vereign immediately. Brunswick, Hesse, and the other states which had
formed Jerome's kingdom of Westphalia, followed the same example. The
Confederation of the Rhine was dissolved for ever; and the princes who
had adhered to that league were permitted to expiate their, in most
cases involuntary, error, by now bringing a year's revenue and a double
conscription to the banner of the Allies. Bernadotte turned from Leipsig
to reduce the garrisons which Napoleon, in the rashness of his
presumption, had disdained to call in, even when compelled to evacuate
Dresden; and one by one they fell, though in most cases--particularly at
Dantzick, Wirtemberg, and Hamburg--the resistance was obstinate and
long. The Crown Prince--having witnessed the reduction of some of these
fortresses, and entrusted the siege of the others to his
lieutenants--invaded Denmark, and the government of that country
perceived the necessity of acceding to the European alliance, by
whatever fine its long adhesion to Napoleon might be expiated. The
treaty was concluded at Kiel, on the 14th of January, 1814. Sweden
yielded Pomerania to Denmark; Denmark gave up Norway to Sweden; and
10,000 Danish troops having joined his standard, Bernadotte then turned
his face towards the Netherlands.

In Holland, no sooner had the story of Leipsig reached it than a
complete, though bloodless revolution was effected. The cry of _orange
boven_, "up with the orange," burst simultaneously from every part of
the country: the French governors, yielding to a power which they
perceived the absurdity of attempting to resist, retired on the instant,
and the long-exiled Stadtholder, the Prince of Orange, returning in
triumph from England, assumed the administration of affairs in November,
1813. A few French garrisons remained shut up in strong places, of which
the most important was Bergen-op-Zoom; and Bernadotte now co-operated
with the Russian corps of Witzingerode, the Prussians of Bulow, and a
British force of 10,000, under Sir T. Graham,[65] with the view of
completing the deliverance of Holland; which was ere long effected, with
the exception of Bergen-op-Zoom, from whose walls the English were
repulsed with dreadful slaughter.

On the side of Italy the aspect of affairs was almost as dark. General
Hiller, having conducted an Austrian army through the Tyrol, as soon as
the decision of his government was taken, had defeated Eugene
Beauharnois, and driven him behind the Adige. The