The campaign against the Russians was carried on in Old Prussia, to the southeast of the Gulf of Dantzic. Its first great engagement was the battle of Eylau on February 8, 1807. This was the closest drawn battle Napoleon had ever fought. His loss was enormous, and he was saved only by a hair’s-breadth from giving the enemy the field of battle. After Eylau the main army went into winter quarters to repair its losses, while Marshal Lefebvre besieged Dantzic, a siege which military critics declare to be, after Sebastopol, the most celebrated of modern times. Dantzic capitulated in May. On June 14th the battle of Friedland was fought. This battle on the anniversary of Marengo, was won largely by Napoleon’s taking advantage of a blunder of his opponent. The French and the Russian armies were on the opposite banks of the Alle. Benningsen, the Russian commander, was marching towards Königsberg by the eastern bank. Napoleon was pursuing by the western bank. The French forces, however, were scattered; and Benningsen, thinking that he could engage and easily rout a portion of the army by crossing the river at Friedland, suddenly led his army across to the western bank. Napoleon utilized this unwise movement with splendid skill. Calling up his re-enforcements he attacked the enemy solidly. As soon as the Russian centre was broken, defeat was inevitable, for the retreating army was driven into the river, and thousands lost. Many were pursued through the streets of Friedland by the French, and slaughtered there. The battle was hardly over when Napoleon wrote to Josephine:
MEETING OF FREDERICK WILLIAM III., KING OF PRUSSIA, NAPOLEON, AND ALEXANDER I., EMPEROR OF RUSSIA, AT TILSIT. THE FIGURE ON THE LEFT IS FREDERICK WILLIAM; THAT ON THE RIGHT IS ALEXANDER.
Engraved by Gügel, after a drawing by Wolff. The meeting occurred June 26, 1807, in the pavilion which had been erected for that purpose on the River Nieman.
“Friedland, 15th June, 1807.
“My Dear: I write you only a few words, for I am very tired. I have been bivouacking for several days. My children have worthily celebrated the anniversary of Marengo. The battle of Friedland will be just as celebrated and as glorious for my people. The whole Russian army routed, eighty guns captured, thirty thousand men taken prisoners or killed, with twenty-five generals; the Russian guard annihilated; it is the worthy sister of Marengo, Austerlitz, and Jena. The bulletin will tell you the rest. My loss is not large. I successfully out-manœuvred the enemy.
“Napoleon.”
Friedland ended the war. Directly after the battle Napoleon went to Tilsit, which for the time was made neutral ground, and here he met the Emperor of Russia and the King of Prussia, and the map of Europe was made over.
The relations between the royal parties seem to have been for the most part amiable. Napoleon became very fond of Alexander I. at Tilsit. “Were he a woman I think I should make love to him,” he wrote Josephine once. Alexander, young and enthusiastic, had a deep admiration for Napoleon’s genius, and the two became good comrades. The King of Prussia, overcome by his losses, was a sorrowful figure in their company. It was their habit at Tilsit to go out every day on horseback, but the king was awkward, always crowding against Napoleon, beside whom he rode, and making his two companions wait for him to climb from the saddle when he returned. Their dinners together were dull, and the emperors, very much in the style of two careless, fun-loving youths, bored by a solemn elderly relative, were accustomed after dinner to make excuses to go home early but later to meet at the apartments of one or the other, and to talk together until after midnight.
