fifty thousand men beyond the Pyrenees, ready to move at the moment of his arrival.

October 25, after his return from Germany, the Emperor pronounced a speech at the opening of his legislative chambers; and the embarrassment of his true position was evident under the words in which he covered it.

"Russia and Denmark," he said, "have united with me against England. The United States have preferred to renounce commerce and the sea rather than recognize their slavery. A part of my army marches against those that England has formed or disembarked in Spain. It is a special benefit of that Providence which has constantly protected our arms, that passion has so blinded English councils as to make them renounce the protection of the sea and at last present their armies on the Continent. I depart in a few days to place myself at the head of my army, and with God's aid to crown the King of Spain in Madrid, and plant my eagles on the forts of Lisbon."

He left Paris October 29, and ten days later, November 9, began the campaign which still attracts the admiration of military critics, but which did not result in planting his eagles on the forts of Lisbon. "To my great astonishment," he afterward said,1 “I had to fight the battles of Tudela, Espinosa, Burgos, and Somo Sierra, to gain Madrid, which, in spite of my victories, refused me admission during two days." After disposing in rapid succession of all the Spanish armies, he occupied Madrid December 4, and found 1 Correspondance de Napoléon, xxxii. 366.

himself at the end of his campaign. The conquest of Lisbon and Cadiz required more time, and led to less military result than suited his objects. At that moment he learned that an English army under Sir John Moore had ventured to march from Portugal into the north of Spain, and had already advanced so far toward Burgos as to make their capture possible. The destruction of an English army, however small, offered Napoleon the triumph he wanted. Rapidly collecting his forces, he hurried across the Guadarrama Mountains to cut off Moore's retreat; but for once he was out-generalled. Sir John Moore not only saved his own army, but also led the French a long and exhausting chase to the extreme northwestern shore of Spain, where the British fleet carried Moore's army out of their reach.

Napoleon would not have been the genius he was had he wasted his energies in following Moore to Corunna, or in trying to plant his eagles on the forts of Lisbon or Cadiz. A year earlier, Lisbon and Cadiz had been central points of his scheme; but in December, 1808, they were worth to him little more than any other seaports without fleets or colonies. For Spain and Portugal Napoleon showed that he had no further use. The moment he saw that Moore had escaped, which became clear when the Emperor reached Astorga, Jan. 2, 1809, throwing upon Soult the task of marching one hundred and fifty miles to Corunna after Moore and the British army, Napoleon

stopped short, turned about, and with rapidity unusual even for him, quitted Spain forever. "The

affairs of Spain are finished,” he wrote January 16; although Joseph had the best reason to know and much cause to tell how his brother left nothing finished in Spain. "The circumstances of Europe oblige me to go for three weeks to Paris," he wrote to Joseph early in the morning of January 15; "if nothing prevents, I shall be back again before the end of February.' With characteristic mixture of harshness and tenderness toward his elder brother, he wrote at noon the same day another account, equally deceptive, of his motives and intentions:

"You must say everywhere, and make the army believe, that I shall return in three or four weeks. In fact, my mere presence at Paris will make Austria shrink back to her nullity; and then, before the end of October, I will be back here. I shall be in Paris in five days. I shall go at full speed, day and night, as far as Bordeaux. Meanwhile everything will go on quieting itself in Spain." 8

Giving out that the conduct of Austria required his presence at Paris, he succeeded in imposing this fiction upon Europe by the empire of his will. Europe accepted the fable, which became history; but although the Emperor soon disposed of Austria, and

1 Napoleon to Jerome, 16 Janvier, 1809; Correspondance, xviii. 237.

although Spain was a more difficult problem than Austria ever was, Napoleon never kept his word to Joseph, and never again ventured within sight of the mistakes he could no longer correct.

Meanwhile Armstrong, disgusted with the disappointments and annoyances of his residence at Paris, had become anxious to escape without further loss of credit. His letters to Madison, published by Congress, returned to terrify his French acquaintance, and to close his sources of information. He could see no hope of further usefulness.. As early as Oct. 25, 1808, when the Emperor was addressing his legislative chambers before setting out for Spain, Armstrong wrote to Madison that no good could come from keeping an American minister at Paris.1 Yet in the enforced idleness of the month when Napoleon was in Spain, Armstrong found one ally whose aid was well worth seeking. After the Czar Alexander accepted, at Tilsit, the ascendency of Napoleon, he appointed as his minister of foreign relations the Count Nicholas Roumanzoff. The Czar was still a young man in his thirty-first year, while Roumanzoff, fifty-four years old, had the full powers of maturity. Together they shaped a Russian policy, in the traditional direction of Russian interests, founded upon jealousy of British maritime tyranny. Lord Howick's and Spencer Perceval's Orders in Council served to sharpen Russian as well as American antipathies, and

1 Armstrong to Madison, Oct. 25, 1808; MSS. State Department Archives.

brought the two distant nations into a sympathy which was certainly not deep, but which England had reason to fear. In the autumn of 1808 Count Roumanzoff came to Paris to arrange with Champagny the details of their joint diplomacy; and at the same time, in the month of November, William Short arrived in Paris secretly accredited as minister plenipotentiary at St. Petersburg, but waiting confirmation by the Senate before going to his post. When Armstrong told Roumanzoff that an American minister would soon be on his way to St. Petersburg, the count was highly pleased, and promised at once to send a full minister to replace André Daschkoff, the chargé at Washington. "Ever since I came into office," he said to Armstrong, "I have been desirous of producing this effect; for in dissolving our commercial connections with Great Britain it became necessary to seek some other power in whom we might find a substitute; and on looking round I could see none but the United States who were at all competent to this object." So far as concerned England, the alliance promised great advantages; but Armstrong's chief anxiety affected France, and when he attempted to enlist Roumanzoff in resistance to Napoleon's robberies, he found no encouragement. Roumanzoff had already tried his influence with Napoleon on behalf of the Danes, who wanted compensation for their plundered commerce. "Give

1

1

Armstrong to Madison, Nov. 24, 1808; MSS. State Department Archives.