CHAPTER XXXII
THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN
Two mighty and ambitious potentates never fully trust one another. Under all the shows of diplomatic affection, there remains a thick rind of reserve or fear. Especially must that be so with men who spring from a fierce untamed stock. Despite the training of Laharpe, Alexander at times showed the passions and finesse of a Boyar. And who shall say that the early Jacobinism and later culture of Napoleon was more than a veneer spread all too thinly over an Italian condottiere of the Renaissance age? These men were too expert at wiles really to trust to the pompous assurances of Tilsit and Erfurt. De Maistre tells us that Napoleon never partook of Alexander's repasts on the banks of the Niemen. For him Muscovite cookery was suspect.
Amidst the glories of Erfurt, Oudinot saw an incident that revealed the Czar's hidden feelings. During one of their rides, the Emperors were stopped by a dyke, which Napoleon's steed refused to take; accordingly the Marshal had to help it across; but the Czar, proud of his horsemanship, finally cleared the obstacle with a splendid bound, though at the cost of a shock which broke his sword-belt. The sword fell to the ground, and Oudinot was about to hand it to Alexander, when Napoleon quickly said: "Keep that sword and bring it to me later": then, turning to the Czar, he added: "You have no objection, Sire?" A look of surprise and distrust flashed across the Czar's features; but, resuming his easy bearing, he gave his assent. Later in the day, Napoleon sent his own sword to Alexander, and thus came off easily best from an incident which threatened at first to throw him into the shade. The affair shows the ready wit and mental superiority of the one man no less than the veiled reserve and uneasiness of the other.
At the close of 1809, Alexander confessed his inner feeling to Czartoryski. Napoleon, he said, was a man who would not scruple to use any means so long as he gained his end: his mental strength was unquestioned: in the worst troubles he was cool and collected: his fits of passion were only meant to intimidate: his every act was the result of calculation: it was absurd to say that his prodigious exertions would drive him mad: his health was splendid and was equal to any effort provided that he had eight hours' sleep every day. The impression left on the ex-Minister was that Alexander understood his ally thoroughly and feared him greatly.[243]
A few days later came Napoleon's request for the hand of the Czar's sister, a request which Alexander declined with many expressions of goodwill and regret. What, then, was his surprise to find that, before the final answer had been returned, Napoleon was in treaty for the hand of an Austrian Archduchess.[244] This time it was for him to feel affronted. And so this breathless search for a bride left sore feelings at both capitals, at Paris because the Czar declined Napoleon's request, at St. Petersburg because the imperial wooer was off on another scent before the first had given out.
Alexander's annoyance was increased by his ally's doubtful behaviour about Poland. After the recent increase of the Duchy of Warsaw he had urged Napoleon to make a declaration that "the Kingdom of Poland shall never be re-established." This matter was being discussed side by side with the matrimonial overtures; and, after their collapse, Napoleon finally declined to give this assurance which Alexander felt needful for checking the rising hopes of Poles and Lithuanians. The utmost the French Emperor would do was to promise, in a secret clause, that he would never aid any other Power or any popular movement that aimed at the re-establishment of that kingdom.[245] In fact, as the Muscovite alliance was on the wane, he judged it bad policy to discourage the Poles, who might do so much for him in case of a Franco-Russian war. He soon begins to face seriously the prospect of such an event. At the close of 1810 he writes that the Russians are intrenching themselves on the Dwina and Dniester, which "shows a bad spirit."
But the great difficulty is Russia's imperfect observation of the Continental System. He begs the Czar to close his ports against English ships: 600 of them are wandering about the Baltic, after being repulsed from its southern shores, in the hope of getting into Russian harbours. Let Alexander seize their cargoes, and England, now at her last gasp, must give in. Five weeks later he returns to the charge. It is not enough to seize British ships; the hated wares get in under American, Swedish, Spanish, and Portuguese, even under French flags. Of the 2,000 ships that entered the Baltic in 1810, not one was really a neutral: they were all charged with English goods, with false papers and forged certificates of origin manufactured in London.[246] Any other unit among earth's millions would have been convinced of the futility of the whole enterprise, now that his own special devices were being turned against him. It was not enough to conquer and enchain the Continent. Every customs officer must be an expert in manufactures, groceries, documents, and the water-marks of paper, if he was to detect the new "frauds of the neutral flags."
But Napoleon knew not the word impossible—"a word that exists only in the dictionary of fools." In fact, his mind, naturally unbending, was now working more and more in self-made grooves. Of these the deepest was his commercial warfare; and he pushed on, reckless of Europe and reckless of the Czar. In the middle of December he annexed the North Sea coast of Germany, including Oldenburg. The heir to this duchy had married Alexander's sister, whose hand Napoleon had claimed at Erfurt. The duke, it is true, was offered the district of Erfurt as an indemnity; but that proposal only stung the Czar the more. The deposition of the duke was not merely a personal affront; it was an infraction of the Treaty of Tilsit which had restored him to his duchy.
A fortnight later, when as yet he knew not of the Oldenburg incident, Alexander himself broke that treaty.[247] At the close of 1810 he declined to admit land-borne goods on the easy terms arranged at Tilsit, but levied heavy dues on them, especially on the articles de luxe that mostly hailed from France. Some such step was inevitable. Unable to export freely to England, Russia had not money enough to buy costly French goods without disordering the exchange and ruining her credit. While seeking to raise revenue on French manufactures, the Czar resolved to admit on easy terms all colonial goods, especially American. English goods he would shut out as heretofore; and he claimed that this new departure was well within the limits of the Treaty of Tilsit. Far different was Napoleon's view: "Here is a great planet taking a wrong direction. I do not understand its course at all."[248] Such were his first words on reading the text of the new ukase. A fatalistic tone now haunts his references to Russia's policy. On April 2nd he writes: "If Alexander does not quickly stop the impetus which has been given, he will be carried away by it next year; and thus war will take place in spite of him, in spite of me, in spite of the interests of France and Russia…. It is an operatic scene, of which the English are the shifters." What madness! As if Russia's craving for colonial wares and solvency were a device of the diabolical islanders.[249] As if his planetary simile were anything more than a claim that he was the centre of the universe and his will its guiding and controlling power.