Neither the Minister of the Interior, the Minister of the Treasury, nor the Emperor in these discussions alluded to the proposed Decree of Vienna, the draft of which was sent to Paris in August, confiscating all American ships in reprisal for the seizures of French ships threatened by the Non-intercourse Act. Although that decree was the point which the Emperor meant to reach, not until January 25—when Champagny, after dismissing Armstrong, reported the interview to Napoleon, bringing with him at the Emperor’s request the text of the Non-intercourse Act—did the Emperor at last revert to the ideas of the Vienna Decree. The long hesitation proved how little satisfactory the plea of retaliation was; but no other excuse could be devised for a measure which Napoleon insisted upon carrying out, and which Champagny had no choice but to execute. The Emperor dictated the draft of a note,[176] in which the principles of confiscation were to be laid down:—
“If American ships have been sequestered in France, France only imitates the example given her by the American government; and the undersigned recalls to Mr. Armstrong the Act of Congress of March 1, 1809, which orders in certain cases the sequestration and confiscation of French ships, excludes them from American ports, and interdicts France to the Americans. It is in reprisal of this last provision that the American ships have been seized in Spain and Naples. The league against England, which has the cause of neutrals for its object, embraces now all the Continental peoples, and permits none of them to enjoy commercial advantages of which France is deprived. France will permit it in no place where her influence extends; but she is ready to grant every favor to the ships of a neutral Power which shall not have subjected themselves to a tribute, and shall recognize only the laws of their own country, not those of a foreign government.... If the Minister of the United States has the power to conclude a convention proper to attain the object indicated, the undersigned is ordered to give all his care to it, and to occupy himself upon it without interruption.”
Perhaps this was the only occasion in Napoleon’s life when he stood between a nation willing to be robbed and a consciousness that to rob it was a blunder. The draft of his note showed his embarrassment. Remarkable in many ways, it required special notice in two points. The proposed Vienna Decree confiscated American ships because French ships were forbidden under threat of confiscation to enter American ports. The note of January 25 suggested a variation from this idea. American ships were to be confiscated everywhere except in France, because they were forbidden to enter France. As they were also confiscated in France because they were forbidden to leave America, the Emperor had nothing more to demand. His reasoning was as convincing as a million bayonets could make it; but perhaps it was less Napoleonic than the avowal that for six months the Emperor had been engaged in inveigling American property into neutral ports in order that he might seize it.
Apparently Cadore still raised obstacles to the Emperor’s will. For some three weeks he held this note back, and when at last, February 14, he sent it to Armstrong, he made changes which were not all improvements in the Emperor’s text. Indeed, Napoleon might reasonably have found as much fault with Champagny as he found with some of his generals, for failing to carry out the orders he dictated:—
“His Majesty could place no reliance on the proceedings of the United States, who, having no ground of complaint against France, comprised her in their acts of exclusion, and since the month of May have forbidden the entrance of their ports to French vessels, under the penalty of confiscation. As soon as his Majesty was informed of this measure, he considered himself bound to order reprisals on American vessels, not only in his territory, but likewise in the countries which are under his influence. In the ports of Holland, of Spain, of Italy, and of Naples, American vessels have been seized because the Americans have seized French vessels.”
After such long discussions and so many experiments, Napoleon had become reckless of appearances when he allowed his foreign secretary to send this note of Feb. 14, 1810, in which every line was a misstatement, and every misstatement, as far as concerned America, was evident in its purpose; while apart from these faults, the note erred in trying to cover too much ground of complaint against the United States. Napoleon had, in the projected Decree of Vienna, ordered retaliation everywhere for the confiscation threatened by the Non-intercourse Act. Made to feel the impossibility of this course, he changed his ground, continuing to confiscate American ships in France under the old Bayonne Decree, and ordering the sequestration of American ships throughout the rest of Europe on the plea that other countries must not enjoy a commerce interdicted to France. Cadore’s note abandoned this ground again, in order to return to the doctrine of the projected Vienna Decree; and in the effort to give it a color of reason, he asserted that the Americans had seized French vessels.
Such a letter was a declaration of war six months after beginning hostilities; and it made no offer of peace except on condition that the United States should pledge themselves to resist every British blockade which was not real in the sense defined by Napoleon. Armstrong wrote to his Government, in language as strong as he could use, that nothing was to be expected from a policy that had no other foundation than force or fraud. His angry remonstrances had embroiled him with the Emperor, and he was on the point of quitting France. Under such circumstances he did not insist on breaking off further conversations with Petry, but February 25 he positively assured Petry that neither would the President and Senate ratify, nor would he himself as negotiator accept, a treaty in any form which did not provide reparation for the past as well as security for the future;[177] and March 10 he replied to the Duc de Cadore in what the Emperor would have called a morose tone, denying every assertion made in Cadore’s note,—reminding Cadore that the Emperor had received knowledge of the Non-intercourse Act at the time of its passage without a sign of protest or complaint; and, finally, renewing his old, longstanding grievances against “the daily and practical outrages on the part of France.”[178]
When the Emperor received Armstrong’s letter, which was excessively strong, and ended in a suggestion that Napoleon was trying to cover theft by falsehood, he showed no sign of anger, but became almost apologetic, and wrote to Cadore,[179]—
“Make a sketch of a reply to the American minister. It will be easy for you to make him understand that I am master to do here what America does there; that when America embargoes French ships entering her ports, I have the right to reciprocate. You will explain to him how that law came to our knowledge only a short time ago, and only when I had knowledge of it did I immediately prescribe the same measure; that a few days before, I was busying myself with provisions for raising the actual prohibitions on American merchandise, when the course of commerce (la voie du commerce) made known to me that our honor was involved, and that no compromise was possible; that I conceive America as entitled to prevent her ships from coming to England and France; that I approved this last measure, though there was much to be said about it; but that I cannot recognize that she should arrogate the right of seizing French ships in her ports without putting herself in the case of incurring reciprocity.”
One must answer as one can the question why Cadore, who had in his hands Armstrong’s letter of April 29, 1809,[180] officially communicating the Non-intercourse Act, should not have suggested to Napoleon that some limit to his failings of memory ought to be observed. Napoleon’s memory was sometimes overtasked by the mass of details he undertook to carry in his mind, but a striking incident always impressed itself there. Mme. de Rémusat[181] told how Grétry, who as member of the Institute regularly attended the Imperial audiences, was almost as regularly asked by Napoleon, “Who are you?” Tired at last of this rough question, Grétry replied by an answer equally blunt: “Sire, toujours Grétry;” and thenceforward the Emperor never failed to remember him. The United States in a similar tone recalled their affairs to the Emperor’s memory by the Non-intercourse Act; but had this “toujours Grétry” not been enough, Napoleon’s financial needs also made him peculiarly alive to every event that could relieve them, and his correspondence proved that the Non-intercourse Act as early as May, 1809, impressed him deeply. Yet in March, 1810, he not only convinced himself that this Act had just come to his knowledge, producing in him an outburst of national dignity, but he also convinced his Minister of Foreign Relations, who knew the contrary, that these impressions were true, and made him witness them by his signature.