The emperor uttered a cry of anger, and, suddenly halting, cast glances on Metternich which seemed to borrow their fire from the lightning. "Are you through with your proposals, sir?" he asked, in a threatening tone.
Metternich bowed. "Yes, sire."
"Well, then," cried the emperor, stepping up to the minister, "to all this I respond only by the question: How much money has England given you to play this part?"
At this question, uttered in a menacing voice, Metternich turned pale, the smile passed from his lips, his brow darkened, and his eyes, usually so mild and pleasant, kindled with anger, and allowed the thoughts, generally concealed in the innermost recesses of the diplomatist's heart, to burst forth for a moment, and betray hatred.
"Ah," cried Napoleon, in a triumphant tone, "I have at length torn the mask from your smiling features, and I see that a serpent is hidden under them as under roses. It would sting, but I know how to be on my guard; I will never grant Austria the right to insult, dictate to, and humiliate me. I will compel her, as I have done so often, to prostrate herself in the dust before me, and ask mercy and forbearance. Do you hear what I say? I will humiliate Austria, trampling her in the dust." The emperor violently raised his clinched fist, and striking it downward struck Metternich's hat, which the minister still held in his hand, and caused it to fall to the ground.
The emperor paused and looked at Metternich, as if to request him to pick up the hat. But the latter did not make the slightest movement. His thoughts and his hatred had already retired into his bosom; his brow was serene again, and his accustomed smile returned. He looked first at the hat, and then at the emperor, who followed his glances, and met them sullenly and defiantly. This little incident, however, seemed to have dispelled Napoleon's anger, or at least to have appeased the first stormy waves of the sea. When he spoke again his tone was milder, and his look less scorching, returning from time to time, as it were involuntarily, to the hat lying on the floor a few steps from him. He commenced pacing the apartment again with quick steps. Metternich followed him, only with somewhat slackened pace, and thus compelled the emperor to walk a little slower.
"Now," said Napoleon, loudly, "I know what you want! Not only Illyria, but the half of Italy, the return of the pope to Rome, Poland, and the abandonment of Spain, Holland, and Switzerland! This is what you call the spirit of moderation! You are intent only on profiting by every chance; you alternately transport your alliance from one camp to the other, in order to be always a sharer in the spoil, and you speak to me of your respect for the rights of independent states! You would have Italy; Russia, Poland; Prussia, Saxony; and England, Holland and Belgium: in fine, peace is only a pretext; you are all intent on dismembering the French empire! And Austria thinks she has only to declare herself, to crown such an enterprise! You pretend here, with a stroke of the pen, to make the ramparts of Dantzic, Custrin, Glogau, Magdeburg, Wesel, Mentz, Antwerp, Alessandria, Mantua, in fine, all the strong places of Europe, sink before you, of which I did not obtain possession but by my victorious arms! And I, obedient to your policy, am to evacuate Europe, of which I still hold the half; recall my legions across the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees; subscribe a treaty which would be nothing but a vast capitulation; and place myself at the mercy of those of whom I am at this moment the conqueror! It is when my standards float at the mouths of the Vistula, and on the banks of the Oder; when my army is at the gates of Berlin, and Breslau; when I am at the head of three hundred thousand men, that Austria, without drawing a sword, expects to make me subscribe such conditions! This is an insult, and it is my father-in-law that has matured such a project; it is he that sends you on such a mission!" [Footnote: This whole speech contains only Napoleon's words.—Vide Fain, "Manuscrit de 1813," vol. i.]
While thus speaking, the emperor was still walking, and Metternich by his side. Whenever they passed the hat lying on the floor, Napoleon cast a quick side-glance on Metternich, who appeared to take no notice of the hat, and it seemed entirely accidental that he slightly wheeled aside, and thus succeeded in passing without touching it.
"You," cried Napoleon, in a thundering voice, "have taken upon yourself the mission of insulting me, and you think I will quietly submit?"
"Sire," said Metternich, with his imperturbable calmness, "I believe you have already punished me for it!"