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قراءة كتاب The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Vol. 4 (of 4)

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The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Vol. 4 (of 4)

The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Vol. 4 (of 4)

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دار النشر: Project Gutenberg
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  • Map of the Campaign of 1815 194
  • Napoleon, François Charles Joseph, Duke of Reichstadt, etc., etc., son of Napoleon Bonaparte 200
  • Napoleon sleeping by Las Cases on board the Bellerophon 224
  • Napoleon at St. Helena 230
  • Napoleon I 274
  • LIFE OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE

    CHAPTER I

    The Last Imperial Victory[1]

    Napoleon's Prospects — The Preparations and Plans of the Coalition — Cross-purposes of the Combatants — Condition of Napoleon's Mind — Strength and Weakness of the Allies — Renewal of Hostilities — The Feint in Silesia — Napoleon at Dresden — First Day's Fighting — The Victory Won on the Second Day.

    1813

    In later years Napoleon confessed that during the interval between the first and second Saxon campaigns he had been outwitted. His antagonists had, in his own language, "changed for the better"; at least they secured the war they so earnestly desired under conditions vastly more favorable to themselves than to their opponent. Both parties had been arming with might and main during the prolonged truce, but each member of the dynastic coalition now had the backing of a growing national enthusiasm, while Napoleon had to deal with waning zeal and an exhausted people. Thus, then, at the opening of the second campaign in Saxony, the allies had four hundred and thirty-five thousand men, and Napoleon but three hundred and fifty thousand. With this inferiority, it behooved the Emperor to use all his strategic powers, and he did so with a brilliancy never surpassed by him. Choosing the Elbe as his natural defensive line, Hamburg stood almost impregnable at one end, flanked to the southward by Magdeburg, Wittenberg, and Torgau, three mighty fortresses. Dresden, which was necessarily the focal point, was intrenched and palisaded for the protection of the army which was to be its main bulwark. Davout and Oudinot, with seventy thousand men, were to threaten Berlin, and, thereby drawing off as many as possible of the enemy, liberate the garrisons of Stettin and Küstrin; they were then to beleaguer Spandau, push the foe across the Oder, and stand ready to fall on the flank of the coalition army. Napoleon himself, with the remaining two hundred and eighty thousand, was to await the onset of the combined Russian, Prussian, and Austrian forces.

    The allies now had in their camp two mighty strategists—Jomini, the well-known Swiss adventurer and military historian, and Moreau, who had returned from the United States. The former, pleading that he had lost a merited promotion by Berthier's ill-will, and that as a foreigner he had the right of choice, had gone over to the enemies of his employer; the latter, yielding to the specious pleas of his silly and ambitious wife that he might fight Napoleon without fighting France, had taken service with the Czar. The arrow which penetrated Napoleon's vitals was indeed feathered from his own pinions, since these two, with another of Napoleon's pupils—Bernadotte, the Crown Prince of Sweden—were virtually the council of war. Two of them, the latter and Moreau, saw the specter of French sovereignty beckoning them on. They dreamed of the chief magistracy in some shape, imperial, monarchical, consular, or presidential, and were more devoted to their personal interests than to those of the coalition. In the service of their ambition was formed the plan by which not only was Napoleon overwhelmed, but the fields of France were drenched with blood. Under their advice, three great armies were arrayed: that of the North, in Brandenburg, was composed of Prussians, Swedes, and a few Russians, its generals being Bülow, Bernadotte, and Tchernicheff; that of the East was the Prusso-Russian army in Silesia, now under Blücher, that astounding young cavalryman of seventy, and Wittgenstein; finally, that of the South was the new Austrian force under Schwarzenberg, with an adjunct force of Russian troops under Barclay, and the Russian guard under the Grand Duke Constantine. Bülow was in and near Berlin with about a hundred and fifty-six thousand men; Blücher had ninety-five thousand, and, having violated the armistice, was on August fourteenth already within the neutral zone at Striegau, before Breslau; the Austro-Russian force of almost two hundred and fifty thousand was in northern Bohemia, near Melnik; Bennigsen was in Poland building up a strong reserve. Schwarzenberg, though commander of the main army, was reduced to virtual impotence by the presence at his headquarters of all the sovereigns and of Moreau. Divided counsels spring from diverse interests; there was at the outset a pitiful caution and inefficiency on the part of the allies, while at Napoleon's headquarters there was unity of design at least.

    Both contestants were apparently under serious misapprehensions. The allies certainly were, because Francis believed that, as so often before, Napoleon's goal would be Vienna. The plan adopted by them was therefore very simple: each division of the allied army was to stand expectant; if assailed it was to yield, draw on the French columns, and expose their flank or rear to the attacks of the other two allied armies; then by superior force the invaders were to be surrounded. The allies divined, or believed they divined, that Napoleon would hold his guard in reserve, throw it behind any portion of his line opposite which they were vulnerable, break through, and defeat them in detachments. Their idea was keen, and displayed a thorough grasp both of the principles on which their opponent had hitherto acted and of his normal character. But nevertheless they were deceived. Napoleon discarded all his old principles, and behaved most abnormally. In his conduct there are evidences of a curious self-deception, and his decisions contradicted his language. Perpetually minimizing in conversation the disparity between the two forces, and sometimes even asserting his own superiority, he nevertheless almost for the first time assumed the defensive. This unheard-of course may have been due to misapprehension and exaggeration, but it produced for the moment a powerful moral effect on his generals, who, without exception, had hitherto been clamorous for peace, and likewise upon his new boy recruits; both classes began to have a realizing sense that they were now fighting, not for aggression, but for life. If the Emperor had any such confidence as he expressed, it must have been due to the fact that boys had fought like veterans at Lützen and Bautzen, and that at last there were cavalry and artillery in fair proportion. Possibly, likewise,

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