Imatges de pàgina
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fortunately such occasions seldom occurred, and might never occur again; but that, if it were possible, the same sentiment which actuated me then, would urge me to take the same responsibility upon myself again, whatever might be the consequences. 'Dans ce cas là,' answered the Prince, 'je vous renverrais de mon quartier général.' I replied I should be immediately prepared to quit it, as soon as I should receive the orders of my sovereign. I had often seen these starts of passion towards others, to a degree of outrage; but nothing of the kind had been addressed to myself, except, as I informed your lordship, in an interview at Juterboch on the subject of his letter to Marshal Ney."

This ebullition of camp violence resembles, on a smaller scale, Bonaparte's insolence at the Tuileries to Lord Whitworth-both arising from the original coarseness of their condition, for the Corsican never forgot the savagery of his childhood; and Bernadotte had been a common marine. Flung up, like the men of the Revolution, into rank, he was, however, the only one of them all who retained his position.

But we pass to a larger scene of operations. Napoleon, after the battles of Lutzen and Bautzen, had been brought to a stand. The plunge into the depths of Germany had only wasted his power and impaired his reputation. Austria, recovering by an armistice of nearly four years, and constantly training her strength for that state of war which, while Napoleon sat on the throne, must be the natural state of all kingdoms, now held the scales of European supremacy in her hand. Napoleon again at tempted negotiation. His interview with Metternich is one of the most characteristic scenes of history. The man is stamped on every sentence. His language has the force, the brevity, and the lucidness of an antique inscription. "I see through you, Metternich; your Cabinet wishes to profit by my embarrassments. Come to the point. Do not forget that I am a soldier, who would rather break than bend." The voices now sank and were inaudible. In a short time, however, Napoleon was heard ex

claiming, "What! not only Illyria, but the half of Italy-and the return of the Pope to Rome-and the abandonment of Spain, Holland, the Con- . federation of the Rhine, and Switzerland! And this you call moderation! a treaty! It would be nothing but a capitulation."

This memorable conference closed abruptly in the brutish language which Napoleon had learned in his cradle, and reinforced in his camp. "Metternich, how much has England given you to make war upon me?" To this nothing could be added; and after a few words to heal the minister's insulted honour, the conference ended, in anger on the one side, and hopelessness on the part of the insulter.

This was one of the decisive moments of empire. We shall not say that on it depended either the ruin or the recovery of the Continent; but the decision came from a nobler quarter than either the tents of France or the council-chambers of Austria. The alliance of Austria with France would unquestionably have either increased the havoc, or prolonged the slavery of Europe. The battle of Vittoria was the impulse. The intelligence of that most decisive defeat of the whole war -except the crowning triumph of Waterloo-in which the whole army of France in the north of Spain, with all its artillery, all its baggage, and even all its plunder; with not merely its battalions, but its court and king, fell into the hands of England, the utter demolition of the structure of conquest and ambition reared by so many crimes of treachery and blood-reached Napoleon on the 30th of June. On the evening of that day he signed the convention by which Austria accepted the office of mediator; and with it was virtually signed the expulsion of Napoleon from Germany.

On the march of the allied armies across that frontier which France had pronounced iron, impassable, and even sacred, it was felt that England was too distant to direct the crisis. The strange and complicated mixture of battle and negotiation which was continually changing the aspect of affairs, required some representation of the English councils at headquarters. It is true that we had already three dis

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tinguished persons officially employed with the Grand Army; but the presence of a cabinet minister, and of a minister of singular firmness and intelligence, was judged essential. three persons were, Lord Aberdeen, Lord Cathcart, and Sir Charles Stewart. The appointment of Lord Castlereagh is interestingly mentioned in a letter written in 1839 to the present Marquis, by the late Lord Harrowby. "In truth I feel some reluctance in recurring to those anecdotes in a more formal manner, as my relating them at all was rather an ebullition of personal vanity on my part, than any sense of their political importance.

"I cannot recollect dates, but it was at the time when you, Lord Aberdeen and Lord Cathcart, were accredited to the three sovereigns. It was mooted in Cabinet, I think, by Lord Castlereagh (as you were, each of you, accredited to a separate sovereign), whether it would not be desirable, in order to carry the full weight of the British Government to bear upon the counsels of the assembled sovereigns, that some one person should be appointed who might speak, in its name, to them all.

"The notion was approved of, and after the Cabinet was over, Castlereagh called me into his private room, and proposed the mission to me. I was, of course, highly flattered by such a proposal from such a person; but I had not a moment's hesitation in telling him, that I had tried my hand in a similar mission to Berlin, when I had also been accredited to two emperors, with general directions to all our ministers upon the Continent to follow my instructions, as the regular communication was intercepted by winter; that I had found my self quite incompetent to the task, which had half killed me;

that I thought the measure highly advisable, but that there was one person only who could execute it, and that person was himself! He started at first. 'How could he, a Secretary of State, undertake it?-the thing was unheard of!' I then said: 'It was not strictly true that it had never been done; that Lord Bolingbroke went to Paris in a diplomatic capacity when Secretary of State; and

that though in that case the precedent was not a good one, it was still a precedent, and I rather believed there were more. In the present instance, it appeared clear that no man but the Foreign Secretary of State himself could combine the efforts of the ambassadors upon the spot, who could not be expected to follow with cordiality the suggestions of any one but their own official superior."

The conclusion to which this conversation led, was, that he would talk it over with Lord Liverpool; and the consequence was, that the next day, or the day after, his mission was decided.

"On his triumphant return to England I called on him, to say that he might indeed consider himself as the saviour of Europe. But, that I was doubly so—first, because I refused to go myself; and still more, because I made him go."

The letter continues in this significant, yet playful style, to narrate another most important service of the noble writer:

"Now for my other service in the dark. After the attempt to assassinate the Duke of Wellington in Paris, the Government was naturally most anxious to get him away. But how? Under whatever pretext it might be veiled, he would still call it running away, to which he was not partial. But when Castlereagh was obliged to leave Vienna, in order to attend his duty in Parliament, I was fortunate enough to suggest that the Duke should be sent to replace him, and that would be a command which he could not refuse to obey. When I mentioned this to the Duke, just after I left you (for I was quite full of the memory of my little exploits), he quite agreed, that if he had been at Paris on the return of Bonaparte to France, it was highly probable that they would have seized him!

"Small events are great to little men; and it is not nothing, to have contributed in the smallest degree to the success of the Congress of Vienna (nor was it then so called), and of the subsequent campaign, and to the saving of the Duke for Waterloo !"

The campaign of 1813 had crushed the French army, shattered the power of Napoleon, and laid open the north

ern and eastern frontier of France. But the "invincible territory," as it was pronounced by the national exaggeration, had been already entered. Wellington had broken down the barrier. On the 8th of October 1813, the English army, after beating Soult through the defiles of the Pyrenees, had planted its colours on the soil of France!

Whether any future war shall equal this, in the magnitude of its interests or the importance of its results, no period, unless the human mind shall change its powers, will exhibit greater talent on the one side, or greater infatuation on the other. Could it have been predicted, that a sudden spirit of manliness should have pervaded the whole of that continent, which for ten years had shrunk before the French throne; or that the possessor of the throne, with ruin surrounding him, with the shouts of triumphant Europe in his ear, and with every hour forcing him to a retrograde step, should have held his sceptre with the same grasp as when Europe shook under its touch; that he should have indulged ambition when France was in despair; and that with a beaten army of forty thousand, he should have held the same lofty language, as when his word pronounced sentence on kingdoms? On the general review of Napoleon's conduct during 1812 and 1813, he seems to have laboured under that privation of sagacity, that disregard of his own science, and that sullen intensity of reliance on his own fortune, while all was crumbling in his sight, to which we rightly give the name of infatuation; or could it be conceived, that when he was daily fighting for his life, he should have left lingering in the garrisons of Germany no less a number than seventythree thousand veteran troops, and left them to be successively captured by the peasantry? His conduct in the conferences for peace was equally unaccountable. While he was daily offered terms which would have left him the most powerful monarch of the Continent, and saw those terms daily diminishing, he still cried out, "All or nothing;" and finding himself driven back day by day to the walls of Paris, still contended for the Continent. We give a few fragments of a most interesting letter (written

in 1830), describing this period, when the sword and the pen alike were completing the destruction of the great despot. The writer (now the Earl of Ripon) had been selected by Lord Castlereagh to accompany him to the camp of the Allies.

"I allude to his first mission to the Continent at the close of 1813. He did me the honour to invite me to accompany him on that mission, and I travelled with him from the Hague to Basle, where he first came in contact with the ministers of the Allied Powers. Thence we proceeded to Langres, where the headquarters of the Grand Allied Army were established, and where the Emperor of Austria, the Emperor of Russia, and the King of Prussia, with their respective ministers, were assembled.

The real difficulties of this interesting period commenced, when the Great Powers took the decisive resolution of conquering him in the heart of France. It had been comparatively no difficult matter to unite them, in the summer of 1813, in the great object of driving France within the limits of the Rhine. The first combined movement broke out in August 1813; and before the 1st of January 1814, the French army was entirely expelled from Germany. . . . The immediate pressure of the common danger being removed, views of individual interests necessarily grew up.

"In the course of our journey from Frankfort to Basle, he (Lord Castlereagh) stated to me, that one of the great difficulties would arise from the want of a habitual, confidential, and free intercourse between the ministers of the Great Powers as a body, and that many pretensions might be modified, asperities removed, and causes of irritation anticipated and removed, by bringing the respective parties into unrestricted communication. No man was ever better calculated so to transact business himself, and to bring others to act with him in such a manner. The suavity and dignity of his manners, his habitual patience and self-command, his considerate tolerance of difference of opinion in others, all fitted him for such a task; while his firmness when he knew that he was right, in no degree detracted

from the influence of his conciliatory a dream, became a brilliant redemeanour."

The letter then adverts to the singular instance of the minister's intrepidity and sagacity, which resulted in the conquest of Paris. The repulse of Blucher, who, by a daring but rash movement, had exposed his army to the whole weight of the French force, and hazarded the communications of the Allies, produced a dangerous diversity of opinion in the allied camp. The spirit of the soldiery was damped, and the population seemed to be preparing for a petty war. It was even suggested that the armies should again take up their ground on the banks of the Rhine. The campaign had suddenly become critical, and a few more successes might have enabled Napoleon to raise all France against the invaders. The French army chiefly pressed on Blucher, and the campaign depended on his being reinforced. But from what quarter was the reinforcement to come? There was no force disposable but a small body of Russians, already on their march to Rheims to join Blucher. But there were two strong corps-one of Prussians under Bulow, and the other of Russians under Winzingerode-who were on their march into France from Flanders; but they were under the command of Bernadotte. The difficulty of withdrawing them from his command, without a tedious discussion with him, was urged by a "great authority" (probably the Czar) as insurmountable! Here the authority of the British minister saved the campaign. He demanded, whether the reinforcement was absolutely necessary. On being answered that it was, "he stated that, in that case, the plan must be adopted; that the orders must be given immediately; that England had a right to expect that her allies would not be deterred from a decisive course by such difficulties as had been urged; and that he would take upon himself all the responsibility of any consequences which might arise regarding the CrownPrince of Sweden." This bold and decisive advice was followed. Blucher was reinforced; the battle of Laon, in which the French were beaten, restored the fortunes of the Allies; and the "march to Paris," so long

ality.

The letter concludes with-"It is not, then, too much to say, that the vigour and energy displayed by Lord Londonderry in this crisis decided the fate of the campaign; and had he been an ordinary man, without the talent to discern what the exigency of the moment required, without capacity to enforce its adoption, or without that influence over others which insured their cordial co-operation, who can say how different the result might have been? or how long the pacification of the world might have been delayed?"

The great drama was now coming to the fall of the curtain. The conference of Chatillon had merely originated " projects and counter-projects." At length Caulaincourt (the French commissioner) gave in the statement which Napoleon declared to be final, which consisted of claims to Antwerp, Flanders, and the frontier of the Rhine; to the annexation of the Ionian Islands to the kingdom of Italy, both to be settled on Eugene Beauharnais and his heirs, with the Adige as a boundary; the demand that Saxony should be restored, the sovereignty of Lucca and Piombino be settled on his sister, the Princess Eliza; the principality of Neufchâtel be secured to Berthier; and all the colonies taken during the war, except Saintes, be restored by England. The extravagance of demands like those by a sovereign reduced to a province, and with a mighty enemy within a march of his capital, rendered all further deliberation impossible.

The Conference of Chatillon broke up instantly, and the fate of Europe was again brought to the edge of the sword. Napoleon adopted the ruinous plan of attacking the Allies in the rear, while Paris was lying open to their front. In other days he would have rushed to Paris, embrasured the walls, called out the national guard of the city, amounting to 50,000 wellequipped men; and have given courage to its volatile population by the presence of his veteran troops, which still amounted to 60,000 infantry and 17,000 horse. But, instead of this obvious manœuvre, he left the city to

the passions of its people-to the disaffection of his councillors, now trembling for their heads—to the partisanship of the Royalists-and to the terrors of a metropolis in sight of an army of all tribes of conquerors, from the Rhine to Tartary.

On the 24th of March the Emperor Alexander gave the word, "Onward to Paris." It was followed by the movement of 180,000 men! A column of 8000 horse, with artillery, was despatched on the route of Napoleon, to deceive him into the idea that the whole army was following. After the battle of Ferte Champenoise, in which the French army covering Paris lost, in killed and wounded, eleven thousand men, the march was a procession. The army first caught sight of Paris in the evening, when a splendid sunset lighted up all the glories of that magnificent city. The end of all their toils was before them-the scene of revenge, the reward of all their battles, the visible triumph of their arms, the pledge of their warlike superiority, the security of their imperishable fame. The scene, the emotions, the memory, the future, all embodied in the capital which lay at their feet on that evening, would have been worth a life to see and feel; and there can be no doubt that the impression of that evening was carried by many a glowing heart to the grave.

The correspondence preceding the meeting at Chatillon consists chiefly of diplomacy, and communications with the British Cabinet. A despatch gives a strong idea of the difficulties which the Foreign Secretary had to overcome, even when the interest of all the sovereigns was the same. This despatch is from Langres (on the march of the Grand Army). It says: “I think our greatest danger at present is from the chivalresque tone in which the Emperor Alexander is disposed to push the war. He has a personal feeling about Paris, distinct from all political or military combinations; he seems to seek for the occasion of entering, with his magnificent Guards, the enemy's capital, probably to display, in his clemency and forbearance, a contrast to the desolation to which his own was devoted. The idea that a rapid nego

tiation might disappoint this hope added to his impatience." In a previous letter Lord Castlereagh speaks of the Guard which were to form this showy spectacle.

"I saw the Russian cavalry of the Guard defile through this town (Langres) yesterday. It is impossible to say too much of their appearance. Indeed, the whole composition of the Russian Guard of all arms is, at this moment, the most splendid that can be imagined. They muster above 30,000 effectives. In addition to all his active armies on this side of the Russian frontier, his Imperial Majesty stated to me, that Prince Labanoff's army of reserve on the Vistula was, at this moment, 110,000 strong, of which 19,000 were cavalry, and that he had 180,000 recruits in his depôts in progress of discipline. It is a most formidable military power." Again, in his letter on the negotiations, he details some of the perplexities of those high transactions. The letter is to Lord Liverpool, acting as Foreign Secretary in his absence. "You may estimate some of the hazards to which affairs are exposed here, when one of the leading monarchs told me, that he had no confidence in his own minister, and still less in that of his ally! There is much intrigue, and more fear of it. Russia distrusts Austria about Saxony; Austria dreads Russia about Poland, especially if she is mistress of the question after a peace. I have got some length with both parties, and I shall try to deliver them from their mutual alarms. Suspicion is the prevailing temper of the Emperor, and Metternich's character furnishes constant food for the intriguants to work upon! . . . The people are quiet everywhere, and good-humoured. They look to the invasion as favourable to peace. They spoke freely against Bonaparte to me on my journey, but I traced little disposition to an effort, and no apparent interest, about the old family.

"A letter from Berthier has been intercepted, which says that Bonaparte is advancing with une belle et bonne armée sur les derrierès de l'ennemi.' I thought the negotiation might have been brought to a short issue. It is difficult in

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