So he passed with good spirit through the few ironic months before Napoleon departed for Italy. He was present at the first meeting of Sieyès and Napoleon. Sieyès saw clearly enough the direction of Napoleon’s policy; Napoleon told him his “Grand Elector” was a roi fainéant, and “the time of do-nothing kings was past.” They quarrelled violently and parted. At the second meeting Sieyès was more amiable. “The pike is making short work of the other fishes,” said a shrewd lady to Mme. Bonaparte. By February the constitutional difficulty was over. Sieyès had disappeared, with a rich sinecure and a large estate. Ducos was submerged in the Senate. The “Grand Elector” had become “First Consul,” with almost unlimited power over the military, naval, civic and foreign administration. The amiable Second and Third Consuls, Cambacérès and Lebrun, were willing to act as little more than background to Napoleon. The more heated Jacobins were banished (Talleyrand striking one of his bitterest enemies, Jarry, off the list of the proscribed). The more serious members of the old legislation were distributed over Europe in foreign embassies and consulships. The Senate was installed at the Luxembourg; the virtuous Tribunate at the Palais Egalité (a hotbed of prostitutes and gamblers); and the Consuls (though Cambacérès prudently declined the honour) at the Tuileries. Napoleon issued a proclamation to the nation, which ended: “Citizens, the Revolution is now sealed with the principles that first set it afoot. It is over.” On the last day of the national mourning he had directed on account of the death of Washington, Napoleon and his colleagues drove in royal state, in a splendid carriage drawn by six white horses, to the Tuileries. They had to pass under a gate over which still lingered the inscription: “Royalty is abolished for ever in France.” Talleyrand drove under it with the other ministers in advance of Napoleon. On the following day Napoleon went over his new home with his friends. “Well, Bourrienne,” he said, “here we are at the Tuileries. The next thing is to see that we stop here.” But he had it immediately decorated with the statues or busts of great generals and great democrats of all nations. Demosthenes, Scipio, Brutus and Mirabeau smiled or frowned on the visitor amidst a crowd of warriors and kings.
Talleyrand, who rightly believed that these changes were for the real good of France, would not be insensible to the humour of the situation or the diplomatic genius of the new head of the State. It had been decreed that ministers should discuss their portfolios every day before the three Consuls, but Talleyrand had pointed out to Napoleon on the day of his installation at the Foreign Office (Nov. 21st, 1799) that its affairs were of a peculiarly private nature, and had proposed that he should confer with the First Consul alone. Napoleon was more than willing, and the long, close, and most fruitful co-operation of the two began. Napoleonist writers are apt to imagine that Talleyrand was little more than a clerk, as most of the other ministers were, but we shall see as we proceed that Napoleon often left even the initiative to him. Thiers observes that Fouché and Talleyrand were the only ministers who were not effaced by the phenomenal activity of Napoleon. His vast intelligence was already at work on plans for beautifying Paris, improving the roads of the country, restoring financial soundness, creating a system of education, reviving industry, formulating a code of laws, and effecting a hundred other improvements. A royalist visitor who saw Napoleon at the time said that he looked like a well-dressed lackey—until you met his eye. That eye was now searching Paris through and through for means of consolidating his position; it was sweeping over the broad provinces of France in search of disorders to remedy and dangers to crush: it was following royalists and Jacobins into exile, scanning the countenances of kings and statesmen abroad, counting their ships and forces, turning from East Indies to West Indies, from St. Petersburg to Cairo and Persia. In Fouché he had a political detective, unhampered by the faintest sense of moral principle, who could answer for Paris. Gradually relaxing the laws against the emigrants, he threw open the career to all talent, excepting only the militant royalists and the most violent Jacobins. Priests were now only required to promise, not to swear allegiance; large numbers of emigrants were struck off the list on one pretext or other, though the peasants were at the same time assured that not a franc’s worth of emigrant or ecclesiastical property would be restored; and all were promptly put under the searchlight of the Ministry of Police. Even Jacobins were in time absorbed. Talleyrand saw one leave Napoleon’s room one day, and expressed surprise at it. “You don’t know the Jacobins,” said Napoleon. “There are the salty Jacobins and the sugary Jacobins. That one is a salty Jacobin. I do what I like with those. They have to be arrested sometimes, but a little money soon manages that. But the sugary Jacobins! They would destroy twenty governments with their metaphysics.”
From an engraving, after the picture by Delaroche.
NAPOLEON.
As long as such a man would leave the choice of language to Talleyrand the diplomatic combination would be superb. They got quickly to work. The year 1799 had hardly closed, London was still wondering what this new phase of French politics portended, when George III. received an edifying invitation from the First Consul to entertain a project of peace. In flawless and dignified language he was urged to reflect before plunging Europe once more into the horrors of war. “The fate of all civilised nations,” the letter concluded, “cries for the termination of a war that embraces the whole world.” Pitt replied—or, rather, sent a note to Talleyrand at the Foreign Office—that England saw no guarantee of stability in French policy until the legitimate ruler of the country was restored. It is generally agreed that this was an egregious blunder, an arrogant and tactless attempt to dictate to the French nation. It was, at all events, immediately recognised as such in France, and the people were more than reconciled to a continuation of the war with England. Talleyrand gravely enquired of Lord Grenville what England would say to a proposal to restore the Stuarts. Napoleon had written at the same time and in the same vein to the Emperor of Austria. “A stranger to every sentiment of vain glory, my first desire is to arrest the shedding of blood.” Austria replied to Talleyrand, as England had done, though less offensively, asking for guarantees of stability. The reply to Austria indicates clearly enough that, as Talleyrand writes, Napoleon did not want peace. They were asked to take the Treaty of Campo Formio (framed when Austria was in a much worse position) as the base of negotiation.
In both cases the correspondence soon came to a futile close. Napoleon had reached the steps of the throne as a military commander, and new victories would at least sustain his prestige. Moreover, the financial condition of France was very low, and Napoleon had had experience of the pecuniary value of victorious warfare. His letters and the first replies (ignoring his official position) strengthened his support in the country, and in fact, as Talleyrand observes, made him out to be “something of a statesman.” He turned cheerfully to the rest of his diplomatic task before proceeding to face Austria. By tactful action in the western provinces he put an end to the civil war there, induced the Vendean leaders to come to Paris, and actually attached some of them to his service. The next important step was to detach Russia from Austria, secure the neutrality of, if not an alliance with, Prussia, and have a good understanding with Spain. The King of Prussia was not unwilling to see France and Austria exhaust themselves in a long conflict, while he himself could continue in peace to strengthen his finances and his army. Duroc was sent to inform him of the change of Government in France, and soon afterwards Talleyrand sent his friend General Beurnonville, an enemy of Austria, to fill the embassy at Berlin. Through Prussia an attempt was to be made to reach the Tsar. Very soon Prussia ceased to talk of the Rhine provinces, and reported that the opposition to France at St. Petersburg was relaxing. Napoleon suspected that Prussia was maintaining too long the profitable rôle of mediator, and urged a direct appeal to Russia. Hearing that the Tsar had seriously quarrelled with Austria, and was not well disposed towards England, he collected all the Russian prisoners he had, re-clothed them, and sent them home with military honours. When he further sent the sword of La Valette to the Tsar (who had been appointed Grand Master of the Order of St. John, and had an enthusiasm for his charge) and invited him to take possession of Malta (then very precariously held by the French against the English), the Tsar was won.
In the meantime the French Minister at Madrid had reported on the situation in Spain. A boorish, thoughtless king, who gave the slightest possible attention to public affairs: a spirited, hard-working queen, with an eye for Parisian millinery: a conceited and incompetent paramour of the queen, Godoy, who was in reality the first minister of the country. In a few weeks cases of valuable French arms were on their way to Godoy. The king, innocent of the vaguest suspicion of political machinery, desired some for himself. A splendid assortment was at once dispatched; and Citoyenne Minette was sent to the queen, with boxes of exquisite Parisian costumes, chosen by Josephine, and with diplomatic instructions from Talleyrand in her pocket.
By the beginning of May Napoleon was ready to open the campaign against Austria. He had set in motion his vast plans for the improvement of Paris and the country, and the restoration of commerce, education, justice, and order. He had pacified la Vendée, and set free the troops for the campaign in Italy. Russia was detached from the coalition, and had sent an ambassador to Paris—a man with whom it would be easy to deal, said Talleyrand, because he had no instructions, and was incensed against his own government. Prussia was most benevolently neutral. Spain seemed to have entirely forgotten Louis XVI. Leaving Talleyrand to sustain the good disposition of these Powers, Napoleon set out on May 6th for Italy. “What we want now,” said Talleyrand to him, “is for success in war to put new life into the department of peace.”
Within six weeks came the news of the victory at Marengo. By July 3rd Napoleon was back in the capital. Austria was crushed, Italy won, and England isolated. A new phase of diplomatic work had now to begin. From the battle-field Napoleon had written to the Austrian Emperor. The Emperor injudiciously sent his reply by the same messenger, a very undiplomatic Austrian soldier, the Count St. Julien, who followed Napoleon to Paris, and was entrusted to Talleyrand to deal with. He had, of course, no power whatever to negotiate, but was instructed to sound the French, and only say sufficient for that purpose about Austria’s disposition. Within a week St. Julien signed the preliminaries of a treaty with France that bound Austria to close her ports against England (with whom she had signed an agreement one month before). The inexperienced soldier had asked Talleyrand’s advice as to the extent of his powers, and Talleyrand gravely replied that if he were in St. Julien’s place he would sign. When Napoleon heard that St. Julien was disavowed and sent to a fortress, and the negotiations were annulled, he said that he rather expected it, but merely “wanted to put the Emperor in the wrong in the eyes of Europe.” He talked of renewing hostilities, but Talleyrand dissuaded him, and in October Count Cobentzl reached Paris for the serious work of negotiation. In the meantime the effect of Marengo was visible on all sides. A succession of fêtes brought Paris and France to the feet of the First Consul. Millions were sent to the Treasury from the seat of war.