Toward the end of August Dreyer’s prophecy became true. Napoleon’s orders forced the King of Denmark and King Louis of Holland to seize neutral commerce and close the Danish and Dutch ports. The question immediately rose whether United States ships and property were still to be treated as exempt from the operation of the Berlin Decree by virtue of the treaty of 1800; and the Emperor promptly decided against them.
“In actual circumstances,” he wrote to Decrès,[84] “navigation offers all sorts of difficulties. France cannot regard as neutral flags which enjoy no consideration. That of America, however exposed it may be to the insults of the English, has a sort of existence, since the English still keep some measure in regard to it, and it imposes on them. That of Portugal and that of Denmark exist no longer.”
This opinion was written before the British ministry touched the Orders in Council; and the “sort of existence” which Napoleon conceded to the United States was already so vague as to be not easily known from the extinction which had fallen upon Portugal and Denmark. A few days afterward General Armstrong received officially an order[85] from the Emperor which expressly declared that the Berlin Decree admitted of no exception in favor of American vessels; and this step was followed by a letter[86] from Champagny, dated October 7, to the same effect. At the same time the Council of Prizes pronounced judgment in the case of the American ship “Horizon,” wrecked some six months before near Morlaix. The Court decreed that such part of the cargo as was not of English origin should be restored to its owners; but that the merchandise which was acknowledged to be of English manufacture or to come from English territory should be confiscated under the Berlin Decree. To this decision Armstrong immediately responded in a strong note[87] of protest to Champagny, which called out an answer from the Emperor himself.
“Reply to the American minister,” wrote Napoleon[88] to Champagny November 15, “that since America suffers her vessels to be searched, she adopts the principle that the flag does not cover the goods. Since she recognizes the absurd blockades laid by England, consents to having her vessels incessantly stopped, sent to England, and so turned aside from their course, why should the Americans not suffer the blockade laid by France? Certainly France is no more blockaded by England than England by France. Why should Americans not equally suffer their vessels to be searched by French ships? Certainly France recognizes that these measures are unjust, illegal, and subversive of national sovereignty; but it is the duty of nations to resort to force, and to declare themselves against things which dishonor them and disgrace their independence.”
Champagny wrote this message to Armstrong November 24, taking the ground that America must submit to the Berlin Decree because she submitted to impressments and search.[89]
As a matter of relative wrong, Napoleon’s argument was more respectable than that of Spencer Perceval and George Canning. He could say with truth that the injury he did to America was wholly consequential on the injury he meant to inflict on England. He had no hidden plan of suppressing American commerce in order to develop the commerce of France; as yet he was not trying to make money by theft. His Berlin Decree interfered in no way with the introduction of American products directly into France; it merely forbade the introduction of English produce or the reception of ships which came from England. Outrageous as its provisions were, “unjust, illegal, and subversive of national sovereignty,” as Napoleon himself admitted and avowed, they bore their character and purpose upon their face, and in that sense were legitimate. He had no secrets on this point. In a famous diplomatic audience at Fontainebleau October 14, Armstrong witnessed a melodramatic scene, in which the Emperor proclaimed to the world that his will was to be law.[90] “The House of Braganza shall reign no more,” said he to the Portuguese minister; then turning to the representative of the Queen of Etruria,—the same Spanish princess on whose head he had five years before placed the shadowy crown of Tuscany,—
“Your mistress,” he said, “has her secret attachments to Great Britain,—as you, Messieurs Deputies of the Hanse Towns are also said to have; but I will put an end to this. Great Britain shall be destroyed. I have the means of doing it, and they shall be employed. I have three hundred thousand men devoted to this object, and an ally who has three hundred thousand to support them. I will permit no nation to receive a minister from Great Britain until she shall have renounced her maritime usages and tyranny; and I desire you, gentlemen, to convey this determination to your respective sovereigns.”
Armstrong obeyed the order; and in doing so he might easily have pointed out the machinery by which Napoleon expected to insure the co-operation of America in securing the destruction of England. He could combine the Berlin Decree with the baffled negotiations for Florida, and could understand why the Emperor at one moment dangled the tempting bait before Jefferson’s eyes, and the next snatched it away. This diplomatic game was one which Napoleon played with every victim he wished to ensnare, and the victim never showed enough force of character to resist temptation. German, Italian, Russian, Spaniard, American, had all been lured by this decoy; one after another had been caught and devoured, but the next victim never saw the trap, or profited by the cries of the last unfortunate. Armstrong knew that whenever Napoleon felt the United States slipping through his fingers, Florida would again be offered to keep Jefferson quiet; yet even Armstrong, man of the world as he was, tried to persuade himself that Napoleon did not know his own mind. One of his despatches at this crisis related a curious story, which he evidently believed to be true, and to prove the vacillating temper of Napoleon’s Florida negotiation.
November 15 Armstrong wrote that the Emperor had left Fontainebleau for Italy; that great changes were predicted, among which it was rumored “that Portugal, taken from the Braganzas, may be lent to the children of the Toscan House, and that the Bourbons of Spain are at last to make way for Lucien Bonaparte, who, in atonement or from policy, is to marry the Queen Regent of Etruria.” That the American minister should at that early day have been so well informed about projects as yet carefully concealed, was creditable to his diplomacy. Not till nearly a month later did Lucien himself, in his Italian banishment, receive notice of the splendid bribe intended for him.
In the same despatch of November 15 Armstrong discussed the Emperor’s plans in their bearing on Florida. “We are, it seems, to be invited to make common cause against England, and to take the guaranty of the Continent for a maritime peace which shall establish the principle of ‘free ships, free goods.’” Armstrong argued that it was wiser to act alone, even in case of war with England; in regard to Florida, France had done all that was to be expected from her, and had latterly become sparing even of promises. Finally, he told the anecdote already alluded to:—