[33] Composed of 9,500 men under Caraffa.
[34] It is impossible to doubt that Napoleon’s scheme was already in progress as early as October. On Nov. 13 he sent orders for the secret arming and provisioning of all the frontier fortresses of France (Nap. Corresp., 13,343). On Nov. 24 he directed his chamberlain, De Tournon, to spy out the condition of Pampeluna and the other Spanish border strongholds, and to discover the exact distribution of the Spanish army (13,354). Such moves could have but one meaning.
[35] Note on this point Talleyrand’s Mémoires, i. 333, and Nap. Corresp., 13,402 (Napoleon to Joseph Bonaparte, Dec. 17, 1807).
[36] In Nap. Corresp., 13,588, will be found the orders to General D’Armagnac to get possession of the citadel by menaces if he can, but if he cannot, by the actual use of force. ‘S’il arrivait que le commandant-général de Navarre se refusât à rendre la citadelle, vous employeriez les troupes du Maréchal Moncey pour l’y forcer.’
[37] It will hardly be believed that Napier, in his blind reverence for Napoleon, omits to give any details concerning the seizure of the fortresses, merely saying that they were ‘taken by various artifices’ (i. 13). It is the particulars which are scandalous as well as the mere fact.
[38] Memoirs of Godoy, i. 122. Cf. Arteche, i. 251.
[39] That Murat did not dream of the Spanish crown is, I think, fairly well demonstrated by his descendant, Count Murat, in his useful Murat, Lieutenant de l’Empereur en Espagne (1897). But that after once reading the dispatches, Nap. Corresp., 13,588 and 13,589, he failed to see that his brother-in-law’s intention was to seize Spain, is impossible.
[40] See the letters of March 22-7 in Toreño, Appendix, i. 436-45.
[41] Letter of March 27, in Toreño, Appendix, i. 441.
[42] Ibid., p. 436.