separate and secret articles, and a treaty of alliance. The first
point gained by Napoleon was the recognition of all his conquests
before 1805. The Czar admitted for the first time absolute equality
between the two empires, and recognized the limits of the French
system as it then existed: first, the Confederation of the Rhine, with
any additions yet to be made; second, the kingdom of Italy, including
Dalmatia; third, the vassalage of Holland, Berg, Naples, and
Switzerland. There was a verbal understanding, it is said, that
Napoleon might do as he liked in Spain and the Papal States, while
the Czar should have the same liberty in regard to Finland. Subsequent
events attested the probability of this statement. To illustrate
Napoleon's attitude toward the recent, but now dissolved alliance,
Prussia was given to understand that she owed to Russia what remnants
of territory she retained; the stipulations with regard to her were
therefore included in the treaty with Russia.

Still, there was to be a Prussia. Between the two great empires was to
lie, in realization of a long-cherished plan, a girdle of neutral
states like the "marches" established by Charles the Great. In this
line Silesia was the only break. Prussia and Austria, one on each side
of this mark, shorn of their strength and prestige, might await their
destiny. France was to mediate for peace between Russia and Turkey,
Russia between England and France. In case Great Britain should not
prove tractable,--that is, admit the sanctity of all flags on the high
seas, and restore all the colonies of France and her allies captured
since 1805,--then Russia, in common with France, Denmark, Sweden,
Portugal, and Austria, would declare commercial war on England, and
complete the continental embargo on British trade. Should Turkey
refuse favorable terms, the two empires would divide between them all
her European lands except Rumelia and the district of Constantinople.
Alexander afterward declared that Napoleon gave a verbal promise that
Russia should have a substantial increment on the Danube. The rumor
was that Bessarabia, Moldavia, Wallachia, and Bulgaria were indicated
to the Czar as his share.

No mention was made of Austria, which the treaty of Presburg had
sufficiently dismembered. But Prussia? In order to complete the great
"march" between east and west, Silesia was essential. At first
Napoleon thought of combining it with Prussian Poland to form a
kingdom. This wo