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My troops are at Madrid, Barcelona, Figué ras, Pampeluna, St. Sebastian, and Burgos: the Spanish army is not formidable. The country is in a state of ferment. The Grand Duke of Berg [Murat] and Marshal Moncey are at Madrid. General Dupont is at Toledo, and Marshal Bessières at Burgos. I have nearly a hundred thousand men here in provisional regiments. They improve every day by exercise and training: they are all big lads, twenty years old, and I have reason to be satisfied with them. These corps have not been increased by a single man belonging to my grand army, either in cavalry, infantry, or artillery. Up to the present time, all my army in Spain is at my expense, and costs me enormous sums." "It is not impossible that in the course of five or six days I may write to desire you to repair to Bayonne. [This was the first hint to Joseph that he might have to exchange the Neapolitan for the Spanish crown.] You will leave Marshal Jourdan in command of your army, and appoint whomsoever you like regent of your kingdom. Your wife should remain at Naples. Up to the present time, however, all is still uncertain.

The result was announced on the 11th of May, as follows:

"King Charles, by his treaty with me, surrenders to me all his rights to the crown of Spain. The prince has already renounced his pretended title of king, the abdication of King Charles in his favor having been involuntary. The nation, through the Supreme Council of Castile, asks me for a king; I destine this crown for you. Spain is a very different thing from Naples: it contains eleven millions of inhabitants, and has more than a hundred and fifty millions of revenue, without counting the Indies and the immense revenue to be derived from them. It is, besides, a throne which places you at Madrid, at three days' journey from France. At Madrid, you are in France; Naples is the end of the world. I wish you, therefore, immediately after the receipt of this letter, to appoint whom you please regent, and to come to Bayonne by way of Turin, Mount Cénis, and Lyons. You will receive this letter on the 19th, you will start on the 20th, and you will be here on the 1st of June. Before you go, leave instructions with Marshal Jourdan as to the disposition of your troops, and make arrangements as if you were to be absent only to the 1st of July. Be secret, however; your journey will probably excite only too much suspicion; but you will say that you are going to the north of Italy, to confer with me on important matters."

The obsequious and accommodating Joseph, finding his position at Naples by no means agreeable, and hoping to renew at Madrid, under more favorable auspices, his dream of being a good and popular king, hastened to obey this peremptory summons. But he speedily found that he had only jumped from the frying-pan into the fire. The Spanish people rose in insurrection against him, and within nine days after he entered Spain, while on his way to

Madrid, he wrote to Napoleon, still at Bayonne, the following piteous letter:

"July 18th, 1808.-Sire-It appears to me that no one has told your majesty the whole truth. I will not conceal it, Our undertaking is a very great one; to get out of it with honor, requires vast means. I do not see double from fear. When I left Naples I saw the risks before me, and I now say to myself every day, 'My life is nothing, I give it to you.' But if I am to live without the shame of failure, I must be supplied largely with men and money. Then the kindness of my nature may make me popular. Now, while all is doubtful, kindness looks like timidity, and I try to conceal mine. To get quickly through this task, so hateful to a sovereign, to prevent further insurrections, to have less blood to shed, and fewer tears to dry, enormous force must be employed. Whatever be the result in Spain, its king must lament; for, if he conquers, it will be by force; but as the die is cast, the struggle should be cut short. My position does not frighten me; but it is one in which a king never was before."

It was in vain that Napoleon insisted that Joseph had a great many partisans in Spain "all the honest people, but they fear to come forward."

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"The honest people," wrote Joseph from Madrid (July 24th), are as little on my side as the rogues are. No, Sire, you are deceived. Your glory will be shipwrecked in Spain. My tomb will be a monument of your want of power to support me; for no one will suspect you of want of will. This will happen, for I am resolved under no circumstances to recross the Ebro.

"Yet, fifty thousand good troops and fifty millions, sent before the end of three months, might set things right. The recall of five or six of your generals; sending hither Jourdan and Maurice Mathieu, who are honest men; on your part, absolute confidence in mo; on my part, absolute power over the officers who misconduct themselves-the union of all this alone can save the country and the army."

Napoleon was willing enough to furnish men and money; but to give up the entire management of the matter to Joseph was the very last thing in his thoughts or intentions. Joseph had asked for a censure on Caulaincourt, because, in cold blood, he had arranged the pillage of the churches and houses of Cuenza, which had operated, as he alleged, to increase the general exasperation. Napoleon's reply was (July 31):

"Caulaincourt did what was perfectly right at Cuenza. The city was pillaged: this is one of the rights of war, since it was captured while the defendants were still in arms.'

Joseph had actually fled from Madrid (on the 24th of July), after only eight days' residence there, retiring to the left bank of the Ebro, in spite of his heroic protestations against ever recrossing

that river. Napoleon, evidently afraid that his gentle-minded brother would break down, and anticipating what had happened, though he was not yet informed of it, wrote from Bordeaux (Aug. 1st):

"Whatever reverses fortune may have in store for you, do not be uneasy; in a short time you will have more than a hundred thousand men. All is in motion; but it must have time. You will reign; you will have conquered your subjects, in order to become their father. The best kings have passed through this school. [The allusion was, probably, to Henry IV.] My orders were given more than three weeks ago. Health to you and happiness; that is to say, strength of mind."

And again, Aug. 3d:

"Tell me that you are well, and in good spirits, and are becoming accustomed to the soldier's trade. You have a fine opportunity to study it. I have written to tell the queen [Joseph's wife] to go to Paris."

It had, indeed, become evident that neither the boy conscripts, of whom the French armies in Spain were chiefly made up, nor yet the generals who commanded them, were sufficient for the existing emergency. Napoleon resolved to go thither himself, at the head of the grand army. But that army had to be brought from Germany; and, to secure himself in that quarter against an attack by Russia, Napoleon was obliged to yield up to the Czar, by a new negotiation, Finland, and the unlimited privilege of acquiring territory from Turkey-thus largely contributing to an aggrandizement of Russia, which it has lately cost so much blood and money to curtail within safe and reasonable limits. Previous to setting out for the Congress of Erfurth with the Emperor of Russia, in which these matters were arranged, Napoleon wrote very detailed letters for the management of his armies in Spain, with sharp criticisms on the mistakes committed there by Joseph and the marshals. His method of replying to the complaints and remonstrances of Joseph, who already despaired of the Spanish crown, and begged to be allowed to return to Naples-which, however, Napoleon presently bestowed on his brother-in-law, Murat-may be judged of from the following letter:

"St. Cloud, Sept. 17, 1808. My brother, I shall not answer your last letter, in which you appear to me to be out of humor. I have observed this rule with you for a long time past. You have too much sense not to be aware that this is the only course open to me,

when you write in such terms. Nor shall I ever discuss the past with you, unless you ask me to do so for your particular benefit. and to serve you as a rule for the future. As long as you are convinced that everything has been done by you in the best possible way, I ought to leave you in this belief and not tease you, since the past can never be remedied."

It is to be observed, however, that, though Napoleon laid down this judicious rule, he did by no means adhere to it very strictly, and that poor Joseph was obliged to listen to a good many pretty unpalatable comments, similar to those we have already given in the case of Naples, on his conduct of Spanish affairs, both civil and military.

At length, on November 3rd, 1808, Napoleon himself entered Spain. He found things in a very bad way for the French, Junot's army of Portugal having capitulated to the English, and Dupont's to the Spaniards; but in the course of six or seven weeks that he remained in Spain, he succeeded in dispersing most of the Spanish insurgent armies, in driving away the English under Sir John Moore, and in re-establishing Joseph at Madrid. As to his first proceedings in that city, Napoleon wrote to him as follows:

"Valladolid, Jan. 12th, 1809. You must hang at Madrid a score of the worst characters. To-morrow I intend to have hanged here seven, notorious for their excesses. They have been secretly denounced to me by respectable per sons, whom their existence disturbed, and who will recover their spirits when they are got rid of. If Madrid is not delivered of at least one hundred of these fire-brands, you will be able to do nothing. Out of this hundred hang or shoot twelve or fifteen, and send the rest to France to the galleys. I had no peace in France, I could not restore confidence to the respectable portion of the community, until I had arrested two hundred fire-brand assassins of September, and sent them to the colonies. From that time the spirit of the capital changed, as if by the waving of a wand."

The act which Napoleon thus stimulated Joseph to imitate was one of his own worse crimes. He had taken advantage of the excitement produced in Paris, by the explosion of the infernal machine, near the end of the year 1800, by which it was attempted to kill him while on his way to the opera, to arrest and, without trial, to transport to the deadly shores of Cayenne, by a mere act of tyrannical power, a hundred and sixty of the leaders of the republican party. The only fault of many of these victims was, having been members of the National Convention, or of the Commune of Paris, and being reputed still

being settled enough to allow his family to join him at Madrid.

The following letter of Joseph's, written about a month after his re-entry into Madrid, exhibits but a painful picture of the position in which he found himself there :

to entertain their original democratic opinions, while there was not one of them who was proved, or even really suspected of having had anything to do with the infernal machine. Indeed, that attempt upon Napoleon's life was shortly after distinctly fixed upon certain partisans of the Bourbons, who were duly punished; notwithstanding which the republican exiles were left to perish in the swamps of Cayenne. The Rev. John C. S. Abbott, according to his characteristic method of whitewashing his hero, informs us, in his so-called Life of Napoleon, that "the decree was passed; but Napoleon, strong in popularity, became so convinced of the powerlessness and insignificance of those Jacobins, that the decree was never enforced against them. They remained in France, but they were conscious that the eye of the police was upon them." Napoleon himself says, on the other hand, that they were sent to the colonies, and boasts of it as a great act of political wisdom, which Joseph ought to imitate-and as to this matter we are induced to regard Napo- 1 were more severe, and left them to the judg

leon, though at times quite a match at telling a story for the Rev. John C. S. Abbott himself, as, on the whole, the better authority.

Three days after, Napoleon, by a natural transition from murder to robbery, wrote as follows:

"Denon is anxious for some pictures; I wish you to seize all that you can find in the confiscated houses and suppressed convents, and to make me a present of fifty chefs d'œuvre, which I want for the museum in Paris. At some future time I will give you others in their places. Consult Denon for this purpose. You are aware that I want only what is really good, and it is supposed that you are richly provided."

Soon after Napoleon's return to Paris, he wrote (Jan. 28th, 1809):

"The suppression of your apanage was part of a general measure; remarks were made about it, and I did not choose it to appear in the accounts, but you need not be in the least uneasy."

This referred to a pension of 1,500,000 francs, which Joseph enjoyed as a French prince. The suppression of it "in the accounts" affords a curious instance of Napoleon's susceptibility to public opinion. It continued, however, to be paid in fact, and constituted the fund upon which Joseph's wife and daughters lived in Paris, the condition of Spain, so long as Joseph remained in it, never

"Feb. 19th, 1809. Sire,-It grieves me to infer from your letter of the 6th of February, that, with respect to the affairs at Madrid, you listen to persons who are interested in deceiving you. [Napoleon had written, "I am sorry that you are changing the system of govern ment at Madrid, and becoming too indulgent."] I have not your entire confidenco, and yet without it my position is not tenable. I shall not repeat all that I have frequently written on the state of the finances. I devote to business all my faculties, from seven in the morning till eleven at night. I have not a farthing to give to anybody. I am in the fourth year of my reign [that is, since he had first been made king of Naples], and my guards are still wearing the same coats which I gave them four years ago. All complaints are addressed to me; all prejudices are opposed to me. I have no real power beyond Madrid, and even at Madrid I am every day counteracted by people who grieve that things are not managed according to their own system. They accuse me of being too mild; they would become infamous if

ment of the tribunals.

"You thought proper to sequester the property of ten families; more than twice that number have been thus treated. Officers are in possession of every habitable house; two thousand servants belonging to the sequestered families have been turned into the streets. All beg; the boldest try to rob and to assassinate my officers. All those who, with me, sacrificed their position in the kingdom of Naples, are still billeted on the inhabitants. Without any capital, without any revenue, without any money, what am I to do? This picture, dark as it is, is not exaggerated. I am not dismayed; I shall surmount these difficulties. Heaven has given to me qualities which will enable me to triumph over obstacles and enemies; but what Heaven has not given me, is a temper capable of bearing the opposition and the insults of those who ought to serve me, and, above all, a temper capable of enduring the displeasure of one whom I have too much loved to be able ever to hate him.

"If, then, sire, my whole life does not entitle me to your perfect confidence, if you think it necessary to surround me by poor creatures who make me blush for myself, if I must be insulted even in my own capital, if I am denied the right of naming the governors and commanders who are always before me, and make me contemptible to the Spaniards, and powerless to do good; if, instead of judg ing me by results, you put me on my trial in every detail-under such circumstances, sire, I have no alternative. I am king of Spain only through the force of your arms-I might be so through the love of the Spanish people; but, for that purpose, I must govern them in my own way. 1 have often heard you say, every animal has its instinct and ought to follow it. I will be such a king as the brother and friend of your majesty ought to

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April following, there is no allusion in this correspondence.

By a decree of Napoleon's, of the 8th of February, 1810, Čatalonia, Aragon, Navarre, Biscay, Burgos, and Valladolid, with Placencia and Toros-thus including the whole north of Spain, all of it, indeed, except the district round Madrid, of which the French had possession-were created into as many governments, under the absolute control, civil as well as military, of six French generals who corresponded directly with Napoleon, and were virtually independent of Joseph.

In Napoleon's letter to Berthier, directing this decree to be communicated to Joseph, he says:

"I intend the administration of the conquered provinces to be in future in the hands of the military commandants, in order that all their resources may be applied to the maintenance of the army. In future I shall be able to send only two millions a month to pay the troops which surround Madrid, and which form the nucleus of the army."

Soult, the commander of that army, had on foot an expedition against Andalusia, with the view of besieging and taking Cadiz, while Massena, placed soon after at the head of the army of Portugal, gradually drove back Wellington, and finally compelled him to retire behind the famous lines of Torres Vedras, near Lisbon.

Of the orders given to these independent commanders, the following letter from Berthier to Suchet, who commanded in Aragon, may serve as a specimen. Some care is taken to avoid touching Joseph's pride unnecessarily, but the orders are peremptory.

"Rambouillet, Feb. 224, 1810. The emper or wishes that Aragon, which is placed in a state of siege, should communicate as little as possible with Madrid. Placing this province in a state of siege gives you absolute authority, and it is your duty to apply all its resources to the pay, the food, and the clothing of your army. If the king [Joseph), as commander-inchief of the armies of Spain. should give you any orders affecting your administration, then and then only you will declare, that, as Aragon has been placed in a state of siege, your army receives its orders only from the emperor. You must feel, M. le Comte, that this declaration is to be made only in the case of absolute necessity; his majesty relies on your prudence, on your devotion to his person, and on your attachment to the French empire. This communication, M. le Comte, is between you and me alone."

These flimsy and transparent precautions could not, however, prevent the sensitive Joseph from understanding VOL. VII. 40

his position; and he thus expressed himself on the subject, in a letter to his wife, who remained at Paris with their two daughters. In a former letter to Napoleon he had scorned the idea of having an advocate with him; but since his direct business correspondence with his brother was interrupted, he appears to have employed in that character Julie, always a favorite with Napoleon.

"Cordova. April 12th, 1810.

Ma chere

amie-M. Deslandes will explain to you my position, and will tell you how necessary it is that it should end, and that I should know what are the real feelings of the emperor towards me. As far as I can judge from the facts, they are unfavorable, and yet I cannot account for them. What does he want with Spain and with me? Let him once announce to me his will, and I should no longer be placed between what I appear to be and what I really am, in a country in which unresisting provinces are given up to the discretion of the generals, who tax them as they like, and are ordered not to attend to me. If the emperor wishes to disgust me with Spain, I wish for nothing but to retire immediately. I am satisfied with having twice tried the experiment of being a king, I do not wish to continue it. I wish either to buy an estate in France far from Paris and to live there quietly, or to be treated as a king and a brother.

"If the emperor has been irritated against me by mischief-makers, by the persons who calumniated me to the Spanish people (and became thus, indeed, did me good when known), and if you cannot make him see the truth. I repeat that I must retire. I beg you, therefore, to prepare for me the means of liv ing independently in retirement and of being just to those who serve me well. I embrace you and Zenaide and Charlotte."

It does not appear that Julie was able to obtain any explanations; while the letters that follow from Napoleon, concerning the orders to be sent to Spain, abound with sharp censures upon Joseph for presuming to intermeddle with the disposal of the British goods seized and confiscated in Andalusia, which Napoleon required to go exclusively to the pay of his soldiers; for persisting in the policy which he had adopted at Naples, of enlisting native regiments; for paying civilians in preference to soldiers; and for not levying contributions on Seville, Malaga, and "all those fine countries," for the pay of the army employed in the siege of Cadiz, which had fallen nine months in arrear. pay this army, Napoleon sent on three millions under a special escort, with express orders to carry it untouched to its destination; no money to be subtracted from it, not even at Madrid.

To

The rumors which reached Joseph that Soult was to be appointed to a

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