that: but Hardenberg
yielded up to Haugwitz the guidance of foreign affairs, and was
granted unlimited leave of absence.

Popular feeling was deeply moved by this craven compliance with French
behests. The officers of the Berlin garrison serenaded the patriotic
statesman, while Haugwitz twice had his windows smashed. Public
opinion, it is true, counted for little in Prussia. The rigorous
separation of classes, the absence of popular education, the complete
subjection of the journals to Government, and the mutual jealousy of
soldiers and civilians, prevented any general expression of opinion in
that almost feudal society.

But when the people of Ansbach piteously begged not to be handed over
to Bavaria, and forthwith saw their land occupied by the French before
Prussia had ratified the cession of that principality; when the North
Germans found that the gain of Hanover by Prussia was at the price of
war with England and the ruin of their commerce; when it was seen that
Frederick William and Haugwitz had clipped the wings of the Prussian
eagle till it shunned a fight with the Gallic cock, a feeling of shame
and indignation arose which proved that the limits of endurance had
been reached. Observers saw that, after all, the old German feeling
was not dead; it was only torpid; and forces were beginning to work
which threatened ruin to the Hohenzollerns if they again tarnished the
national honour.[77]

Meanwhile the first overtures for peace were exchanged between Paris,
London, and St. Petersburg. In the spring of 1806 there seemed some
ground for hope that Europe might find repose, at least on land, after
fourteen years of almost constant war. France was no longer
Jacobinical. Under Napoleon she had quickly fallen into line with the
monarchical States, and the questions now at stake merely related to
boundaries and the balance of power. The bellicose ardour of the Czar
had melted away at Austerlitz. The seizure of Hanover by Prussia moved
him but little, and he sought to compose the resulting strife. As for
the other Powers, they were either helpless or torpid. The King of
Sweden was venting his spleen upon Prussia. Italy, South Germany,
Holland, and Spain were at Napoleon's beck; and the policy of England
under the new Grenville-Fox Ministry inclined strongly towards peace.
There seemed, then, every chance of founding the supremacy of France
upon lasting foundations, if the claims of Britain and Austria
received reasona