e of power
among the chief States."[289] Such was the secret aim of Austria's
mediation. Obviously, it gave her many advantages. While posing as
mediator, she could claim her share in the territorial redistribution
which must accompany the peace. The blessing awarded to the peacemaker
must be tangible and immediate.

Napoleon's reply to the ambassador was carefully guarded. War was not
to his interest. It would cost more blood than the Moscow campaign.
The great hindrance to any settlement would be England. Russia also
seemed disposed to a fight _a outrance_; but if the Czar wanted peace,
it was for him, not for France, to take the initiative: "I cannot take
the initiative: that would be like capitulating as if I were in a
fort: it is for the others to send me their proposals." And he
expressed his resolve to accept no disadvantageous terms in these
notable words: "If I concluded a dishonourable peace, it would be my
overthrow. I am a new man; I must pay the more heed to public opinion,
because I stand in need of it. The French have lively imaginations:
they love fame and excitement, and are nervous. Do you know the prime
cause of the fall of the Bourbons? It dates from Rossbach." Benevolent
assurances as to Napoleon's desire for peace and for the assembly of a
Congress were all that Schwarzenberg could gain; and his mission was
barren of result, except to increase suspicions on both sides.

In fact, Napoleon was playing his cards at Vienna. He had sent Count
Narbonne thither on a special mission, the purport of which stands
revealed in the envoy's "verbal note" of April 7th. In that note
Austria was pressed to help France with 100,000 men, against Russia
and Prussia, in case they should open hostilities; her reward was to
be the rich province of Silesia. As for the rest of Prussia, two
millions of that people were to be assigned to Saxony, Frederick
William being thrust to the east of the lower Vistula, and left with
one million subjects.[290] Such was the glittering prize dangled
before Metternich. But even the prospect of regaining the province
torn away by the great Frederick moved him not. He judged the
establishment of equilibrium in Europe to be preferable to a mean
triumph over Prussia. To her and to the Czar he had secretly held out
hopes of succour in case Napoleon should prove intractable: and to
this course of action he still clung. True, he trampled on _la petite
morale_ in neglecting to aid his nominal a