From this time Ferdinand had no longer to complain of Buonaparte’s silence: an answer was brought to Vittoria by Savary. It began by acknowledging the receipt of that letter which the Prince had written respecting the projected marriage before the affair of the Escurial, and the receipt of which Buonaparte had formerly denied. “Your Highness,” said he, (for the title of King was carefully withheld,) “will permit me, under the present circumstances, to address you with frankness and sincerity. I expected that, on my arrival at Madrid, I should have persuaded my illustrious friend to make some necessary reforms in his dominions, which would give considerable satisfaction to the public feeling. The removal of the Prince of the Peace appeared to me indispensable to his happiness and the interests of his people. I have frequently expressed my wishes that he should be removed; and, if I did not persevere in the application, it was on account of my friendship for King Charles, and a wish, if possible, not to see the weakness of his attachments. O wretchedness of human nature! imbecility and error! such is our lot. The events of the North retarded my journey, and the occurrences at Aranjuez supervened. I do not constitute myself judge of those events: but it is very dangerous for Kings to accustom their subjects to shed blood, and to take the administration of justice into their own hands. I pray God that your Highness may not one day find it so. It would not be conformable to the interests of Spain to proceed severely against a Prince who is united to one of the Royal Family, and has so long governed the kingdom. He has no longer any friends; as little will your Royal Highness find any, should you cease to be fortunate.... The people eagerly avenge themselves for the homage which they pay us.”
This was the language of one who felt that he held his power by no other tenure than that of force, and reconciled himself to that tenure by a base philosophy, ... thinking ill of human nature because he could not think well of himself. What followed was more remarkable. “How,” said he, “could the Prince of the Peace be brought to trial without implicating the King and Queen in the process of exciting seditious passions, the result of which might be fatal to your crown? Your Royal Highness has no other right to it than what you derive from your mother. If the cause injures her honour, you destroy your own claims. Do not give ear to weak and perfidious counsels. You have no right to try the Prince; his crimes, if any are imputed to him, merge in the prerogative of the crown. He may be banished from Spain, and I may offer him an asylum in France.”
With respect to the abdication, Buonaparte said, that, as that event had taken place when his armies were in Spain, it might appear in the eyes of Europe and of posterity as if he had sent them for the purpose of expelling a friend and ally from his throne. As a neighbouring sovereign, it became him, therefore, to inform himself of all the circumstances before he acknowledged the abdication. He added, “I declare to your Royal Highness, to the Spaniards, and to the whole world, that, if the abdication of King Charles be voluntary, and has not been forced upon him by the insurrection and tumults at Aranjuez, I have no difficulty in acknowledging your Royal Highness as King of Spain. I am therefore anxious to have some conversation with you on this subject. The circumspection which I have observed on this point ought to convince you of the support you will find in me, were it ever to happen that factions of any kind should disturb you on your throne. When King Charles informed me of the affair of the Escurial, it gave me the greatest pain, and I flatter myself that I contributed to its happy termination. Your Royal Highness is not altogether free from blame: of this the letter which you wrote to me, and which I have always wished to forget, is a sufficient proof. When you are King, you will know how sacred are the rights of the throne. Every application of an hereditary prince to a foreign sovereign is criminal.” The proposed marriage, Buonaparte said, accorded, in his opinion, with the interests of his people; and he regarded it as a circumstance which would unite him by new ties to a house whose conduct he had had every reason to praise since he ascended the throne.
A threat was then held out.... “Your Highness ought to dread the consequences of popular commotions. It is possible that assassinations may be committed upon some stragglers of my army, but they would only lead to the ruin of Spain. I have learnt, with regret, that certain letters of the Captain-General of Catalonia have been circulated at Madrid, and that they have had the effect of exciting some irritation.” After this menace, Buonaparte assured the young King that he had laid open the inmost sentiments of his heart, and that, under all circumstances, he should conduct himself towards him in the same manner as he had done towards the King his father; and he concluded with this hypocritical form, ... “My Cousin, I pray God to take you into his high and holy keeping.”
♦Ferdinand advised to proceed.♦
This letter might well have alarmed Ferdinand and his counsellors; but there came at the same time letters from the persons who had been sent forward to Bayonne, urging him to show no distrust of Buonaparte, but to hasten forward and meet him, as the sure and only means of averting the fatal effects of his displeasure, and securing his friendship. They had now indeed advanced too far to recede; and their thoughts were rather exercised in seeking to justify to themselves the imprudence which they had already committed, than in devising how to remedy it. They persuaded themselves that Buonaparte was not ambitious of adding territory to the French empire; that his conduct, even toward hostile powers, was marked by generosity and moderation; and that his leading maxims of policy were, not wholly to despoil his enemies, but to aggrandize and reward his allies at their expense, and with what he took from them to form states more or less considerable for his relations, whose interest it would be to observe his system and support his empire. The instances of Holland and Naples might indeed seem not very well to agree with this view of his conduct; but it was obvious, they said, that while Holland remained under a republican form it would unavoidably connive with England, and the Dutch themselves were desirous of the change; and with regard to Naples, Napoleon could not possibly act otherwise than he had done, after the conduct of that court. Such was the miserable reasoning with which Ferdinand’s advisers flattered themselves at the time, ♦Escoiquiz. Idea Sencilla, c. 3.♦ and which they have since offered to the world as their justification; instead of fairly confessing, that in consequence of the events at Aranjuez they had placed themselves in a situation in which there was no alternative for men of their pitch of mind but to surrender at discretion to Buonaparte.
♦Promises of Savary, and preparations for seizing Ferdinand.♦
All of them were not thus deluded. Cevallos would fain have gone no farther; and the people of Vittoria, more quick-sighted than their Prince, besought him not to proceed. On the other hand, General Savary assured him with the most vehement protestations, as Murat had done before, that the Emperor did not wish to dismember Spain of a single village; and he offered to pledge his life, that within a few minutes after his arrival at Bayonne he would be recognized as King of Spain and the Indies. The Emperor, to preserve his own consistency, would begin by giving him the title of Highness; but he would presently give him that of Majesty; in three days every thing would be settled, and he might return to Spain. General Savary, if these persuasions had proved ineffectual, was prepared to use other methods not less congenial to his own character and his master’s; for not only were there troops in the neighbourhood of Vittoria surrounding this ill-fated Prince, to intercept his retreat, if he should attempt it; but soldiers were ready that night to have seized him, and a French aide-de-camp was in the apartment waiting for the determination. ♦Escoiquiz, 41.♦ Confused and terrified as Ferdinand was, and feeling himself in the power of the French, the only ease he could find was by endeavouring implicitly to believe their protestations of friendship. ♦Apr. 19.♦ Accordingly the next morning he renewed his journey, though the people, finding their cries and entreaties were of no avail, even cut the traces of his coach, and led away his mules.
♦Ferdinand passes the frontiers.♦
He proceeded, and crossed the stream which divides the two kingdoms. Scarcely had he set foot on the French territory, before he remarked, that no one came to receive him; a neglect more striking, as he had travelled so far to meet the Emperor. At St. Jean de Luz, however, the mayor made his appearance, attended by the municipality. Too humble to be informed of Buonaparte’s designs, and probably too honest to suspect them, he came to the carriage and addressed Ferdinand, expressing, in the most lively manner, the joy he felt at having the honour of being the first person to receive a sovereign, the friend and ally of France. Shortly afterwards he was met by the grandees, who had been sent to compliment the Emperor: their account was sufficiently discouraging; but he was now near Bayonne, and it was too late to turn back. The Prince of Neufchatel (Berthier) and Duroc, the marshal of the palace, came out to meet him, and conduct him to the place which had been appointed for his residence, ... a place so little suitable to such a guest, that he could not for a moment conceal from himself, that it marked an intentional disrespect. Before he had recovered from the ominous feeling which such a reception occasioned, Buonaparte, accompanied by some of his generals, paid him a visit. Ferdinand went down to the street door to receive him; and they embraced with every appearance of friendship. ♦Buonaparte receives him with an embrace.♦ The interview was short, and merely complimentary; Buonaparte again embraced him at parting. The kiss of Judas Iscariot was not more treacherous than this imperial embrace.