ed Napoleon in Spain was of a
most alarming character, and made certain considerations so emphatic
that all others became insignificant. It mattered not that he must
leave behind him a half-accomplished task; that while his strategy had
been successful, he had lost the opportunity to annihilate the
English, which, though he did not know it at the time, he had really
had in the tardy arrival of their transports at Corunna; that the
national uprising was not suppressed by his carefully devised
measures; that the oaths of allegiance sworn to Joseph and the
constitution had been sworn under compulsion by a minority, who, pious
as the people were, did not, for that reason, consider even themselves
as bound, much less the nation as a whole--all this was serious
enough, but it was paltry when compared with what had taken place in
German lands while he had been absent from Paris.

During the campaign of Marengo there had been a knot of active,
self-seeking, and traitorous men who, having risen by Bonaparte's
help, schemed how best to sustain themselves in case of his death.
This same group, under the leadership of Talleyrand and Fouche, had
been again arranging plans for their guidance should misfortune
overwhelm Napoleon in Spain. Such was their activity that even
Metternich had been deceived into the belief that they had a large
party of French patriots behind them, who, weary of the Emperor's
incessant calls on France for aid in enterprises foreign to her
welfare, would gladly be rid of him. So grave did the Austrian
ambassador consider the crisis that late in November he left his post
and set out for Vienna. Vincent's reports about the friction at Erfurt
had already found credence in the Austrian capital among the war
party, and the belief was spreading that the Franco-Russian alliance
was hollow.

Stein's absence from North Germany had only intensified the sympathy
of the people with his policy. Even at Koenigsberg, the seat of
government, public opinion demanded the measures he had desired.
Prussia was not only strong once more, but was ardent to redeem its
disgrace. The reflex influence of the popular movements in Prussia and
Austria upon one another had intensified both, until the more advanced
leaders in the two countries cared little whether the process of
German regeneration was begun under Hohenzollern or Hapsburg
leadership. Into this surcharged atmosphere came Metternich with his
exaggerated statements about th