A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4

W >> Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks >> Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4




The faithful troops of the veteran marshal (the old Silesian army)
were completely worn out by the battle, by their retreat in the heavy
rain over deep roads, and by the want of food. The distance from
Wavre, whence they had been driven, to Waterloo, where Wellington was
then in action, was not great, but was rendered arduous owing to these
circumstances. The men sometimes fell down from extreme weariness, and
the guns stuck fast in the deep mud. But Blucher was everywhere
present, and notwithstanding his bodily pain ever cheered his men
forward, with "indescribable pathos," saying to his disheartened
soldiers, "My children, we must advance; I have promised it, do not
cause me to break my word!" While still distant from the scene of
action, he ordered the guns to be fired in order to keep up the
courage of the English, and at length, between six and seven in the
evening, the first Prussian corps in advance, that of Ziethen, fell
furiously upon the enemy: "Bravo!" cried Blucher, "I know you, my
Silesians; to-day we shall see the backs of these French rascals!"
Ziethen filled up the space still intervening between Wellington and
Bulow. Exactly at that moment, Napoleon had sent his old guard forward
in four massive squares in order to make a last attempt to break the
British lines, when Ziethen fell upon their flank and dealt fearful
havoc among their close masses with his artillery. Bulow's troops,
inspirited by this success, now pressed gallantly forward and finally
regained the long-contested village of Planchenoit from the enemy. The
whole of the Prussian army, advancing at the double and with drums
beating, had already driven back the right wing of the French, when
the English, regaining courage, advanced, Napoleon was surrounded on
two sides, and the whole of his troops, the old guard under General
Cambronne alone excepted, were totally dispersed and fled in complete
disorder. The old guard, surrounded by Bulow's cavalry, nobly replied,
when challenged to surrender, "La garde ne se rend pas"; and in a few
minutes the veteran conquerors of Europe fell beneath the righteous
and avenging blows of their antagonists. At the farm of La Belle
Alliance, Blucher offered his hand to Wellington. "I will sleep
to-night in Bonaparte's last night's quarters," said Wellington. "And
I will drive him out of his present ones!" replied Blucher. The
Prussians, fired by enthusiasm, forgot the fatigue they had for four
days endured, and, favored by a moonlight night, so zealously pursued
the French that an immense number of prisoners and a vast amount of
booty fell into their hands and Napoleon narrowly escaped being taken
prisoner. At Genappe, where the bridge was blocked by fugitives, the
pursuit was so close that he was compelled to abandon his carriage
leaving his sword and hat behind him. Blucher, who reached the spot a
moment afterward, took possession of the booty, sent Napoleon's hat,
sword, and star to the king of Prussia, retained his cloak, telescope,
and carriage for his own use, and gave up everything else, including a
quantity of the most valuable jewelry, gold, and money, to his brave
soldiery. The whole of the army stores, two hundred and forty guns,
and an innumerable quantity of arms thrown away by the fugitives, fell
into his hands.

The Prussian general, Thielemann, who, with a few troops, had remained
behind at Wavre in order, at great hazard, to deceive Grouchy into the
belief that he was still opposed by Blucher's entire force, acted a
lesser, but equally honorable part on this great day. He fulfilled his
commission with great skill, and so completely deceived Grouchy as to
hinder his making a single attempt to throw himself in the way of the
Prussians on the Paris road.

Blucher pushed forward without a moment's delay, and, on the 29th of
June, stood before Paris. Napoleon had, meanwhile, a second time
abdicated, and had fled from Paris in the hope of escaping across the
seas. Davoust, the ancient instrument of his tyranny, who commanded in
Paris, attempting to make terms of capitulation with Blucher, was
sharply answered, "You want to make a defence? Take care what you do.
You well know what license the irritated soldiery will take if your
city must be taken by storm. Do you wish to add the sack of Paris to
that of Hamburg, already loading your conscience?"[16] Paris
surrendered after a severe engagement at Issy, and Muffling, the
Prussian general, was placed in command of the city, July the 7th,
1815. It was on the occasion of a grand banquet given by Wellington
shortly after the occupation of Paris by the allied troops that
Blucher gave the celebrated toast, "May the pens of diplomatists not
again spoil all that the swords of our gallant armies have so nobly
won!"

Schwarzenberg had in the interim also penetrated into France, and the
crown prince of Wurtemberg had defeated General Rapp at Strasburg and
had surrounded that fortress. The Swiss, under General Bachmann, who
had, although fully equipped for the field, hitherto prudently watched
the turn of events, invaded France immediately after the battle of
Waterloo, pillaged Burgundy, besieged and took the fortress of
Huningen, which, with the permission of the allies, they justly razed
to the ground, the insolent French having thence fired upon the
bridges of Basel which lay close in its vicinity. A fresh Austrian
army under Frimont advanced from Italy as far as Lyons. On the 17th of
July, Napoleon surrendered himself in the bay of Rochefort to the
English, whose ships prevented his escape; he moreover preferred
falling into their hands than into those of the Prussians. The whole
of France submitted to the triumphant allies, and Louis XVIII. was
reinstated on his throne. Murat had also been simultaneously defeated
at Tolentino in Italy by the Austrians under Bianchi, and Ferdinand
IV. had been restored to the throne of Naples. Murat fled to Corsica,
but his retreat to France was prevented by the success of the allies,
and in his despair he, with native rashness, yielded to the advice of
secret intriguants and returned to Italy with a design of raising a
popular insurrection, but was seized on landing and shot on the 13th
of October.[17]

Blucher was greatly inclined to give full vent to his justly roused
rage against Paris. The bridge of Jena, one of the numerous bridges
across the Seine, the principal object of his displeasure, was,
curiously enough, saved from destruction (he had already attempted to
blow it up) by the arrival of the king of Prussia.[18] His proposal to
punish France by partitioning the country and thus placing it on a par
with Germany, was far more practical in its tendency.

This honest veteran had in fact a deeper insight into affairs than the
most wary diplomatists.[19] In 1815, the same persons, as in 1814, met
in Paris, and similar interests were agitated. Foreign jealousy again
effected the conclusion of this peace at the expense of Germany and in
favor of France. Blucher's influence at first reigned supreme. The
king of Prussia, who, together with the emperors of Russia and
Austria, revisited Paris, took Stein and Gruner into his council. The
crown prince of Wurtemberg also zealously exerted himself in favor of
the reunion of Lorraine and Alsace with Germany.[20] But Russia and
England beholding the reintegration of Germany with displeasure,
Austria,[21] and finally Prussia, against whose patriots all were in
league, yielded.[22] The future destinies of Europe were settled on
the side of England by Wellington and Castlereagh; on that of Russia
by Prince John Razumowsky, Nesselrode, and Capo d'Istria; on that of
Austria by Metternich and Wessenberg; on that of Prussia by Hardenberg
and William von Humboldt. The German patriots were excluded from the
discussion,[23] and a result extremely unfavorable to Germany
naturally followed:[24] Alsace and Lorraine remained annexed to
France. By the second treaty of Paris, which was definitively
concluded on the 20th of November, 1815, France was merely compelled
to give up the fortresses of Philippeville, Marienburg, Sarlouis, and
Landau, to demolish Huningen, and to allow eighteen other fortresses
on the German frontier to be occupied by the allies until the new
government had taken firm footing in France. Until then, one hundred
and fifty thousand of the allied troops were also to remain within the
French territory and to be maintained at the expense of the people.
France was, moreover, condemned to pay seven hundred millions of
francs toward the expenses of the war and to restore the _chef
d'oeuvres_ of which she had deprived every capital in Europe. The
sword of Frederick the Great was not refound: Marshal Serrurier
declared that he had burned it.[25] On the other hand, however, almost
all the famous old German manuscripts, which had formerly been carried
from Heidelberg to Rome, and thence by Napoleon to Paris, were sent
back to Heidelberg. One of the most valuable, the Manessian Code of
the Swabian Minnesingers, was left in Paris, where it had been
concealed. Blucher expired, in 1819, on his estate in Silesia.[26]

The French were now sufficiently humbled to remain in tranquillity,
and designedly displayed such submission that the allied sovereigns
resolved, at a congress held at Aix-la-Chapelle, in the autumn of
1818, to withdraw their troops. Napoleon was, with the concurrence of
the assembled powers, taken to the island of St. Helena, where,
surrounded by the dreary ocean, several hundred miles from any
inhabited spot, and guarded with petty severity by the English, he was
at length deprived of every means of disturbing the peace of Europe.
Inactivity and the unhealthiness of the climate speedily dissolved the
earthly abode of this giant spirit. He expired on the 5th of May,
1821. His consort, Maria Louisa, was created Duchess of Parma; and his
son lived, under the title of Duke of Reichstadt, with his imperial
grandfather at Vienna, until his death in 1832. Napoleon's stepson,
Eugene Beauharnais, the former viceroy of Italy, the son-in-law to the
king of Bavaria, received the newly-created mediatized principality of
Eichstadt, which was dependent upon Bavaria, and the title of Duke of
Leuchtenberg. Jerome, the former king of Westphalia, became Count de
Montfort;[27] Louis, ex-king of Holland, Count de St. Leu.


[Footnote 1: From London, Frederick William went to Switzerland and
took possession of his ancient hereditary territory, Wälsch-Neuenburg
or Neufchâtel, visited the beautiful Bernese Oberland, and then
returned to Berlin, where, on the 7th of August, he passed in triumph
through the Brandenburg gate, which was again adorned with the car of
victory and the fine group of horses, and rode through the lime trees
to an altar, around which the clergy belonging to every religious sect
were assembled. Here public thanks were given and the whole of the
citizens present fell upon their knees.--_Allgemeine Zeitung, 262_. On
the 17th of September, the preparation of a new liturgy was announced
in a ministerial proclamation, "by which the solemnity of the church
service was to be increased, the present one being too little
calculated to excite or strike the imagination."]

[Footnote 2: Oxford conferred a doctor's degree upon Blücher, who,
upon receiving this strange honor, said, "Make Gneisenau apothecary,
for he it was who prepared my pills." On his first reception at
Carlton House, the populace pushed their way through the guards and
doors as far as the apartments of the prince-regent, who, taking his
gray-headed guest by the hand, presented him to them, and publicly
hung his portrait set in brilliants around his neck. On his passing
through the streets, the horses were taken from his carriage, and he
was drawn in triumph by the shouting crowd. One fête succeeded
another. During the great races at Ascot, the crowd breaking through
the barriers and insisting upon Blücher's showing himself, the
prince-regent came forward, and, politely telling them that he had not
yet arrived, led forward the emperor Alexander, who was loudly
cheered, but Blücher's arrival was greeted with thunders of applause
far surpassing those bestowed upon the sovereigns, a circumstance that
was afterward blamed by the English papers. In the Freemasons' Lodge,
Blücher was received by numbers of ladies, on each of whom he bestowed
a salute. At Portsmouth, he drank to the health of the English in the
presence of an immense concourse of people assembled beneath his
windows.--The general rejoicing was solely clouded by the domestic
circumstances of the royal family, by the insanity of the aged and
blind king and by the disunion reigning between the prince-regent and
his thoughtless consort, Caroline of Brunswick.--Although the whole of
the allied sovereigns, some of whom were unable to speak English,
understood German, French was adopted as the medium of conversation.--
_Allgemeine Zeitung, 174._]

[Footnote 3: "There are moments in the life of nations on which the
whole of their future destiny depends. The children are destined to
expiate their fathers' errors with their blood. Germany has everything
to fear from the foreigner, and yet she cannot arrange her own affairs
without calling the foreigner to her aid.--Who, in the congress,
chiefly oppose every well-laid plan? Who, with the dagger's point pick
out and reopen all our wounds, and rub them with salt and poison? Who
promote confusion, provoke, insinuate, and attempt to creep into every
committee, to interfere in every discussion? who but those sent
thither by France?"--_The Rhenish Mercury._]

[Footnote 4: Fate willed that Stein should not be called upon to act
with firmness, but Hardenberg to make concessions. Stein disappeared
from the theatre of events and was degraded to a lower sphere.
Hardenberg was created prince.]

[Footnote 5: Napoleon had such good friends among the Rhenish
confederated princes that Augustus, duke of Gotha, for instance, even
after the second occupation of Paris, on the return of his troops in
the November of 1815, prohibited any demonstrations of triumph and
even deprived the _Landwehr_ of their uniforms, so that the poor
fellows had to return in their shirt-sleeves to their native villages
during the hard winter.--_Jacob's Campaigns._]

[Footnote 6: An attack upon Berne had already been concerted. Colonel
Bär marched with the people of Aargau in the night time upon Aarburg,
but his confederates failing to make their appearance, he caused the
nearest Bernese governor to be alarmed and hastily retraced his steps.
The Bernese instantly sent an armed force to the frontier, where,
finding all tranquil, the charge of aggression was thrown upon their
shoulders.]

[Footnote 7: Vide Muralt's Life of Reinhard.]

[Footnote 8: Blücher was at Berlin at the moment when the news of
Napoleon's escape arrived. He instantly roused the English ambassador
from his sleep by shouting in his ear, "Have the English a fleet in
the Mediterranean?"]

[Footnote 9: The blame was entirely upon the Prussian side. The
Saxons, as good soldiers, naturally revolted at the idea that they
would at once be faithless to their oath and mutinied. General
Müffling was insulted for having spoken of "Saxon hounds." Blücher
even was compelled secretly to take his departure. The Saxon troops
were, however, reduced to obedience by superior numbers of Prussians,
and their colors were burned. The whole corps was about to be
decimated, when Colonel Romer came forward and demanded that the
sentence of death should be first executed on him. Milder measures
were in consequence reverted to, and a few of the men were condemned
to death by drawing lots. Kanitz, the drummer, a youth of sixteen,
however, threw away the dice, exclaiming, "It is I who beat the
summons for revolt, and I will be the first to die." He and six others
were shot. Borstel, the Prussian general, the hero of Dennewitz, who
had steadily refused to burn the Saxon colors, was compelled to quit
the service.]

[Footnote 10: For a refutation of Menzel's absurdly perverted relation
of these great events, the reader is referred not only to the Duke of
Wellington's despatches and to Colonel Siborne's well-established
account of the battles of Ligny, Wavre, Quatre Bras, and Waterloo, but
also to those of his countrymen, Muffling, the Prussian general, and
Wagner.--_Trans._]

[Footnote 11: Shortly before the battle, Bourmont, the French general,
set up the white cockade (the symbol of Bourbon) and deserted to
Blucher, who merely said, "It is all one what symbol the fellows set
up, rascals are ever rascals!"]

[Footnote 12: The surgeon, when about to rub him with some liquid, was
asked by him what it was, and being told that it was spirits, "Ah,"
said he, "the thing is of no use externally!" and snatching the glass
from the hand of his attendant, he drank it off.]

[Footnote 13: Against all expectation to aid an ally who on the
previous day had against all expectation been unable to give him aid,
evinced at once magnanimity, sense, and good feeling.--_Clausewitz_.]

[Footnote 14: A Prussian battery, that on its way from Namur turned
back on receiving news of this disaster and was taken by the French,
is said to have chiefly led to the commission of this immense blunder
by Napoleon.]

[Footnote 15: The Hanoverian legion again covered itself with glory by
the steadiness with which it opposed the enemy. It lost three thousand
five hundred men, the Dutch eight thousand; the German troops
consequently lost collectively as many as the English, whose loss was
computed at eleven or twelve thousand men. The Prussians, whose loss
at Ligny and Waterloo exceeded that of their allies, behaved with even
greater gallantry.]

[Footnote 16: The French were extremely affronted on account of this
communication being made in German instead of French, and even at the
present day German historians are generally struck with deeper
astonishment at this sample of Blücher's bold spirit than at any
other.]

[Footnote 17: Ney, "the bravest of the brave," who dishonored his
bravery by the basest treachery, met with an equally melancholy fate.
Immediately after having, for instance, kissed the gouty fingers of
Louis XVIII. and boasting that he would imprison Napoleon within an
iron cage, he went over to the latter. He was sentenced to death and
shot, after vainly imploring the allied monarchs and personally
petitioning Wellington for mercy.--Alexander Berthier, prince of
Neufchatel, Napoleon's chief confidant, had, even before the outbreak
of war, thrown himself out of a window in a fit of hypochondriasis and
been killed.]

[Footnote 18: Talleyrand begged Count von der Goltz to use his
influence for its preservation with Blücher, who replied to his
entreaties, "I will blow up the bridge, and should very much like to
have Talleyrand sitting upon it at the time!" An attempt to blow it up
was actually made, but failed.]

[Footnote 19: Many of whom were in fact wilfully blind. Hardenberg, by
whom the noble-spirited Stein was so ill replaced, and who, with all
possible decency, ever succeeded in losing in the cabinet the
advantages gained by Blücher in the field, the diplomatic bird of ill
omen by whom the peace of Basel had formerly been concluded, was thus
addressed by Blücher: "I should like you gentlemen of the quill to be
for once in a way exposed to a smart platoon fire, just to teach you
what perils we soldiers have to run in order to repair the blunders
you so thoughtlessly commit." An instructive commentary upon these
events is to be met with in Stein's letters to Gagern. The light in
which Stein viewed the Saxons may be gathered from the following
passages in his letters: "My desire for the aggrandizement of Prussia
proceeded not from a blind partiality to that state, but from the
conviction that Germany is weakened by a system of partition ruinous
alike to her national learning and national feelings."--"It is not for
Prussia but for Germany that I desire a closer, a firmer internal
combination, a wish that will accompany me to the grave: the division
of our national strength may be gratifying to others, it never can be
so to me." This truly German policy mainly distinguished Stein from
Hardenberg, who, thoroughly Prussian in his ideas, was incapable of
perceiving that Prussia's best-understood policy ever will be to
identify herself with Germany.]

[Footnote 20: Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 285.]

[Footnote 21: It was proposed that Lorraine and Alsace should be
bestowed upon the Archduke Charles, who at that period wedded the
Princess Henrietta of Nassau. The proposition, however, quickly fell
to the ground.]

[Footnote 22: Even in July, their organ, Görres's Rhenish Mercury, was
placed beneath the censor. In August, it was said that the men,
desirous of giving a constitution to Prussia, had fallen into
disgrace.--Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 249. In September, Schmalz, in
Berlin, unveiled the presumed revolutionary intrigues of the
_Tugendbund_ and declared "the unity of Germany is something to which
the spirit of every nation in Germany has ever been antipathetic." He
received a Prussian and a Wurtemberg order, besides an extremely
gracious autograph letter from the king of Prussia, although his base
calumnies against the friends of his country were thrown back upon him
by the historians Niebuhr and Runs, who were then in a high position,
by Schleiermacher, the theologian, and by others. The nobility also
began to stir, attempted to regain their ancient privileges in
Prussia, and intrigued against the men who, during the time of need,
had made concessions to the citizens.--Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 276.]

[Footnote 23: The Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 349, laughs at the report of
their having withdrawn from the discussion, and says that they were no
longer invited to take part in it.]

[Footnote 24: On the loud complaints of the Rhenish Mercury, of the
gazettes of Bremen and Hanau, and even of the Allgemeine Zeitung, the
Austrian Observer, edited by Gentz, declared that "to demand a better
peace would be to demand the ruin of France."--Allgemeine Zeitung,
Nos. 345, 365. On Görres's repeated demand for the reannexation of
Alsace and Lorraine, of which Germany had been so unwarrantably
deprived, the Austrian Observer declared in the beginning of 1816,
"who would believe that Görres would lend his pen to such miserable
arguments. Alsace and Lorraine are guaranteed to France. To demand
their restoration would be contrary to every notion of honor and
justice." In this manner was Germany a second time robbed of these
provinces. Washington Paine denominated Strasburg, "a melancholy
sentry, of which unwary Germany has allowed herself to be deprived,
and which now, accoutred in an incongruous uniform, does duty against
his own country."]

[Footnote 25: The Invalids had in the same spirit cast the triumphal
monument of the field of Rossbach into the Seine, in order to prevent
its restoration. The alarum formerly belonging to Frederick the Great
was also missing. Napoleon had it on his person during his flight and
made use of it at St. Helena, where it struck his death-hour.]

[Footnote 26: He was descended from a noble race, which at a very
early period enjoyed high repute in Mecklenburg and Pomerania. In
1271, an Ulric von Blücher was bishop of Batzeburg. A legend relates
that, during a time of dearth, an empty barn was, on his petitioning
Heaven, instantly filled with corn. In 1356, Wipertus von Blücher also
became bishop of Ratzeburg, and, on the pope's refusal to confirm him
in his diocese on account of his youth, his hair turned gray in one
night. Vide Klüwer's Description of Mecklenburg, 1728.]

[Footnote 27: His wife, Catherine of Würtemberg, was in 1814, attacked
during her flight, on her way through France and robbed of her
jewels.--_Allgemeine Zettung, No. 130._]


* * * * *

PART XXIII

THE LATEST TIMES

CCLXIV. The German Confederation


Thus terminated the terrible storms that, not without benefit, had
convulsed Europe. Every description of political crime had been
fearfully avenged and presumption had been chastised by the unerring
hand of Providence. At that solemn period, the sovereigns of Russia,
Austria, and Prussia concluded a treaty by which they bound themselves
to follow, not the ruinous policy they had hitherto pursued, but the
undoubted will of the King of kings, and, as the viceroys of God upon
the earth, to maintain peace, to uphold virtue and justice. This Holy
Alliance was concluded on the 26th of September, 1815. All the
European powers took part in it; England, who excused herself, the
pope, and the sultan, whose accession was not demanded, alone
excepted.

The new partition of Europe, nevertheless, retained almost all the
unnatural conditions introduced by the more ancient and godless policy
of Louis XIV. and of Catherine II. Germany, Poland, and Italy remained
partitioned among rulers partly foreign. Everywhere were countries
exchanged or freshly partitioned and rendered subject to foreign rule.
England retained possession of Hanover, which was elevated into a
German kingdom, of the Ionian islands, and of Malta in the
Mediterranean. Russia received the grandduchy of Warsaw, which was
raised to a kingdom of Poland, but was not united with Lithuania,
Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraine, the ancient provinces of Poland
standing beneath the sovereignty of Russia, and Finland, for which
Sweden received in exchange Norway, of which Denmark was forcibly
dispossessed. Holland was annexed to the old Austrian Netherlands and
elevated to a kingdom under William of Orange.[1] Switzerland remained
a confederation of twenty-two cantons,[2] externally independent and
neutral, internally somewhat aristocratic in tendency, the ancient
oligarchy everywhere regaining their power. The Jesuits were
reinstated by the pope. In Spain, Portugal, and Naples, the form of
government prior to the Revolution was reestablished by the ancient
sovereigns on their restoration to their thrones.

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