Nevertheless, the insult rankled deep in his being, there
to be nursed for five years, and then in the fullness of time to dart
forth with a snake-like revenge. In 1814 and 1815 men saw that not the
least serious result of Napoleon's Spanish policy was the envenoming
of his relations with the two cleverest of living Frenchmen.

NOTE TO THE THIRD EDITION.--In the foregoing narrative, describing the
battle of the Somosierra, I followed the usually accepted account,
which assigns the victory solely to the credit of the Polish horsemen.
But Mr. Oman has shown ("History of the Peninsular War," vol. i., pp.
459-461) that their first charge failed, and that only when a brigade
of French infantry skirmished right up to the crest, did a second
effort of the Poles, supported by cavalry of the Guard, secure the
pass. Napier's description (vol. i., p. 267), based on the French
bulletin, is incorrect.

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXX

NAPOLEON AND AUSTRIA

"Never maltreat an enemy by halves": such was the sage advice of
Prussia's warrior King Frederick the Great, who instinctively saw the
folly of half measures in dealing with a formidable foe. The only
statesmanlike alternatives were, to win his friendship by generous
treatment, or to crush him to the earth so that he could not rise to
deal another blow.

As we have seen, Napoleon deliberately took the perilous middle course
with the Hapsburgs after Austerlitz. He tore away from them their
faithful Tyrolese along with all their Swabian lands, and he half
crippled them in Italy by leaving them the line of the Adige instead
of the Mincio. Later on, he compelled Austria to join the Continental
System, to the detriment of her commerce and revenue; and his thinly
veiled threats at Erfurt nerved her to strike home as soon as she saw
him embarked on the Spanish enterprise. She had some grounds for
confidence. The blows showered on the Hapsburg States had served to
weld them more closely together; reforms effected in the
administration under the guidance of the able and high-spirited
minister, Stadion, promised to reinvigorate the whole Empire; and army
reforms, championed by the Archduke Charles, had shelved the petted
incapables of the Court and opened up undreamt-of vistas of hope even
to the common soldier. Moreover, it was certain that the Tyrolese
would revolt against the cast-iron Liberalism now imposed on them from
Munich, which interfered w