“I had been but a few minutes in the room,” Wieland says, “when Napoleon crossed it to come to us. I was presented by the Duchess of Weimar. He paid me some compliments in an affable tone, fixing his eye piercingly upon me. Few men have appeared to me to possess, in the same degree, the power of penetrating at a glance the thoughts of others. I have never beheld anyone more calm, more simple, more mild, or less ostentatious in appearance. Nothing about him indicated the feeling of power in a great monarch. He spoke to me as an old acquaintance would speak to an equal. What was more extraordinary on his part, he conversed with me exclusively for an hour and a half, to the great surprise of the assembly. He appeared to have no relish for anything gay. In spite of the prepossessing amenity of his manners, he seemed to me to be of bronze. Towards midnight I began to feel that it was improper to detain him so long, and I took the liberty to request permission to retire: ‘Go, then,’ said he in a friendly tone. ‘Good-night.’”
The Emperor conferred the Cross of the Legion of Honour on Wieland, a mark of Imperial favour which he likewise showed to Goethe. The interview between Napoleon and the latter took place on the 2nd October 1808, in the presence of Talleyrand, Daru, Berthier, and Savary. “You are a man!” he exclaimed, either in a burst of admiration or of flattery, and then he asked the poet his age and particulars of his work, adding that he had read “Werther” seven times and had taken the volume to Egypt. “After various remarks, all very just,” says Goethe, “he pointed out a passage, and asked me why I had written so, it was contrary to nature. This opinion he developed in great clearness. I listened calmly, and smilingly replied that I did not know whether the objection had been made before; but that I found it perfectly just.... The Emperor seemed satisfied and returned to the drama, criticising it like a man who had studied the tragic stage with the attention of a criminal judge, and who was keenly alive to the fault of the French in departing from nature. He disapproved of all pieces in which Fate played a part. ‘Those pieces belong to a dark epoch. Besides, what do they mean by Fate? Politics are Fate!’”
Even more interesting perhaps, because it so essentially reveals Napoleon’s outlook on life, was a remark he made at a later meeting at which both Wieland and Goethe were present. He wished the latter to treat of the “Death of Cæsar.” “That,” he said, “should be the great task of your life. In that tragedy you should show the world how much Cæsar would have done for humanity, if only he had been allowed time to carry out his great plans.” When we reflect on the events which had immediately preceded this notable utterance, on the grandiose schemes which were then being actively promulgated by the speaker for the conquest of Europe and the advancement of his Empire of the West, we can understand why Napoleon wished to woo this literary giant to his cause. “Come to Paris,” Napoleon said in his abrupt, commanding way, “I desire it of you. There you will find a wider circle for your spirit of observation; there you will find enormous material for poetic creations.” But it was not to be; Goethe had other wishes and ideals. Had he acceded to the despot’s request the result would have been no more felicitous than that which had attended Voltaire’s removal to the Court of Frederick the Great. Goethe loved Prussia too well to desert her, and while he admired Napoleon in some ways he did not admire him in all.
Peace with Great Britain was suggested by the two Emperors at Erfurt, but England had far too much to lose to seriously entertain such an overture. In his reply Canning made it perfectly clear that George III. was not prepared to break faith with his Portuguese, Sicilian, and Spanish allies. Both the King and his Minister fully realised the nature of the undertaking upon which they had embarked, and having put their hands to the plough there was to be no turning back. Their course gave rise to many blunders abroad and many heartburnings at home, yet they loyally followed the precept of the great man whose ashes were now lying in Westminster Abbey. “England,” said Pitt in his last public speech, “has saved herself by her exertions, and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.”
We must now glance across the Pyrenees at the strife still going on in the Peninsula. Had Sir John Moore secured the active and loyal assistance of the people, as he clearly had a right to expect, all might have been well with the cause of the allies. The preliminary successes of the Spaniards, however, had made them over-confident, and over-confidence is a sure prelude to disaster. Of all their many mistakes most fatal was their preference for fighting with independent corps, each under a Captain-General. Instead of joining together in the common cause there was considerable rivalry and many misunderstandings between the various forces. As a consequence when Napoleon, feeling comparatively secure from Austrian menaces because of the Russian alliance, determined to lead his armies in person, the Spaniards were but ill organised. Their antagonist, on the contrary, soon had at his disposal 300,000 trained soldiers divided into eight corps under his most skilled generals. “In a few days,” the Emperor said before leaving Paris, “I shall set out to place myself at the head of my army, and, with the aid of God, crown at Madrid the King of Spain, and plant my eagles on the towers of Lisbon.” The Spaniards could not muster at the moment more than 76,000 men, and whereas their cavalry totalled 2000, that of Napoleon was at least twenty times the number. A reserve of nearly 60,000 Spaniards was gathering in the rear, but would not be available for the first desperate onslaught, on the result of which so much would depend. The British army of some 30,000 was, by a series of misfortunes, in three divisions and unable to come up with any of the Spanish armies, which were also separated.
Napoleon began his movements and got into action while his opponents were thinking of what was likely to happen. Blake’s ragged patriots were scattered by Lefebvre early in November after having been defeated at Tornosa and Reynosa. Soult defeated the army under the Count de Belvidere at Burgos on the 10th November, the Spaniards suffering a loss of 2000 men and 800 prisoners, as well as their ammunition and stores. The town, after having been pillaged, became the Emperor’s headquarters. On the 22nd of the same month Castaños’ forces, augmented by the men under Palafox, and amounting in all to 43,000, were routed by the 35,000 troops opposed to them by Lannes. After such a series of defeats it was not difficult for the Emperor to push towards Madrid, the outskirts of which he reached, after forcing the Somosierra Pass, on the 2nd December. The inhabitants made some show of resistance, but they were so badly organised as to preclude any possibility of serious defensive measures. Wishing to spare the city from bombardment, Napoleon sent a flag of truce, and a capitulation was speedily signed.
A soldier who was present thus relates the entry of the French into Madrid: “A heavy silence,” he says, “had succeeded that confusion and uproar which had reigned within and without the walls of the capital only the day before. The streets through which we entered were deserted; and even in the market-place, the numerous shops of the vendors of necessaries still remained shut. The water-carriers were the only people of the town who had not interrupted their usual avocations. They moved about uttering their cries with the nasal, drawling tone, peculiar to their native mountains of Galicia, ‘Quien quiere agua?’—Who wants water? No purchasers made their appearance; the waterman muttered to himself sorrowfully, ‘Dios que la da,’—It is God’s gift,—and cried again.
“As we advanced into the heart of the city, we perceived groups of Spaniards standing at the corner of a square, where they had formerly been in the habit of assembling in great numbers. They stood muffled in their capacious cloaks, regarding us with a sullen, dejected aspect. Their national pride could scarcely let them credit that any other than Spanish soldiers could have beaten Spaniards. If they happened to perceive among our ranks a horse which had once belonged to their cavalry, they soon distinguished him by his pace, and awakening from their apathy, would whisper together: ‘Este caballo es Español’—That’s a Spanish horse; as if they had discovered the sole cause of our success.”
On the 7th December 1808, Napoleon issued a proclamation which was largely a fierce tirade against England and the English, whose armies were to be chased from the Peninsula. In the constitution which he framed for the nation he abolished the iniquitous Inquisition, and the old feudal system which had held Spain in its shackles for so long, reduced the number of monasteries and convents by two-thirds, improved the customs, and endeavoured to institute reforms which would have been beneficial. “It depends upon you,” the Emperor told the people, “whether this moderate constitution which I offer you shall henceforth be your law. Should all my efforts prove vain, and should you refuse to justify my confidence, then nothing will remain for me but to treat you as a conquered province and find a new throne for my brother. In that case I shall myself assume the crown of Spain and teach the ill-disposed to respect that crown, for God has given me the power and the will to overcome all obstacles.”
The concluding words are noteworthy. Napoleon now regarded himself as little less than omnipotent. Impelled by the force of his own volition, into a dangerous situation, he was to find it impossible to draw back when the nations which he had treated with contempt felt that self-confidence which alone made Leipzig and Waterloo possible. The Peninsular War was indeed what Talleyrand prophesied, “the beginning of the end.”