Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/222

Rh 210 NAPOLEON [1805- resolved not to defend, and the French also succeeded by an unscrupulous trick in getting possession of the bridges over the Danube. So far his progress had been triumphant and yet his position was now extremely critical. The archduke Charles was approaching from Hungary with 80,000 Austrians ; another Russian army was entering Moravia to join Kutusoff, who had with great skill escapee from the pursuit of Murat after the capture of Vienna. Napoleon, though he had brought 200,000 men into Germany, had not now, since he was obliged to keep open his communications down the valley of the Danube, a large army available for the field. But, what was much more serious, he had recklessly driven Prussia into the opposite camp. He had marched troops across her territory of Ansbach, violating her neutrality, and in consequence on November 3 (while Napoleon was at Linz) she had signed with Russia the treaty of Potsdam, which practically placed 180,000 of the most highly drilled troops in the world at the service of the Coalition. Such had been Napoleon s rashness, for his audacious daring was balanced indeed by infinite cunning and ingenuity, but was seldom tempered by prudence. In this position, it may be asked, how could he expect ever to make his way back to France ? What he had done to Mack Prussia would now do to him. The army of Frederick would block the Danube between him and France, while the Russians and Austrians united under the archduke would seek him at Vienna. As at Marengo, fortune favoured his desperate play. The allies had only to play a waiting game, but this the Russians and their young czar, who was now in the Moravian headquarters, would not consent to do. He was surrounded by young and rash counsellors, and the Russians, remembering the victories of Suwaroff in 1799, and remarking that almost all Napoleon s victories hitherto had been won over Austrians, had not yet learned to be afraid of him. Napoleon became aware of their sanguine confidence from Savary, whom he had sent to the czar with proposals ; he contrived to heighten it by exhibiting his army as ill-prepared to Dolgorouki, sent to him on the part of the czar. The end was that the Russians (80,000 men, aided by about 15,000 Austrians) rushed into the Battle of battle of Austerlitz (December 2, 1 805), which brought Anster- the third Coalition to an end, as that of Hohenlinden had brought the second. Nowhere was Napoleon s superiority more manifest; the Russians lost more than 20,000 men, the Austrians 6000. The former retired at once under a military convention, and before the year 1805 was out the treaty at Pressburg was concluded with Austria (December 26) and that of Schonbrunn with Prussia (December 15). It was a transformation-scene more bewildering than even that of Marengo, and completely altered the position of Napoleon before Europe. To the French indeed Austerlitz was not, as a matter of exultation, equal to Marengo, for it did not deliver the state from danger, but only raised it from a perilous eminence to an eminence more perilous still. But as a military achievement it was far greater, exhibiting the army at the height of its valour and organization (the illusion of liberty not yet quite dis sipated), and the commander at the height of his tactical skill ; and in its historical results it is greater still, ranking among the great events of the world. For not only did it found the ephemeral Napoleonic empire by handing over Venetia to the Napoleonic monarchy of Italy, and Tyrol and Vorarlberg to Napoleon s new client Bavaria ; it also destroyed the Holy Roman Empire while it divided the remains of Hither Austria between Wiirtemberg and Baden. In the summer of 1806 the emperor of Austria (he had this title since 1804) solemnly abdicated the title of Roman emperor ; the ancient diet of Ratisbon was dissolved, and a new organization was created under the litz. name of Confederation of the Rhine, in which the minor states of Germany were united under the protectorate of Napoleon. Bavaria and Wiirtemberg at the same time were raised into kingdoms. In all the changes which have happened since, the Holy Roman Empire has never been revived, and this event remains the greatest in the modern history of Germany. But Austerlitz was greater than Marengo in another way. That victory had a tranquillizing effect, and was soon followed by a peace which lasted more than four years. But the equilibrium established after Austerlitz was of the most unstable kind ; it was but momentary, and was followed by a succession of the most appalling convulsions; the very report of the battle was fatal to William Pitt. A French ascendency had existed since 1797, and Napoleon s Government had at first promised to make it less intoler able. Since 1803 this hope had vanished, but now suddenly the ascendency was converted into something like a universal monarchy. Europe could not settle down. The first half of 1806 was devoted to the internal recon struction of Germany and to the negotiation of peace with the two great belligerents who remained after Austria and Prussia had retired, viz., England and Russia. But these negotiations failed, and in failing created suddenly a new Coalition. In England, Fox showed unexpectedly all the firmness of Pitt ; and the czar refused his ratification to the treaty which his representative at Paris, D Oubril, had signed. But the negotiations had gone far enough to give Prussia deep offence. At a moment when she found herself almost shut out of the German world by the new Confederation, Napoleon was found coolly treating with England for the restoration of Hanover to George III. In August 1806, just at the moment of the dissolution of the War Holy Roman Empire and the formation of the Conf edera- witl1 tion of the Rhine, Prussia suddenly mobilized her army, Prussia - and about the same time Russia rejected the treaty. This amounted practically to a new Coalition, or to a revival of the old one with Prussia in the place of Austria. No one knew so well as Napoleon the advantage given by sudden ness and rapidity. The year before he had succeeded in crushing the Austrians before the Russians could come up ; against Prussia he had now the advantage that she had long been politically isolated, and could not immediately get help either from Russia or England, for the moment only Saxony and Hesse-Cassel stood by her, while his armies, to the number of 200,000 men, were already stationed in Bavaria and Swabia, whence in a few days they could arrive on the scene of action. The year before Austria had been ruined by the incapacity of Mack ; Prussia now suffered from an incapacity diffused through the higher ranks both of the military and civil service. Generals too old, such as Brunswick and Mollendorf, a military system corrupted by long peace, a policy without clearness, a diplo macy without honour, had converted the great power ouncled by Frederick into a body without a soul. There aegan a new war of which the incidents are almost precisely parallel to those of the war which had so lately closed. As the Austrians at Ulm, so now Napoleon crushed the Prussians at Jena and Auerstadt (October 14) before the appearance of the Russians ; as he entered Vienna, so now he enters Berlin (October 27) ; as he fought a second war in Moravia, in which Austria played a second part to Russia, so now from November 1806 to June 1807 he fights in East Prussia against the Russians aided vith smaller numbers by the Prussians; as he might .hen, after all his successes, have been ruined by the ntervention of Prussia, so now, had Austria struck in, le might have found much difficulty in making his way )ack to France; as at Austerlitz, so at Friedland in ^e 1807 the Russians ran hastily into a decisive battle