Вальтер Скотт
Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Volume III
At Astorga, 30th December, the commander-in-chief found about 5000 Spaniards under Romana, the relics of the Galician army. These troops wanted clothing, accoutrements, arms, ammunition, and pay – they wanted, in short, every thing, excepting that courage and devotion to the cause of their country, which would have had a better fate, had fortune favoured desert.
The Spanish general still proposed to make a stand at this rallying point; but whatever might be Romana's own skill, and the bravery of his followers, his forces were not of a quality such as to induce Sir John Moore to halt his retreat, which he now directed avowedly upon Corunna.
The scarcity of provisions required forced marches, and combined, with want of general knowledge of the country in a military sense, to hurry forward the soldiers, who too readily took advantage of these irregular movements to straggle and plunder, inflicting on the friendly natives, and receiving from them in return, the mutual evils which are given and received by invaders in an enemy's country. The weather dark and rainy – the roads blockaded by half-melted snow – the fords become almost impassable – augmented the difficulties of a retreat, resembling that by which a defeated army is forced into a country totally unknown to them, and through which the fugitives must find their way as they can. The baggage of the army, and its ammunition, were abandoned and destroyed. The sick, the wounded, were left to the mercy of the pursuers; and the numbers who in that hour of despair gave way to the national vice of intoxication, added largely to the ineffective and the helpless. The very treasure-chests of the army were thrown away and abandoned. There was never so complete an example of a disastrous retreat.
One saving circumstance, already mentioned, tended to qualify the bad behaviour of the troops; namely, that when a report arose that a battle was to be expected, the courage, nay, the discipline of the soldiers, seemed to revive. This was especially the case on the 6th January, when the French ventured an attack upon our rear-guard near Lugo. So soon as a prospect of action was presented, stragglers hastened to join their ranks – the disobedient became at once subordinate, as if on the parade; and it was made manifest that the call to battle, far from having the natural effect of intimidating to utter dispersion troops already so much disordered, was to the English army the means of restoring discipline, steadiness, and confidence.
The French having declined the proffered engagement, Sir John Moore continued his retreat under the same disadvantageous circumstances, until he arrived at Corunna, the original object of his destination. He was preparing to embark his forces in the transports, which lay prepared for their reception, when his pursuer, Soult, now pressing boldly forward, made it evident that this could not be accomplished unless either by a convention with him, or by the event of a battle, which might disqualify him from opposing the embarkation. Sir John Moore, with the dignity becoming his character, chose the latter alternative, and occupied a position of no great strength in front of the town, to protect the embarkation. The attack was made by the French on the 16th January, in heavy columns, and with their usual vivacity; but it was sustained and repelled on all hands. The gallant general was mortally wounded in the action, just as he called on the 42d Highland regiment to "remember Egypt," and reminded the same brave mountaineers, that though ammunition was scarce, "they had their bayonets."467
Thus died on the field of victory, which atoned for previous misfortunes, one of the bravest and best officers of the British army. His body was wrapped in his military cloak, instead of the usual vestments of the tomb; it was deposited in a grave hastily dug on the ramparts of the citadel of Corunna; and the army completing its embarkation upon the subsequent day, their late general was "left alone with his glory."
Thus ended, in the acquisition of barren laurels, plentifully blended with cypress, the campaign, which had been undertaken by so beautiful and efficient an army, under so approved a commander. The delay in sending it to the scene of action was one great cause of its failure, and for that the gallant general, or his memory, cannot be held responsible. Such a force at Salamanca, while the French were unequal in numbers to the Spanish armies, might have had the most important consequences. At a later period, when the patriotic armies were every where defeated, we confess that General Moore, with the ideas which he entertained of the Spaniards, does not seem to us to have been called upon to place the fate of the British army – auxiliaries, it must be observed, not principals in the war – on the same desperate cast by which the natives were compelled to abide. The disasters of the retreat appear to rest on want of knowledge of the ground they were to traverse, and on the deficiency of the commissariat, which, though the army must be entirely dependent on it, was not at that time sufficiently under the control of the commander-in-chief. We owe it to his memory to say, that at the close of his own valuable life, he amply redeemed in his last act the character of the army which he commanded.468
CHAPTER XLVII
General Belliard occupies Madrid – Napoleon returns to France – Cause of his hurried return – View of the Circumstances leading to a Rupture with Austria – Feelings of Russia upon this occasion – Secret intrigues of Talleyrand to preserve Peace – Immense exertions made by Austria – Counter efforts of Buonaparte – The Austrian Army enters Bavaria, 9th April, 1809 – Napoleon hastens to meet them – Austrians defeated at Abensberg on the 20th – and at Eckmühl on the 22d – They are driven out of Ratisbon on the 23d – The Archduke Charles retreats into Bohemia – Napoleon pushes forward to Vienna – which, after a brief defence, is occupied by the French on the 12th of May – Retrospect of the events of the War in Poland, Italy, the North of Germany, and the Tyrol – Enterprises of Schill – of the Duke of Brunswick Oels – Movements in the Tyrol – Character and Manners of the Tyrolese – Retreat of the Archduke John into Hungary.
MADRID.
Having thus completed the episode of Sir John Moore's expedition, we resume the progress of Napoleon, to whom the successive victories of Reynosa, Burgos, and Tudela, had offered a triumphant path to Madrid. On the 1st of December, his headquarters being at the village of Saint Augustino, he was within sight of that capital, and almost within hearing of the bells, whose hollow and continued toll announced general insurrection, and the most desperate resistance. Nor was the zeal of the people of Madrid inadequate to the occasion, had it been properly directed and encouraged. They seized on the French officer who brought a summons of surrender, and were with difficulty prevented from tearing him to pieces. On the 3d, the French attacked Buen Retiro, a palace which had been fortified as a kind of citadel. A thousand Spaniards died in the defence of this stronghold. On the 4th, Morla opened a capitulation with Napoleon. He and Yriarte, another noble Spaniard, of whom better things had been hoped, came to testify their repentance for the rash part they had undertaken, and to express their sense that the city could in nowise be defended; but, at the same time to state, that the populace and volunteers were resolute in its defence, and that some delay would be necessary, to let their zeal cool, and their fears come to work in their turn.
Buonaparte admitted these deputies to his own presence, and with the audacity which sometimes characterised his language, he read them a lecture on their bad faith,469 in not observing the treaty of Baylen – on their bad faith, in suffering Frenchmen to be assassinated – on their bad faith, in seizing upon the French squadron at Cadiz. This rebuke was gravely urged by the individual, who had kidnapped the royal family of Spain while they courted his protection as his devoted vassals – who had seized the fortresses into which his troops had been received as friends and allies – who had floated the streets of Madrid with the blood of its population – and, finally, who had taken it upon him to assume the supreme authority, and dispose of the crown of Spain, under no better pretext than that he had the will and the power to do so. Had a Spaniard been at liberty to reply to the Lord of Legions, and reckon with him injury for injury, falsehood for falsehood, drop of blood for drop of blood, what an awful balance must have been struck against him!470
In the meantime, those citizens of Madrid who had determined on resistance, began to see that they were deserted by such as should have headed them in the task, and their zeal became cooled under the feelings of dismay and distrust. A military convention was finally concluded, in virtue of which General Belliard took possession of the city, on the 4th of December. The terms were so favourable, as to show that Buonaparte, while pretending to despise the sort of resistance which the population might have effected, was well pleased, nevertheless, not to drive them to extremity. He then published a proclamation, setting forth his desire to be the regenerator of the Spanish empire. But in case his mild and healing mediation should be again refused, he declared he would treat them as a conquered people, and place his brother on another throne. "I will, in that case, set the crown of Spain on my own head, and I shall know how to make it respected; for God," concluded this extraordinary document, "has given me the power and the will to surmount all difficulties."471
VALLADOLID.
There were now two operations which nearly concerned Buonaparte. The first was the dispersion of the remaining troops of Castanos, which had escaped the fatal battle of Tudela, and such other armed bodies as continued to occupy the south of Spain. In this the French had for some time an easy task; for the Spanish soldiers, surprised and incensed at their own disasters, were, in many instances, the assassins of their generals, and the generals had lost all confidence in their mutinous followers. But before pursuing his successes in the south, it was Buonaparte's first resolution to detach a part of the French army upon Portugal, by the way of Talavera, and by occupying Lisbon, intercept the retreat of Sir John Moore and his English army. The advance of the English general to Salamanca interfered with this last design. It seemed to Napoleon, that he did not yet possess forces sufficient at the same time to confront and turn back Sir John Moore, and, on the other hand, to enter Portugal and possess himself of Lisbon. The latter part of the plan was postponed. Placing himself at the head of his Guards, Napoleon, as we have seen, directed his march towards Valladolid, and witnessed the retreat of Sir John Moore. He had the pleasure of beholding with his own eyes the people whom he hated most, and certainly did not fear the least, in full retreat, and was observed scarcely ever to have appeared so gay and joyous as during the pursuit, which the French officers termed the race of Benevente.472 But he had also the less pleasing spectacle of the skirmish, in which the general commanding the cavalry of his Imperial Guard was defeated, and his favourite, General Lefebvre, made prisoner. He halted with his Guards at Astorga, left Ney with 18,000 men to keep the country in subjection, and assigned to Soult the glorious task of pursuing the English and completing their destruction. We have already seen how far he proved able to accomplish his commission.
Meanwhile, the Emperor himself returned to Valladolid, and from thence set off for France with the most precipitate haste. His last act was to declare his brother Joseph generalissimo over the French armies; yet, notwithstanding this mark of trust and confidence, there is reason to believe that Buonaparte repented already his liberality, in assigning to another, though his own brother, an appanage so splendid, and which was likely to cost so much blood and treasure. Something to this purpose broke out in his proclamation to the people of Madrid; and he was more explicit when speaking confidentially to the Abbé de Pradt, whom, in returning from Benevente, the Emperor met at Valladolid.
They were alone; it was a stormy night; and Buonaparte, opening the window from time to time, to ascertain the possibility of travelling, only turned from it to overwhelm Monsieur de Pradt with questions on the state of the capital which he had just left. The abbé did not disguise their disaffection; and when Napoleon endeavoured to show the injustice of their complaints, by insisting on the blessings he had conferred on Spain, by the diminution of tithes, abolishing feudal servitudes, and correcting other abuses of the old government, De Pradt answered by saying, that the Spaniards did not thank Napoleon for relief from evils to which they were insensible; and that the country was in the situation of the wife of Sganarelle in the farce, who quarrelled with a stranger for interfering with her husband when he was beating her. Buonaparte laughed, and continued in these remarkable words: – "I did not know what Spain was. It is a finer country than I was aware, and I have made Joseph a more valuable present than I dreamed of. But you will see, that by and by the Spaniards will commit some folly, which will place their country once more at my disposal. I will then take care to keep it to myself, and divide it into five great viceroyships."473
While the favourite of fortune nourished these plans of engrossing and expanding ambition, the eagerness of his mind seems to have communicated itself to his bodily frame; for, when the weather permitted him to mount on horseback, he is said at once, and without halting, save to change horses, to have performed the journey from Valladolid, to Burgos, being thirty-five Spanish leagues, or about seventy English miles and upwards, in the space of five hours and a half.474
The incredible rapidity with which Napoleon pressed his return to France, without again visiting Madrid, or pausing to hear the fate of the English army, surprised those around him. Some conjectured that a conspiracy had been discovered against his authority at Paris; others, that a band of Spaniards had devoted themselves to assassinate him; a third class assigned different causes; but it was soon found that the despatch which he used had its cause in the approaching rupture with Austria.475
AUSTRIA.
This breach of friendship appears certainly to have been sought by Austria without any of those plausible reasons of complaint, on which nations generally are desirous to bottom their quarrels. She did not allege that, with respect to herself or her dominions, France had, by any recent aggression, given her cause of offence. The Abbé de Pradt remarks upon the occasion, with his usual shrewdness, that if Napoleon was no religious observer of the faith of treaties, it could not be maintained that other states acted much more scrupulously in reference to him. Buonaparte himself has alleged, what, in one sense of the word was true, that many of his wars were, in respect to the immediate causes of quarrel, merely defensive on his side. But this was a natural consequence of the style and structure of his government, which, aiming directly at universal empire, caused him to be looked upon by all nations as a common enemy, the legitimate object of attack whenever he could be attacked with advantage, because he himself neglected no opportunity to advance his pretensions against the independence of Europe.
The singular situation of Great Britain, unassailable by his arms, enabled her to avow this doctrine, and to refuse making peace with Napoleon, on terms how favourable soever for England, unless she were at the same time recognised as having authority to guarantee the security of such states as she had a chance of protecting, if she remained at war. Thus, she refused peace when offered, under the condition that France should have Sicily; and, at the period of which we treat, she had again recently declined the terms of pacification proposed by the overture from Erfurt, which inferred the abandonment of the Spanish cause.
This principle of constant war with Buonaparte, or rather with the progress of his ambition, guided and influenced every state in Europe, which had yet any claim for their independence. Their military disasters, indeed, often prevented their being able to keep the flag of defence flying; but the cessions which they were compelled to make at the moment of defeat, only exasperated their feelings of resentment, and made them watch more eagerly for the period, when their own increasing strength, or the weakness of the common enemy, might enable them to resume the struggle. Napoleon's idea of a peace was, as we have elsewhere seen, that the party with whom he treated should derive no more from the articles agreed upon, than the special provisions expressed in his favour. So long, for instance, as he himself observed all points of the treaty of Presburg, the last which he had dictated to Austria, that power, according to his view of the transaction, had no farther right either of remonstrance or intervention, and was bound to view with indifference whatever changes the French Emperor might please to work on the general state of Europe. This was no doubt a convenient interpretation for one who, aiming at universal monarchy, desired that there should be as little interference as possible with the various steps by which he was to achieve that great plan; but it is entirely contradictory of the interpretation put upon treaties by the jurists; and were the jurists of a contrary opinion, it is in diametrical opposition to the feelings of human nature, by which the policy of states, and the conduct of individuals, are alike dictated. Buonaparte being, as his conduct showed him, engaged in a constant train of innovation upon the liberties of Europe, it followed, that the states whom he had not been able entirely to deprive of independence, should, without farther, or more particularly national cause of war, be perpetually on the watch for opportunities to destroy or diminish his terrible authority. In this point of view, the question for Austria to consider was, not the justice of the war, but its expediency; not her right of resisting the common enemy of the freedom of Europe, but practically, whether she had the means of effectual opposition. The event served to show that Austria had over-estimated her own resources.
It is true, that an opportunity now presented itself, which seemed in the highest degree tempting. Buonaparte was absent in Spain, engaged in a distant conquest, in which, besides the general unpopularity of his cause, obstacles had arisen which were strangers to any previous part of his history, and resistance had been offered of a nature so serious, as to shake the opinion hitherto entertained of his invincibility. On the other hand, Austria had instituted in her states organic laws, by which she secured herself the power of being able to call out to arms her immense and military population; and her chief error seems to have been, in not postponing the fatal struggle until these new levies had acquired a better disciplined and more consolidated form. Of this the Emperor of Russia was fully sensible, and, as we have already noticed, he saw with great apprehension Austria's purpose of opposing herself singly to the arms of France; since, however close the intimacy which, for the present, subsisted betwixt Alexander and Napoleon, it was impossible for the former to be indifferent to the vast risk which Europe must incur, should France finally annihilate the independence of Austria. A series of intrigues, of a very singular nature, was accordingly undertaken at Paris, in the hope of preserving peace. Talleyrand, who, perhaps on Napoleon's own account as well as that of France, was unwilling that another great continental war should arise, was active in endeavouring to discover means by which peace might be preserved.476 In the evening, it was his custom to meet the Counts Metternich and Romanzow at the assemblies of the Prince of Tour and Taxis, and there, totally unknown to Buonaparte, to agitate the means of preventing war; – so certain it is, that even the ablest and most absolute of sovereigns was liable, like an ordinary prince, to be deceived by the statesmen around him. But the ingenuity of these distinguished politicians could find no means of reconciliating the interests of Austria – seeing, as she thought, an opportunity of forcing from Napoleon, in his hour of weakness, what she had been compelled to surrender to him in his hour of strength – and those of Buonaparte, who knew that so soon as he should make a single sacrifice to compulsion, he would be held as having degraded that high military reputation which was the foundation of his power. It may reasonably be supposed, that, with the undecided war of Spain on his hands, he would willingly have adjourned the contest; but with him, the sound of the trumpet was a summons to be complied with, in the most complicated state of general embarrassment.
EXERTIONS OF AUSTRIA.
The exertions made by Austria on this important occasion were gigantic, and her forces were superior to those which she had been able to summon out at any former period of her history. Including the army of reserve, they were computed as high as five hundred and fifty thousand men, which the Archduke Charles once more commanded in the character of generalissimo.477 It is said that this gallant prince did not heartily approve of the war, at least of the period chosen to commence it, but readily sacrificed his own opinion to the desire of contributing his utmost abilities to the service of his brother and of his country.
Six corps d'armée, each about thirty thousand strong, were destined, under the archduke's immediate command, to maintain the principal weight of the war in Germany; a seventh, under the Archduke Ferdinand, was stationed in Galicia, and judged sufficient to oppose themselves to what forces Russia, in compliance with her engagements to Napoleon, might find herself obliged to detach in that direction; and two divisions, under the Archduke John, were destined to awaken hostilities in the north of Italy, into which they were to penetrate by the passes of Carinthia and Carniola.
Buonaparte had not sufficient numbers to oppose these formidable masses; but he had recourse to his old policy, and trusted to make up for deficiency of general numerical force, by such rapidity of movement as should ensure a local superiority on the spot in which the contest might take place.478 He summoned out the auxiliary forces of the Confederation of the Rhine, and of the King of Saxony. He remanded many troops who were on their march for Spain, and by doing so virtually adjourned, and, as it proved, for ever, the subjugation of that country. He had already in Germany the corps of Davoust, and of General Oudinot. The garrisons which France had established in Prussia, and in the northern parts of Germany, were drained for the purpose of reinforcing his ranks; but the total amount of his assembled forces was still greatly inferior to those of the Archduke Charles.479
On the 9th of April, 1809, the archduke crossed the Inn; and thus a second time Austria commenced her combat with France, by the invasion of Germany. Some confidence was placed in the general discontent which prevailed among the Germans, and especially those of the Confederation of the Rhine, and their hatred of a system which made them on every occasion the instruments of French policy. The archduke averred in his manifesto, that the cause of his brother was that of general independence, not individual aggrandisement; and he addressed himself particularly to those his brothers of Germany, who were now compelled by circumstances to serve in the opposite ranks. Whatever effects might have been produced by such an address, supposing it to have had time to operate, the result was disconcerted by the promptitude, which with Buonaparte was almost always the harbinger of success.
While the Austrian army moved slow, and with frequent halts, encumbered as they were with their baggage and supplies, Napoleon had no sooner learned by the telegraph the actual invasion of Bavaria, than he left Paris on the instant, [11th April,] and hurried to Frankfort; without guards, without equipage, almost without a companion, save the faithful Josephine, who accompanied him as far as Strasbourg, and there remained for some time watching the progress of the campaign, the event of which was destined to have such a melancholy influence on her own happiness.
The Archduke Charles's plan was to act upon the offensive. His talents were undoubted, his army greatly superior in numbers to the French, and favourably disposed, whether for attack or defence; yet, by a series of combinations, the most beautiful and striking, perhaps, which occur in the life of one so famed for his power of forming such, Buonaparte was enabled, in the short space of five days, totally to defeat the formidable masses which were opposed to him.
ACTION OF ABENSBERG.
20th April.
Napoleon found his own force unfavourably disposed, on a long line, extending between the towns of Augsburg and Ratisbon, and presenting, through the incapacity it is said of Berthier, an alarming vacancy in the centre, by operating on which the enemy might have separated the French army into two parts, and exposed each to a flank attack.480 Sensible of the full, and perhaps fatal consequences, which might attend this error, Napoleon determined on the daring attempt to concentrate his army by a lateral march, to be accomplished by the two wings simultaneously. With this view he posted himself in the centre, where the danger was principally apprehended, commanding Massena to advance by a flank movement from Augsburg to Pfaffenhofen, and Davoust to approach the centre by a similar manœuvre from Ratisbon to Neustadt. These marches must necessarily be forced, that of Davoust being eight, that of Massena betwixt twelve and thirteen leagues. The order for this daring operation was sent to Massena on the night of the 17th, and concluded with an earnest recommendation of speed and intelligence. When the time for executing these movements had been allowed, Buonaparte, at the head of the centre of his forces, made a sudden and desperate assault upon two Austrian divisions, commanded by the Archduke Louis and General Hiller. So judiciously was this timed, that the appearance of Davoust on the one flank kept in check those other Austrian corps d'armée, by whom the divisions attacked ought to have been supported; while the yet more formidable operations of Massena, in the rear of the Archduke Louis, achieved the defeat of the enemy. This victory, gained at Abensberg upon the 20th April, broke the line of the Austrians, and exposed them to farther misfortunes.481 The Emperor attacked the fugitives the next day at Landshut, where the Austrians lost thirty pieces of cannon, nine thousand prisoners, and much ammunition and baggage.482
On the 22d April, after this fortunate commencement of the campaign, Buonaparte directed his whole force, scientifically arranged into different divisions, and moving by different routes, on the principal army of the Archduke Charles, which, during these misfortunes, he had concentrated at Eckmühl. The battle is said to have been one of the most splendid which the art of war could display. An hundred thousand men and upwards were dispossessed of all their positions by the combined attack of their scientific enemy, the divisions appearing on the field, each in its due place and order, as regularly as the movements of the various pieces in a game of chess. All the Austrian wounded, great part of their artillery, fifteen stand of colours, and 20,000 prisoners, remained in the power of the French.483 The retreat was attended with corresponding loss; and Austria, again baffled in her hopes of reacquiring her influence in Germany, was once more reduced to combat for her existence amongst nations.
On the subsequent day, the Austrians made some attempt to protect the retreat of their army, by defending Ratisbon. A partial breach in the ancient walls was hastily effected, but for some time the French who advanced to the storm, were destroyed by the musketry of the defenders. There was at length difficulty in finding volunteers to renew the attack, when the impetuous Lannes, by whom they were commanded, seized a ladder, and rushed forward to fix it himself against the walls. "I will show you," he exclaimed, "that your general is still a grenadier." The example prevailed, the wall was surmounted, and the combat was continued or renewed in the streets of the town, which was speedily on fire. A body of French, rushing to charge a body of Austrians, which still occupied one end of a burning street, were interrupted by some waggons belonging to the enemy's train. "They are tumbrils of powder," cried the Austrian commanding, to the French; "if the flames reach them, both sides perish." The combat ceased, and the two parties joined in averting a calamity which must have been fatal to both, and finally, saved the ammunition from the flames. At length the Austrians were driven out of Ratisbon, leaving much cannon, baggage, and prisoners, in the hands of the enemy.484
In the middle of this last mêlée, Buonaparte, who was speaking with his adjutant, Duroc, observing the affair at some distance, was struck on the toe of the left foot by a spent musket-ball, which occasioned a severe contusion. "That must have been a Tyrolese," said the Emperor coolly; "who has aimed at me from such a distance. These fellows fire with wonderful precision." Those around remonstrated with him for exposing his person; to which he answered, "What can I do? I must needs see how matters go on." The soldiers crowded about him in alarm at the report of his wound; but he would hardly allow it to be dressed, so eager was he to get on horseback and put an end to the solicitude of his army, by showing himself publicly among the troops.485