he crisis which his affairs had
reached. Berthier, and indeed almost all the generals on whose opinions
he had been accustomed to place reliance, concurred in pressing him
either to make peace on the terms proposed, or to draw in his garrisons
on the Oder and Elbe, whereby he would strengthen his army with 50,000
veterans, and retire to the Rhine. There, they said, with such a force
assembled on such a river, and with all the resources of France behind
him, he might bid defiance to the united armies of Europe, and, at
worst, obtain a peace that would leave him in secure tenure of a nobler
dominion than any of the kings, his predecessors, had ever hoped to
possess. _Ten battles lost_, said he, _would not sink me lower than you
would have me to place myself by my own voluntary act; but one battle
gained enables me to seize Berlin and Breslau, and make peace on terms
compatible with my glory._ He proceeded to insult both ministers and
generals by insinuations that they were actuated by selfish motives;
complained haughtily that they seemed disposed to draw distinctions
between the country and the sovereign; and ended by announcing that he
did not wish for any plans of theirs, but their service in the execution
of his.

Thus blinded by arrogance and self-confidence, and incapable of weighing
any other considerations against what he considered as the essence of
his personal glory, Napoleon refused to abate one iota of his
pretensions--until it was too late. Then, indeed, whether more accurate
intelligence from Spain had reached him, or the accounts of those who
had been watching the unremitting preparations of the allies in his
neighbourhood, had at length found due weight--then, indeed, he did show
some symptoms of concession. A courier arrived at Prague with a note, in
which he signified his willingness to accede to a considerable number of
the Austrian stipulations. But this was on the 11th of August. The day
preceding was that on which, by the agreement, the armistice was to end.
On that day Austria had to sign an alliance, offensive and defensive,
with Russia and Prussia. On the night between the 10th and 11th, rockets
answering rockets, from height to height along the frontiers of Bohemia
and Silesia, had announced to all the armies of the allies this
accession of strength and the immediate recommencement of hostilities.

On neither side had the pending negotiation been permitted for a moment
to interrupt or slacken m