Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Volume IV. Вальтер Скотт

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СКАЧАТЬ English, than the millers of the Ebro could be made to understand the denunciation of Don Quixote against their customers. These magnates only saw that the Ruler of France wished them to submit to great commercial distress and inconvenience, in order to accelerate his plan of ruining Great Britain, after which achievement he might find it a more easy undertaking to destroy their own natural importance as a European power, by re-establishing Poland, and resuming the fertile provinces on the western boundary; thus leading the Russian Cabinet, if the French interest should remain paramount there, by a very disadvantageous road to a still more disastrous conclusion.

      There was, besides, spread through the Russian nation generally, a sense that France was treating their Emperor rather on the footing of an inferior. It is a thing entirely unknown in diplomacy, that one government should pretend a right to dictate to another who is upon terms of equality, the conditions on which she should conduct her commerce; and the assuming such a right, seconded by threatening language in case of non-compliance, has been always held a legitimate cause of war. Indeed, the opinion that the French league disgraced the Russian nation, plunged their country into embarrassments, and was likely to occasion still farther misfortunes to them, became so general, that the Emperor must have paid some attention to the wishes of his people, even if his own friendship with Buonaparte had not been cooled by late occurrences.

      The alliance with Austria was of a character calculated to alarm Alexander. Russia and Austria, though they had a common interest to withstand the overpowering strength of Buonaparte, had been in ordinary times always rivals, and sometimes enemies. It was the interference of Austria, which, upon several occasions, checked the progress of the Russians in Turkey, and it was Austria also which formed a barrier against the increase of their power in the south of Europe. The family connexion, therefore, formed by Buonaparte with the House of Hapsburg, made him still more formidable to Russia, as likely to embrace the quarrels and forward the pretensions of that power against the Czar, even if France herself should have none to discuss with him.

      But there was no need to have recourse to remote causes of suspicion. Russia had, and must always have had, direct and immediate cause of jealousy, while France or her Emperor claimed the permanent right of thinking and deciding for her, as well as other nations, in the relations of commerce and others, in which every independent state is most desirous of exercising the right of deliberating for herself. This was the true state of the case. To remain the ally of Buonaparte, Alexander must have become his vassal; to attempt to be independent of him, was to make him his enemy; and it can be no wonder that a sovereign so proud and powerful as the Czar, chose rather to stand the hazard of battle, than diminish the lustre, or compromise the independence, of his ancient crown.

      The time, too, for resistance, seemed as favourable as Russia could ever expect. The war of Spain, though chequered in its fortune, was in no respect near a sudden end. It occupied 250,000 of the best and oldest French troops; demanded also an immense expenditure, and diminished, of course, the power of the French Emperor to carry on the war on the frontiers of Russia. A conclusion of these wasting hostilities would have rendered him far more formidable with respect to the quality, as well as the number, of his disposable forces, and it seemed the interest of Russia not to wait till that period should arrive.

      The same arguments which recommended to Russia to choose the immediate moment for resisting the extravagant pretensions of France, ought, in point of prudence, to have induced Napoleon to desist from urging such pretensions, and to avoid the voluntarily engaging in two wars at the same time, both of a character decidedly national, and to only one of which he could give the influence of his own talents and his own presence. His best and wisest generals, whom he consulted, or, to speak more properly, to whom he opened his purpose, used various arguments to induce him to alter, or at least defer his resolution. He himself hesitated for more than a year, and was repeatedly upon the point of settling with Russia the grounds of disagreement betwixt them upon amicable terms.

COMPLAINTS OF THE CZAR

      The reasons of complaint, on the part of the Czar, were four in number.

      I. The alarm given to Russia by the extension of the grand duchy of Warsaw by the treaty of Schoenbrun, as if it were destined to be the central part of an independent state, or kingdom, in Poland, to which those provinces of that dismembered country, which had become part of Russia, were at some convenient time to be united. On this point the Czar demanded an explicit engagement, on the part of the French Emperor, that the kingdom of Poland should not be again established. Napoleon declined this form of guarantee, as it seemed to engage him to warrant Russia against an event which might happen without his co-operation; but he offered to pledge himself that he would not favour any enterprise which should, directly or indirectly, lead to the re-establishment of Poland as an independent state. This modified acquiescence in what was required by Russia fell considerably short of what the Czar wished; for the stipulation, as at first worded, would have amounted to an engagement on the part of France to join in opposing any step towards Polish independence; whereas, according to the modification which it received at Paris, it only implied that France should remain neuter if such an attempt should take place.

      II. The wrong done by including the duchy of Oldenburg, though guaranteed by the treaty of Tilsit to its prince, the Czar's near relative and ally, in the territory annexed to France, admitted of being compensated by an indemnification. But Russia desired that this indemnification should be either the city of Dantzic, or some equally important territory, on the frontiers of the grand duchy of Warsaw, which might offer an additional guarantee against the apprehended enlargement of that state. France would not listen to this, though she did not object to compensation elsewhere.

      III. The third point in question, was the degree to which the Russian commerce with England was to be restricted. Napoleon proposed to grant some relaxation on the occasions where the produce of Russia was exported in exchange for that of England, to be effected by the way of mutual licenses.

      IV. It was proposed to revise the Russian tariff of 1810, so as, without injuring the interests of Russia, it might relax the heavy duties imposed on the objects of French commerce.

      From this statement, which comprehends the last basis on which Napoleon expressed himself willing to treat, it is quite evident, that had there not been a deeper feeling of jealousy and animosity betwixt the two Emperors, than those expressed in the subjects of actual debate betwixt them, these might have been accommodated in an amicable way. But as it was impossible for Napoleon to endure being called to account, like a sovereign of the second rate, or at least in the tone of an equal, by the Emperor of Russia; so the latter, more and more alarmed by the motions of the French armies, which were advancing into Pomerania, could not persuade himself, that, in agreeing to admit the present grounds of complaint, Napoleon meant more than to postpone the fatal struggle for superiority, until he should find a convenient time to commence it with a more absolute prospect of success.

      In the meantime, and ere the negotiations were finally broken off, Buonaparte's counsellors urged him with as much argument as they dared, to desist from running the hazard of an enterprise so remote, so hazardous, and so little called for. They contended, that no French interest, and no national point of honour, were involved in the disagreement which had arisen. The principles upon which the points of dispute might be settled, being in a manner agreed upon, they argued that their master should stop in their military preparations. To march an army into Prussia, and to call forth the Prussians as auxiliaries, would, they contended, be using measures towards Russia, which could not but bring on the war which they anxiously deprecated. To submit to menaces supported by demonstrations of open force, would be destructive of the influence of Russia, both at home and abroad. She could not be expected to give way without a struggle.

WAR WITH RUSSIA

      These advisers allowed, that a case might be conceived for justifying an exertion to destroy the power of Russia, a case arising out of the transactions between France and the other states of Europe, and out of the apprehension that these states, aggrieved and irritated by the conduct of France, might be tempted to seek a leader, patron, and protector, in the Emperor Alexander. But this extremity, they alleged, could not СКАЧАТЬ