not
in the use of such tools: it was in the contempt for nationality
shown first in making the treaty of Fontainebleau, then in its
violation by the subsequent seizure of Portugal, and finally in the
occupation of Spain by French troops. Declaring that more had been
lost than gained by the events which occurred at Bayonne, Talleyrand
says that on one occasion he icily observed to Napoleon that society
would pardon much to a man of the world, but cheating at cards never.
If this be true, it was a stinging rebuke and one which touched the
heart of the whole matter.

To the bloody butchery and broken faith of May second, the day of the
Madrid riots, may be attributed the turn of Napoleon's fortunes. How
far he was responsible for each of Murat's successive acts cannot be
known. With exaggerated conceptions of the Emperor's ubiquity, some
attribute every detail in every step to the direct intervention of the
master. This is unproved and highly improbable; but the spirit was
his, and the use he made of each occasion as it arose is matter of
history. The fires of rebellion were lighted thenceforth on every
Spanish hearth. Madrid itself was dangerous enough, but Madrid was not
Spain, as Paris is France, and the fine local enthusiasm of
uncorrupted Spanish blood in every district was awakened into vigorous
activity by the news of how faithless had been the French treatment,
not only of the royal house, but of the citizens--men and women who
were themselves true Spaniards, brothers and sisters of every other
Spaniard. This possibility Napoleon had not foreseen, and he did not
grasp the fact until long afterward, when years of bitter experience
had rolled over his head. The Madrid riots, suppressed by Murat with
such terrible bloodshed, were at the time, in Napoleon's mind, only a
welcome leverage for moving Ferdinand to compliance, and that was all.

But the city had been full of provincials attracted from all parts of
the country to swell the triumph of their idol Ferdinand on his
accession to the throne. They returned to their homes inspired with
hatred for the French and with bitter scorn for the pretexts on which
Spain and Portugal had been torn from a commercial system that brought
them considerable prosperity and many comforts, in order that they
might be incorporated, under foreign princes, into another system,
which not only required serious self-denial, but brought stagnation,
disorganization, and the presence of an