for the
parts they had undertaken to play. M. de Talleyrand had effected a
miracle at Vienna; by the treaty of alliance concluded on the 3rd
January, 1815, between France, England, and Austria, he had put an end
to the coalition formed against us in 1813, and separated Europe into
two parties, to the advantage of France. But the event of the 20th of
March had destroyed his work; the European coalition was again formed
against the Emperor and against France, who had made herself, or had
permitted herself to be made, the instrument of Napoleon. There was no
longer a chance of breaking up this formidable alliance. The same
feeling of uneasiness and mistrust of our faith, the same desire for a
firm and lasting union, animated the sovereigns and the nations. They
had speedily arranged at Vienna the questions which had threatened to
divide them. In this fortified hostility against France the Emperor
Alexander participated, with extreme irritation towards the House of
Bourbon and M. de Talleyrand, who had sought to deprive him of his
allies. The second Restoration was no longer like the first, the
personal glory and work of M. de Talleyrand; the honour was chiefly due
to England and the Duke of Wellington. Instigated by self-love and
policy, the Emperor Alexander arrived at Paris on the 10th of July,
1815, stern and angrily disposed towards the King and his advisers.

France and the King stood, nevertheless, in serious need of the goodwill
of the Russian Emperor, encompassed as they were by the rancorous and
eager ambition of Germany. Her diplomatists drew up the geographical
chart of our territory, leaving out the provinces of which they desired
to deprive us. Her generals undermined, to blow into the air, the
monuments which recalled their defeats in the midst of their victories.
Louis XVIII. resisted with much dignity these acts of foreign barbarism;
he threatened to place his chair of state upon the bridge of Jena, and
said publicly to the Duke of Wellington, "Do you think, my Lord, that
your Government would consent to receive me if I were again to solicit a
refuge?" Wellington restrained to the utmost of his power the violence
of Bluecher, and remonstrated with him by arguments equally urgent and
politic; but neither the dignity of the King, nor the amicable
intervention of England were sufficient to curb the overweening
pretensions of Germany. The Emperor Alexander alone could keep them
within bounds. M. de Talleyrand s