THE ABBÉ DE PRADT, AND HIS EMBASSY TO WARSAW.
THE RUSSIAN WAR.—ITS ORIGIN.
28th.—The Emperor again recurred to the Abbé de Pradt and his work, which he reduced to merely the first and last pages. “In the first,” said he, "he states himself to be the only man who arrested Napoleon’s career; in the last, he shows that the Emperor, in his way back from Moscow, dismissed him from the embassy, which is true; and this fact his self-love would fain misrepresent or revenge. This is the whole work....
“But the Abbé,” continued the Emperor, “did not fulfil at Warsaw any of the objects which had been intended; on the contrary, he did a great deal of mischief. Reports against him poured in upon me from every quarter. Even the young men, the clerks attached to the embassy, were surprised at his conduct, and went so far as to accuse him of maintaining an understanding with the enemy; which, however, I by no means believed. But he certainly had a long conversation with me, which he misrepresents, as might be expected; and it was at the very moment when he was delivering a long prosing speech, which appeared to me a mere string of absurdity and impertinence, that I scrawled on the corner of the chimney-piece the order to withdraw him from his embassy, and to send him as soon as possible to France; a circumstance which was the cause of a good deal of merriment at the time, and which the Abbé seems very desirous of concealing.”
I cannot refrain from transcribing from the Embassy to Warsaw, M. de Pradt’s account of the Emperor Napoleon’s court at Dresden. His remarks on this subject are striking, and afford a faithful picture both of men and things at that period.
“You,” he says, "who wish to form a just idea of the omnipotence exercised in Europe by the Emperor Napoleon, who wish to fathom the depths of terror into which almost every European sovereign has fallen, transport yourselves in imagination to Dresden, and there contemplate that superb Prince, at the period of his highest glory, so nearly bordering on his fall!
"The Emperor occupied the state apartments of the palace whither he had transferred a considerable portion of his household. Here he gave grand dinner parties; and, with the exception of the first Sunday, when the King of Saxony had a gala, Napoleon’s parties were always attended by the Sovereigns and different members of their families, according to the invitations issued by the Grand Marshal of the Palace. Some private individuals were admitted on these occasions. I enjoyed that honour on the day of my appointment to the embassy of Warsaw.
"The Emperor’s levees were held here, as at the Tuileries, at nine o’clock. Then with what timid submission did a crowd of Princes, mingling with the courtiers, and often scarcely perceived among them, anxiously await the moment for presenting themselves before the new arbiter of their destinies!"
These passages, and some others of equal truth and beauty of diction, are lost amidst a heap of details full of misrepresentation and malice. “They are distorted facts and mutilated conversations,” said the Emperor: and, adverting to the accounts of the Empress of Austria, which were filled with adulation, and of the Emperor Alexander, whose amiable virtues and brilliant qualities are extolled by the author, to the detriment of Napoleon. “Surely,” exclaimed the Emperor, “this is not a French bishop, but one of the eastern magi—a worshipper of the rising sun.” I shall both now and henceforward suppress, from a feeling of justice, several other articles and many details. The following observations may however be noted down, in opposition to the Abbé de Pradt’s endeavours to prove that the French were the unjust aggressors in the contest with Russia.
The Emperor, speaking of the Russian war, said: "No events are trifling with regard to nations and sovereigns; for it is such that govern their destinies. For some time a misunderstanding had sprung up between France and Russia. France reproached Russia with the violation of the continental system, and Russia required an indemnification for the Duke of Oldenburg, and raised other pretensions. Russian troops were approaching the duchy of Warsaw, and a French army was forming in the north of Germany. Yet we were far from being determined on war, when, all on a sudden, a new Russian army commenced its march towards the Duchy; and, as an ultimatum, an insolent note was presented at Paris by the Russian Ambassador, who, in the event of its nonacceptance, threatened to quit Paris in eight days. I considered this as a declaration of war. It was long since I had been accustomed to this sort of tone. I was not in the habit of allowing myself to be anticipated. I could march to Russia at the head of the rest of Europe; the enterprise was popular; the cause was one which interested Europe. It was the last effort that remained to France. Her fate, and that of the new European system, depended on the struggle. Russia was the last resource of England. The peace of the whole world rested with Russia. The event could not be doubtful. I commenced my march; but when I reached the frontier I, to whom Russia had declared war by withdrawing her Ambassador, still considered it my duty to send mine (Lauriston) to the Emperor Alexander at Wilna: he was rejected, and the war commenced!
"Yet, who would credit it? Alexander and myself were in the situation of two bullies, who, without wishing to fight, were endeavouring to terrify each other. I would most willingly have maintained peace; I was surrounded and overwhelmed with unfavourable circumstances, and all that I have since learned convinces me that Alexander was still less eager for war than myself.