maments to enforce her demands.
Immediately after Luetzen, Stadion, sometime Austrian minister of war,
was sent to the camp of the allies. He stated that the minimum terms
of peace would be the dismemberment of Warsaw, the restoration of
Prussia, the surrender by France of Holland, Oldenburg, and the
Hanseatic lands, the abandonment of the protectorate over the
Confederation of the Rhine by Napoleon, and the surrender to Austria
of Illyria and Dalmatia, with a rectification of her western frontier.
Almost simultaneously Bubna appeared at Napoleon's headquarters with
suggestions for a general armistice, during which peace negotiations
should be carried on as rapidly as possible by a congress of the
powers. Dwelling on the necessity of territorial concessions by France
for the sake of a general pacification of the Continent, the envoy
declared that if this were accomplished, Great Britain, finding
herself isolated, must yield, and grant to Napoleon a substantial
indemnification from her vast colonial system. The propositions of
Austria were received by the allies with open eagerness, by the
Emperor of the French with apparent hesitancy. Next to the
establishment of his continental empire, the humiliation of Great
Britain was Napoleon's highest ambition. Compromise with her meant
defeat. With a mixture of proud determination and anxiety, he
therefore replied to Francis that he desired a pacification as
ardently as any one; that he was ready for such a congress as was
suggested; that he would even go further, and admit to it delegates
from the insurgent Spaniards; that he would still further consent to a
truce during its sessions: but that he would rather die at the head of
his high-spirited Frenchmen than make himself ridiculous before
England. Never was the writer's statecraft unfolded to greater daring.
Long consultations were held with the King of Saxony, a man of
gentleness and refinement, who was completely won by Napoleon's almost
filial attentions, and Bubna was often kept at the council-table until
after midnight. Eugene, however, was instantly despatched to raise a
new army in Italy, with orders not to conceal his movements from
Austria.

But Napoleon's chief efforts were put forth in the direction of
Russia. The adroit Caulaincourt was chosen as a fitting envoy, and
instructed not merely to reknit his personal relations with the Czar,
but also to surrender every point which had been contested in the
previous ne