Part 8

"I shall set out this night, to place myself at the head of my armies: the movements of the different corps of the enemy render my presence there indispensable. During my absence, I shall see with pleasure, that a committee named by each chamber is meditating on our constitution.

"The constitution is our rallying point: it should be our pole-star in this season of tempests. Every public discussion, that would tend, directly or indirectly, to diminish the confidence we ought to have in its arrangements, would be a misfortune to the state: we should find ourselves in the midst of shoals, without a compass, and without a chart. The crisis in which we are engaged is violent. Let us not imitate the example of the Lower Empire, which, pressed on all sides by the barbarians, rendered itself the laughing-stock of posterity, by engaging in abstract discussions, at the moment when the battering ram was bursting open the gates of the city.

"Independently of the legislative measures, which internal circumstances require, you will deem it useful perhaps, to occupy yourselves on regulating laws, calculated to render the constitution active. These may be subjects of your public labours without any inconvenience.

"Mr. President, and gentlemen deputies of the chamber of representatives, the sentiments expressed in your address sufficiently demonstrate the attachment of the chamber to my person, and all the patriotism, with which it is animated. In all events my course will ever be straight and firm. Assist me to save our country. The first representative of the people, I have contracted the obligation, which I renew, of employing, in times of greater tranquillity, all the prerogatives of the crown, and the little experience I have acquired, to second you in the improvement of our institutions."

The voice of Napoleon, naturally emphatic, gave prominence to the masculine thoughts, that sparkled throughout both these speeches: and when he arrived at this passage, "every public discussion, that would tend to diminish the confidence," &c.; and at this, "let us not imitate the Lower Empire;" he gave these salutary exhortations with a penetrating look, that made the instigators of discord cast down their eyes. The sound part of the representatives approved the Emperor's answer: the rest considered it as a lecture offensive to the dignity of the chamber. There are some men, who think they may be allowed to push remonstrance to insult, yet cannot listen to the most prudent and temperate advice, without being offended.

The Emperor set out, as he had announced, in the night of the 12th of May.

The question of deciding, whether he ought to be the first, to give the signal for hostilities, or not, had frequently recurred to his reflections.

By attacking the enemy, he had the advantage of engaging before the arrival of the Russians, and of carrying the war out of the French territories. If he were victorious, he might raise up Belgium, and detach from the coalition a part of the old confederation of the Rhine, and perhaps Austria.

By waiting to be attacked, he retained it in his power to choose his field of battle, to increase his means of resistance in an infinite degree, and of carrying the strength and devotion of his army to the highest pitch. An army of Frenchmen, fighting under the eyes of their mothers, their wives, and their children, for the preservation of their well-being, and in defence of the honour and independence of their country, would have been invincible. It was the latter alternative, to which Napoleon gave the preference: it agreed with the hope he involuntarily cherished of coming to an agreement with the foreign powers, and with his fear of gaining the ill-will of the chamber, if he commenced the war without previously exhausting all means of obtaining peace.

But Napoleon felt, that, to render a war national, all the citizens must be united in heart and will with their chief: and convinced, that the untoward disposition of the chamber would increase daily, and introduce division and trouble into the state, he resolved to commence the war; hoping, that fortune would favour his arms, and that victory would reconcile him to the deputies, or furnish him with the means of reducing them to order.

The Emperor entrusted the government during his absence to a council, composed of the fourteen persons following:

Prince Joseph, president. Prince Lucien.

_Ministers._ Prince Cambacérès. The prince of Eckmuhl. The duke of Vicenza. The duke of Gaëta. The duke of Decrès. The duke of Otranto. Count Mollien. Count Carnot.

_Ministers of State_[34]. Count Défermon. Count Regnaud de St. Jean d'Angeli. Count Boulay de la Meurthe. Count Merlin.

[Footnote 34: Ministers without any ostensible office, for their conduct in which they would be responsible. We have had members somewhat similar in our privy council. _Tr._]

He said to them: "To-night I set off: do your duty: the French army and I will do ours: I recommend to you union, zeal, and energy."

It appeared strange, in a representative monarchy, where responsibility bore hard on ministers, to see ministers of state, who were not responsible, associated in the government.

This was remarked to the Emperor, and he answered, that he had added ministers of state to the council, that they might be the interpreters of the government to the chamber of deputies; that he wished the ministers at the head of particular offices, to appear in this chamber as little as possible, as long as their constitutional education was incomplete; that they were not familiarized to the tribune[35]; that they might there disclose opinions or principles, without intending it, that government could not avow; and that it would be inconvenient and difficult, to contradict the words of a minister, while those of a minister of state might be disavowed, without implicating the government, or wounding its dignity.

[Footnote 35: The members of the French chambers do not speak in their places, but from a pulpit erected for the purpose. _Tr._]

Were these the only motives? I think not. He distrusted the perfidy of the Duke of Otranto, and the indifference of more ministers than one; and he was glad to find a reason, or a pretence, for introducing into the council of regency the four ministers of state, whose devotion and unshaken fidelity appeared to him an additional guarantee. When he made known his intention of commencing the war, the Duke of Vicenza solicited the favour of attending him to the army, "If I do not leave you at Paris," answered Napoleon, "on whom can I depend?" How much is expressed in these few words!

The day after his departure, the ministers of the interior and for foreign affairs repaired to the chamber of peers. M. Carnot laid before it a statement of the situation of the Emperor and the empire.

"His Majesty," said he, "enlightened by past events, has returned, having at heart the full desire and hope of preserving peace abroad, and of governing paternally at home....

"If the Emperor were less secure of the firmness of his character, and the purity of his resolutions, he might consider himself as placed between two shoals, the partisans of the expelled dynasty, and those of the _republican system_. But the former, having been unable to retain what they possessed, must be still less capable of seizing on it anew: the latter, undeceived by long experience, and bound by gratitude to the prince, who has been their deliverer, are become his most zealous defenders; their candour, as well known as their philanthropic ardour, surround the throne occupied by the august founder of a new dynasty, who glories in having issued from the ranks of the people."

After this declaration, to which the republican opinions of M. Carnot gave great weight, he entered into an examination of the several branches of the public administration in succession.

He disclosed the state, to which the calamities of the times, and the mismanagement of the regal government, had reduced the finances of the communes, the hospitals, religious worship, public works, mines, manufactures, commerce, and public instruction; and made known the system of improvement, which the Emperor had formed, and already commenced, to restore to the communes and hospitals their former resources, to public works their activity, to commerce its scope, to the university its lustre, to manufactures their prosperity, to the clergy that respect and easiness of circumstances, which it had forfeited through the persecutions, directed by it, at the instigation of the emigrants, against the pretended spoilers of their property.

When come to the war department, he announced, that the Emperor had re-established on its old foundations the army, the elements of which had been intentionally dispersed by the late government. That since the 20th of March our forces had been raised by voluntary enlistments, and the recall of the ancient soldiery, from a hundred thousand men, to three hundred and seventy-five thousand. That the imperial guard, the noblest ornament of France during peace, and its strongest rampart during war, would soon amount to forty thousand men. That the artillery, notwithstanding the twelve thousand six hundred pieces of ordnance delivered to the enemy by the fatal convention of the 23d of April, 1814, had risen from its ruins, and now reckoned a hundred batteries, and twenty thousand horses. That our disorganised arsenals had resumed their labours, and were replacing the army stores. That our manufactories of arms, lately abandoned and empty, had made or repaired four hundred thousand muskets in the course of two months. That a hundred and seventy fortified towns, or fortresses, both on the frontiers and in the interior, had been provisioned, repaired, and put into a condition, to resist an enemy. That the national guard, completely re-organised, had already supplied for the defence of the frontiers two hundred and forty battalions, or a hundred and fifty thousand men; and that the successive formation of the other battalions of flank companies would produce more than two hundred thousand men. That the volunteers in the walled towns, and the pupils of the Lyceums and _special_ schools[36], had been formed into companies of artillery, and constituted a body of more than twenty-five thousand excellent gunners. So that eight hundred and fifty thousand Frenchmen would defend the independence, the liberty, and the honour of the country; while the sedentary national guards were preparing themselves in the interior, to furnish fresh resources for the triumph of the national cause.

[Footnote 36: These were schools intended for finishing public education.--_Tr._]

In fine, after having taken a hasty view of the hostile dispositions of our enemies, of the interior disturbances they had excited, and of the means the Emperor had adopted to suppress them, M. Carnot concluded his report by expressing a wish, that the two chambers might soon bestow on France, in concert with the Emperor, those organising laws, which were necessary _to prevent licentiousness from assuming the place of liberty, and anarchy that of order_.

This report, in which M. Carnot did not totally conceal the apprehensions, with which the progress of that spirit of insubordination and demagogism, manifested by certain members of the chamber, inspired the Emperor and the nation, was immediately followed by one from the Duke of Vicenza, on the menacing dispositions of foreign powers, and the fruitless efforts, that the Emperor had made, to bring them to moderate and pacific sentiments. Their hostile resolutions he ascribed chiefly to the suggestions of the cabinet of London. He afterward made known the military preparations of the four great powers, the leagues renewed or recently formed against us, and concluded thus:

"To believe it possible, to maintain peace, at present, therefore, would be a dangerous blindness: war surrounds us on all sides, and it is on the field of battle alone, that peace can be regained by France. The English, the Prussians, the Austrians, are in line of battle; the Russians are in full march. It becomes a duty, to hasten the day of engagement, when too long hesitation might endanger the welfare of the state."

These two reports were presented to the chamber of deputies by ministers of state, at the same time when the ministers were making them known to the chamber of peers. Instead of impressing upon the representatives the necessity of frankly joining the Emperor, and, as one of them observed, of not entering into a contest with the government, at a moment when the blood of Frenchmen was about to be shed, they suggested to them only steril discussions of the impropriety of the connexion of ministers of state with the chamber, and of the urgency of appointing a committee, to remould the additional act. An immoderate desire of speechifying, and of making laws, had seized the greater number of the deputies: but a state is not to be saved by empty words, and schemes of a constitution. The Romans, when their country was in danger, instead of deliberating, suspended the sway of the laws, and gave themselves a dictator.

The next day, the 17th, a new report, made to the Emperor by the minister of police, on the moral state of France, was communicated to the two chambers.

"Sire," said this minister, "it is my duty, to tell you the whole truth. Our enemies are emboldened by instruments without, and supporters within. They wait only for a favourable moment, to realize the plan they conceived twenty years ago, and which during these twenty years has been continually frustrated, of uniting the camp of Jalès to Vendée, and seducing a part of the multitude into that confederacy which extends from the Mediterranean to the Channel.

"In this system, the plains on the left bank of the Loire, the population of which it is most easy to mislead, are the principal focus of the insurrection; which, by the help of the wandering bands of Britanny, is to spread into Normandy, where the vicinity of the islands, and the disposition of the coasts, will render communication more easy. On the other side it rests on the Cevennes, to extend thence to the banks of the Rhone by the revolts, that may be excited in some parts of Languedoc and Provence. Bordeaux has been the centre of the direction of these movements from the beginning.

"This plan is not abandoned. Nay more: the party has been increased, at every change in our revolution, by all the malecontents, that events have produced; by all the factious, that a certainty of amnesty has encouraged; and by all the ambitious, who have been desirous of acquiring some political importance in the changes they foreboded.

"...... It is this party, that now disturbs the interior. Marseilles, Toulouse, and Bordeaux, are agitated by it. Marseilles, where the spirit of sedition animates even the lowest classes of the population; where the laws have been disregarded: Toulouse, which seems still under the influence of that revolutionary organisation, which was imparted to it some months ago: Bordeaux, where all the germs of revolt are deposited, and intensely fermenting.

"It is this party, which by false alarms, false hopes, distribution of money, and the employment of threats, has succeeded in stirring up peaceable agriculturists, throughout the territory included between the Loire, la Vendée, the ocean, and the Rhone. Arms and ammunition have been landed there. The hydra of rebellion revives, re-appears wherever it formerly exercised its ravages, and is not destroyed by our successes at St. Gilles and Aisenay. On the other side of the Loire, bands are desolating the department of Morbihan, and some parts of those of Isle and Vilaine, the Coasts of the North, and Sarthe. They have invaded in a moment the towns of Aurai, Rhedon, and Ploermel, and the plains of Mayenne as far as the gates of Laval; they stop the soldiers and sailors, that are recalled; they disarm the land-holders; increase their numbers by peasants, whom they compel to march with them; pillage the public treasures, annihilate the instruments of administration, threaten the persons in office, seize the stage coaches, stop the couriers, and for a moment intercepted the communication between Mans and Angers, Angers and Nantes, Nantes and Rennes, and Rennes and Vannes.

"On the borders of the Channel, Dieppe and Havre have been agitated by seditious commotions. Throughout the whole of the 15th division, the battalions of the national militia have been formed only with the greatest difficulty. The soldiers and sailors have refused, to answer their call; and have obeyed it only by compulsion. Caen has twice been disturbed by the resistance of the royalists; and in some of the circles of the Orne bands are formed as in Britanny and Mayenne.

"In fine, all kinds of writings, that can discourage the weak, embolden the factious, shake confidence, divide the nation, bring the government into contempt; all the pamphlets, that issue from the printing-offices of Belgium, or the clandestine presses of France; all that the foreign newspapers publish against us, all that the party-writers compose; are distributed, hawked about, and diffused with impunity, for want of restrictive laws, and from the abuse of the liberty of the press.

"Firm in the system of moderation, which your Majesty had adopted, you have thought it right, to wait for the meeting of the chambers, that legal precautions only might be opposed to manoeuvres, which by the ordinary course of law are not always punishable, and which it could neither foresee, nor prevent......"

The Duke of Otranto, entering on the subject, then discussed the laws, which, issued under analogous circumstances, might have been applied on the present occasion; and, as these laws appeared to him, impolitic, dangerous, and inadequate, he concluded, that it was indispensable for the chambers, immediately to set about framing new laws, which were necessary to check the licentiousness of the press, and circumscribe personal liberty, till internal peace and order were restored.

This report did not make the impression, that might have been expected from it. The deputies, accurately acquainted with what was passing in their departments, knew, that facts had been misrepresented. They persuaded themselves, that the melancholy picture of the situation of France, presented to them by M. Fouché, had been drawn up by order of the Emperor, with the view to alarm them, and render them more docile to his will.

The separate committees of the chamber rung with the contradictions, more or less direct, that each representative gave to the assertions of the minister. One of the members of the deputation from Calvados, would not rest satisfied with this civil way of giving him the lie, but declared openly from the tribune, that the agents of the minister had deceived their principal, by describing to him a personal quarrel of no consequence, and quelled on the spot, as a general insurrection of the royalists. They might have spared themselves the trouble of telling M. Fouché, that his report exaggerated the truth, and transformed private occurrences into public events: he knew this. Already devoted to the cause of the Bourbons, he had intentionally distorted facts, with the design of giving hope and consistency to the royalists, and of intimidating, cooling, and dividing, the partisans of Napoleon[37].

[Footnote 37: The Duke of Otranto excelled in the art of bending facts to his own liking. He exaggerated or extenuated them with so much skill, grasped them with so much address, and deduced consequences from them so naturally, that he was often able, to fascinate Napoleon. More securely to deceive and seduce him, he loaded him in his reports with protestations of attachment and fidelity; and he took care to contrive occasions of adding marginal notes with his own hand, in which he adroitly displayed in a distinguished manner his devotion, discernment, and activity. All his reports in general bore the same stamp: with much of cunning, and much of talent, they offered to the eye a rare and valuable assemblage of quickness and judgment, of moderation and firmness: at every word you might discover the able minister, the profound politician, the consummate statesman: in short, M. Fouché would have wanted nothing, to place him in the rank of great ministers, had he been what I shall call an honest statesman (_un ministre honnête homme._)]

The chamber, instead of occupying itself on laws and measures for promoting the public safety, the introduction of which had been referred to them, left to the minister the task of proposing them. It preferred the resumption of its discussions on its favourite subject, the additional act; and I shall leave it, to waste its time in abstract dissertations, while I return to Napoleon.

The Emperor, who set out on the 12th at three in the morning, had gone over the fortifications of Soissons and Laon in his way, and arrived at Avesnes on the 13th. His anxious thoughts were incessantly turned toward Paris. Placed as it were between two fires, he seemed less to dread the enemies he had before him, than those he left behind.

On the 14th of June the whole of his forces amounted to three hundred thousand men; of which only a hundred and fifty thousand infantry, and thirty-five thousand cavalry, were in a state to take the field.

These hundred and eighty-five thousand men he had formed into four armies, and four corps of observation.

The first, under the name of the grand army, was intended to act immediately under his own orders. This was subdivided into five principal corps, commanded

The 1st by Count d'Erlon;

The 2d by Count Reille;

The 3d by Count Vandamme;

The 4th by Count Gérard;

The 5th (called the 6th) by Count de Lobau[38]:

[Footnote 38: The 5th corps became the army of the Rhine, and the 6th, which at first was only a corps of reserve, took its place, without changing its number.]

And into a corps of cavalry commanded by Marshal Grouchy.

This army, exclusive of the imperial guard, which was 4500 horse, and 14,000 foot, amounted to a hundred thousand men, or thereabouts, of whom sixteen thousand were cavalry.

The second, entitled the army of the Alps, was commanded by Marshal the Duke of Albuféra. It was to occupy the passes of Italy, and the border country of the Pays de Gex. Its strength might be twelve thousand men.

The third, styled the army of the Rhine, had at its head General Count Rapp; and its business was, to protect the frontiers of Alsace. It was estimated at eighteen thousand men.

The fourth, called the army of the West, was employed in La Vendée; and, after that country was quieted, it was to be incorporated in the grand army. It consisted of seventeen thousand men; and General Lamarque was its commander-in-chief.

The first corps of observation, stationed at Béford, was commanded by General Lecourbe. It had to defend the passages from Switzerland, and Franche Comté; and to form a communication, according to circumstances, by its left with the army of the Alps, or by its right with the army of the Rhine[39].

[Footnote 39: Surely the army of the Alps must have been on its right, and that of the Rhine on its left, unless it was stationed with its rear to the enemy.--_Tr._]