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BONAPARTE. NAPOLEON I. 



BONAPARTE. NAPOLEON L 



conference. On returning from Erfurt, Napoleon told hii senate that 

 he and tbo emperor of Russia were irrevocably united in a bond of 



The English in the meantime had reconquered Portugal, and were 

 advancing to the assistance of the Spaniards. King Joeeph had been 

 obliged to leave Madrid, and the French armiee had withdrawn behind 

 the Ebro, Napoleon reeolred to set out for Spain himself. On the 

 2ith of October he opened in person the session of the legislative 

 body with one of his characteristic speeches :-" The hideous presence 

 of the English leopards contaminates the continent of Spaiu and 

 Portugal I go to place myself at the head of my armies, to crown my 

 brother at Madrid, and to plant the French eagles on the ramparts of 

 Lisbon." Two days afterwards he set off for Spain. On the 23rd of 

 November 1803, Napoleon defeated the Spanish troops at Tudela, and 

 on the 4th of December Madrid capitulated. He then set off for 

 Astorga, expecting to intercept Sir John Moore in his retreat In this 

 however he did not succeed ; and leaving the tuk of pursuing the 

 RnglUh to Soult and Ney, he suddenly quitted Astorga, and returned 

 in great haste to France in January 1809. 



A new Austrian war was on the point of breaking out This time 

 Austria came single into the field. She hod made astonishing exertions 

 to recruit her armies to the number of nearly half a million of men. 

 Austria had apparently no new personal subject of complaint, except 

 the alarm she naturally felt at the rapid strides of Napoleon towards 

 univenal dominion. The Archduke Charles commanded the Austrian 

 army of Germany, and the Archduke John that of Italy. The Austrions 

 crossed the Inn on the 9th of April, and occupied Bavaria and the 

 Tyrol. Napoleon quickly assembled his army beyond the Rhine, 

 repaired to Augsburg, and by one of his skilful manoeuvres broke the 

 line of the Austrian*, gained the battle of Eckuiuhl, and obliged the 

 Archduke Charles to retire into Bohemia, leaving the road to Vienna 

 open to the French. (For the details of this campaign see General 

 Pelet, ' Mcmoires sur la Guerre de 1809.' 4 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1824-26.) 

 On the 12th of May the French entered Vienna. The archduke now 

 collected his army on the left bank of the Danube. Bonaparte crossed 

 the river to attack him, and the great battle of Aspern took place, 21st 

 of May. The battle remained undecided ; but on the following day it 

 was renewed with fury on both sides, when in the midst of the actioa 

 Bonaparte was informed that the bridge in his roar, which communi- 

 cated with the right bank of the Danube, had been carried off by a 

 flood. He then ordered a retreat, and withdrew his army into the 

 island of Lobau in the middle of the Danube. The loss of the French 

 was very great : Marshal Lannes was among the generals killed. 

 Napoleon remained for six weeks on the island. Having re-established 

 the bridge, and received reinforcements, he crossed once more to the 

 left bank, when he fought the battle of Wagram, 6th of July, in which 

 be defeated the Austrian*, with a tremendous loss on both sides. Still 

 the Austrian army was not destroyed or dispersed, and the Archduke 

 Charles was for continuing the struggle. Other counsels however 

 prevailed, and an armistice was concluded at Znaim, and this led to 

 the peace of Sebonbrunn, which was not signed however till the 14th 

 of October. Napoleon had entertained some idea of dismembering the 

 Austrian empire; he had even addressed an invitation to the Hunga- 

 rians to form an independent kingdom under a native ruler, but this 

 address produced no effect. Germany began to be agitated by a spirit 

 of popular resistance against him ; bands of partisans \mder Schill, the 

 Duke of Brunswick, and others, had appeared ; Tyrol was still in arms, 

 and he was not quite sura of Russia. The war in Spain continued with 

 dubious success, and the English had landed a considerable force at 

 Flushing. He thought best therefore to grant peace to Austria on 

 moderate conditions. The Archduke Charles disapproved of the peace, 

 and gave up his command. Austria ceded Trieste, Carniola, and part 

 of Croatia, Salxburg, Cracow, and Western Gallicia, and several other 

 districts, to the amount of about two millions and a half of inhabitants. 

 The brave Tyrolese were abandoned to their fate. Hofer and others 

 of their chiefs were seized by the French, taken to Mantua, and 

 there shot 



Whether the subsequent marriage of Napoleon with a daughter of 

 'Emperor Francis was in course of negociation at the time of the 

 I of Scbonbrunn has been doubted, but soon after his return to 



the Emperor Francis was in course of negociatton at the time of the 

 pe*ee of Scbonbrunn has been doubted, but soon after his return to 

 Peril he made known to bis wife Josephine his determination to divorce 



her. A painful scene took place on this occasion, which is well described 

 by De Bauseet, prefect of the imperial household, in his ' Momoires 

 Anecdotiqurs sur 1'InWrieur du Palais.' Napoleon himself seems to 

 have bren sincerely affected at Josephine's grief, but his notion of the 

 necessity of having an heir to the empire subdued his feelings. It is 

 known that from the time of the conferences of Erfurt, and perhaps of 

 Tilsit, he had bad in view a marriage with one of Alexander's sisters; 

 and the project bad been communicated to the Russian court, but the 

 empress mother had always objected to it on the plea of difference of 

 religion. The divorce being consented to by Josephine in presence of 

 commissioners from the senate, the act was solemnly passed and regis- 

 tered on the 16th of December 1809. On the llth of March 1810 

 Napoleon married by proxy the Archduchess Maria Louisa, who soon 

 after set off for Paris. The marriage ceremony was performed at Paris 

 by Cardinal Freeh. 



The years 1810 and 1811 were the period of Napoleon's greatest 

 power. There an interesting report made by Count Moutalivet 



of the situation of the French empire in 1810, which displays the 

 gigantic extent of its dominions. One passage which refers to Holland 

 is curious. That country was under the government of Louis Bona- 

 parte, who felt really anxious for the welfare of his Dutch subjects, 

 and did not enforce very strictly the continental system, as it was 

 styled, against English trade. This led to frequent reproofs from his 

 imperious brother, who at last resolved to enforce his own decrees 

 himself by uniting Holland to the French empire. (Louis Bonaparte, 

 ' Historical Documents and Reflections on the Government of Holland.') 

 Count Mont ilivet in his report made use of a curious argument to 

 prepare the people's minds for this measure: "Holland," he said, 

 " is in reality a continuation of France ; it may be defined at being 

 formed out of the alluvia of the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheldt, 

 which are the great arteries of the empire." And Champagny, m. 

 for foreign affairs, in a report to the emperor said " Holland is an 

 emanation of the French empire. In order to possess the Rhine, your 

 majesty must extend your territory to the Zuyderzee." But even the 

 Zuyderzee was not far enough. By a Senatus Consultum, 13th Decem- 

 ber 1810, Holland, Friesland, Oldenburg, Bremen, and all the line of 

 coast to Hamburg, and the country between that town and Lubeck, 

 were annexed to the French empire, of which this new territory formed 

 ten additional departments. The French empire now extended from 

 the frontiers of Denmark to those of Naples, for Napoleon had finally 

 annexed Rome and the southern papal provinces to France. The pope 

 launched a bull of excommunication against Napoleon, upon which he 

 was arrested in his palace on the Quiriual in the middle of the night 

 of the 6th July 1809 by a party of gendarmes who escaladed the walls, 

 and was carried off to Savona, where he was kept prisoner until he 

 was removed to Fontainebleau. The papal territory was divided into 

 two departments of the French empire, called of Rome and of the 

 Thrasymene, of which last Perugia was the head town. Napoleon 

 gave his ' good city of Rome ' the rank of second town in the French 

 empire. 



Besides the French empire, which, thus extended, reckoned 130 

 departments and 42 millions of people, Napoleon held under his 

 sway the kingdom of Italy, which included Lornbor.ly and Venice, 

 Modena, Bologna, and the other legations and the marches, with above 

 six millions of inhabitants ; aUo the Illyrian provinces, including 

 Dalmatia, Caruiola, and part of Croatia, which formed a separate 

 government The kingdom of Naples, with about five millions more, 

 was also dependent on his will, as well as the kingdom of Westphali i, 

 the grand-duchy of Berg, &c. The policy of Napoloou towards the 

 coimtrieB wliich ho bestowed on hU brothers and other relatives was 

 plainly stated by himself to his brother Lucien, in an interview at 

 Mantua in 1S11. " In the interior, as well as the exterior, all my 

 relatives must follow my orders : everything must be subservient to 

 the interest of France ; conscription, laws, taxes, all must be in your 

 respective states for the advantage and support of my orown. I 

 should otherwise net against my duty and my interest." Hi- would 

 not allow his brothers to identify themselves with their subjects, and 

 to strengthen themselves on their thrones, because he foresaw that 

 it might suit him some day to remove them on the occasion of a general 

 peace, or upon some now scheme of his own. He sacrificed the people 

 of those countries and their interests, as well as the happiness and the 

 greatness of his brothers, to what be conceived to be the interest and 

 the glory of France. (' Rdponse de Lucien Bonaparte aux Mumoires 

 de Lamarque.') But even his brothers were restive under this discip- 

 line, Louis ran away from his kingdom of Holland : Mur.it wai in 

 continual disputes with his brother-in-law, and Lucien would not accept 

 any crown under such conditions. 



As Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, Napoleon had 

 under his orders the kings of Saxony, Bavaria, and Wurtemburg, the 

 Grand Duke of Baden, and the other German prince*. He bad also 

 under his protection the Helvetic Confederation, which was bound to 

 furnish him with troops, and to follow his policy. Prussia, hu 

 and dismembered, lay entirely at his mercy. He could thus dispose 

 of more than eighty millions of people. Never, since the fall of the 

 Roman empire, had so great a part of Europe been subject to the will 

 of one man. Austria was his ally through fear as well as by family 

 connection; Russia through prudence and self-interest. In Sweden, 

 General Bernadotte had been chosen Crown lYiuce, and, after obt lin- 

 ing Napoleon's consent, had repaired to Stockholm. Spain, bleeding 

 at every pore, straggled hard, and apparently with little hope of 

 ultimate success. Britain alone continued to defy his power, and held 

 Sicily and Portugal under her protection. Such was the political con- 

 dition of Europe at the beginning of 181 1. On the 20th of March of 

 that year Maria Louisa was delivered of a son, who was saluted by 

 Napoleon as ' King of Rome,' an ominous title to those Italians who 

 si ill fancied that the crown of Italy was to be, according to Napoleon's 

 promise, separated from that of France. 



In 1811 the first symptoms of coolness between Alexander and 

 Napoleon manifested themselves. The complaints of the Russian 

 landholders against the continental system, which prevented their 

 exporting by sea the produce of their va.it estates, had induced Alex- 

 ander to issue an ukue, 31st of December, 1810, by which colonial 

 and other goods were allowed to be imported into the ports of Russia, 

 unless they appeared to belong to subjects of Great Britain. This 

 last restriction was of course easily |evadod, and the trade with England 



