r number of men
than was necessary for his Portuguese invasion, and turned them against
the Spaniards, many of whose most important forts had been taken by the
French soldiers through treachery as well as by stratagem. When the
conquest of Spain was ended Napoleon placed his brother, Joseph, on the
Spanish throne.

Austria, however, was preparing for another struggle against Napoleon.
Though continually defeated by the French, the Austrians lost no chance
of turning on them or taking any opportunity that might bring success
against the victorious soldiers of Napoleon. But this only brought upon
the Austrians the further defeat of Wagram and the loss of additional
territory to Napoleon.

But now fortune began to go against the brilliant soldier who had
seldom lost a battle and practically never had been defeated. The
Russians did not like the alliance with France that had been imposed
upon them at Tilsit and in spite of the Czar's vows of friendship were
ready to turn against Napoleon on the first opportunity. In fact the
Czar had become directly angered at Napoleon for the following reason.

Although Napoleon had made himself Emperor there was no heir to the
French throne. As it seemed that Josephine would remain childless,
Napoleon conceived the plan of divorcing her and marrying some high
born lady whose alliance with him would strengthen the bonds between
her country and that of the French. He had negotiated with the Russian
Czar for the hand of a Russian princess, but before the arrangements
had been completed he married an Austrian duchess named Marie Louise.

This turned Russia into the scale against Napoleon, who had already
dealt with the Russians in a high handed manner. So the Czar entered
into a close alliance with England against the conqueror.

Then Napoleon made the greatest mistake of all his brilliant career.
With all Europe in unrest against him, he nevertheless conceived the
plan of invading Russia and raised a great army for this purpose.
Russia was and is one of the most difficult countries in all Europe in
which to carry on a military invasion. The country is so cold and
barren and the distances are so great that any invading army has great
difficulty in transporting its supplies and marching the required
distances. Napoleon had almost always relied for his supplies on the
countries he had conquered and believed that it was always possible for
large armies to subsist on forage and the supplies