"The Army of Naples has no occasion to complain. Let them inquire of General Berthier. He will tell them that their Emperor has for fifteen days eaten nothing but potatoes and meat, whilst bivouacking in the midst of the snows of Poland. Judge from that what must be the condition of the officers. They have nothing but meat."
On the 26th of March, 1807, Joseph wrote, in a letter to his brother Napoleon, urging the promotion of Colonel Destrees, who, by his probity, had won the affections of the people.
Letter from Joseph.
"Here, sire, an honest man is worth more to me than a man of ability. When I find both qualities united in the same person, I esteem him of more value than a regiment. It is for this reason that I value so highly Reynier, Partouneaux, Donzelot, Lamarque, Jourdan, Saligny, and Mathieu; it is this which leads me to prize so highly Roederer and Dumas."
Frank Admissions and Advice of Joseph.
Again he wrote to his brother on the 29th of March: "Sire, as I see more of men and become better acquainted with them, I recognize more and more the truth of what I have heard from your Majesty during the whole of my life. The experience of government has confirmed the truth of that which your Majesty has so often said to me. I hope your Majesty will not regard this as flattery. But it is true; and I never cease to repeat, and particularly to myself, that you have been born with a superiority of reason truly astonishing, and now I recognize fully that men are what you have always told me that they were. How many abuses, which I confess still astonish me, have I encountered, in the journey which I have just made. A prince confiding and amiable is a great scourge from heaven. I am instructed, sire, and I hope ere long to be a better ruler by not giving the majority of men the credit for that spirit of justice and humanity which I hope your Majesty recognizes in me. I have assembled the notables of this province. How docile these people are! but they are very badly governed. I have dismissed the prefect, the sub-prefect, the general, the commandant, a set of rascals who were here the instruments and the agents of an honest prince. This province, the most tranquil in the realm, had become, in the opinion of notables, the most disaffected and the most ready to desire the arrival of the enemy. I journeyed from village to village, and speedily repaired the evil. These people have so much vivacity of spirit and ardor of soul, that both good and evil operate easily upon them. Their inconstancy is not so much the result of their character as of their topographical and military position.
"I am aware, sire, that I have not, as your Majesty has, the art of employing all kinds of men. I need honest men, in whom I can repose some confidence. Sire, I am in that mood of mind, which your Majesty recognizes in me, in which I love to say whatever I think right. Your Majesty ought to make peace at whatever price. Your Majesty is victorious, triumphant everywhere. You ought to recoil before the blood of your people. It is for the prince to hold back the hero. No extent of country, be it more or less, should restrain you. All the concessions you may make will be glorious, because they will be useful to your peoples, whose purest blood now flows; and victorious and invincible as you are, by the admission of all, no condition can be supposed to be prescribed to you by an enemy whom you have vanquished.
"Sire, it is the love which I bear for a brother who has become a father to me, and the love which I owe to France and to the people whom you have given me, which dictates these words of truth. As for me, sire, I shall be happy to do whatever may be in my power to secure that end."
This strain of remark must have been not a little annoying to the Emperor. While Joseph did not deny that the Emperor was waging war solely in self-defense, he assumed that he was now so powerful that he could make peace at any time upon his own terms. But dynastic Europe was allying itself, coalition after coalition, in an interminable series, with the avowed object of driving Napoleon from the throne, reinstating the Bourbons, re-establishing the old feudal despotisms, and of then overthrowing the regenerated kingdoms of Italy and of Naples, and all the other popular governments established under the protection of Napoleon. Against these foes the Emperor was contending, not for France alone, but for the rights of humanity throughout Europe and the world. As Napoleon left Paris for the campaigns of Jena and Auerstadt, he said to the Senate,