430 



ANNUAL REGISTER, 1813. 



tural consequence of her defection 

 from France, and of the continua- 

 tion of the war ; and that it now- 

 only depended upon Austria to add 

 the most important and most flou- 

 rishing of her provinces to its own 

 state ; a suggestion which showed 

 distinctly enough, that no means 

 could properly be neglected to save 

 that power. If this great object 

 could not be obtained by a just 

 peace, it was necessary to support 

 Russia and Prussia by a powerful 

 co-operation. From this natural 

 view of things, upon which even 

 France could no longer deceive 

 herself, his majesty continued his 

 preparations with unwearied acti- 

 vity. He quitted, in the early part 

 of July, his residence, and pro- 

 ceeded to the vicinity of the scene 

 of action, in order the more ef- 

 fectually to labour at the negocia- 

 tion for peace, which still conti- 

 nued to be the object of his most 

 ardent desires ; and partly to be 

 able the more effectually to con- 

 duct the preparations for war, if 

 no other choice should remain for 

 Austria. 



A short time before, the empe- 

 ror Napoleon had declared, " that 

 he had proposed a Congress, to be 

 held at Prague, where plenipoten- 

 tiaries from France, the United 

 States of North America, Den- 

 mark, the king of Spain, and the 

 other allied princes on the one 

 hand ; and on the other, plenipo- 

 tentiaries of England, Russia, Prus- 

 sia, the Spanish insurgents, and 

 the other allies of this hostile mass, 

 should meet, and lay the ground- 

 work of a durable peace." To 

 whom this proposition was ad- 

 dressed, in what manner, in what 

 diplomatic form, through whose 



organ it could have been done, 

 was perfectly unknown to the Aus- 

 trian cabinet, which only was 

 made acquainted with the circum- 

 stance through the medium of the 

 public prints. How, too, such a 

 project could be brought to bear — 

 how, from the combination of such 

 dissimilar elements, without any 

 generally acknowledged principle, 

 without any previously regulated 

 plan, a negociation for peace was 

 to be set on foot, was so little to be 

 comprehended, that it was very 

 allowable to consider the whole 

 proposition rather as a play of the 

 imagination, than as a serious in- 

 vitation to the adoption of a great 

 political measure. 



Perfectly acquainted with all the 

 obstacles to a general peace, Aus- 

 tria had long considered whether 

 this distant and difficult object was 

 not rather to be obtained progres- 

 sively ; and in this opinion, had 

 expressed herself both to France, 

 and to Russia and Prussia, upon the 

 subject of a continental peace. Not 

 that the Austrian court had mis- 

 conceived, even for a moment, the 

 necessity and importance of an 

 universal peace among all the great 

 powers of Europe, and without 

 which there was no hope of either 

 safety or happiness, or had ima- 

 gined that the continent could 

 exist, if the separation of England 

 were not invariably considered as a 

 most deadly evil ! The negociation 

 which Austria proposed, after the 

 alarming declaration of France had 

 nearly destroyed all hopes of Eng- 

 land uniting her endeavours in 

 the attempt to procure a general 

 peace, was an essential part of the 

 great approaching negociation, for 

 a general and effective Congress for 



