At last the Italian complications came, and the government of the czar increased the testimonials of his good relations with the cabinet of the Tuileries. "Our relations with France are cordial," replied Prince Gortchakof to Lord Napier, charged by his government with sounding the disposition of Russia in such grave matters. England then made earnest efforts to prevent the war in Italy from breaking out. Lord Cowley, sent with a certain flourish on a mission to Vienna, exerted himself to discover the possible bases of an accommodation, and the cabinet of St. James already flattered itself with the hope of having quelled the tempest, when Prince Gortchakof suddenly proposed a congress, and pronounced that fatal word which then, as so often since, was only the signal for a rupture. A congress! A treaty of peace before any hostility, the glory of the triumph without the peril of victory,—that was the eternal hystéron-protéron of the Napoleonic ideology, that was the chimera pursued by the dreamer of Ham in the question of the Papacy, in the question of Poland, and of Denmark; and up to the catastrophe of 1870, after the declaration of war, it is curious to see Prince Gortchakof first suggest a remedy which imperial France was yet to recommend so often for all the chronic evils of Europe.[30] The chief of the English government, the old Earl of Derby, complained bitterly of the horrible trick which the proposition emanating from St. Petersburg had played him, and there has never been any doubt in England but that it was brought about by a telegram sent from Paris. Not less serviceable for France did the Russian vice-chancellor show himself in his circular of the 27th May, 1859, when he endeavored to calm the warlike ardor of the secondary States of Germany, and it was in this celebrated dispatch that he made the judicious demonstration as well as the merited praise of the "combination purely and exclusively defensive" of the Bund, a salutary combination which permitted the localization of a war become inevitable, "in place of generalizing it and giving to the struggle a character and proportions which escape all human foresight."
Napoleon III. descended to the plains of Lombardy; Austria was vanquished at Magenta and Solferino, and Russia could enjoy its first revenge on the ungrateful Hapsburg, who had "betrayed" it before Sebastopol. The year after, in consequence of the annexation of Savoy, Lord Russell made the solemn declaration to the parliament that his country "should not separate itself from the rest of the nations of Europe; that it should always be ready to act with the different states, if it did not wish to dread to-day such an annexation, and to-morrow to hear another spoken of." That was the funeral oration of the Anglo-French alliance: four years after the war of the Crimea, France had lost one and then the other of its two great allies in the crisis of the Orient, and Russia did not care to complain. It did not protest against the annexation of Savoy; it even declared that it only saw in it a "regular transaction;" but it profited by the moment to make its reëntry into European politics, and bring back on the tapis the question ... of the Ottoman empire! The 4th May, 1860, Prince Gortchakof convoked in his cabinet the ambassadors of the great Powers in order to examine with them the "dolorous and precarious" position of the Christians in Bosnia, Herzegovina and Bulgaria, and soon a circular of the vice-chancellor (20th May) insisted on the reunion of a conference in order to alter the stipulations established by the treaty of Paris. "The time of illusions is passed," Alexander Mikhaïlovitch wrote in this circular; "all hesitation every adjournment will bring grave inconvenience," and he even seized upon the recent liberation of Italy as an argument for the future independence of the populations who awakened all his solicitude: "the events accomplished in the east of Europe have resounded in all the Orient like an encouragement and like a hope!" Thus, scarcely four years after the treaty of Paris, Russia began anew to speak to the world of the "sick man," and to do it, it did not shelter itself, as in the conferences and commissions of 1856-1859, under the protection and language of France; it went all alone, and took the initiative in the debate!
This was not enough: in that year alone, 1860, the cabinet of St. Petersburg regained almost all the ground lost since the war of the Crimea; that was a year of peculiar fortune for Russia, for it was a year of universal distrust of France. The acquisition of Savoy, the strange and profoundly immoral spectacle which the negotiations of this treaty of Zurich offered, torn up even before being signed, the Piedmontese annexations in Italy, the expedition of Garibaldi to Sicily, the "new right" of which the official journals in France spoke, and the famous pamphlet on the "Pope and Congress," had caused the alarm and awakened in the highest degree the uneasiness of Europe. Lord Palmerston declared "that he would only be willing to give his hand to a former ally in holding the other on the buckler of defense," and he armed his volunteers. Switzerland was violently agitated; the National-Verein swore to die for the defense of the Rhine, and even those honest and peaceful Belgians affirmed in an address to the king that "if their independence was menaced, they would submit to the most severe trials." Above these popular frights the cabals of the sovereigns were agitated; the German princes united at Baden, and the emperor of the French thought it opportune to surprise them in a measure in the midst of their deliberations by making that "rapid voyage" from which the "Moniteur" promised "very happy results." "Nothing was wanting but the spontaneity of a proceeding so significant," added the official journal, "to put an end to this unanimous concert of malicious rumors and false estimations. In truth, the emperor, in explaining frankly to the sovereigns united at Baden how his policy never conflicted with right and justice, carried to minds equally distinguished and equally exempt from prejudices, the conviction which does not fail to be inspired by a true sentiment expressed with loyalty." It appeared, however, that the conviction had not worked completely on the prejudices, for, at the close of the reunion of Baden, there was another at Toeplitz, between the Emperor of Austria and the Prince Regent of Prussia, where they agreed on a third which was to be held at Warsaw with the Emperor of Russia,—and the czar accepted the rendezvous.
"It is not a coalition, it is a reconciliation which I am going to make at Warsaw," declared the Emperor Alexander II. to the French ambassador, the Duke of Montebello, whose government was naturally much agitated by the turn affairs were taking. In truth, conciliating expressions were not wanting in the dispatch by which Prince Gortchakof "invited the French government to let him know in what measure it thought that it would be able to second the efforts which Russia was making to prevent the crisis with which Europe was menaced;" but, however polite these forms were, they did not hide a necessity for explanation. The cabinet of the Tuileries replied by a memorandum in which it gave, above all, "the categoric engagement not to give any support to Piedmont in case that Austria should be attacked in Venetia." The cabinets of Vienna and Berlin made their remarks on several points of the French memorandum, and addressed them ... to the Russian vice-chancellor, who transmitted them to Paris, with the request for new explanations more explicit and more reassuring. Sum total, no positive result came from this meeting of the three sovereigns of the North, who had for a moment caused very grave apprehensions in France. This was because the Emperor Alexander had gone to Warsaw only in a particular interest; he did not wish to make a coalition nor a reconciliation there; he simply wished to show his influence: to give a demonstration of his power. He was flattered at seeing these sovereigns, these German princes, coming to the former capital of Poland to deliberate there on the general situation, and to receive the word of command: that recalled the good days of the Emperor Nicholas. On the other side, Russia was very much pleased at making France feel the whole price of its friendship, at making it understand that its services had now a much greater value, perhaps even their tariff. The clever productions which emanated successively in these years 1856-1860 from the chancellor's office at St. Petersburg, indicated in a very plastic manner the continually ascending advance of Russia since the peace of Paris. In the first of these celebrated circulars, it declared "that it did not sulk, but meditated;" in the second, on the occasion of the Italian complications, it already emerged "from the reserve which it had imposed on itself since the war of the Crimea." After the annexation of Savoy "its conscience warned it of being any longer silent on the unhappy state of the Christians in the Orient, etc." At last, in the month of October, 1860, it was the mouth-piece of the general interests of Europe, the intermediary which demanded explanations from the cabinets of the Tuileries. A modest protégé of France, and full of "reserves" until the war in Italy, it ascends in 1859 to the rank of a "precious friend," to become after the interview of Warsaw the important and almost indispensable ally,—an ally very resolute in not accepting a secondary rôle, in guarding its position of marked influence, in taking for itself a large part in the great combinations of the future.
Assuredly the desultory, undecisive, and eternally contradictory policy of the Emperor Napoleon III. played into the hands of Russia. But it is just to acknowledge that Prince Gortchakof allowed no chance of fortune to escape, and that without creating the events, he understood admirably how to profit by them. The superiority of the statesman always reveals itself by the measure which he preserves in his "cordiality" and even in his vengeance, by the foreseeing mind which he does not cease to preserve even in the midst of the allurements of success. It is not doubtful for instance that the warnings of Russia after the battle of Solferino, the fears which it then suddenly expressed of not being able longer to restrain Germany in its ardor to go to the rescue of Austria, contributed greatly to the hasty peace of Villafranca, and, however fatal this event was as regards the interests of France and even of Austria, one cannot deny that Russia accomplished its purpose perfectly. In fact, the complete execution of the programme "of the Alps to the Adriatic" would have probably given an entirely different turn to the Italian affairs, would certainly have rendered possible in the future a sincere reconciliation between France and Austria, while the half drawn solution by the peace of Villafranca, leaving all the questions in suspense, could only embitter the relations of the two belligerents, and render the friendship of Russia more precious to France. On the other side, this campaign of Lombardy, while giving satisfaction to the Muscovite hatred sprung from the war of the Orient, was still far from destroying one of the fundamental elements of the traditional policy of the czars as regards Germany. In spite of the loss of Milan, Austria preserved its position intact in the centre of Europe, was a balance for Prussia, and the interview of Warsaw proved that the Russian influence among the Germanic States had certainly not decreased.
Not less circumspect and skillful did the Russian vice-chancellor show himself in not compromising too far in his connivances with the Emperor Napoleon III. during these years 1856-1860, certain general principles of preservation which had made the greatness and strength of the reign of Nicholas. Without doubt, in Servia, in the Danubian Principalities, Alexander Mikhaïlovitch was not of a vigorous orthodoxy, and allowed popular votes to annul there the arrangements stipulated by the treaties; but in comparison with those countries of the Orient Russia has always allowed itself many political licenses. In the affairs of the Occident, on the contrary, Prince Gortchakof took care to remain as far as possible in the traditions and not to overturn too much in the "new right." He let the journals and periodicals of Moscow and St. Petersburg plume themselves at their ease on what Russia boldly contributed to the deliverance of the peoples and to the triumph of nationalities; for himself, in the documents dated at his office, he refrained carefully from all these neologisms and persevered in the terminology consecrated by the old diplomatic language. In these documents he had not spoken at all of the national aspirations nor of the popular votes, when Milan and Savoy changed masters; in the eyes of the Russian vice-chancellor, all these were simply facts of war, "regular transactions." Still less did he care to make the revolutionary propaganda abroad and to associate himself in the commerce of exportation which, according to a malicious remark of those days, Napoleon III. had undertaken with liberal ideas. He declined categorically all participation in the remonstrances addressed to the King of Naples, and declared in his circular of the 22d September, 1856, "that to wish to obtain from a sovereign concessions as to the internal government of his states in a comminatory manner or by menacing demonstrations, was to substitute one's self violently on one's own authority, to govern in his place, and to proclaim without disguise the right of the strong over the weak." Lastly, in his famous note to Prince Gagarine of the 10th October, 1860, he took up the Sardinian government roundly for its conduct in Emilia, Tuscany, the Duchies of Parma and Modena, and strongly opposed the deposal of these princes and the annexations of those provinces, which six years later he was to tolerate, even favor in Germany. "It is no longer," he said in the dispatch to Prince Gagarine, "a question of Italian interests, but of general interests, common to all governments, it is a question which is directly connected with those eternal laws without which, neither order, peace, nor security can exist in Europe." Finally, he sneered at those Jenners of politics who recommend the vaccination of anarchy to remove from it its pernicious character, and who pretend to remove the arms from the demagogy in appropriating to themselves its baggage; "the necessity in which the Sardinian government pretends to be situated in combating anarchy does not justify it, since it only moves with the revolution to recover by it its heritage." In a word, the Russian vice-chancellor profited with prodigious dexterity by the good disposition of France and still more by its errors, without ever sacrificing the will, the decorum, and the principles of his own government to it. He made use of the Emperor Napoleon III. without using him too much, and above all without ever subjecting himself to an order of ideas in which Russia could find any deception. For the good of Russia, for the happiness of Europe, it would have been desirable for Prince Gortchakof to have observed later, in his intimacy with Prussia, a little of that care and that intelligent egotism which he gave proof of in such a superior manner in his intimacy with France. "To love, there must be two," said the great theologian of the Middle Ages on the subject that those centuries of faith called divine love, the relations of the human soul with its heavenly Creator. The precept is assuredly much more to be recommended in the much less mystical relations between the powers of the earth, and the Russian vice-chancellor did not forget it during that first period of his ministry, during those years of "cordiality" with the cabinet of the Tuileries. It was only during the second period that the heart of Alexander Mikhaïlovitch began to control the right of the state, and that the love for M. de Bismarck proved to be stronger than the world, stronger even than Russia and its interests.
II.
While Prince Gortchakof thus reaped the fruits of his "French" policy, among which that of vengeance on Austria was surely not the least sweet or pleasant, his former colleague of Frankfort, having become representative of Prussia at the court of Russia, was consumed at his side by the languishing fever of a man of action trammeled by foolish probity. He had arrived at St. Petersburg in the spring of the year 1859, three months after the famous birthday reception given to M. de Hübner by the Emperor Napoleon III.; the Italian complications were about to break out, and the Russian vice-chancellor lent himself to all those diplomatic tricks which, according to the desire of the cabinet of the Tuileries, would drive the Emperor Francis Joseph to a declaration of war. The new plenipotentiary of Prussia at the court of St. Petersburg had not a moment of doubt concerning the bearing which his government should observe in circumstances so propitious. It was from this time (12th May, 1859) that his confidential dispatch to M. de Schleinitz dates, in which he recommends the rupture with the Bund, the radical proceeding by sword and fire, ferro et igne. In the preceding year, during a journey to Paris, he had occasion to have an interview with the Emperor of the French, and to recognize his good will toward Prussia, and the unqualified wishes which were expressed in the Tuileries for the greatness and the prosperity of the country of Frederick II. and of Blücher. In the month of November of that same year 1858, Napoleon III. had charged the Marquis Pepoli, then en route for Berlin, to represent to the Hohenzollern all the advantages which he would find in a rupture with Austria: "In Germany," the Emperor of the French had said, "Austria represents the past, Prussia represents the future; in linking itself to Austria, Prussia condemns itself to immobility; it cannot be thus contented; it is called to a higher fortune; it should accomplish in Germany the great destinies which await it, and which Germany awaits from it."[31] Thus thought the future prisoner of Wilhelmshoehe on the eve of Magenta and Solferino, and "his excellency the lieutenant" certainly found no objections in such a magnificent programme. But those good ministers of the new era at Berlin unfortunately had not the slightest notion of the "new right," and up to the prince regent himself, they did not cease to speak of conquests purely moral. They even asked one another at Potsdam if they should not assist Austria, and whether they did not have federal obligations towards the Emperor Francis Joseph! The Samson of the Mark strove in vain against the ties which the "Philistines of the Spree" imposed on him, and the war in Italy became his Dalila: in fact, it was from this epoch that the renowned boldness of the present chancellor of Germany dates.
It is interesting to study, in the confidential letters to Malvina, the state of mind of M. de Bismarck during these years 1859-1860. At the commencement of hostilities, and evidently despairing of seeing his government adopt the line of conduct which he had not ceased to recommend, he left his post, went to Moscow to visit the Kremlin, passed an agreeable day in a villa, so much more agreeable "when one has the feeling of being sheltered from the telegraph." The news of a great battle fought in Lombardy (Magenta) caused him, nevertheless, to return to St. Petersburg. "Perhaps there will be something for the diplomats to do." At St. Petersburg, he learns of the strange desire at Berlin of interceding for Austria, of mobilizing the federal armies, and from it he conceived the greatest apprehensions for his country. He became ill. A very grave case of hepatitis endangered his life seriously. "They covered my body with innumerable cupping glasses large as saucers, with mustard poultices and quantities of blisters, and I was already half way to a better world when I began to convince my doctors that my nerves were disordered by eight years of griefs and excitement without intermission (the eight years of Frankfort!), and that by continuing to weaken me, they would lead me into typhoid fever or imbecility. My good constitution ended by conquering, thanks, above all, to several dozen bottles of good wine."
His good disposition did not the less remain dull and morose, and two months later he avowed that he would not have been sorry to have ended his life then. Austria was vanquished, it is true; she had lost two great battles and one of the richest provinces; but Prussia had not drawn any material, palpable advantage from this disaster of the Hapsburg, and the cavalier of the Mark was not the man to cherish, like his friend Alexander Mikhaïlovitch, a purely Platonic hatred. He consoled himself, however, by the thought that the peace of Villafranca was only a truce: "to wish in the present state of affairs to seriously reconcile Austria with France, is to labor at the squaring of the circle." "I shall endeavor," he wrote at the approach of autumn, 1859, "to cower in my bear-skin, and to bury myself in the snow; in the thaw of next May, I will see what remains of me and our affairs; if too little I shall definitely settle with politics." The following month of May brought grave events; the annexation of Savoy became the signal for the greatest distrust in Europe, of which we have spoken above: but the cabinet of Berlin persisted in its ancient course, and the prince regent had, in July, an interview with the Emperor Francis Joseph at Toeplitz. "I learn," wrote the representative of Prussia at the court of St. Petersburg with undisguised spite, "that we have been shaved at Toeplitz, splendidly shaved; we have let ourselves be taken in by the Viennese good nature. And all that for nothing, not even the smallest plate of lentils." At last, in the month of October, after Castelfidardo and the conquest of the kingdom of Naples, the cabinet of Berlin addressed an energetic note to M. de Cavour, on the bearing of the House of Savoy on the Italian peninsula. The note established that "it is solely in the legal manner of reforms, and in respecting the existing rights, that a regular government is allowed to realize the legitimate wishes of nations," and closes by the following passage: "Called to express ourselves on the acts and principles of the Sardinian government, we can only deplore them profoundly, and we believe that we are fulfilling a rigorous duty by expressing in the most explicit and formal manner our disapprobation, both of those principles and of the application which has been thought could be made of them." One can imagine what bad humor such naïvetés would cause to the future destroyer of the Bund, to the future spoliator of Denmark, of Hanover, and so many other states. He again thought of leaving the career; he resolved in any case to "cling to the situation of an observer," as regards the monstrous policy which was pursued at Berlin. He is perfectly astonished at the scandal which is caused on the banks of the Spree by the publication of the posthumous journal of M. de Varnhagen, a journal full of piquant revelations concerning the court of Prussia. "Why be so indignant. Is it not taken from life? Varnhagen is vain and méchant, but who is not? Does it not all depend on the manner in which nature has ripened our lives? According to what we have suffered from the bites of worms, from dampness, or from the sun, behold us sweet, sour, or rotten."