Bonaparte's landing in France spared him the trouble.[461]
To assert, however, that Napoleon's escape from Elba was prompted by a desire to avoid bankruptcy, is to credit him with respectable bourgeois scruples by which he was never troubled. Though "Madame Mère" and Pauline complained bitterly to Campbell of the lack of funds at Elba, the Emperor himself was far from depressed. "His spirits seem of late," wrote Campbell on December 28th, "rather to rise, and not to yield in the smallest degree to the pressure of pecuniary difficulties." Both Campbell and Lord John Russell, who then paid the Emperor a flying visit, thought that he was planning some great move, and warned our Ministers.[462] But they shared the view of other wiseacres, that Italy would be his goal, and that too, when Campbell's despatches teemed with remarks made to him by Napoleon as to the certainty of an outbreak in France. Here are two of them:
He said that there would be a violent outbreak, similar to the Revolution, in consequence of their present humiliation: every man in France considers the Rhine to be the natural frontier of France, and nothing can alter this opinion. If the spirit of the nation is roused into action nothing can oppose it. It is like a torrent…. The present Government of France is too feeble: the Bourbons should make war as soon as possible so as to establish themselves upon the throne. It would not be difficult to recover Belgium. It is only for the British troops there that the French army has the smallest awe" (sic).
His final resolve to put everything to the hazard was formed about February 13th, when, shortly after receiving tidings as to the unrest in Italy, the discords of the Powers, and the resolve of the allied sovereigns to leave Vienna on the 20th, he heard news of the highest importance from France. On that day one of his former officials, Fleury de Chaboulon, landed in Elba, and informed him of the hatching of a plot by military malcontents, under the lead of Fouché, for the overthrow of Louis XVIII.[463] Napoleon at once despatched his informant to Naples, and ordered his brig, "L'Inconstant," to be painted like an English vessel. Most fortunately for him, Campbell on the 16th set sail for Tuscany—"for his health and on private affairs"—on the small war-vessel, "Partridge," to which the British Government had intrusted the supervision of Napoleon. Captain Adye, of that vessel, promised, after taking Campbell to Leghorn, to return and cruise off Elba. He called at Porto Ferrajo on the 24th, and to Bertrand's question, when he was to bring Campbell back, returned the undiplomatic answer that it was fixed for the 26th. The news seems to have decided Napoleon to escape on that day, when the "Partridge" would be absent at Leghorn. Meanwhile Campbell, alarmed by the news of the preparations at Elba, was sending off a request to Genoa that another British warship should be sent to frustrate the designs of the "restless villain."
But it was now too late. On that Sunday night at 9 p.m., the Emperor, with 1,050 officers and men, embarked at Porto Ferrajo on the "Inconstant" and six smaller craft. Favoured by the light airs that detained the British vessel, his flotilla glided away northwards; and not before the 28th did Adye and Campbell find that the imperial eagle had flown. Meanwhile Napoleon had eluded the French guard-ship, "Fleur-de-Lys," and ordered his vessels to scatter. On doubling the north of Corsica, he fell in with another French cruiser, the "Zephyr," which hailed his brig and inquired how the great man was. "Marvellously well," came the reply, suggested by Napoleon himself to his captain. The royalist cruiser passed on contented. And thus, thanks to the imbecility of the old Governments and of their servants, Napoleon was able to land his little force safely in the Golfe de Jouan on the afternoon of March 1st.[464] Is it surprising that foreigners, who had not yet fathomed the eccentricities of British officialdom, should have believed that we connived at Napoleon's escape? It needed the blood shed at Waterloo to wipe out the misconception.
"I shall reach Paris without firing a shot." Such was the prophecy of Napoleon to his rather questioning followers as they neared the coast of Provence. It seemed the wildest of dreams. Could the man, who had been wellnigh murdered by the rabble of Avignon and Orgon, hope to march in peace through that royalist province? And, if he ever reached the central districts where men loved him better, would the soldiery dare to disobey the commands of Soult, the new Minister of War, of Ney, Berthier, Macdonald, St. Cyr, Suchet, Augereau, and of many more who were now honestly serving the Bourbons? The King and his brothers had no fears. They laughed at the folly of this rash intruder.
At first their confidence seemed justified. Napoleon's overtures to the officer and garrison of Antibes were repulsed, and the small detachment which he sent there was captured. Undaunted by this check, he decided to hurry on by way of Grasse towards Grenoble, thus forestalling the news of his first failure, and avoiding the royalist districts of the lower Rhone.
Napoleon was visibly perturbed as he drew near to Grenoble. There the officer in command, General Marchand, had threatened to exterminate this "band of brigands"; and his soldiers as yet showed no signs of defection. But, by some bad management, only one battalion held the defile of Laffray on the south. As the bear-skins of the Guard came in sight, the royalist ranks swerved and drew back. Then the Emperor came forward, and ordered his men to lower their arms. "There he is: fire on him," cried a royalist officer. Not a shot rang out.—"Soldiers," said the well-known voice, "if there is one among you who wishes to kill his Emperor, he can do so. Here I am." At once a great shout of "Vive l'Empereur" burst forth: and the battalion broke into an enthusiastic rush towards the idol of the soldiery.
That scene decided the whole course of events. A little later, a young noble, Labédoyère, leads over his regiment; at Grenoble the garrison stands looking on and cheering while the Bonapartists batter in the gates; and the hero is borne in amidst a whirlwind of cheers. At Lyons, the Comte d'Artois and Macdonald seek safety in flight; and soldiers and workmen welcome their chief with wild acclaim; but amidst the wonted cries are heard threats of "The Bourbons to the guillotine," "Down with the priests!"
The shouts were ominous: they showed that the Jacobins meant to use Napoleon merely as a tool for the overthrow of the Bourbons. The "have-nots" cheered him, but the "haves" shivered at his coming, for every thinking man knew that it implied war with Europe.[465] Napoleon saw the danger of relying merely on malcontents and sought to arouse a truly national feeling. He therefore on March 13th issued a series of popular decrees, that declared the rule of the Bourbons at an end, dissolved the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, and summoned the "electoral colleges" of the Empire to a great assembly, or Champ de Mai, at Paris. He further proscribed the white flag, ordered the wearing of the tri-colour cockade, disbanded the hated "Maison du Roi," abolished feudal titles, and sequestered the domains of the Bourbon princes. In brief, he acted as the Bonaparte of 1799. He then set forth for Paris, at the head of 14,000 men.
Ney was at the same time marching with 6,000 men from Besançon. He had lately assured Louis XVIII. that Napoleon deserved to be brought to Paris in an iron cage. But now his soldiers kept a sullen silence. At Bourg the leading regiment deserted; and while beset by difficulties, the Marshal received from Napoleon the assurance that he would be received as he was on the day after the Moskwa (Borodino). This was enough. He drew his troops around him, and, to their lively joy, declared for the Emperor (March 14th). Napoleon was as good as his word. Never prone to petty malice, he now received with equal graciousness those officers who flung themselves at his feet, and those who staunchly served the King to the very last. Before this sunny magnanimity the last hopes of the Bourbons melted away. Greeted on all sides by soldiers and peasants, the enchanter advances on Paris, whence the King and Court beat a hasty retreat towards Lille.
Crowds of peasants line and almost block the road from Fontainebleau to catch a glimpse of the gray coat; and, to expedite matters, he drives on in a cabriolet with his faithful Caulaincourt. Escorted by a cavalcade of officers he enters Paris after nightfall; but there the tone of the public is cool and questioning, until the front of the Tuileries facing the river is reached.[466] Then a mighty shout arises from the throng of jubilant half-pay officers as the well-known figure alights: he passes in, and is half carried up the grand staircase, "his eyes half closed," says Lavalette, "his hands extended before him like a blind man, and expressing his joy only by a smile." Ladies are there also, who have spent the weary hours of waiting in stripping off fleurs-de-lys, and gleefully exposing the N's and golden bees concealed by cheap Bourbon upholstery. Anon they fly back to this task; the palace wears its wonted look; and the brief spell of Bourbon rule seems gone for ever.
To his contemporaries this triumph of Napoleon appeared a miracle before which the voice of criticism must be dumb. And yet, if we remember the hollowness of the Bourbon restoration, the tactlessness of the princes and the greed of their partisans, it seems strange that the house of cards reared by the Czar and Talleyrand remained standing even for eleven months. Napoleon correctly described the condition of France when he said to his comrades on the "Inconstant": "There is no historic example that induces me to venture on this bold enterprise: but I have taken into account the surprise that will seize on men, the state of public feeling, the resentment against the allies, the love of my soldiers, in fine, all the Napoleonic elements that still germinate in our beautiful France."[467]
Still less was he deceived by the seemingly overwhelming impulse in his favour. He looked beyond the hysteria of welcome to the cold and critical fit which follows; and he saw danger ahead. When Mollien complimented him on his return, he replied, alluding to the general indifference at the departure of the Bourbons: "My dear fellow! People have let me come, just as they let the others go." The remark reveals keen insight into the workings of French public opinion. The whole course of the Revolution had shown how easy it was to destroy a Government, how difficult to rebuild. In truth, the events of March, 1815, may be called the epilogue of the revolutionary drama. The royal House had offended the two most powerful of French interests, the military and the agrarian, so that soldiers and peasants clutched eagerly at Napoleon as a mighty lever for its overthrow.
The Emperor wisely formed his Ministry before the first enthusiasm cooled down. Maret again became Secretary of State; Decrès took the Navy; Gaudin the finances; Mollien was coaxed back to the Treasury, and Davoust reluctantly accepted the Ministry of War. Savary declined to be burdened with the Police, and Napoleon did not press him: for that clever intriguer, Fouché, was pointed out as the only man who could rally the Jacobins around the imperial throne: to him, then, Napoleon assigned this important post, though fully aware that in his hands it was a two-edged tool. Carnot was finally persuaded to become Minister for Home Affairs.
Napoleon's fate, however, was to be decided, not at Paris, but by the statesmen assembled at Vienna. There time was hanging somewhat heavily, and the news of Napoleon's escape was welcomed at first as a grateful diversion. Talleyrand asserted that Napoleon would aim at Italy, but Metternich at once remarked: "He will make straight for Paris." When this prophecy proved to be alarmingly true, a drastic method was adopted to save the Bourbons. The plenipotentiaries drew up a declaration that Bonaparte, having broken the compact which established him at Elba—the only legal title attaching to his existence—had placed himself outside the bounds of civil and social relations, and, as an enemy and disturber of the peace of the world, was consigned to "public prosecution" (March 13th).[468] The rigour of this decree has been generally condemned. But, after all, it did not exceed in harshness Napoleon's own act of proscription against Stein; it was a desperate attempt to stop the flight of the imperial eagle to Paris and to save France from war with Europe.
Public considerations were doubtless commingled with the promptings of personal hatred. We are assured that Talleyrand was the author of this declaration, which had the complete approval of the Czar. But Napoleon had one enemy more powerful than Alexander, more insidious than Talleyrand, and that was—his own past. Everywhere the spectre of war rose up before the imagination of men. The merchant pictured his ships swept off by privateers: the peasant saw his homestead desolate: the housewife dreamt of her larder emptied by taxes, and sons carried off for the war. At Berlin, wrote Jackson, all was agitation, and everybody said that the work of last year would have to be done over again.
In England the current of public feeling was somewhat weakened by the drifts and eddies of party politics. Many of the Whigs made a popular hero of Napoleon, some from a desire to overthrow the Liverpool Ministry that proscribed him; others because they believed, or tried to believe, that the return of Napoleon concerned only France, and that he would leave Europe alone if Europe left him alone. Others there were again, as Hazlitt, who could not ignore the patent fact that Napoleon was an international personage and had violated a European compact, yet nevertheless longed for his triumph over the bad old Governments and did not trouble much as to what would come next. But, on the whole, the judgment of well-informed people may be summed up in the conclusion of that keen lawyer, Crabb Robinson: "The question is, peace with Bonaparte now, or war with him in Germany two years hence."[469] The matter came to a test on April 28th, when Whitbread's motion against war was rejected by 273 to 72.[470]
If that was the general opinion in days when Ministers and diplomatists alone knew the secrets of the game, it was certain that the initiated, who remembered his wrongheaded refusals to make peace even in the depressing days of 1814, would strive to crush him before he could gather all his strength. In vain did he protest that he had learnt by sad experience and was a changed man. They interpreted his pacific speeches by their experience of his actions; and thus his overweening conduct in the past blotted out all hope of his crowning a romantic career by a peaceful and benignant close. The declaration of outlawry was followed, on March 25th, by the conclusion of treaties between the Powers, which virtually renewed those framed at Chaumont. In quick succession the smaller States gave in their adhesion; and thus the coalition which tact and diplomacy had dissolved was revivified by the fears which the mighty warrior aroused. Napoleon made several efforts to sow distrust among the Powers; and chance placed in his hands a veritable apple of discord.
The Bourbons in their hasty flight from Paris had left behind several State papers, among them being the recent secret compact against Russia and Prussia. Napoleon promptly sent this document to the Czar at Vienna; but his hopes of sundering the allies were soon blighted. Though Alexander and Metternich had for months refused to exchange a word or a look, yet the news of Napoleon's adventure brought about a speedy reconciliation; and when the compromising paper from Paris was placed in the Czar's hands, he took the noble revenge of sending for Metternich, casting it into the fire, and adjuring the Minister to forget recent disputes in the presence of their common enemy. Napoleon strove to detach Austria from the Coalition, as did also Fouché on his own account; but the overtures led to no noteworthy result, except that Napoleon, on finding out Fouché's intrigue, threatened to have him shot—a threat which that necessary tool treated with quiet derision.
A few acts of war occurred at once; but Austria and Russia pressed for delay, the latter with the view of overthrowing Murat. That potentate now drew the sword on behalf of Napoleon, and summoned the Italians to struggle for their independence. But he was quickly overpowered at Tolentino (May 3rd), and fled from his kingdom, disguised as a sailor, to Toulon. There he offered his sword to Napoleon; but the Emperor refused his offer and blamed him severely, alleging that he had compromised the fortunes of France by rendering peace impossible. The charge must be pronounced not proven. The allies had taken their resolve to destroy Napoleon on March 13th, and Murat's adventure merely postponed the final struggle for a month or so.
Napoleon used this time of respite to form his army and stamp out opposition in France. The French royalist bands gave him little trouble. In the south-west the fleur-de-lys was speedily beaten down; but in La Vendée royalism had its roots deep-seated. Headed by the two Larochejacqueleins, the peasants made a brave fight; and 20,000 regulars failed to break them up until the month of June was wearing on. What might not those 20,000 men, detained in La Vendée, have effected on the crest of Waterloo?
Napoleon's preoccupation, however, was the conduct of the Jacobins in France, who had been quickened to immense energy by the absurdities of the royalist reaction and felt that they had the new ruler in their power. A game of skill ensued, which took up the greater part of the "Hundred Days" of Napoleon's second reign. His conduct proved that he was not sure of success. He felt out of touch with this new liberty-loving France, so different from the passively devoted people whom he had left in 1814; he bridled his impetuous nature, reasoning with men, inviting criticism, and suggesting doubts as to his own proposals, in a way that contrasted curiously with the old sledge-hammer methods.
"He seemed," writes Mollien, "habitually calm, pensive, and preserved without affectation a serious dignity, with little of that old audacity and self-confidence which had never met with insuperable obstacles…. As his thoughts were cramped in a narrow space girt with precipices instead of soaring freely over a vast horizon of power, they became laborious and
This Pegasus in harness chafed at the unwonted yoke; and at times the old instincts showed themselves. On one occasion, when the subject turned on the new passion for liberty, he said to Lavalette with a question in his voice: "All this will last two or three years?" "Your Majesty," replied the Minister, "must not believe that. It will last for ever."
The first grave difficulty was to frame a constitution, especially as his Lyons decrees led men to believe that it would emanate from the people, and be sanctioned by them in a great Champ de Mai. Perhaps this was impossible. A great part of France was a prey to civil strifes; and it was a skilful device to intrust the drafting of a constitution to Benjamin Constant.
This brilliant writer and talker had now run through the whole gamut of political professions. A pronounced Jacobin and free-thinker during the Consulate, he subsequently retired to Germany, where he unlearnt his politics, his religion, and his philosophy. The sight of Napoleon's devastations made him a supporter of the throne and altar, compelled him to recast his treatises, and drove him to consort with the quaint circle of pietists who prayed and grovelled with Madame de Krudener. Returning to France at the Restoration, he wielded his facile pen in the cause of the monarchy, and fluttered after the fading charms of Madame Récamier, confiding to his friend, De Broglie, that he knew not whether to trust most to divine or satanic agencies for success in this lawless chase. In March, 1815, he thundered in the Press against the brigand of Elba—until the latter won him over in the space of a brief interview, and persuaded him to draft, with a few colleagues, the final constitution of the age.
Not that Constant had a free hand: he worked under imperial inspiration. The present effort was named the Additional Act—additional, that is, to the Constitutions of the Empire (April 22nd, 1815). It established a Chamber of Peers nominated by Napoleon, with hereditary rights, and a Chamber of Representatives elected on the plan devised in August, 1802. The Emperor was to nominate all the judges, including the juges de paix; the jury system was maintained, and liberty of the Press was granted. The Chambers also gained somewhat wider control over the Ministers.[471]
This Act called forth a hail of criticisms. When the Council of State pointed out that there was no guarantee against confiscations, Napoleon's eyes flashed fire, and he burst forth:
"You are pushing me in a way that is not mine. You are weakening and chaining me. France looks for me and does not find me. Public opinion was excellent: now it is execrable. France is asking what has come to the Emperor's arm, this arm which she needs to master Europe. Why speak to me of goodness, abstract justice, and of natural laws? The first law is necessity: the first justice is the public safety."
The councillors quailed under this tirade and conceded the point—though we may here remark that Napoleon showed a wise clemency towards his foes, and confiscated the estates of only thirteen of them.
Public opinion became more and more "execrable." Some historians have asserted that the decline of Napoleon's popularity was due, not to the Additional Act, but to the menaces of war from a united Europe: this may be doubted. Miot de Melito, who was working for the Emperor in the West, states that "never had a political error more immediate effects" than that Act; and Lavalette, always a devoted adherent, asserts that Frenchmen thenceforth "saw only a despot in the Emperor and forgot about the enemy."
As a display of military enthusiasm, the Champ de Mai, of June 1st, recalled the palmy days gone by. Veterans and conscripts hailed their chief with jubilant acclaim, as with a few burning words he handed them their eagles. But the people on the outskirts cheered only when the troops cheered. Why should they, or the "electors" of France, cheer? They had hoped to give her a constitution; and they were now merely witnesses to Napoleon's oath that he would obey the constitution of his own making. As a civic festival, it was a mockery in the eyes of men who remembered the "Feast of Pikes," and were not to be dazzled by the waving of banners and the gorgeous costumes of Napoleon and his brothers. The opening of the Chambers six days later gave an outlet to the general discontent. The report that Napoleon designed his brother Lucien for the Presidency of the Lower House is incorrect. That honest democrat Lanjuinais was elected. Everything portended a constitutional crisis, when the summons to arms rang forth; and the chief, warning the deputies not to imitate the Greeks of the late Empire by discussing abstract propositions while the battering-ram thundered at their gates, cut short these barren debates by that appeal to the sword which had rarely belied his hopes.