NAPOLEON AND POPE PIUS VII. IN CONFERENCE AT FONTAINEBLEAU.
Engraved by Robinson, after a painting made in 1836 by Wilkie.
To the irritation against the emperor’s church policy was added bitter resentment against the conscription, that tax of blood and muscle demanded of the country. Napoleon had formulated and attempted to make tolerable the principle born of the Revolution, which declared that every male citizen of age owed the state a service of blood in case it needed him. The wisdom of his management of the conscription had prevented discontent until 1807; then the draft on life had begun to be arbitrary and grievous. The laws of exemptions were disregarded. The “only son of his mother” no longer remained at her side. The father whose little children were motherless must leave them; aged and helpless parents no longer gave immunity. Those who had bought their exemption by heavy sacrifices were obliged to go. Persons whom the law made subject to conscription in 1807, were called out in 1806; those of 1808, in 1807. So far was this premature drafting pushed, that the armies were said to be made up of “boy soldiers,” weak, unformed youths, fresh from school, who wilted in a sun like that of Spain, and dropped out in the march.
At the rate at which men had been killed, however, there was no other way of keeping up the army. Between 1804 and 1811 one million seven hundred thousand men had perished in battle. What wonder that now the boys of France were pressed into service! At the same time the country was overrun with the lame, the blind, the broken-down, who had come back from war to live on their friends or on charity. It was not only the funeral crape on almost every door which made Frenchmen hate the conscription, it was the crippled men whom they met at every corner.
THE KING OF ROME. 1811.
Engraved by Desnoyers, after Gérard. “His Majesty the King of Rome. Dedicated to her Majesty Imperial and Royal, Marie Louise.”
While within, the people fretted over the religious disturbances and the abuses of the conscription, without, the continental blockade was causing serious trouble between Napoleon and the kings he ruled. In spite of all his efforts English merchandise penetrated everywhere. The fair at Rotterdam in 1807 was filled with English goods. They passed into Italy under false seals. They came into France on pretence that they were for the empress. Napoleon remonstrated and threatened, but he could not check the traffic. The most serious trouble caused by this violation of the Berlin Decree was with Louis, King of Holland. In 1808 Napoleon complained to his brother that more than one hundred ships passed between his kingdom and England every month, and a year later he wrote in desperation, “Holland is an English province.”
The relations of the brothers grew more and more bitter. Napoleon resented the half support Louis gave him, and as a punishment he took away his provinces, filled his forts with French troops, threatened him with war if he did not break up the trade. So far did these hostilities go, that in the summer of 1810 King Louis abdicated in favor of his son and retired to Austria. Napoleon tried his best to persuade him at least to return into French territory, but he refused. This break was the sadder because Louis was the brother for whom Napoleon had really done most.
Joseph was not happier than Louis. The Spanish war still went on, and no better than in 1808. Joseph, humbled and unhappy, had even prayed to be freed of the throne.