He gave France a new constitution, which was accepted by the votes of the people almost unanimously, over 3,000,000 in the affirmative, and a few hundreds in the negative. He abolished the annual festival celebrating the death of Louis XVI. He opened the prisons where those opposed to the state were confined; hundreds of exiles returned to France. The country was bankrupt; but now that confidence was restored, with the help of the best financiers, the Bank of France was established, a sinking fund provided, judicious taxation adopted,and an era of prosperity began. Napoleon built canals, roads, and bridges, and splendid monuments. He restored Sunday as a day of rest, which had been set aside when the Goddess of Reason was worshipped during the Revolution.
A little later, duly 15, 1801,—by the Concordat,—he recognized the Roman Catholic religion as the religion of France. He said, "I am convinced that a part of France would become Protestant, were I to favor that disposition. I am also certain that the much greater portion would continue Catholic, and that they would oppose, with the greatest zeal, the division among their fellow-citizens. We should then have the Huguenot wars over again, and interminable conflicts. But by reviving a religion which has always prevailed in the country, and by giving perfect liberty of conscience to the minority, all will be satisfied."
He did not like numerous festival days. "A saint's day," he said, "is a day of idleness, and I do not wish for that. People must labor in order to live."
Nobody labored harder than Napoleon. He kept several secretaries busy. Writing fatigued him, and he wrote so hurriedly that the last half of the word was usually a dash, or omitted. He could go without sleep, snatching a few minutes in his chair, or in his saddle before a battle. He seldom took over twenty minutes for dinner, even when he was Emperor, and rose from the table as soon as he had finished. His time was too precious to wait long for others. He was very prompt, and required others to be so.
He said, "Occupation is my element.... I have seen the extent to which I could use my eyes, but I have never known any bounds to my capacity for application."
Lanfrey says he "had a prodigious power of work," and "a rapidity of conception that no other man has probably ever possessed to the same extent." He used often to say, "Succeed! I judge men only by results."
Nobody knew better the value of time. "I worked all day," said a person to him, in apology for not having completed some duty. "But had you not the night also?" was the reply.
"Ask me for whatever you please excepttime," he said to another; "that is the only thing which is beyond my power."
While taking his bath, Bourrienne read to him. While being shaved, he read, or somebody read to him. He ate fast, and was irregular at his meals, sometimes passing a whole day without eating. He always walked up and down the room, with his arms folded behind him, when dictating to his secretaries. "He was exceedingly temperate," says Bourrienne, "and averse to all excess."
"The institutions of modern France date not, as is often said, from the Revolution, but from the Consulate," says Professor Seeley. "The work of reconstruction which distinguishes the Consulate, though it was continued under the Empire, is the most enduring of all the achievements of Napoleon."
"The institutions now created," says Seeley, "and which form the organization of modern France, are, 1. The Restored Church, resting on the Concordat; 2. the University; 3. the judicial system; 4. the Codes:Code Civil, calledCode NapoléonSept. 3, 1807,Code de Commerce,Code Pénal,Code d'Instruction Criminelle; 5. the system of local government; 6. the Bank of France; 7. the Legion of Honor."
"My code will outlive my victories," said Napoleon,truly. He put the best minds of France upon the codification and improvement of her laws, and he carefully watched every detail.
"Bourrienne," Napoleon used to say, "it is for France I am doing all this! All I wish, all I desire, the end of all my labors, is, that my name should be indissolubly connected with that of France!"
Now that France was prosperous and settled, Napoleon wrote to George III., King of England, proposing peace. Lord Grenville, for his nation, which had grown more confident since the battle of the Nile and the successes in Egypt, declined to treat with the Consular Government of France. Canning spoke of this "new usurper, who, like a spectre, wears on his head a something that has a phantom resemblance to a crown." Who would have prophesied then that young Napoleon IV. would have died fighting the battles of England in Zululand?
He proposed peace to Austria, but she decided like her ally, England. Napoleon said bitterly, "England wants war. She shall have it. Yes! yes! war to the death."
He immediately sent General Moreau with one hundred and thirty thousand men against the Austrian army on the Rhine, and took forty thousand himself to Italy, crossing the Alps over the Great St. Bernard. The carriages and wheels were slung on poles; the ammunition boxes were borne on mules; the cannon were carried in trees hollowed out, each dragged up the heights by a hundred men; the soldiers crept up the icy steeps each with sixty or seventy pounds upon his back. At the well-known Hospice kept by the monks, Napoleon had sent forward supplies for his men, who, cold and exhausted, were overjoyed at the repast.
The story is told that the young guide who ledNapoleon's mule over the Alps confided to the sympathetic stranger his poverty, his desire to marry the girl of his choice, and his inability to provide her a home. The small man in a gray overcoat gave him a note to the head of the convent. To his astonishment, it provided him with a house and a piece of ground.
The army then swept down upon Italy. The First Consul entered Milan June 2; Lannes was victorious at Montebello June 9, and on the morning of June 14 forty thousand Austrians were opposed to a much smaller number of French on the plain of Marengo. The battle was hotly contested for twelve hours. At first the Austrians seemed victorious, till Desaix, who had just come back from Egypt, rushed upon the field with his reserves. He was shot dead, but his columns were soon avenged.
Six thousand Austrians threw down their arms, a panic spread through their troops, the cavalry plunged over the infantry to be first in crossing the Bormida, and thousands perished in the dreadful confusion. Marengo is regarded by many as Napoleon's most masterful battle.
Desaix's death was a sad blow to Napoleon. Savary found his body stripped of clothing, wrapped it in a cloak, laid it across a horse, and Napoleon had it carried to Milan to be embalmed. He said, "Victory at such a price is dear." Kléber was killed in Egypt on the same day. At St. Helena, Napoleon said, "Of all the generals I ever had under my command, Desaix and Kléber possessed the greatest talent—in particular Desaix.... Kléber and Desaix were irreparable losses to France."
Napoleon returned to Milan and went in state to the Cathedral to theTe Deum, four days after the battle of Marengo. The people everywhere gave him an ovation."Bourrienne," he said, "do you hear the acclamations still resounding? That noise is as sweet to me as the sound of Josephine's voice." Napoleon reached Paris late in June.
Dec. 3 of this same year, 1800, Moreau fought the famous battle of Hohenlinden, in the black forests of Germany, at midnight. In the blinding snowstorm both armies got entangled in the forests. The Austrians left ten thousand in dead and wounded on the field, with seven thousand prisoners. The poem of Campbell is well known:—
"On Linden, when the sun was low,All bloodless lay the untrodden snow,And dark as winter was the flowOf Iser rolling rapidly."
"On Linden, when the sun was low,All bloodless lay the untrodden snow,And dark as winter was the flowOf Iser rolling rapidly."
"On Linden, when the sun was low,All bloodless lay the untrodden snow,And dark as winter was the flowOf Iser rolling rapidly."
"On Linden, when the sun was low,
All bloodless lay the untrodden snow,
And dark as winter was the flow
Of Iser rolling rapidly."
Finally a treaty of peace between France and Austria was signed at Lunéville, Feb. 9, 1801, followed March 27, 1802, by the treaty of Amiens, between France and England.
Both countries rejoiced in the cessation of hostilities. Fox came over from England and was received with great cordiality. Napoleon said, "I considered him an ornament to mankind, and was very much attached to him."
Four months later, Aug. 4, 1802, by an overwhelming majority of the votes of the people, over three and a half millions in favor to about eight thousand against it, Napoleon was declared Consul for life. La Fayette could not conscientiously favor it, unless liberty of the press were guaranteed. He said to Napoleon, "A free government, and you at its head—that comprehends all my desires."
Napoleon said, "He thinks he is still in the UnitedStates—as if the French were Americans. He has no conception of what is required for this country." Napoleon felt, no doubt sincerely, that France was more stable under an Emperor than a President. And yet since the fall of Napoleon III. France has shown that she can live and prosper as a republic.
All through these years the Royalists were plotting to return to the throne; for when did ever a king reign who did not think it was by "Divine right"?
Louis XVIII. wrote another letter to Napoleon: "You must have long since been convinced, General, that you possess my esteem.... We may insure the glory of France. I saywe, because I require the aid of Bonaparte, and he can do nothing without me. General, Europe observes you; glory awaits you; I am impatient to restore peace to my people." In answer to this letter, Napoleon wrote, "You must not seek to return to France. To do so, you must trample over a hundred thousand dead bodies."
Several attempts were made to assassinate Napoleon. Possibly some of these were the work of Jacobins, who feared that the republic was slipping into an empire; but they were for the most part traced to Royalists, the leaders of whom lived in England, and were receiving yearly pensions, because they had aided her in former wars.
On the evening of Dec. 24, 1800, as Napoleon was going to the opera to hear Haydn's Oratorio of "The Creation," he was obliged to pass through the Rue Saint-Nicaise, where an upturned cart covered a barrel of gunpowder, grape-shot, and pieces of iron. The "infernal machine" exploded two seconds after he had passed in his carriage. The carriage was uplifted fromthe ground, four persons were killed, sixty wounded, of whom several died, and forty-six houses were badly damaged. One of the horses of Napoleon's escort was wounded.
Other plans were soon discovered, concocted by Georges Cadoudal, General Pichegru, and others, all in the confidence of the Comte d'Artois, afterwards Charles X., the brother of Louis XVIII. He lived in or near London.
Cadoudal, or Georges as he is usually called, was to meet Napoleon in the streets, and, with a band of thirty or forty followers, kill him and his staff. When all was ready, the Bourbon princes were to be near at hand to head the revolt of the people. Georges was arrested and executed with eleven of his companions.
The Duke d'Enghien, Louis Antoine, Henri de Bourbon, son of the Duke of Bourbon, and a descendant of the great Condé who had done so much for France in her wars, was living at Ettenheim, under the protection of the Margrave of Baden, to be near the lady whom he loved, the Princess Charlotte de Rohan, and "to be ready," says Walter Scott, "to put himself at the head of the royalists in the east of France," if opportunity offered.
It was reported to Napoleon that the duke came over into France probably on political errands, and that he was corresponding with disaffected persons in France.
Napoleon sent some officers to seize the duke on the night of March 15, 1804; he was carried to Strasburg, and thence to the Castle of Vincennes, near Paris, arriving on the afternoon of Tuesday, March 20. He was aroused from sleep a little before six on the morning of the 21st, and innocently asked if he were to be imprisoned. He was conducted outside the castle; by the light of a lanternhis sentence was read to him. He denied any complicity in the conspiracy against the life of the First Consul, which was doubtless true; requested to see Napoleon, which was refused; asked an officer to take a ring, a lock of hair, and a letter to his beloved, and was shot at six in the morning, by his open grave, his devoted dog by his side. Bourrienne says, "This faithful animal returned incessantly to the fatal spot.... The fidelity of the poor dog excited so much interest that the police prevented any one from visiting the fatal spot, and the dog was no longer heard to howl over his master's grave."
Josephine had heard of Napoleon's intention to send terror among the Bourbon conspirators, and had begged him, on her knees and with tears, to save the life of the young prince. It would have been well for him had he listened to her entreaties.
France, and Europe as well, were shocked at this death. The Russian court went into mourning for the Bourbon prince. No doubt Napoleon was incensed by the Bourbon plots, and after this death these ceased; but Las Cases, at St. Helena, said Napoleon always regretted it, saying, "Undoubtedly, if I had been informed in time of certain circumstances respecting the opinions of the prince, and his disposition, if, above all, I had seen the letter which he wrote to me, and which, God knows for what reason, was only delivered to me after his death, I should certainly have forgiven him."
Napoleon has been blamed for another matter,—the taking of Saint Domingo, and the imprisonment of Toussaint L'Ouverture. This remarkable colored man, who had been a slave, had acquired the control of the island by driving the French and Spanish troops out, and making it a republic, with a nominal dependence uponFrance. Napoleon, with a desire unfortunately shown and carried out by other nations, wished to enlarge his colonies and also to settle some dissensions in the island, and sent Dec. 14, 1801, General Leclerc, who had married his pretty sister Pauline, with 25,000 men to Saint Domingo to re-establish French sovereignty. He was to send back to France any who rebelled. Toussaint L'Ouverture, who was among them, was imprisoned in the fortress of Joux, near Besançon, in Normandy, and died in ten months, away from his own people, the victim of the spirit of conquest, which is not dead even in the nineteenth century. The climate destroyed the French army. Only two or three thousand ever returned. General Leclerc died, like the rest, of yellow fever.
Napoleon said at St. Helena, "I ought to have been satisfied with governing it [Saint Domingo] through the medium of Toussaint.... The design of reducing it by force was a great error."
Only a year after the treaty of Amiens was concluded, it became evident that it would not last. It was said that Napoleon's power was becoming too great for the security of Europe. England had determined not to give up Malta to the Knights as she had promised. Under Pitt's guidance she was arming and making herself ready for a great combat. The Royalists were using their pens in their English homes, to abuse the head of the French nation, held there by the votes of the French people. It was, of course, exasperating, and tended to produce revolt. Napoleon called attention to the terms of the treaty, which stipulated that neither of the two nations should giveany protectionto those who were injuring the other. Commercial tariffs bred dislike. English pride was stirred because Napoleon said, "England, single-handed, is unable to cope with France."
Finally in May, 1803, the war began. Alison says, and Scott agrees with him, "Upon coolly reviewing the circumstances under which the contest was renewed, it is impossible to deny that the British government manifested a feverish desire to come to a rupture, and that, as far as the transactions between the two countries are concerned, they are the aggressors."
Napoleon was determined to invade England,—Bourrienne thinks it was only a feint, and that his real motive "was to invade Germany and repulse the Russian troops,"—and he gathered an army of 150,000 in and around Boulogne, and an immense flotilla which should be able to transport these men ten leagues across the channel to the English coast.
While these preparations were going on, the French Senate, undoubtedly in accord with the views of the First Consul, suggested publicly the idea of an empire over which Napoleon should be the hereditary ruler. The people were tired of Bourbon plottings, and, if Napoleon were killed, the scenes of the Revolution might again be witnessed in the streets of Paris. Napoleon was declared Emperor of the French, May 18, 1804, and publicly crowned by Pope Pius VII., at Notre Dame, Dec. 2 of the same year.
Paris was thronged with people on the day of the coronation. At half-past ten in the morning Napoleon and Josephine drove to the cathedral in a carriage largely of glass, surmounted by a golden crown upheld by four eagles with outstretched wings, drawn by eight superb horses. Twenty squadrons of cavalry led the procession, Marshal Murat at the head. Eighteen carriages, each drawn by six horses, followed.
Napoleon wore a coat of crimson velvet faced withwhite velvet, white velvet boots, a short cloak of crimson lined with white satin, and a black velvet cap with two aigrettes and several diamonds.
At the Archbishop's Palace, Napoleon put on his coronation robes. These were a tight-fitting gown of white satin, a crimson mantle covered with golden bees, having an embroidered border with the letter N, and a crown above each letter, the lining and cape of ermine, the whole weighing eighty pounds, and held up by four persons. His crown was of golden laurel; his sword at his left side was in a scabbard of blue enamel, covered with eagles and bees.
Josephine wore a white satin gown, with a train of silver brocade covered with bees, a girdle of very expensive diamonds, necklace, bracelets, and earrings of precious stones and antique cameos, and a diadem of four rows of pearls with clusters of diamonds. The Emperor was much struck with Josephine's beauty, and said to his brother Joseph, "If father could see us!"
As Napoleon entered the cathedral, which was draped in crimson and gold, twenty thousand spectators shouted, "Long live the Emperor!"
The Emperor and Empress knelt on blue velvet cushions before the Pope, who anointed Napoleon on the head and hands, and the Empress in the same way. Then high mass began with three hundred performers. When the moment came for the Pope to crown the Emperor, Napoleon took the crown from his hands and placed it upon his own head, and then crowned Josephine. Her crown was formed of eight branches set in diamonds, emeralds, and amethysts, under a gold globe surmounted by a cross. Then they proceeded to the great throne reached by twenty-four steps, Josephinesitting one step lower than her husband. France had placed her all in the hands of one man; and Lanfrey justly remarks, "A nation that carries love of ease so far as to thrust the whole burden of duties and responsibility on a single man is always punished for it."
After the gorgeous ceremony was over, Napoleon and the Empress dined alone, and were happy. He said to David, who had painted the coronation scene at the moment when Napoleon was placing the crown upon the head of the lovely Josephine, "I thank you for transmitting to ages to come the proof of affection I wanted to give to her who shares with me the pains of government." Then he raised his hat to the artist, and said, "David, I salute you." Josephine had opposed Napoleon's becoming Emperor, because it meant hereditary succession, and she had no child by Napoleon. His brothers had for some years urged a divorce, so that Josephine's life had been one of much sorrow.
Napoleon had said to Bourrienne, "It is the torment of my life not to have a child. I plainly perceive that my power will never be firmly established until I have one. If I die without an heir, not one of my brothers is capable of supplying my place. All is begun, but nothing is ended. God knows what will happen!"
Josephine had urged her young daughter Hortense into a marriage with Louis, the brother of Napoleon, Jan. 2, 1802, with the hope that their child might be the heir to the empire. Each loved another person before marriage, and their married life was one of constant misery.
Their first child, Charles Napoleon, born Oct. 10, 1802, whom Napoleon would have adopted, a beautiful and most intelligent boy, died when he was four years and ahalf old, of croup, May 5, 1807. "Sometimes when his parents were quarrelling," says Saint-Amand, "he succeeded in reconciling them. He used to take his father by the hand, who gladly let himself be led by this little angel, and then he would say in a caressing tone: 'Kiss her, papa, I beg of you;' then he was perfectly happy when his father and mother exchanged a kiss of peace."
Hortense, the mother, was so prostrated with grief, that it was feared she would lose her reason. Madame de Rémusat says of her, "The Queen has but one thought, the loss she has suffered; she speaks of only one thing, ofhim. Not a tear, but a cold, calm, and almost absolute silence about everything, and when she speaks she wrings every one's heart. If she sees any one whom she has ever seen with her son, she looks at him with kindliness and interest, and says, 'You know he is dead.' When she first saw her mother, she said to her, 'It's not long since he was here with me. I held him on my knees thus.' ... She heard ten o'clock strike; she turned to one of the ladies and said, 'You know it was at ten that he died.' That is the only way she breaks her almost continual silence."
Josephine was doubly crushed by the blow. She saw her hopes for the future blighted. The Emperor wrote to her from the seat of war; "I can well imagine the grief which Napoleon's death must cause. You can understand what I suffer. I should like to be with you, that you might be moderate and discreet in your grief.... Let me hear that you are calm and well! Do you want to add to my regret? Good-by, my dear."
Napoleon was not cold-hearted, but believed that only those accomplish much in life who have self-control. Two of his soldiers having committed suicide on accountof love affairs, Napoleon caused it to be inserted in the order-book of the guard, that "there is as much true courage in bearing up against mental sufferings with constancy as in remaining firm on the wall of a battery."
Nearly six months after the crowning in Notre Dame, the Emperor was crowned King of Italy in the cathedral of Milan, May 26, 1805, with the iron crown of Charlemagne. This crown of gold and precious stones covers an iron ring said to have been made from a spike which pierced the Saviour's hand at the crucifixion. Napoleon and the Empress were both gorgeously arrayed. He placed the crown upon his own head, repeating the words used in ancient times: "God has given it to me—woe to him that touches it."
Everywhere Napoleon and Josephine were adored by the people. They went into the cabin of a poor woman, who was anxious and needy because her husband could not get work. "How much money would make you perfectly happy?" asked Napoleon. "Ah, sir, a great deal! As much as eighty dollars."
The Emperor gave her several hundreds, and told her to rent a piece of ground and buy some goats.
"Josephine," says Saint-Amand, "had all the qualities that are attractive in a sovereign,—affability, gentleness, kindliness, generosity. She had a way of convincing every one of her personal interest. She had an excellent memory, and surprised those with whom she talked by the exactness with which she recalled the past, even to details they had themselves nearly forgotten. The sound of her gentle, penetrating, and sympathetic voice added to the courtesy and charm of her words. Every one listened to her with pleasure; she spoke with grace andlistened courteously. She always appeared to be doing a kindness, and thus inspired affection and gratitude."
"Her only fault," says Saint-Amand, "was extravagance." But it must be remembered that Napoleon wished her to dress elegantly. It seemed as though everybody came to ask her to buy, and she bought, says Saint-Amand, "simply to oblige the dealers. There was no limit to her liberality. She would have liked to own all the treasures of the earth in order to give them all away." ... Napoleon, economical by nature, scolded and forgave. "He could refuse Josephine nothing," says the same writer, "and she was really the only woman who had any influence over him."
Napoleon made Josephine's son, Eugène, Viceroy of Italy,—he often said, "Eugène may serve as a model to all the young men of the age,"—returned to Paris, and then started for his troops at Boulogne. There he waited for some days for his feet under Villeneuve, who, having been watched by the English, and in part crippled by them, failed to appear. He dared not proceed to Brest, which the English blockaded, and so repaired to Cadiz, to be crushed soon after by that Napoleon of the sea, Horatio Nelson, at the battle of Trafalgar. Villeneuve afterwards committed suicide, stabbing himself to the heart. He left a letter for his wife in which he said, "What a blessing that I have no children to reap my horrible heritage and bear the weight of my name!"
Meantime, Russia, Austria, and Sweden had joined themselves to England to defeat Napoleon. The Emperor, with that quickness of decision and rapidity of execution for which he was phenomenal, managed to separate the armies of his foes, and beat them in turn. At Ulm, Oct. 20, 1805, over thirty thousand Austriansunder General Mack, led by sixteen generals, surrendered, laid down their arms, and retired to the rear of the French army. More than twenty thousand Austrians had been taken prisoners in the few days preceding, and the Austrian army of eighty thousand was well-nigh destroyed.
Napoleon wrote to Josephine Oct. 21: "I am very well, my dear. I have made an army of thirty-three thousand men surrender. I have taken from sixty to seventy thousand prisoners, more than ninety flags, and more than two hundred cannon. In the military annals there is no such defeat."
Napoleon pushed on to Vienna, which he entered Nov. 14, and went to the palace of Schönbrunn. The Emperor Francis had fled, and joined the Tsar and the Russian army at Brunn. Thither Napoleon marched at once. On the night of Dec. 1, 1805, he mounted his horse to reconnoitre the enemy's lines. As he returned, going on foot from one watch-fire to another, he fell to the ground over the stump of a tree. A grenadier lighted a torch of straw, then the whole line did the same and cheered the Emperor. They remembered that the next day, Dec. 2, was the anniversary of the coronation. The Russians thought the French were retreating. Then all slept for a few hours, and awoke to the battle of Austerlitz.
At daybreak there was a heavy mist, then the sun shone out full and clear, and the French believed they would win a glorious victory. They were not disappointed. During the terrible conflict the Russians and Austrians lost over thirty thousand in killed and wounded, treble the number of the French. The enemy fled across the lakes, the ice of which being broken bythe French batteries, thousands were ingulfed. Their cries and groans, says Lanfrey, were heard on the following day.
Napoleon said, "I have fought thirty battles like that, but I have never seen so decisive a victory, or one where the chances were so unevenly balanced." The Russian and Austrian forces greatly outnumbered the French. To his soldiers Napoleon said, "I am satisfied with you; you have covered your eagles with undying glory."
To Josephine he wrote: "The battle of Austerlitz is the greatest I have won; forty-five flags, more than one hundred and fifty cannon, the standards of the Russian guards, twenty generals, more than twenty thousand killed,—a horrid sight! The Emperor Alexander is in despair, and is leaving for Russia. Yesterday I saw the Emperor of Germany in my bivouac; we talked for two hours, and agreed on a speedy peace.... I shall see with pleasure the time that will restore me to you."
The defeat of the allies at Austerlitz hastened the death of William Pitt of England. He looked long on the map of Europe, and said, "Henceforth we may close that map for half a century." He died Jan. 23, 1806.
On Napoleon's return to Paris he erected a column in the Place Vendôme to the Grand Army. It was constructed of cannon taken from the enemy, and has illustrations upon it of the campaigns of Ulm and Austerlitz. W. O'Connor Morris calls Austerlitz "the most perfect of battles on land, as the Nile was the most perfect on sea." Seeley thinks, in its historical results, Austerlitz "ranks among the great events of the world."
The peace of Pressburg was effected between France and Austria, Dec. 26, 1805. Charles James Fox, who had succeeded Pitt in England, was favorable to peacebetween the nations, but the war party in England was strong. Fox soon died, and the peace negotiations failed.
Napoleon said at St. Helena, "The death of Fox was one of the fatalities of my career. Had his life been prolonged, affairs would have taken a totally different turn. The cause of the people would have triumphed, and we should have established a new order of things in Europe."
Meantime Napoleon had placed his brother Joseph on the throne of Naples, Louis on the throne of Holland, and had formed a Confederation of the Rhine out of several states in the valley of the Rhine, which had fourteen million people. Napoleon was elected Protector of the Confederation.
Russia now became an ally of Prussia, and war was declared against France Oct. 14, 1806. The double battle of Jena and Auerstädt was fought, and the Prussians were completely defeated. Alison says, "The loss of the Prussians was prodigious; on the two fields there fell nearly twenty thousand killed and wounded, besides nearly as many prisoners.... Ten thousand of the killed and wounded fell at Auerstädt."
Napoleon entered Berlin in triumph Oct. 27, 1806, and established himself in the king's palace. He did not like the beautiful Queen Louise, because he felt that she had inspired the soldiers by her presence, and urged her husband to make war. He was unjust to her in his bulletins, and Josephine reproached him for "speaking ill of women."
Napoleon visited the palace of Sans Souci to see the room where Frederick the Great died, still preserved as he left it, and then went to the church where he is buried. At the tomb, says General de Ségur, "Napoleonpaused at the entrance in a grave and respectful attitude. He gazed into the shadow enclosing the hero's ashes, and stood thus for nearly ten minutes, motionless, silent, as if buried in deep thought." The sword of Frederick he took with him, and gave it to the Hotel des Invalides in Paris, with the flags carried by his guard in the Seven Years' War.
Early in November, Prince Hohenlohe surrendered twenty thousand Prussians to the French; and Blücher, whom Napoleon was to meet again at Waterloo, surrendered twenty thousand men and over five hundred officers.
With all this victory, Josephine was not happy. Napoleon wrote her Nov. 1: "Talleyrand has come, and tells me you do nothing but cry." She wrote to Hortense, more miserable than herself, that she could not be happy so far from the Emperor.
Napoleon, while at Berlin, issued, Nov. 21, 1806, his famous "Berlin Decree," wherein he declared the British Islands blockaded. All commerce with England and her colonies was prohibited; all property belonging to an English subject confiscated; every native of England found in a country occupied by French troops to be made prisoner of war.
Napoleon declared that this was a retaliatory measure against England. Every French port was, in fact, blockaded by English vessels from the Elbe to Brest, by a decree of the British Government, passed in May, 1806, according to Alison. Some months after the Berlin Decree, England issued further prohibitory acts, called Orders in Council. The consequence of all this was that hate between the two nations was increased.
After the humiliation of Prussia, the war went on with Russia. After some minor battles, both armiesmet on the bloody field of Eylau, Feb. 7, 1807. Jomini thinks the forces about equal, though some historians place the number at eighty thousand Russians, and sixty thousand French. Part of Feb. 7 and all of Feb. 8, the armies were in deadly conflict. A blinding snowstorm part of the time prevented the armies from seeing each other. The snow and ice were so thick that men fought on ponds and did not know it.
Fifty thousand dead and wounded lay on the snow. Marshal Augereau's corps was almost destroyed; three thousand only remained out of fifteen thousand. Napoleon wrote in his bulletins: "Imagine, on a space a league square, nine or ten thousand corpses; four or five thousand dead horses; lines of Russian knapsacks; fragments of guns and sabres; the earth covered with bullets, shells, supplies; twenty-four cannon surrounded by their artillerymen, slain just as they were trying to take their guns away; and all that in plainest relief on the stretch of snow."
He said, as he looked upon the ghastly field, "This sight is one to fill rulers with a love of peace and a horror of war." At three o'clock in the morning of Feb. 9, he wrote to Josephine: "We had a great battle yesterday. I was victorious, but our loss was heavy; that of the enemy, which was even greater, is no consolation for me. I write you these few lines myself, though I am very tired, to tell you that I am well and love you.
Ever yours."
Baron de Marbot, in his most interesting memoirs, tells of his thrilling experiences in this battle. He was at that time an officer under Augereau. His horse, Lisette, of whom he was extremely fond, was addicted to biting, but valued for her speed. At great risk, Marbotcarried a message to the Fourteenth. "I see no means of saving the regiment," said the major; "return to the Emperor, bid him farewell from the Fourteenth of the line, which has faithfully executed his orders, and bear him the eagle which he gave us, and which we can no longer defend; it would add too much to the pain of death to see it fall into the hands of the enemy."
Marbot took the eagle, when a cannon ball went through the hinder part of his hat, forcing, by the shock, the blood from his nose, ears, and even eyes. His limbs were almost paralyzed. A hand to hand combat raged around him. Several Frenchmen, not to be struck from behind, set their backs against the sides of Lisette, who stood quite still. One of the Russians thrust his bayonet into Marbot's left arm, and then into Lisette's thigh.
"Her ferocious instincts being restored by the pain," says Marbot, "she sprang at the Russian, and at one mouthful tore off his nose, lips, eyebrows, and all the skin of his face, making of him a living death's-head, dripping with blood. Then, hurling herself with fury among the combatants, kicking and biting, Lisette upset everything that she met on the road."
She seized another Russian who had tried to hit Marbot, "tore out his entrails, and mashed his body under her feet, leaving him dying on the snow."
When Lisette and her rider reached the cemetery of Eylau, where the battle was hottest, the poor creature fell exhausted. The young Marbot, supposed to be dead amid the piles of dead and wounded, was stripped of his clothing. He was marvellously rescued by a servant, who cut up the shirt of a dead soldier and bandaged the leg of Lisette, by which she also was saved.Lisette, after doing service just before Friedland by galloping twelve leagues on a hot day to carry a message of warning to the Emperor, was cared for by the wife of an officer, and died of old age.
Napoleon shared with his soldiers all the dangers and privations of war. He wrote to his brother Joseph: "The staff-officers have not taken off their clothes for two months, and some not for four. I have myself been a fortnight without taking off my boots. We are deep in the snow and mud.... The wounded have to be carried in open sleighs for fifty leagues."
Josephine wished to come to him. He wrote: "You couldn't be racing through inns and camps. I am as anxious as you can be to see you and be quiet.... All my life I have sacrificed everything—peace, interest, happiness—to my destiny."
The next great battle was at Friedland, when eighty thousand French met seventy-five thousand Russians. "This is the anniversary of Marengo," said Napoleon, June 14, 1800, "and to-dayfortune is with me."
And so it proved. The Russians fought desperately, but they were overpowered. They retreated towards the river, and thousands who were not captured were drowned. They lost twenty-six thousand, says Marbot, in dead and wounded, and the French about half that number.
The conquered were glad to make peace, which was concluded at Tilsit, July 7, 1807, between Alexander I. of Russia, Frederick William III. of Prussia, and Napoleon. By this treaty, among other articles, some provinces west of the Elbe were made into the kingdom of Westphalia, and another brother of Napoleon, Jerome, was placed upon a throne. He had married, when nineteen, Miss Elizabeth Patterson of Baltimore; but throughNapoleon's influence the union was annulled, and he married, at twenty-three, Aug. 23, 1807, the daughter of the king of Würtemberg. She proved a noble woman. When her husband was dethroned in 1814, she refused to obtain a divorce, writing to her father: "Having been forced, by reasons of state, to marry the king, my husband, it has been granted me by fate to be the happiest woman in the world."
Napoleon said of her at Saint Helena, "Princess Catherine of Würtemberg has, with her own hands, written her name in history."
Napoleon returned to Paris after the peace of Tilsit, and was received with unbounded love and honor. He made Paris more beautiful with arches and churches, he developed her industries, and he established schools and colleges. He said, "We must not pass through this world without leaving traces which may commend our memory to posterity."
England was still the bitter enemy of Napoleon. The decrees of both regarding commerce were soon to plunge nearly all Europe into war. By agreement of Alexander and Napoleon, if England did not consent to peace, they were to summon Denmark, Sweden, Portugal, and perhaps Austria, to close their ports against her. Denmark wished to be neutral. While she hesitated, England, having heard of this project, sent a fleet against Copenhagen and bombarded it.
Napoleon sent an army under Junot into Portugal to compel her assent, and Murat into Spain, which at that time was friendly with France, though distracted by royal dissensions. Napoleon placed his brother Joseph on the throne. Mr. Ropes thinks, and probably correctly, that Napoleon supposed "the population of the Spanishpeninsula was ready for the great reforms in government in which France had led the way, and in which Holland, Western Germany, and Italy were then cheerfully and hopefully marching, and that the better and more enlightened part of the Spanish people would be thankful to see a liberal, intelligent, and conscientious man like Joseph take the place of the bigoted and profligate Charles IV."
Napoleon said at St. Helena: "It was the subject of my perpetual dreams to render Paris the real capital of Europe.... My ambition was of the highest and noblest kind that ever existed,—that of establishing and consecrating the empire of reason, and the full exercise and complete enjoyment of all the human faculties."
A dreadful insurrection took place in Spain against the rule of Joseph, and Napoleon sent a large army to quell it. He succeeded in reinstating Joseph on the throne for a time. He abolished the Inquisition and began several reforms.
The insurrection in Spain gave great joy in England. "The general rapture knew no bounds," says Alison. England sent her armies into Spain and Portugal, and the Peninsular War resulted, which Napier has described so vividly. To restore Ferdinand, the son of Charles IV., to Spain, England spent, says Napier, one hundred millions sterling, about five hundred million dollars, "and the bones of forty thousand British soldiers lie scattered on the plains and mountains of the Peninsula." The heroic Sir John Moore fell at Corunna, and was buried in his bloody cloak at night by torchlight.
"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;Not a soldier discharged his farewell shotO'er the grave where our hero we buried."
"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;Not a soldier discharged his farewell shotO'er the grave where our hero we buried."
"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;Not a soldier discharged his farewell shotO'er the grave where our hero we buried."
"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried."
His last words were, "I hope the people of England will be satisfied. I hope my country will do me justice." After his death, Sir Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, was made commander-in-chief of all the English troops in the Spanish peninsula. Austria considered this an opportune time to make war on Napoleon. The latter raised another immense army,—Lanfrey says with much truth, "France was bleeding to death,"—marched against Austria, and several bloody battles resulted.
At Eckmühl the Austrians, says Marbot, admitted a loss of five thousand killed, and fifteen thousand prisoners. Napoleon said at St. Helena, "The greatest military manœuvres I ever made, and those for which I give myself most credit, were performed at Eckmühl."
At Ratisbon the Emperor was wounded in the foot, just before the retaking. So wild were the soldiers at the news, that as soon as his wound was dressed he rode in front of the whole line to appease their anxiety.
After some other successes, Napoleon reached Vienna, May 10, the Emperor Francis having fled, as before, to a place of safety. Napoleon went at once to the royal palace of Schönbrunn.
The enemy were now on the left bank of the Danube. The spring rains had swollen the great river, and the crossing was most hazardous. In the midst of the thousand yards of water was the huge Island of Lobau, four and a half miles long. Here the troops of Napoleon intrenched themselves, and built a bridge of boats to either side of the Danube. As soon as a portion of the French troops had crossed the river, and reached the towns of Aspern and Essling, the Austrians fell upon them with great slaughter, compelling the French toretreat to the Island of Lobau, in the middle of the river. In these battles the heroic Lannes had both legs crushed by a cannon-ball. One leg was amputated. The Emperor knelt beside the stretcher and wept as he embraced Lannes, whose blood stained Napoleon's white kerseymere waistcoat.
"You will live, my friend, you will live," said the Emperor.
"I trust I may, if I can still be of use to France and your Majesty," was the reply.
After his death, said Marbot, "Napoleon embraced the marshal's body, bathing it with tears, and saying repeatedly, 'What a loss for France and for me!'"
The losses at this double battle are variously estimated from twenty to fifty thousand; Lanfrey accepts the latter number. Seeley calls it "one of the most terrible and bloody battles of the period." Napoleon at once began to build substantial bridges on piles across the Danube, one of them eight hundred yards long, broad enough for three carriages to pass abreast. These bridges were finished in twenty days, and compelled great admiration.
To the astonishment of the Austrians, he crossed most of his army of 150,000 men during the night of July 4, and on July 6 fought the dreadful battle of Wagram. About 300,000 were in the battle. Fifty thousand on both sides were killed and wounded, probably about an equal number in each army.
The weather was extremely hot, and the corn on the battle-field caught fire from the shells. "The movements of both armies were hampered by the necessity of avoiding it," says Marbot; "for if once troops were overtaken by it, pouches and wagons exploded, carryingdestruction through the ranks.... Of the soldiers who were severely wounded, great numbers perished in the flames; and of those whom the fire did not reach, many lay for days hidden by the tall corn, living during that time on the ears. The Emperor had the plains searched by bands of cavalry, and vehicles were brought from Vienna to remove the wounded, friends and foes alike. But few of those even whom the fire had passed recovered, and the soldiers had a saying that straw-fire had killed nearly as many as gun-fire."
"After the battle," says General Savary, "the Emperor sent sixty francs in crown pieces to each wounded soldier, and more than this to each officer."
Oct. 14, 1809, the peace of Vienna was signed at Schönbrunn, between France and Austria. "I committed a great fault after the battle of Wagram," said Napoleon at St. Helena, "in not reducing the power of Austria still more. She remained too strong for our safety, and to her we must attribute our ruin."
On Napoleon's return to France he had made up his mind to an act which will always tarnish his fame, and from which the decadence of his empire may be dated. He would divorce Josephine, and marry another, with the hope that he might have an heir to the throne. Undoubtedly he believed he was doing the best thing for France; and Thiers says the French people, while they loved Josephine, wished for the divorce.
On Nov. 30, 1809, as he and Josephine were dining together at Fontainebleau, not a word having been uttered except Napoleon asked one of the servants what time it was, he communicated to her his decision. After dismissing the servants, he came to her, took her hand, pressed it to his heart, and said, "Josephine! my dearJosephine! You know how I have loved you.... To you, to you alone, I owe the only moments of happiness I have tasted in this world. But, Josephine, my destiny is not to be controlled by my will. My dearest affections must yield to the interests of France."
"I expected this," said poor Josephine, "but the blow is none the less mortal."
She became at once insensible; and Napoleon, alarmed, hastily called assistance and bore her to her room. He came to see her in the evening, and wept.
Eugène determined at once to resign his position as Viceroy of Italy, but his mother begged him to remain the friend of Napoleon.
On Dec. 15, at the Tuileries, before the officers of the Empire, the divorce was announced. Josephine was almost overcome by her sobs. "The Emperor will always find in me his best friend," she said, and so it proved.
The next day the divorce was consummated before the Senate. Eugène announced the divorce, saying, "The tears of the Emperor do honor to my mother." Josephine, in a simple white muslin dress, leaning on the arm of Hortense, entered and signed the fatal decree. Both mother and daughter were in tears, as well as many of those present. Eugène, who idolized his mother, fell fainting to the floor. That evening when Josephine thought her husband had retired, she came to his room, her eyes swollen with weeping, and tottering towards the bed fell upon his neck, and sobbed as though her heart would break. They wept together, and talked for an hour. The next day Napoleon came to see her, accompanied by his secretary, Meneval. "He pressed her to his bosom with the most ardent embraces," says Meneval. "In the excess of her emotion she fainted."
At eleven o'clock the same day, veiled from head to foot, Josephine entered a close carriage drawn by six horses, said good-by to the Tuileries forever, and was driven to Malmaison. She retained the title of Empress, with $600,000 a year for her support. Napoleon passed eight days in retirement at Trianon. On his return to the Tuileries, he wrote to her, "I have been very lonely.... This great palace appears to me empty, and I find myself in solitude. Adieu, my love."
He frequently visited Malmaison. One day he found Josephine painting a violet. She says, "He threw himself with transport into the arms of his old friend.... It seemed impossible for him to cease gazing upon me, and his look was that of the most tender affection. At length he said, 'My dear Josephine, I have always loved you. I love you still. Do you still love me?"
Three months later, Mar. 11, 1810, Napoleon was married by proxy at Vienna, Archduke Charles representing him at the wedding, to Marie Louise, the daughter of Emperor Francis I. of Austria. He met her with his suite at the palace of Compiègne. She was eighteen, with light hair, and blue eyes, and gentle in manner. Napoleon was forty.
The civil marriage was celebrated at St. Cloud, April 1; and the next day they made their triumphal entry into Paris, by the Arc de l'Étoile, to the Tuileries, amid the cheers of three hundred thousand people. The world must have been amazed at such a union of France and Austria,—nations which had been at war for years. No wonder Napoleon, at St. Helena, spoke of it as "an abyss covered with a bed of flowers."
Two weeks later Josephine wrote him, "Your majesty shall never be troubled in his happiness by an expressionof my grief. I offer incessant prayers that your majesty may be happy."
A year after his marriage, Mar. 20, 1811, a son, Napoleon Francis, was born to Napoleon, called the King of Rome, as the Roman States had been annexed to the Empire. All France rejoiced when the firing of one hundred guns announced the event.
Josephine wrote at once, telling Napoleon, "More than any one in the world do I rejoice in your joy." Of Marie Louise she wrote, "She cannot be more tenderly devoted to you than I am, but she has been enabled to contribute more toward your happiness, by securing that of France.... Not till you have ceased to watch by her bed, not till you are weary of embracing your son, will you take your pen to converse with your best friend. I will wait."
Napoleon brought his child to Josephine. "The moment I saw you enter," she wrote him, "bearing the young Napoleon in your hands, was unquestionably one of the happiest of my life."
He said at St. Helena: "Josephine would willingly have seen Marie Louise. She frequently spoke of her with great interest.... Marie Louise manifested the utmost dislike, and even jealousy, of Josephine. I wished one day to take her to Malmaison, but she burst into tears when I made the proposal. She said she did not object to my visiting Josephine, only she did not wish to know it. But whenever she suspected my intention of going to Malmaison, there was no stratagem which she did not employ for the sake of annoying me."
The emperor was devoted to his son, and always considerate and tender to Marie Louise. The boy developed into a very beautiful and bright child, winning the love of everybody.
A little more than a year after the birth of the King of Rome, Russia and France were again at war. Whatever Alexander's personal feelings toward Napoleon, his nobles were opposed to him; they disliked his restrictions on commerce, and feared his growing power. Russia and England became allies, though Napoleon offered to make peace with the latter, which offers she always declined. Probably the real truth was they all wished to humble Napoleon.
Russia and France each raised a great army, the latter about a half million men.
Napoleon left Paris for Dresden, May 9, taking Marie Louise with him. He left her at Prague. Before he started from Paris he spent two hours in earnest conversation with Josephine at Malmaison.
This Grand Army must have made an imposing appearance, with their twenty thousand carriages, one hundred and eighty thousand horses employed in the artillery, besides thousands of provision wagons and baggage.
He began to cross the river Niemen, which empties into the Baltic, on the night of June 23, 1812. The policy of the Russians was to retreat, burning the towns through which they passed, and destroying all produce, that the French might find no support in the desolated country.
The first terrible battle was at Borodino, Sept. 7, where the French lost about thirty thousand, and the Russians fifty thousand, in killed and wounded.
On Sept. 14, Napoleon and his weary army—many thousands had been stationed at various places along the route—entered Moscow. Here they hoped for food and rest. They found the great city deserted. Powder had been placed under the Kremlin, and shellsunder the larger palaces, where Napoleon and his officers would be apt to lodge; water-pipes had been cut, fountains destroyed; and, the day after Napoleon's arrival, the whole city was set on fire by Russians detailed for that purpose. No wonder Napoleon said, years later, of this terrible destruction of a great city, "It was the most grand, the most sublime, the most terrific sight the world ever beheld!"
Napoleon wrote to the Tsar proposing peace; but no answer was ever returned, though he waited some weeks in Moscow, hoping to hear favorably. The more intelligent serfs offered to rise against their masters, and aid Napoleon, but he did not desire civil war.
On Oct. 19, 1812, the Grand Army of France, one hundred thousand strong, commenced its heart-breaking retreat. Deep snow had already come, earlier than usual. Kutusof, the Russian general, moved his army parallel to the French, and fought them at every available point. Marshal Ney covered the rear, and made for himself an immortal record. Napoleon rightly called him "The Bravest of the Brave." When they reached Borodino they sadly turned their heads away from the battle-fields where the bodies of thirty thousand men were half devoured by wolves. The cold became intense. Horses slipped and fell on the icy ground. Artillery and baggage were abandoned. There was no food in the devastated country. Where Napoleon had left provisions on his way to Moscow the enemy had destroyed them. Men ate their horses for food. They lay down at night on the snow to sleep, and never rose. "Every morning," says Marbot, "we left thousands of dead in our bivouacs.... So intense was the cold that we could see a kind of vapor rising from men's ears and eyes. Condensing,on contact with the air, this vapor fell back on our persons with a rattle such as grains of millet might have made. We had often to halt and clear away from the horses' bits the icicles formed by their frozen breath.... Many soldiers of all ranks blew out their brains to put an end to their misery.... All ranks were confounded; there were no arms, no military bearings; soldiers, officers, generals, were clad in rags, and for boots had nothing but strips of leather or cloth, hardly fastened together with a string." The Emperor himself was grave, calm, and self-controlled, with no diminution of courage.
The soldiers of the allies of Napoleon, Austria, Prussia, Spain, and others, deserted by the thousands, the Russians having sent proclamations in various languages into the camps, telling them they should be returned to their homes.
Finally they reached the river Beresina, the bridge over which had been destroyed by the Russians. Tearing down the hovels in the village, the French built two bridges at night, the men standing for six or seven hours in the water. Then the troops surged upon them, and one bridge broke under the weight of guns and men. In rushing upon the other, great crowds were forced into the river and drowned. The Russians meantime swept them with cannon. From twenty to twenty-five thousand men perished in this dreadful crossing of the Beresina.
On Dec. 5, 1812, they were within the borders of Poland; and Napoleon, having learned that his death had been proclaimed in Paris, and that a man had tried to usurp the power, left his army in charge of Murat, and, with two officers, hastened by sledges to Paris, which he reached Dec. 18.
The loss of the French army and its allies in theRussian campaign Thiers estimates as 300,000 men; other authorities make it 350,000; 100,000 were killed in the advance and retreat from Moscow; 150,000 died of hunger, fatigue, and cold; 100,000 were taken prisoners. The Russian losses were also heavy.
Prussia now joined herself to Russia, and declared war against France. Napoleon at once raised another army of nearly two hundred thousand by conscription, and defeated the enemy at Lützen, or Gross-Beeren, and Bautzen. His young conscripts fought heroically. His beloved Marshal Duroc was killed just after the latter battle. Napoleon wept as he left him dying, saying, "Duroc, there is another life.... We shall one day meet again."
Austria offered to be a mediator, but failing, hastened to join Prussia and Russia. The marriage with Marie Louise had not won Napoleon friends, as he had fondly hoped.
The allies now had five hundred thousand men, the Prussians under Blücher, the Austrians under Schwarzenberg. Upon Aug. 27, 1813, Napoleon defeated them at Dresden, where they left forty thousand on the field, half of whom were prisoners, but was himself defeated in the dreadful battle of Leipsic, Oct. 16-19.
Bavaria and Westphalia had been compelled to join the allies, whose forces thrice outnumbered the French. The Swedes, under Bernadotte, had now turned against France. "In the three days' battle," says Alison, "the French lost 60,000 men, and the allies nearly as many."
In the retreat of the French from Leipsic they were obliged to cross the Elster river. The bridge had been mined, and by a mistake was exploded before all the French had passed over. Marbot says, of those whowere left in Leipsic, about 13,000 were killed, and 25,000 made prisoners.
Meantime the English had been victorious over the French in Spain and Portugal, and Joseph Bonaparte had been driven from the throne. He came to the United States and lived at Bordentown, New Jersey, for some years, dying at Florence, Italy, July 28, 1844, at the age of seventy-six.
The allies now pushed into France, determined to enter Paris and dethrone Napoleon. The Emperor raised a new army, and with prodigious energy and courage fought against the coalition of Europe. Often with his forces greatly inferior in number to the allies, he defeated them, but finally he was overborne. Marie Louise fled to Blois. The young King of Rome refused to go. "They are betraying my papa," he said, "and I will not go away. I do not wish to leave the palace." He wept as he was taken to the carriage. His governess promised that he should come back, but she was never able to keep her promise.
Paris capitulated March 30, 1814; and the Senate, through the lead of Talleyrand, declared that Napoleon and his family had forfeited the throne.
Napoleon arrived at Paris a few hours after the capitulation, stunned at the news. Fearless as ever, he wished to attack the allies, but was persuaded by his marshals to desist.
With agony of soul, but calmness of demeanor, he signed his abdication at Fontainebleau, April 6, 1814: "The Emperor Napoleon declares that he renounces, for himself and his heirs, the throne of France and Italy; and that there is no personal sacrifice, not even that of life itself, which he is not willing to make for the interests of France."
By the will of the allies, Louis XVIII. was recalled, and Napoleon was banished to the Island of Elba, east of Corsica, with an annual income from France of $500,000. He bade the Old Guard an affectionate good-by. "Adieu, my children," he said. "I would that I could press you all to my heart. Let me at least embrace your general and your eagle." He put his arms around General Petit, and kissed the eagle on its silver beak. Amid the tears and sobs of his brave soldiers, on April 20, Napoleon drove away from Fontainebleau to Fréjus, and in the British frigate, The Undaunted, set sail for Elba, April 27, 1814.
He had frequently written to Josephine through these melancholy months. Once he wrote: "To me death would now be a blessing. But I would once more see Josephine," and he saw her before his departure.
Four days before he left Fontainebleau for Elba, he wrote, "Adieu, my dear Josephine. Be resigned, as I am, and never forget him who never forgot, and who never will forget you. Farewell, Josephine."
She longed to follow him to Elba, but waited to see if Marie Louise would join him. At first Marie Louise desired to go to him, but was prevailed upon by her father, the Emperor Francis, to return to Austria, where she and her son became virtually prisoners. She finally retired to the Duchy of Parma, which the allies had given her, and later married her chamberlain, Count de Neipperg, an Austrian general.
Josephine wrote to Napoleon: "I have been on the point of quitting France to follow your footsteps, and to consecrate to you the remainder of an existence which you so long embellished. A single motive restrains me, and that you may divine.... Say but the word, and I depart."
As soon as Napoleon went to Elba, Josephine's health rapidly declined. She caught cold in driving in the park at Malmaison. When near death she said to Hortense, "I can say with truth, in this, my dying hour, that the first wife of Napoleon never caused a single tear to flow."
Napoleon landed at Elba, May 4, 1814. A month later, May 29, Josephine died, uttering, with her last breath, "Napoleon! Elba!"
"I have seen," said Mademoiselle Avrillon, the first lady of her bedchamber, "the Empress Josephine's sleeplessness and her terrible dreams. I have known her to pass whole days buried in the gloomiest thought. I know what I have seen and heard, and I am sure that grief killed her!"
Napoleon's mother, a woman of sixty-four, and his sister Pauline, joined him at Elba. The latter had married Prince Borghese in 1803, but they soon separated. After several years they were reconciled to each other. She died at Florence in 1825.
Napoleon remained at Elba ten months, when he escaped, landed at Cannes, Mar. 1, 1815, raised an army in France as if by magic, and entered Paris at its head, Mar. 20.
The people seemed glad to be rid of Louis XVIII., who fled at midnight, Mar. 19. Napoleon said, with much truth, "The Bourbons, during their exile, had learned nothing, and forgotten nothing." The Grand Army joyously received their leader. The people shouted themselves hoarse. They wept, and sang songs of thanksgiving. Paris was brilliant with illuminations. When he reached the Tuileries, he was seized and borne aloft above the heads of the throng. The ladies of thecourt, says Alison, "received him with transports, and imprinted fervent kisses on his cheeks, his hands, and even his dress. Never was such a scene witnessed in history." Hortense and her two children were at the Tuileries to welcome Napoleon.
The allies cared little whom France wished to rule her. They preferred the conservative Bourbons or indeed anybody who would not disturb the so-called balance of power in Europe. They at once banded themselves together, England, Austria, Russia, Prussia, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden, to crush this "enemy and disturber of the world."
A million men were soon raised by the allies, and Napoleon brought together over 200,000. He decided at once to take the offensive rather than let the allies invade France. He left Paris for Belgium, June 12, 1815, taking with him about 120,000 men. He drove the Prussians out of Charleroi, and on June 16 gained a victory over the Prussian marshal, Blücher, at Ligny. Jomini, who is usually authentic, says Napoleon had 72,000 in the battle, and Blücher from 80,000 to 90,000. It was a hotly contested battle-field in which the Prussians lost from 12,000 to 20,000 men. Thiers says 30,000.
Blücher had his gray charger, given him by the Prince Regent of England, shot under him, and was nearly killed in the retreat.
The same day occurred the desperate battle of Quatre-Bras, in which Marshal Ney was defeated.
On June 18, 1815, the decisive battle of Waterloo was fought, nine miles south-east of Brussels. Napoleon's forces, according to Jomini and Thiers, were 70,000 in number; Seeley and Ropes say 72,000. Wellington had about 68,000.
The ground was so drenched by rains that the battle was not begun till a little past eleven. Both sides fought desperately. Blücher, a few miles to the right of Wellington, at Wavre, had promised to join him. Napoleon had told Marshal Grouchy to follow the Prussians and thus prevent their union with the English. He started too late for Wavre; he did not take the advice of some of his officers to hasten to Napoleon when they heard the sound of battle, and his 33,000 men failed to help at Waterloo. Ropes gives an interesting account of this in theAtlantic Monthly, June, 1881, "Who lost Waterloo?"
All day long the battle raged. Hand to hand combats were constant. The battle seemed in favor of the French. Meantime Blücher was coming from Wavre, with his guns sinking axle-deep in the mud. "We shall never get on," was heard on all sides. "Wemust get on," said the bluff Blücher; "I have given my word to Wellington."
Napoleon kept watching for Grouchy. Early in the afternoon about 30,000 Prussians under Bulow had come to Wellington's assistance. Night came on and the firing of musketry was heard. "There's Grouchy!" said the Emperor. His aide-de-camp, Labédoyère, rushed to announce it to the army. "Marshal Grouchy is arriving, the Guard is going to charge. Courage! courage! 'tis all over with the English."
"One last shout of hope burst from every rank," says M. Fleury de Chaboulon, ex-secretary of the Emperor; "the wounded who were still capable of taking a few steps returned to the combat, and thousands of voices eagerly repeated, Forward! forward!"
It was not Grouchy, but Blücher with thirty or fortythousand fresh troops. The Imperial Guard did indeed charge with all their wonted impetuosity. They were mowed down like grain. Ney, with five horses shot under him, marched on foot with his drawn sword. Napoleon watched them, pale, yet calm. "All is lost!" said he, "the Guard recoils!"
The Emperor was everywhere in the battle. "Death shuns you. You will be made a prisoner," said his generals, and an officer seized the bridle of his horse and dragged him away.
The French were completely overcome, and the Prussians pursued them with great vigor. It is estimated that the French lost thirty thousand on the field of Waterloo, and the loss of the allies was probably not much less. It was one of the most bloody battles of modern times.
Napoleon returned to Paris, and then retired to Malmaison. He abdicated in favor of his son, Napoleon II.; but the allies, when they captured Paris a second time, July 7, 1815, placed Louis XVIII. again on the throne.
Napoleon repaired to Rochefort with the hope that he might embark for America, but the coast was so blockaded by the English steamers that this was impossible. He surrendered himself to go on board the English ship, Bellerophon, July 15, with the hope that he should find a generous foe. He soon learned, to his inexpressible grief, that he was destined for St. Helena. On Aug. 7 he was transferred to the Northumberland, and sailed for his lonely place of exile, which he reached Oct. 16, 1815.
The Island of St. Helena, ten miles broad and seven long, is in the Atlantic Ocean, fourteen hundred miles west of the west coast of South Africa. It is composed of rugged mountains of volcanic origin, with littlevegetation. Wherever a vessel could approach a fort was planted, so that the island formed a complete prison.
Lieutenant John R. Glover, who accompanied the British admiral who took Napoleon to St. Helena, said of the island (Century, for November, 1893): "Nothing can possibly be less prepossessing, nay, more horribly forbidding, than the first appearance of this isolated and apparently burnt up barren rock, which promises neither refreshment nor pleasure.... During our eight months' residence we experienced little variation, and had continued rains. The climate is by no means healthy, ... the children being sickly, and the adults suffering from the liver, of which complaint many of our men died."
Here Napoleon lived for six years, till his death, May 5, 1821, at the age of fifty-two, of a cancer in the stomach, the same disease which had killed his father. He was allowed to take with him to St. Helena three of his generals and their families, and a secretary, Las Cases.
His jailer, Sir Hudson Lowe, seems to have been a most unfortunate choice in the surveillance of a high-spirited and remarkable man.