We now turn to consider the influence which the founding of the Rhenish Confederation exerted on the international problems which were being discussed at Paris.  Having gained this diplomatic victory, Napoleon, it seems, might well afford to be lenient to Prussia, to the Czar, even to England.  Would he seize this opportunity, and soothe the fears of these Powers by a few timely concessions, or would he press them all the harder because the third of Germany was now under his control?  Here again he was at the parting of the ways.

As the only obstacles to the conclusion of a durable peace with England were Sicily and Hanover, it may be well to examine here the bearing of these questions on the peace of Europe and Napoleon’s future.

It is clear from his letters to Joseph that he had firmly resolved to conquer Sicily.  Before his brother had reached Naples he warned him to prepare for the expulsion of the Bourbons from that island.  For that purpose the French pushed on into Calabria and began to make extensive preparationsat the very time when Talleyrand stated to Lord Yarmouth that the French did not want Sicily.  But the English forces defending that island prepared to deal a blow that would prevent a French descent.  A force of about 5,000 men under Sir John Stuart landed in the Bay of St. Euphemia:  and when, on the 4th of July, 1806, Reynier led 7,000 troops against them in full assurance of victory, his choicest battalions sank before the fierce bayonet charge of the British:  in half an hour the French were in full retreat, leaving half their numbers on the field.

The moral effect of this victory was very great.  Hitherto our troops, except in Egypt, had had no opportunity of showing their splendid qualities.  More than half a century had passed since at Minden a British force had triumphed over a French force in Europe; and Napoleon expressed the current opinion when he declared to Joseph his joy that at last the slow and clumsy English had ventured on the mainland. Moreover, the success at Maida, the general rising of the Calabrias that speedily followed, and Stuart’s capture of Reggio, Cortone, and other towns, with large stores and forty cannon destined for the conquest of Sicily, scattered to the winds the French hope of carrying Sicily by a coup de main.

If there was any chance of the Russian and British Governments deserting the cause of the Bourbons, it was ended by the news from the Mediterranean; and Napoleon now realized that the mastery of that sea“the principal and constant aim of my policy”had once more slipped from his grasp!  On their side the Bourbons were unduly elated by a further success which was more brilliant than solid.  Queen Caroline, excited at the capture of Capri by Sir Sidney Smith, sought to rouse all her lost provinces:  she intrigued behind the back of the King and of General Acton, while the knight-errant succeeded in paralyzing the plans of Sir John Stuart. Meanwhile Massena, after reducing the fortress of Gaeta to surrender, marched southward with a large force, and the British and Bourbon forces re-embarked for Sicily, leaving the fierce peasants and bandits of Calabria to the mercies of the conquerors.  But Maida was not fought in vain.  Sicily thenceforth was safe, the British army regained something of its ancient fame, and the hope of resisting Napoleon was strengthened both at St. Petersburg and London.

Peace can rarely be attained unless one of the combatants is overcome or both are exhausted.  But neither Great Britain nor France was in this position.  By sea our successes had been as continuous as those of Napoleon over our allies on land.  In January we captured the Cape from the Dutch:  in February the French force at St. Domingo surrendered to Sir James Duckworth:  Admiral Warren in March closed the career of the adventurous Linois; and early in July a British force seized great treasure at Buenos Ayres, whence, however, it was soon obliged to retire.  After these successes Fox could not but be firm.  He refused to budge from the standpoint of uti possidetis which our envoy had stated as the basis of negotiations:  and the Earl of Lauderdale, who was sent to support and finally to supersede the Earl of Yarmouth, at once took a firm tone which drew forth a truculent rejoinder.  If that was to be the basis, wrote Clarke, the French plenipotentiary, then France would require Moravia, Styria, the whole of Austria (Proper), and Hanover, and in that case leave England her few colonial conquests.

This reply of August 8th nearly severed the negotiations on the spot:  but Talleyrand persistently refused to grant the passports which Lauderdale demandedevidently in the hope that the Czar’s ratification of Oubril’s treaty would cause us to give up Sicily. He was in error.  On September 3rd the news reached Paris that Alexander scornfully rejected his envoy’s handiwork.  Nevertheless, Napoleon refused to forego his claims to Sicily; and the closing days of Fox were embittered by the thought that this negotiation, the last hope of a career fruitful in disappointments, was doomed to failure.  After using his splendid eloquence for fifteen years in defence of the Revolution and its “heir,” he came to the bitter conclusion that liberty had miscarried in France, and that that land had bent beneath the yoke in order the more completely to subjugate the Continent.  He died on September 13th.

French historians, following an article in the “Moniteur” of November 26th, have often asserted that the death of Fox and the accession to power of the warlike faction changed the character of the negotiations. Nothing can be further from the truth.  Not long before his end, Fox thus expressed to his nephew his despair of peace: 

“We can in honour do nothing without the full and bona fide consent of the Queen and Court of Naples; but, even exclusive of that consideration and of the great importance of Sicily, it is not so much the value of the point in dispute as the manner in which the French fly from their word that disheartens me.  It is not Sicily, but the shuffling, insincere way in which they act, that shows me that they are playing a false game; and in that case it would be very imprudent to make any concessions, which by any possibility could be thought inconsistent with our honour, or could furnish our allies with a plausible pretence for suspecting, reproaching, or deserting us.”

It is further to be noted that Lauderdale stayed on at Paris three weeks after the death of Fox; that he put forward no new demand, but required that Talleyrand should revert to his first promise of renouncing all claim to Sicily, and should treat conjointly with England and Russia.  It was in vain.  Napoleon’s final concessions were that the Bourbons, after losing Sicily, should have the Balearic Isles and be pensioned by Spain; that Russia should hold Corfu (as she already did); and that we should recover Hanover from Prussia, and keep Malta, the Cape, Tobago, and the three French towns in India; but, except Hanover, all of these were in our power.  On Sicily he would not bate one jot of his pretensions.  The negotiations were therefore broken off on October 6th, twelve days after Napoleon left Paris to marshal his troops against Prussia. The whole affair revealed Napoleon’s determination to trick the allies into signing separate and disadvantageous treaties, and thus to regain by craft the ground which he had lost in fair fight at Maida.

If Sicily was the rock of stumbling between us and Napoleon, Hanover was the chief cause of the war between France and Prussia.  During the negotiations at Paris, Lord Yarmouth privately informed Lucchesini, the Prussian ambassador, that Talleyrand made no difficulty about the restitution of Hanover to George III.  The news, when forwarded to Berlin at the close of July, caused a nervous flutter in ministerial circles, where every effort was being made to keep on good terms with France.

Even before this news arrived, the task was far from easy.  Murat, when occupying his new Duchy of Berg, pushed on his troops into the old Church lands of Essen and Werden.  Prussia looked on these districts as her own, and the sturdy patriot Bluecher at once marched in his soldiers, tore down Murat’s proclamations, and restored the Prussian eagle with blare of trumpet and beat of drum. A collision was with difficulty averted by the complaisance of Frederick William, who called back his troops and referred the question to lawyers; but even the King was piqued when the Grand-Duke of Berg sent him a letter of remonstrance on Bluecher’s conduct, commencing with the familiar address, Mon frère.

Bluecher meanwhile and the soldiery were eating out their hearts with rage, as they saw the French pouring across the Rhine, and constructing a bridge of boats at Wesel; and had they known that that important stronghold, the key of North Germany, was quietly declared to be a French garrison town, they would probably have forced the hands of the King. For at this time Frederick William and Haugwitz were alarmed by the formation of the Rhenish Confederation, and were not wholly reassured by Napoleon’s suggestion that the abolition of the old Empire must be an advantage to Prussia.  They clutched eagerly, however, at his proposal that Prussia should form a league of the North German States, and made overtures to the two most important States, Saxony and Hesse-Cassel.  During a few halcyon days the King even proposed to assume the title Emperor of Prussia, from which, however, the Elector of Saxony ironically dissuaded him.  This castle in the air faded away when news reached Berlin at the beginning of August that Napoleon was seeking to bring the Elector of Hesse-Cassel into the Rhenish Confederation, and was offering as a bait the domains of some Imperial Knights and the principality of Fulda, now held by the Prince of Orange, a relative of Frederick William.  Moreover, the moves of the French troops in Thuringia were so threatening to Saxony that the Court of Dresden began to scout the project of a North German Confederation.

Still, the King and Haugwitz tried to persuade themselves that Napoleon meant well for Prussia, that England had been doing her utmost to make bad blood between the two allies, and that “great results could not be attained without some friction.”  In this hope they were encouraged by the French ambassador, the man who had enticed Prussia to her demobilization.  He was charged by Talleyrand to report at Berlin that “peace with England would be made, as well as with Russia, if France had consented to the restitution of Hanover.I have renewed,” added Laforest, “the assurance that the Emperor [Napoleon] would never yield on this point.”

And yet at that very time the French Foreign Office was at work upon a Project of a Treaty in which the restitution of Hanover to George III. was expressly named and received the assent of Napoleon. The Prussian ambassador, Lucchesini, had some inkling of this from French sources, as well as from Lord Yarmouth, and on July 28th penned a despatch which fell like a thunderbolt on the optimists of Berlin.  It crossed on the waysuch is the irony of diplomacya despatch from Berlin that required him to show unlimited confidence in Napoleon.  From confidence the King now rushed to the opposite extreme, and saw Napoleon’s hand in all the friction of the last few weeks.

Here again he was wrong; for the French Emperor had held back Murat and the other hot-bloods of the army who were longing to measure swords with Prussia. His correspondence proves that his first thoughts were always in the Mediterranean.  For one page that he wrote about German affairs he wrote twenty to Joseph or Eugene on the need of keeping a firm hand and punishing Calabrian rebels“shoot three men in every village”above all, on the plans for conquering Sicily.  It was therefore with real surprise that on August 16th-18th he learnt from a purloined despatch of Lucchesini that the latter suspected him of planning with the Czar the partition of Prussian Poland.  He treated the matter with contempt, and seems to have thought that Prussia would meekly accept the morsels which he proposed to throw to her in place of Hanover.  But he misread the character of Frederick William, if he thought so grievous an insult would be passed over, and he knew not the power of the Prussian Queen to kindle the fire of patriotism.

Queen Louisa was at this time thirty years of age and in the flower of that noble matronly beauty which bespoke a pure and exalted being.  As daughter of a poverty-stricken prince of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, her youth had been spent in the homeliest fashion, until her charms won the heart of the Crown Prince of Prussia.  Her first entry into Berlin was graced by an act that proclaimed a loving nature.  When a group of children dressed in white greeted her with verses of welcome, she lifted up and kissed their little leader, to the scandal of stiff dowagers, and the joy of the citizens.  The incident recalls the easy grace and disregard of etiquette shown by Marie Antoinette at Versailles in her young bridal days; and, in truth, these queens have something in common, besides their loveliness and their misfortunes.  Both were mated with cold and uninspiring consorts.  Destiny had refused both to Frederick William and to Louis XVI. the power of exciting feelings warmer than the esteem and respect due to a worthy man; and all the fervour of loyalty was aroused by their queens.

Louisa was a North German Marie Antoinette, but more staid and homely than the vivacious daughter of Maria Theresa.  Neither did she interfere much in politics, until the great crash came:  even when the blow was impending, and the patriotic statesmen, with whom she sympathized, begged the King to remove Haugwitz, she disappointed them by withholding the entreaties which her instincts urged but her wifely obedience restrained.  Her influence as yet was that of a noble, fascinating woman, who softened the jars occasioned by the King’s narrow and pedantic nature, and purified the Court from the grossness of the past.  But in the dark days that were to come, her faith and enthusiasm breathed new force into a down-trodden people; and where all else was shattered, the King and Queen still held forth the ideal of that first and strongest of Teutonic institutions, a pure family life.

The “Memoirs” of Hardenberg show that the Queen quietly upheld the patriotic cause; and in the tone of the letter that Frederick William wrote to the Czar (August 8th) there is something of feminine resentment against the French Emperor:  after recounting his grievances at Napoleon’s hands, he continued: 

“If the news be true, if he be capable of perfidy so black, be convinced, Sire, that it is not merely a question about Hanover between him and me, but that he has decided to make war against me at all costs.  He wants no other Power beside his own....  Tell me, Sire, I conjure you, if I may hope that your troops will be within reach of succour for me, and if I may count on them in case of aggression.”

Alexander wrote a cheering response, advising him to settle his differences with England and Sweden, and assuring him of help.  Whereupon the King replied (September 6th) that he had reopened the North Sea rivers to British ships and hoped for peace and pecuniary help from London.  He concluded thus: 

“Meanwhile, Bonaparte has left me at my ease:  for not only does he not enter into any explanation about my armaments, but he has even forbidden his Ministers to give and receive any explanations whatever.  It appears, then, that it is I who am to take the initiative.  My troops are marching on all sides to hasten that moment."

These last sentences are the handwriting on the wall for the ancien regime in Prussia.  Taking the bland assurances of Talleyrand and the studied indifference of Laforest as signs that Napoleon might be caught off his guard, Prussia continued her warlike preparations; and in order to gain time Lucchesini was recalled and replaced by an envoy who was to enter into lengthy explanations.  The trick did not deceive Napoleon, who on September 3rd had heard with much surprise that Russia meant to continue the war.  At once he saw the germ of a new Coalition, and bent his energies to the task of conciliating Austria, and of fomenting the disputes between Russia and Turkey.  Towards Frederick William his tone was that of a friend who grieves at an unexpected quarrel.  Howhe exclaimed to Lucchesini on the ambassador’s departurehow could the King credit him with encouraging the intrigues of a fussy ambassador at Cassel or the bluster of Murat?

As for Hanover, he had intended sending some one to Berlin to propose an equivalent for it in case England still made its restitution a sine qua non of peace.  “But,” he added, “if your young officers and your women at Berlin want war, I am preparing to satisfy them.  Yet my ambition turns wholly to Italy.  She is a mistress whose favours I will share with no one.  I will have all the Adriatic.  The Pope shall be my vassal, and I will conquer Sicily.  On North Germany I have no claims:  I do not object to the Hanse towns entering your confederation.  As to the inclusion of Saxony in it, my mind is not yet made up."

Indeed, the tenor of his private correspondence proves that before the first week of September he did not expect a new Coalition.  He believed that England and Russia would give way before him, and that Prussia would never dare to stir.  For the Court of Berlin he had a sovereign contempt, as for the “old coalition machines” in general.  His conduct of affairs at this time betokens, not so much desire for war as lack of imagination where other persons’ susceptibilities are concerned.  It is probable that he then wanted peace with England and peace on the Continent; for his diplomacy won conquests fully as valuable as the booty of his sword, and only in a naval peace could he lay the foundations of that oriental empire which, he assured O’Meara at St. Helena, held the first place in his thoughts after the overthrow of Austria.  But it was not in his nature to make the needful concessions. “I must follow my policy in a geometrical line” he said to Lucchesini.  England might have Hanover and a few colonies if she would let Sicily go to a Bonaparte:  as for Prussia, she might absorb half-a-dozen neighbouring princelings.

That is the gist of Napoleon’s European policy in the summer of 1806; and the surprise which he expressed to Mollien at the rejection of his offers is probably genuine.  Sensitive to the least insult himself, his bluntness of perception respecting the honour of others might almost qualify him to rank with Aristotle’s man devoid of feeling.  It is perfectly true that he did not make war on Prussia in 1806 any more than on England in 1803.  He only made peace impossible.

The condition on which Prussia now urgently insisted was the entire evacuation of Germany by French troops.  This Napoleon refused to concede until Frederick William demobilized his army, a step that would have once more humbled him in the eyes of this people.  It might even have led to his dethronement.  For an incident had just occurred in Bavaria that fanned German sentiment to a flame.  A bookseller of Nuremberg, named Palm, was proved by French officers to have sold an anonymous pamphlet entitled “Germany in her deep Humiliation.”  It was by no means of a revolutionary type, and the worthy man believed it to be a mistake when he was arrested by the military authorities.  He was wrong.  Napoleon had sent orders that a terrible example must be made in order to stop the sale of patriotic German pamphlets.  Palm was therefore haled away to Braunau, an Austrian town then held by French troops, was tried by martial law and shot (August 25th).  Never did the Emperor commit a greater blunder.  The outrage sent a thrill of indignation through the length and breadth of Germany.  Instead of quenching, it inflamed the national sentiment, and thus rendered doubly difficult any peaceful compromise between Frederick William and Napoleon.  The latter was now looked upon as a tyrant by the citizen class which his reforms were designed to conciliate:  and Frederick William became almost the champion of Germany when he demanded the withdrawal of the French troops.

Unfortunately, the King refused to appoint Ministers who inspired confidence.  With Hardenberg in place of Haugwitz, men would have felt sure that the sword would not again be tamely sheathed; great efforts were made to effect this change, but met with a chilling repulse from the King. It is true that Haugwitz and Beyme now expressed the bitterest hatred of Napoleon, as well they might for a man who had betrayed their confidence.  But, none the less, the King’s refusal to change his men along with his policy was fatal.  Both at St. Petersburg and London no trust was felt in Prussia as long as Haugwitz was at the helm.  The man who had twice steered the ship of state under Napoleon’s guns might do it again; and both England and Russia waited to see some irrevocable step taken before they again risked an army for that prince of waverers.

Grenville rather tardily sent Lord Morpeth to arrange an alliance, but only after he should receive a solemn pledge that Hanover would be restored.  That envoy approached the Prussian headquarters just in time to be swept away in the torrent of fugitives from Jena.  As for Russia, she had awaited the arrival of a Prussian officer at St. Petersburg to concert a plan of campaign.  When he arrived he had no plan; and the Czar, perplexed by the fatuity of his ally, and the hostility of the Turks, refused to march his troops forthwith into Prussia. Equally disappointing was the conduct of Austria.  This Power, bleeding from the wounds of last year and smarting under the jealousy of Russia, refused to move until the allies had won a victory.  And so, thanks to the jealousies of the old monarchies, Frederick William had no Russian or Austrian troops at his side, no sinews of war from London to invigorate his preparations, when he staked his all in the high places of Thuringia.  He gained, it is true, the support of Saxony and Weimar; but this brought less than 21,000 men to his side.

On the other hand, Napoleon, as Protector of the Rhenish Confederation, secured the aid of 25,000 South Germans, as well as an excellent fortified base at Wuerzburg.  His troops, holding the citadels of Passau and Braunau on the Austrian frontier, kept the Hapsburgs quiet; and 60,000 French and Dutch troops at Wesel menaced the Prussians in Hanover.  Above all, his forces already in Germany were strengthened until, in the early days of October, some 200,000 men were marching from the Main towards the Duchy of Weimar.  Soult and Ney led 60,000 men from Amberg towards Baireuth and Hof:  Bernadotte and Davoust, with 90,000, marched towards Schleitz, while Lannes and Augereau, with 46,000, moved by a road further to the left towards Saalfeld.

The progress of these dense columns near together and through a hilly country presented great difficulties, which only the experience of the officers, the energy and patience of the men, and the genius of their great leader could overcome.  Meanwhile Napoleon had quietly left Paris on September 25th.  Travelling at his usual rapid rate, he reached Mainz on the 28th:  he was at Wuerzburg on October 2nd; there he directed the operations, confident that the impact of his immense force would speedily break the Prussians, drive them down the valley of the Saale and thus detach the Elector of Saxony from an alliance that already was irksome.

The French, therefore, had a vast mass of seasoned fighters, a good base of operations, and a clear plan of attack.  The Prussians, on the contrary, could muster barely 128,000 men, including the Saxons, for service in the field; and of these 27,000 with Ruechel were on the frontier of Hesse-Cassel seeking to assure the alliance of the Elector.  The commander-in-chief was the septuagenarian Duke of Brunswick, well known for his failure at Valmy in 1792 and his recent support to the policy of complaisance to France.  His appointment aroused anger and consternation; and General Kalckreuth expressed to Gentz the general opinion when he said that the Duke was quite incompetent for such a command:  “His character is not strong enough, his mediocrity, irresolution, and untrustworthiness would ruin the best undertaking.”  The Duke himself was aware of his incompetence.  Why then, we ask, did he accept the command?  The answer is startling; but it rests on the evidence of General von Mueffling: 

“The Duke of Brunswick had accepted the command in order to avert war.  I can affirm this with perfect certainty, since I have heard it from his own lips more than once.  He was fully aware of the weaknesses of the Prussian army and the incompetence of its officers."

Thus there was seen the strange sight of a diffident, peace-loving King accompanying the army and sharing in all the deliberations; while these were nominally presided over by a despondent old man who still intrigued to preserve peace, and shifted on to the King the responsibility of every important act.  And yet there were able generals who could have acted with effect, even if they fell short of the opinion hopefully bruited by General Ruechel, that “several were equal to M. de Bonaparte.”  Events were to prove that Gneisenau, Scharnhorst, and Bluecher rivalled the best of the French Marshals; but in this war their lights were placed under bushels and only shone forth when the official covers had been shattered.  Scharnhorst, already renowned for his strategic and administrative genius, took part in some of the many councils of war where everything was discussed and little was decided; but his opinion had no weight, for on October 7th he wrote:  “What we ought to do I know right well, what we shall do only the gods know." He evidently referred to the need of concentration.  At that time the thin Prussian lines were spread out over a front of eighty-five miles, the Saxons being near Gera, the chief army, under Brunswick, at Erfurth, while Ruechel was so far distant on the west that he could only come up at Jena just one hour too late to avert disaster.

And yet with these weak and scattered forces, Prince Hohenlohe proposed a bold move forward to the Main.  Brunswick, on the other hand, counselled a prudent defensive; but he could not, or would not, enforce his plan; and the result was an oscillation between the two extremes.  Had he massed all his forces so as to command the valleys of the Saale and Elster near Jena and Gera, the campaign might possibly have been prolonged until the Russians came up.  As it was, the allies dulled the ardour of their troops by marches, counter-marches, and interminable councils-of-war, while Napoleon’s columns were threading their way along those valleys at the average rate of fifteen miles a day, in order to turn the allied left and cut the connection between Prussia and Saxony.

The first serious fighting was on October the 10th at Saalfeld, where Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia with a small force sought to protect Hohenlohe’s flank march westwards on Jena.  The task was beyond the strength even of this flower of Prussian chivalry.  He was overpowered by the weight and vigour of Lannes’ attack, and when already wounded in a cavalry melee was pierced through the body by an officer to whom he proudly refused to surrender.  The death of this hero, the “Alcibiades” of Prussia, cast a gloom over the whole army, and mournful faces at headquarters seemed to presage yet worse disasters.  Perhaps it was some inkling of this discouragement, or a laudable desire to stop “an impolitic war,” that urged Napoleon two days later to pen a letter to the King of Prussia urging him to make peace before he was crushed, as he assuredly would be.  In itself the letter seems admirableuntil one remembers the circumstances of the case.  The King had pledged his word to the Czar to make war; if, therefore, he now made peace and sent the Russians back, he would once more stand condemned of preferring dishonourable ease to the noble hazards of an affair of honour.  As Napoleon was aware of the union of the King and Czar, this letter must be regarded as an attempt to dissolve the alliance and tarnish Frederick William’s reputation.  It was viewed in that light by that monarch; and there is not a hint in Napoleon’s other letters that he really expected peace.

He was then at Gera, pushing forward his corps towards Naumburg so as to cut off the Prussians from Saxony and the Elbe.  Great as was his superiority, these movements occasioned such a dispersion of his forces as to invite attack from enterprising foes; but he despised the Prussian generals as imbéciles, and endeavoured to unsteady their rank and file by seizing and burning their military stores at the latter town.  He certainly believed that they were all in retreat northwards, and great was his surprise when he heard from Lannes early on October 13th that his scouts, after scaling the hills behind Jena in a dense mist, had come upon the Prussian army.  The news was only partly correct.  It was only Hohenlohe’s corps:  for the bulk of that army, under Brunswick, was retreating northwards, and nearly stumbled upon the corps of Davoust and Bernadotte behind Naumburg.

Lannes also was in danger on the Landgrafenberg.  This is a lofty hill which towers above the town of Jena and the narrow winding vale of the Saale; while its other slopes, to the north and west, rise above and dominate the broken and irregular plateau on which Hohenlohe’s force was encamped.  Had the Prussians attacked his weary regiments in force, they might easily have hurled them into the Saale.  But Hohenlohe had received orders to retire northwards in the rear of Brunswick, as soon as he had rallied the detachment of Ruechel near Weimar, and was therefore indisposed to venture on the bold offensive which now was his only means of safety.  The respite thus granted was used by the French to hurry every available regiment up the slopes north and west of Jena.  Late in the afternoon, Napoleon himself ascended the Landgrafenberg to survey the plateau; while a pastor of the town was compelled to show a path further north which leads to the same plateau through a gulley called the Rau-thal.

On the south the heights sink away into a wider valley, the Muehl-thal, along which runs the road to Weimar; and on this side too their wooded brows are broken by gulleys, up one of which runs a winding track known as the Schnecke or Snail.  Villages and woods diversified the plateau and hindered the free use of that extended line formation on which the Prussians relied, while favouring the operations of dense columns preceded by clouds of skirmishers by which Napoleon so often hewed his way to victory.  His greatest advantage, however, lay in the ignorance of his foes.  Hohenlohe, believing that he was confronted only by Lannes’ corps, took little thought about what was going on in his front, and judging the Muehl-thal approach alone to be accessible, posted his chief force on this side.  So insufficient a guard was therefore kept on the side of the Landgrafenberg that the French, under cover of the darkness, not only crowned the summit densely with troops, but dragged up whole batteries of cannon.

The toil was stupendous:  in one of the steep hollow tracks a number of cannon and wagons stuck fast; but the Emperor, making his rounds at midnight, brought the magic of his presence to aid the weary troops and rebuke the officers whose negligence had caused this block.  Lantern in hand, he went up and down the line to direct the work; and Savary, who saw this scene, noted the wonder of the men, as they caught sight of the Emperor, the renewed energy of their blows at the rocks, and their whispers of surprise that he should come in person when their officers were asleep.  The night was far spent when, after seeing the first wagon right through the narrow steep, he repaired to his bivouac amidst his Guards on the summit, and issued further orders before snatching a brief repose.  By such untiring energy did he assure victory.  Apart from its immense effect on the spirits of his troops, his vigilance reaped a rich reward.  Jena was won by a rapid concentration of troops, and the prompt seizure of a commanding position almost under the eyes of an unenterprising enemy.  The corps of Soult and Ney spent most of the night and early morning in marching towards Jena and taking up their positions on the right or north wing, while Lannes and the Guard held the central height, and Augereau’s corps in the Muehl-thal threatened the Saxons and Prussians guarding the Schnecke.

A dense fog screened the moves of the assailants early on the morrow, and, after some confused but obstinate fighting, the French secured their hold on the plateau not only above the town of Jena, where their onset took the Prussians by surprise, but also above the Muehl-thal, where the enemy were in force.

By ten o’clock the fog lifted, and the warm rays of the autumn sun showed the dense masses of the French advancing towards the middle of the plateau.  Hohenlohe now saw the full extent of his error and despatched an urgent message to Ruechel for aid.  It was too late.  The French centre, led by Lannes, began to push back the Prussian lines on the village named Vierzehn Heiligen.  It was in vain that Hohenlohe’s choice squadrons flung themselves on the serried masses in front:  the artillery and musketry fire disordered them, while French dragoons were ready to profit by their confusion.  The village was lost, then retaken by a rally of the Prussians, then lost again when Ney was reinforced; and when the full vigour of the French attack was developed by the advance of Soult and Augereau on either wing, Napoleon launched his reserves, his Guard, and Murat’s squadrons on the disordered lines.  The impact was irresistible, and Hohenlohe’s force was swept away.  Then it was that Ruechel’s force drew near, and strove to stem the rout.  Advancing steadily, as if on parade, his troops for a brief space held up the French onset; but neither the dash of the Prussian horse nor the bravery of the foot-soldiers could dam that mighty tide, which laid low the gallant leader and swept his lines away into the general wreck.

In the headlong flight before Murat’s horsemen, the fugitives fell in with another beaten array, that of Brunswick.  At Jena the Prussians, if defeated, were not disgraced:  before the first shot was fired their defeat was a mathematical certainty.  At the crisis of the battle they had but 47,400 men at hand, while Napoleon then disposed of 83,600 combatants. But at Auerstaedt they were driven back and disgraced.  There they had a decided superiority in numbers, having more than 35,000 of their choicest troops, while opposite to them stood only the 27,000 men of Davoust’s corps.

Hitherto Davoust had been remarkable rather for his dog-like devotion to Napoleon than for any martial genius; and the brilliant Marmont had openly scoffed at his receiving the title of Marshal.  But, under his quiet exterior and plodding habits, there lay concealed a variety of gifts which only needed a great occasion to shine forth and astonish the world. The time was now at hand.  Frederick William and Brunswick were marching from Auerstaedt to make good their retreat on the Elbe, when their foremost horsemen, led by the gallant Bluecher, saw a solid wall of French infantry loom through the morning fog.  It was part of Davoust’s corps, strongly posted in and around the village of Hassenhausen.

At once Bluecher charged, only to be driven back with severe loss.  Again he came on, this time supported by infantry and cannon:  again he was repulsed; for Davoust, aided by the fog, had seized the neighbouring heights which commanded the high road, and held them with firm grip.  Determined to brush aside or crush this stubborn foe, the Duke of Brunswick now led heavy masses along the narrow defile; but the steady fire of the French laid him low, with most of the officers; and as the Prussians fell back, Davoust swung forward his men to threaten their flanks.  The King was dismayed at these repeated checks, and though the Prussian reserves under Kalckreuth could have been called up to overwhelm the hard-pressed French by the weight of numbers, yet he judged it better to draw off his men and fall back on Hohenlohe for support.

But what a support!  Instead of an army, it was a terrified mob flying before Murat’s sabres, that met them halfway between Auerstaedt and Weimar.  Threatened also by Bernadotte’s corps on their left flank, the two Prussian armies now melted away in one indistinguishable torrent, that was stemmed only by the sheltering walls of Erfurt, Magdeburg, and of fortresses yet more remote.

Of the twin battles of Jena and Auerstaedt, the latter was unquestionably the more glorious for the French arms.  That Napoleon should have beaten an army of little more than half his numbers is in no way remarkable.  What is strange is that so consummate a leader should have been entirely ignorant of the distribution of the enemy’s forces, and should have left Davoust with only 27,000 men exposed to the attack of Brunswick with nearly 40,000. In his bulletins, as in the “Relation Officielle,” the Emperor sought to gloze over his error by magnifying Hohenlohe’s corps into a great army and attenuating Davoust’s splendid exploit, which in his private letters he warmly praised.  The fact is, he had made all his dispositions in the belief that he had the main body of the Prussians before him at Jena.

That is why, on the afternoon of the 13th, he hastily sent to recall Murat’s horse and Bernadotte’s corps from Naumburg and its vicinity; and in consequence Bernadotte took no very active part in the fighting.  For this he has been bitterly blamed, on the strength of an assertion that Napoleon during the night of the 13th-14th sent him an order to support Davoust.  This order has never been produced, and it finds no place in the latest and fullest collection of French official despatches, which, however, contains some that fully exonerate Bernadotte. Unfortunately for Bernadotte’s fame, the tattle of memoir writers is more attractive and gains more currency than the prosaic facts of despatches.

Fortune plays an immense part in warfare; and never did she favour the Emperor more than on October the 14th, 1806.  Fortune and the skill and bravery of Davoust and his corps turned what might have been an almost doubtful conflict into an overwhelming victory.  Though Napoleon was as ignorant of the movements of Brunswick as he was of the flank march of Bluecher at Waterloo, yet the enterprise and tenacity of Davoust and Lannes yielded him, on the Thuringian heights, a triumph scarcely paralleled in the annals of war.  It is difficult to overpraise those Marshals for the energy with which they clung to the foe and brought on a battle under conditions highly favourable to the French:  without their efforts, the Prussian army could never have been shattered on a single day.

The flood of invasion now roared down the Thuringian valleys and deluged the plains of Saxony and Brandenburg.  Rivers and ramparts were alike helpless to stay that all-devouring tide.  On October the 16th, 16,000 men surrendered at Erfurt to Murat:  then, spurring eastward, lé beau sabreur rushed on the wreck of Hohenlohe’s force, and with the aid of Lannes’ untiring corps compelled it to surrender at Prenzlau. Bluecher meanwhile stubbornly retreated to the north; but, with Murat, Soult, and Bernadotte dogging his steps, he finally threw himself into Luebeck, where, after a last desperate effort, he surrendered to overpowering numbers (November 7th).

Here the gloom of defeat was relieved by gleams of heroism; but before the walls of other Prussian strongholds disaster was blackened by disgrace.  Held by timid old men or nerveless pedants, they scarcely waited for a vigorous attack.  A few cannon-shots, or even a demonstration of cavalry, generally brought out the white flag.  In quick succession, Spandau, Stettin, Kuestrin, Magdeburg, and Hameln opened their gates, the governor of the last-named being mainly concerned about securing his future retiring pension from the French as soon as Hanover passed into their keeping.

Amidst these shameful surrenders the capital fell into the hands of Davoust (October 25th).  Varnhagen von Ense had described his mingled surprise and admiration at seeing those “lively, impudent, mean-looking little fellows,” who had beaten the splendid soldiers trained in the school of Frederick the Great.  His wonder was natural; but all who looked beneath the surface well knew that Prussia was overthrown before the first shot was fired.  She was the victim of a deadening barrack routine, of official apathy or corruption, and of a degrading policy which dulled the enthusiasm of her sons.

Thirteen days after the great battle, Napoleon himself entered Berlin in triumph.  It was the first time that he allowed himself a victor’s privilege, and no pains were spared to impress the imagination of mankind by a parade of his choicest troops.  First came the foot grenadiers and chasseurs of the Imperial Guard:  behind the central group marched other squadrons and battalions of these veterans, already famed as the doughtiest fighters of their age.  In their midst came the mind of this military machineNapoleon, accompanied by three Marshals and a brilliant staff.  Among them men noted the plain, soldierlike Berthier, the ever trusty and methodical chief of the staff.  At his side rode Davoust, whose round and placid face gave little promise of his rapid rush to the front rank among the French paladins.  There too was the tall, handsome, threatening form of Augereau, whose services at Jena, meritorious as they were, scarcely maintained his fame at the high level to which it soared at Castiglione.  Then came Napoleon’s favourite aide-de-camp, Duroc, a short, stern, war-hardened man, well known in Berlin, where twice he had sought to rivet close the bonds of the French alliance.

Above all, the gaze of the awe-struck crowd was fixed on the figure of the chief, now grown to the roundness of robust health amidst toils that would have worn most men to a shadow; and on the face, no longer thin with the unsatisfied longings of youth, but square and full with toil requited and ambition wellnigh sateda visage redeemed from the coarseness of the epicure’s only by the knitted brows that bespoke ceaseless thought, and by the keen, melancholy, unfathomable eyes.