[wrong] ELBA, A HUNDRED YEARS AFTER 207 



him. They knew his strength. They feared him and offered to 

 compromise if he would abandon his dream of world-conquest. Even 

 after the disaster in Russia it was possible for him to have retained in 

 the north the left bank of the Rhine and in the south Nice and Savoy; 

 but he blindly refused such terms. He would have all or nothing, and 

 in the end his enemies saw that their only safety lay in crushing him 

 completely. His final failure after the return from Elba was due to 

 the universal conviction that he could not be trusted. He had so 

 outraged and violated Europe that Europe would not tolerate even a 

 Napoleonic dynasty. The dream of a Bourbon world power 

 ended with the death of Louis XIV in 1715. That of a Napoleonic 

 supremacy over the world ended at Waterloo in 1815. It is quite 

 possible that the year 1915 will see decisions even more momentous than 

 those of these earlier dates. It seems as if the finger of God has written 

 in large letters at regular intervals across the pages of history the fate 

 which attends the ambition for world-mastery. 



Napoleon arrived in Elba on May 3, 1814, and left it on February 

 26, 1815. By the treaty signed at Paris on April 11, 1814, Elba, 

 which had been under French rule for a time, became a separate and 

 independent state with Napoleon as its despotic sovereign. After a 

 momentary hesitation Elba went into transports at the arrival of its 

 new ruler. The islanders had been given no notice of their destiny. 

 Many -of them believed that, in the new settlement of Europe, Elba 

 would go to Great Britain as Malta had gone at an earlier period, and 

 some bold spirits had talked of making a declaration of independence 

 and of building up Elba as a nation. The arrival of Napoleon satisfied, 

 however, the highest aspirations of the Elbahs. Not only would the 

 island now be an independent state; the fact that the conqueror 

 of the world had come to rule the Elbans was staggering in its appeal 

 to their pride. The civic officials welcomed Napoleon with florid 

 eloquence. Island poets burst into song. The representative of the 

 Church praised God for this crowning mercy; it would, he said, inun- 

 date the island with riches. The people of Elba were only too ready 

 to believe that now for them a new era was dawning. They were to 

 bask in the sunshine of endless prosperity. There should be no more 

 taxes. All injustices should be righted, all grievances remedied. 

 It was said that the Elbans could not have been more enthusiastic if 

 a god had come to dwell among them. The joy was without discrim- 

 ination, and later, when Napoleon insisted on the payment of taxes, 

 his popularity suffered an eclipse with many of the islanders. But it 

 was a happy multitude which crowded the strand at Porto Ferraio 

 when Napoleon landed. He issued a proclamation saying that he 



