mporarily kept his
strong places in Silesia and Pomerania; but his propositions for an
alliance were incontinently rejected. Next day there was another
meeting on the same raft, but this was tripartite, for the King of
Prussia was present. Napoleon was blunt and imperious, reproaching
Frederick William with the duplicity of his policy, vindictively (the
descriptive word he used himself), and with emphasis, demanding
Hardenberg's dismissal. At parting he invited Alexander to dinner, but
ostentatiously omitted to include Frederick William in the request. It
was agreed that to expedite the final negotiations the three monarchs
should remain on the ground; one half the town of Tilsit was
neutralized and divided into three portions, each of the three parties
to take up his residence in one. This closed the preliminaries, and
the two emperors returned with mutual satisfaction to the respective
sides of the river from which they had come. The sensations of
Frederick William, who accompanied Alexander, must have been those of
a soldier on the field under a capital operation in surgery. That very
afternoon the Czar removed to the quarter of Tilsit appropriated to
him. The King of Prussia took lodgings in the house of a miller, but
spent only a part of each day in them, preferring the melancholy
solitude of the neighboring hamlet of Piktupoenen, where he and
Hardenberg had last alighted.

Alexander was now thirty years of age, sanguine, ambitious,
impressionable, and mature in proportion to his years. His features
were well formed on Slavic lines, his look was sympathetic, and his
form elegant. The many graces of his mind and person were natural. "My
friend," wrote Napoleon to Josephine on the twenty-fifth, "I have
just met the Emperor Alexander. I have been much pleased with him; he
is a very handsome, good young emperor; he has more intelligence than
is generally thought." Napoleon himself was only eight years older,
but his mind was more penetrating and adroit by a whole generation.
The classic cast in his features, which only a few years before made
sculptors mold him like the statue of the young Augustus, had nearly
disappeared. A complete transformation had been produced in his bodily
appearance by the robust health he had for some time enjoyed. He had
become more of a primitive Italian and less of a Roman. His skin was
now clear and of a rich, dark tint. His powerful frame was fully
developed, and while fat, he was not ob