Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 54.djvu/360

 self for the allied headquarters as British minister plenipotentiary.

He spent some time in Holland, on a mission to the Prince of Orange, and did not reach Basle till 18 Jan. 1814. So great was his personal influence, so important was the course England might take at this juncture, and so unlimited were his powers understood to be, that till his arrival the representatives of the allies would take no steps in negotiation. Nor was it easy to conciliate the jealousies and harmonise the conflicting interests of the different powers. Against the Emperor Alexander and his party, who wished to press on to Paris and make no peace till it had fallen, were ranged the Austrian adherents led by Metternich, who had no mind to complete the destruction of France, especially at the cost of so much exalting Russia. Castlereagh found the alliance almost on the point of breaking up. On 3 Feb. 1814 the congress assembled at Châtillon, but in form Lord Castlereagh was not a member of it. England was formally represented by Lords Cathcart and Aberdeen and by Sir Charles Stewart. The line taken by Lord Castlereagh was that peace ought to be concluded with Napoleon without ulterior dynastic motives, and that a Bourbon restoration must be brought about, if at all, by the force of circumstances, and not by the arms of the allies. His view prevailed with Russia and Prussia, and the negotiations proceeded without the abdication of Napoleon being demanded as a preliminary; and he subsequently carried the powers with him in his plan for the creation of a kingdom of the Low Countries, under the Prince of Orange, the Cape of Good Hope being ceded to Great Britain by way of compensation, and Venice to Austria. France was to be reduced to her dimensions as they existed in 1790, and the sovereigns of Spain and Portugal were to be restored to their thrones. The envoys of the allies were instructed to negotiate on these lines, and Lord Castlereagh at once established his influence by severing himself from all intrigue, and endeavouring to convince Napoleon's plenipotentiary, Caulaincourt, and the representatives of the powers that England was sincerely anxious for peace, and was willing to make great sacrifices to obtain it. These proposals were put forward on the 7th. Caulaincourt succeeded in gaining time for Napoleon to act, and the battle of Champaubert was won on 10 Feb., a victory through which Napoleon expected to force the allies shortly back across the Rhine. His successes on this and the following days did in fact add greatly to the dissensions already existing among the allies. To prevent open disunion, Castlereagh was obliged to take a firm tone with them. He pressed upon the Austrians a vigorous continuance of the war. He resisted the Russian demands for more money, and temporised with their proposals for a change of dynasty in France; he constrained Bernadotte to a more loyal support of the joint operations. He brought the allies to sign a new treaty of alliance on 1 March, the treaty of Chaumont, and did not shrink from pledging Great Britain to maintain one hundred and fifty thousand men in the field, and to contribute to the resources of the other powers 5,000,000l. sterling per annum. The secret terms of this treaty, as to the territorial rearrangement of Europe beyond the dominions of the allies, subsequently became the basis of the treaty of Vienna, but from this point the negotiations of Châtillon became less and less promising of any conclusion. Each side rejected the other's proposals, and the congress eventually broke up on 18 March. Though the prospects of peace were thus for the time being overcast, and Lord Castlereagh's mission had failed of success, there can be little doubt that but for his presence with the allied sovereigns in Germany in February and March 1814, and his mingled firmness, resource, persuasiveness, and personal influence, the alliance would have broken up, and combined action against Napoleon would have ceased.

When the congress of Châtillon terminated, Castlereagh went to the headquarters of the emperor of Austria at Dijon, and remained there till after Napoleon's abdication at Fontainebleau. He was principally occupied during this time in negotiating the future arrangements of Italy, where matters were complicated, as far as Great Britain's course was concerned, by the unauthorised act of Lord William Bentinck in April in proclaiming the re-establishment of the Genoese constitution, contrary to Castlereagh's instruction from Dijon. He arrived in Paris on 10 April, and on the following day signed the preliminaries of peace of 30 March, but with a reservation that Great Britain answered for its own obligations only, and not for those of other powers. Castlereagh was in fact wholly opposed to the title of emperor and the position in Elba assigned to Napoleon, foreseeing that he must there be a source of danger to Europe. The final adjustment of European questions was reserved to the congress shortly to be held at Vienna. Wellington became British ambassador in Paris, and Castlereagh returned home and received the order of the Garter (installed 28 June 1814).