To diminish the bad effects arising from this discontent among the troops, Schwartzenberg published an order of the day,[339] commanding the officers to enforce the strictest discipline, and at the same time explain to the army that the present retreat was only temporary, and that on joining with its reserves, which had already crossed the Rhine, the grand army would instantly resume the offensive, while Field-marshal Blucher, at present moving northward, so as to form a junction with Winzengerode and Bulow, should at the same time attack the rear and flank of the enemy. The publishing this plan of the campaign, went far to rouse the dejected confidence of the Austrian army.
On the evening of the 22d February, an answer to the letter of Schwartzenberg was received, but it was addressed exclusively to the Emperor of Austria; and while its expressions of respect are bestowed liberally on that power, the manner in which the other members of the coalition are treated, shows unabated enmity, ill-concealed under an affectation of contempt. The Emperor of France expressed himself willing to treat upon the basis of the Frankfort declaration, but exclaimed against the terms which his own envoy, Caulaincourt, had proposed to the plenipotentiaries of the other powers. In short, the whole letter indicated, not that Napoleon desired a general peace with the allies, but that it was his anxious wish to break up the coalition, by making a separate peace with Austria. This counteracted in spirit and letter the purpose of the confederates, distinctly expressed in their communication to Napoleon.
The Emperor Francis and his ministers were resolved not to listen to any proposals which went to separate the Austrian cause from that of their allies. It was therefore at first resolved that no answer should be sent to the letter; but the desire of gaining time for bringing up the reserves of the grand army, who were approaching the Swiss frontier under the direction of the Prince of Hesse-Homberg, as also for the union of the army of the north, under Bulow and Winzengerode, with that of Silesia, determined them to accept the offer of a suspension of hostilities. Under these considerations, Prince Wenceslaus of Lichtenstein was sent to the headquarters of Napoleon, to treat concerning an armistice. The Emperor seemed to be in a state of high hope, and called upon the Austrians not to sacrifice themselves to the selfish views of Russia, and the miserable policy of England. He appointed Count Flahault his commissioner to negotiate for a line of demarcation, and directed him to meet with the envoy from the allies at Lusigny, on 24th February.[340]
On the night of the 23d, the French bombarded Troyes, which the allied troops evacuated according to their latest plan of the campaign. The French entered the town on the 24th, when the sick and wounded, left behind by the allies, were dragged out to grace Napoleon's triumph; and a scene, not less deplorable, but of another description, was performed at the same time.
EXECUTION OF GOUAULT.
Amid the high hopes which the entrance of the allies into France had suggested to the enemies of Buonaparte's government, five persons, the chief of whom were the Marquis de Vidranges, and the Chevalier de Gouault, had displayed the white cockade, and other emblems of loyalty to the exiled family. They had received little encouragement to take so decided a step either from the Crown Prince of Wirtemberg, or from the Emperor Alexander; both of whom, although approving the principles on which these gentlemen acted, refused to sanction the step they had taken, or to warrant them against the consequences.[341] It does not appear that their declaration had excited any corresponding enthusiasm in the people of Troyes or the neighbourhood; and it would have been wiser in Napoleon to have overlooked such a trifling movement, which he might have represented as arising from the dotage of loyalty, rather than to have, at this critical period, called the public attention to the Bourbons, by denouncing and executing vengeance upon their partisans. Nevertheless, Napoleon had scarce entered Troyes, when the chevalier Gouault (the other Royalists having fortunately escaped) was seized upon, tried by a military commission, condemned, and immediately shot. He died with the utmost firmness, exclaiming, "Vive le Roi!"[342] A violent and ill-timed decree promulgated the penalty of death against all who should wear the decorations of the Bourbons, and on all emigrants who should join the allies.[343] The severity of the measure, so contrary to Napoleon's general conduct of late years towards the Bourbons and their followers, whom he had for a long period scarce even alluded to, made the world ascribe his unusual ferocity to an uncommon state of apprehension; and thus it gave farther encouragement to those into whom it was intended to strike terror.
At this period of the retreat of Schwartzenberg from Troyes, and the movement of Blucher towards the Marne, we must leave the armies which were contending in the interior of France, in order to retrace those movements upon the frontiers, which, though operating at a distance, tended at once to reinforce the invading armies, and to cripple Napoleon's means of defence.
It is difficult for the inhabitants of a peaceful territory to picture to themselves the miseries sustained by the country which formed the theatre of this sanguinary contest. While Buonaparte, like a tiger hemmed in by hounds and hunters, now menaced one of his foes, now sprung furiously upon another, and while, although his rapid movements disconcerted and dismayed them, he still remained unable to destroy the individuals whom he had assailed, lest, while aiming to do so, he should afford a fatal advantage to those who were disengaged—the scene of this desultory warfare was laid waste in the most merciless manner. The soldiers on both parts, driven to desperation by rapid marches through roads blocked with snow, or trodden into swamps, became reckless and pitiless; and, straggling from their columns in all directions, committed every species of excess upon the inhabitants. These evils are mentioned in the bulletins of Napoleon, as well as in the general orders of Schwartzenberg.
The peasants, with their wives and children, fled to caves, quarries, and woods, where the latter were starved to death by the inclemency of the season, and want of sustenance; and the former, collecting into small bodies, increased the terrors of war, by pillaging the convoys of both armies, attacking small parties of all nations, and cutting off the sick, the wounded, and the stragglers. The repeated advance and retreat of the different contending parties, exasperated these evils. Every fresh band of plunderers which arrived, was savagely eager after spoil, in proportion as the gleanings became scarce. In the words of Scripture, what the locust left was devoured by the palmer-worm—what escaped the Baskirs, and Kirgas, and Croats of the Wolga, and Caspian, and Turkish frontier, was seized by the half-clad, and half-starved conscripts of Napoleon, whom want, hardship, and an embittered spirit, rendered as careless of the ties of country and language, as the others were indifferent to the general claims of humanity. The towns and villages, which were the scenes of actual conflict, were frequently burnt to the ground; and this not only in the course of the actions of importance which we have detailed, but in consequence of innumerable skirmishes fought in different points, which had no influence, indeed, upon the issue of the campaign, but increased incalculably the distress of the invaded country, by extending the terrors of battle, with fire, famine, and slaughter for its accompaniments, into the most remote and sequestered districts. The woods afforded no concealment, the churches no sanctuary; even the grave itself gave no cover to the relics of mortality. The villages were every where burnt, the farms wasted and pillaged, the abodes of man, and all that belongs to peaceful industry and domestic comfort, desolated and destroyed. Wolves, and other savage animals, increased fearfully in the districts which had been laid waste by human hands, with ferocity congenial to their own. Thus were the evils which France had unsparingly inflicted upon Spain, Prussia, Russia, and almost every European nation, terribly retaliated within a few leagues of her own metropolis; and such were the consequences of a system, which assuming military force for its sole principle and law, taught the united nations of Europe to repel its aggressions by means yet more formidable in extent than those which had been used in supporting them.