Vienna, 1814: How the Conquerors of Napoleon Made Love, War, and Peace at the Congress of Vienna (47 page)

This had been rash, and many of his advisers had argued against it. Murat’s wife, Caroline, was one who strongly opposed any action that could be seen as breaking his agreements with Austria. “What need have I of alliances,” Murat had said, “since the Italians salute me as their sovereign?”

Even Napoleon had also been against such an invasion. In fact, he had ordered Murat
not
to attack, at least not yet. Timing was everything, and, at the moment, he needed Murat to stay in the south and keep Austria anxious about its Italian holdings. But Murat had been thrilled by Napoleon’s successes and wanted to undertake his own. He would succeed, he was confident, just as he had at Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, Eylau, and many other battles where, with his bold strikes, he had played a key role in Napoleon’s victories.

Fortunately for Talleyrand, who had tried to warn diplomats about the dangers of this man for months, Murat’s move was now making his job much easier. As Talleyrand put it, this attack “has at last opened the eyes of Austria, and made an end of all her hesitations.”

Actually, it was not that Austria suddenly realized the dangers of Murat, but rather that the king of Naples had finally made the fatal error of judgment that Metternich had long expected. Austria declared war. One hundred thousand Austrian troops were ordered to march and restore order in Italy. The whole Naples affair, Talleyrand predicted confidently, “will very soon be definitely settled.”

Once this matter was resolved, the remaining issues would most likely fall into place. “All that will then remain for us to do,” Talleyrand elaborated, “will be to collect all the articles already agreed upon, and form them into the act which is to terminate the Congress.”

As far as France was concerned, the sooner the congress was finished, the better. The embassy was virtually bankrupt. Fortunately, Talleyrand had managed to secure some emergency financial assistance from Great Britain, though this barely covered the embassy’s most basic expenses, never mind the stack of unpaid bills. Talleyrand had to send many of his staff home, including his chef and several assistants. While Talleyrand struggled with the new financial realities, Napoleon went one step further and revoked his authority as a French diplomat.

Indeed, messengers were already on their way from Paris with papers officially dissolving the mission of Talleyrand, Dalberg, and the whole “diplomatic phalanx” at Kaunitz Palace. The French embassy had suddenly found itself without anyone to represent—that is, besides a dethroned king who had fled the country.

Opinion in Vienna was becoming increasingly hostile to the Bourbon dynasty, who had abandoned the country without much of a fight. The king’s supporters had certainly seemed lackluster; Castlereagh had labeled them “Criers of
Vive le Roi!
Doers of nothing.” This was a problem because, as Talleyrand rightly urged, the king needed to show that he maintained the support of his people. The king should, moreover, return to France as soon as possible, and in all events he should not remain anywhere near the coast. This only gave the impression that the king would soon once again flee to Britain.

Frustratingly, days now passed without any news from King Louis XVIII or anyone in the exiled French Foreign Ministry, which had recently moved from Brussels to Ghent. Talleyrand was used to a fair amount of discretionary power, but at this late stage of the conference, the lack of information was exasperating, and he was forced to wait for every morsel with “extreme impatience.”

A
S SPRING CAME
early to Vienna, dinners and salons had been reenergized, though with less of a stellar cast in attendance than before. Many headed out to enjoy the Prater in bloom, or found themselves caught up in the long conferences that had become the rule. A new martial air had also come over the congress. In a series of conferences, with military matters now assuming top priority, Vienna’s peacemakers sat down to appoint commanders, assign troops, persuade other powers to join its alliance, and, in short, devise a general strategy to face Napoleon.

“If we are to undertake the job,” Castlereagh wrote from London to advise the British delegation, “we must leave nothing to chance. It must be done upon the largest scale.” The Allies must amass an enormous force, strike hard, and, as he put it, “inundate France from all directions.”

But to do that would be expensive, and, after the last war, few states had the resources for such an undertaking. Indeed, for many plenipotentiaries, the negotiations at the war council were taken as an invitation to barter for financial support from Great Britain. The London government was viewed as an inexhaustible bank freely dispensing its gifts. Such subsidies would help ensure a well-supplied army, and, at the same time, many hoped that they would help prevent the worst cases of pillaging sure to result when the large armies took to the field. The Prussians, in particular, were feared as a modern “Praetorian Guard” drunk with revenge.

Some of the smaller German states also set a price for their participation, promising to cooperate with the Allies in the war in return for a guarantee that the conference would establish a German
Bund,
or union of the German states. This loosely unified Germany should, moreover, be guaranteed a “liberal constitution” with many rights for the people, ranging from a free press to freedom of religion.

In addition, while all these demands were being championed with unexpected intensity, the Great Powers had to wrestle with startling signs of disloyalty among their own troops. Many Saxons, for instance, were manifestly upset about joining the Kingdom of Prussia. The king of Saxony had never agreed to relinquish any part of his country, nor had he freed the troops from their personal oath to him. Many Saxon soldiers plainly preferred to fight their new rulers, the Prussians, rather than Napoleon.

In the unstable environment of Napoleon’s return, Bavaria also seemed to be showing just how to profit from the tension. Bavaria was planning to send twice the troops Vienna requested, and this enthusiastic support worried Metternich. As Austria and Bavaria had still not agreed over who should own Salzburg or the surrounding Alpine regions, Metternich feared that Bavaria was cynically exploiting the threat of Napoleon to mobilize a huge force, and then maneuver it, under the pretext of defense, into a strategic offensive position. That way, with the increased leverage, Bavaria could be assured of its gains, either from diplomacy in Vienna or outright seizure on the battlefield.

W
ITH HIS RETURN
to Paris, Napoleon was claiming to be a new man who had learned from his mistakes. He promised to be more moderate in his actions, guaranteeing a liberal constitution with a freedom of the press. He would establish “an empire of liberty,” honoring all existing treaties, including the ones that parceled out his previous conquests. All he wanted, in return, was recognition of his authority as the legitimate ruler of France.

Leaders at Vienna had learned from experience to be wary of Napoleon’s appeals to peace. This new pledge to respect all existing agreements, many were sure, was as credible as the string of broken treaties he had previously left behind.

Realizing the dangers of Napoleon’s usual “divide and conquer” diplomacy, the delegates at the Vienna Congress went to work on another declaration that would reaffirm the aims of their coalition and the basis for the war against Napoleon, “the tiger that had escaped from his cage”:

[Europe] is arming, not against France, but as much for the welfare of France as for her own security. She acknowledges no other enemy than Napoleon Bonaparte, and all who fight in his cause.

The Vienna Congress would not recognize Napoleon’s authority, and the many ambassadors he sent to Vienna would be treated merely as “messengers,” and then promptly ignored.

But despite the virtual unanimity, ignoring Napoleon’s representatives was becoming increasingly difficult. Was not the fact that they had signed a second declaration reaffirming their position a sign that they might not be as unified as they wished to appear?

There was a betting chance, Napoleon gambled, that Austria might be persuaded to accept peace with him as the ruler of France. After all, he had a Habsburg wife and son, and Metternich was known to be the least antagonistic of the Allies. And many at the congress did fear that Metternich was secretly scheming to accept Napoleon as ruler of France.

The Russian tsar was another one who might be lured away from the coalition. Alexander had personally been kind to many Bonaparte family members in Vienna, often visiting Marie Louise at Schönbrunn and spending a great deal of time with Napoleon’s stepson, Prince Eugène. In addition, Napoleon now had a copy of the secret treaty that would reveal what the tsar’s so-called allies really thought of him.

As for Britain, Napoleon knew that he had virtually no chance at winning over Castlereagh and the Tory Party that controlled Parliament. What he could do, however, was undermine their government. Indeed, on assuming power in France, Napoleon immediately abolished the slave trade, accomplishing at one stroke what the congress had only managed to condemn after endless discussion and countless concessions. Whig opposition leaders, very much impressed, seized the opportunity to denounce the British government for wanting to wage war against such an enlightened ruler.

Napoleon certainly knew how to target his appeals with great skill, and he had a plan for winning over Talleyrand as well. The emperor promised to be forgiving—for he, too, had made mistakes, he admitted. Despite their differences in the past, Napoleon wanted Talleyrand back: “He is still the man, who knows the most about the century, the cabinets, and the peoples.” The person he chose to convey this message, Count Auguste-Charles-Joseph Flahaut de la Billarderie, was none other than Talleyrand’s son, from an affair back in Paris thirty years before.

When Flahaut had difficulty reaching Vienna, arrested on the way at Stuttgart by officials of the king of Württemberg, Napoleon sent another courier, Count François-Casimir Mouret de Montrond, the charming adventurer known in Paris salons as the “beautiful Montrond” or the “most devilish man in France.” He had long been one of Talleyrand’s close friends. Montrond’s relationship would guarantee an opportunity to present his appeal to the foreign minister. His charm, Napoleon hoped, would do the rest.

Count Montrond made his way to Vienna, arriving successfully by using the false name of Abbé Altieri. On the first evening at the Kaunitz Palace, Montrond asked Talleyrand, point-blank, if he, as French foreign minister, could really support a war against France.

“Read the declaration,” Talleyrand responded, pointing to the Vienna papers that outlawed Bonaparte; “it does not contain a single word with which I do not agree.” Besides, the French foreign minister continued, “The question, too, is not of a war against France, but of a war against the man of Elba.”

This was a firm response, without the equivocation that often shrouded the comments of his gifted colleague Metternich. Or was it, as some of Talleyrand’s enemies feared, merely a ploy to raise the price of his cooperation? Almost certainly, Talleyrand had no intention of joining Napoleon, though his former boss continued to raise the stakes.

By the end of the month, another messenger would convey an additional offer intended to appeal to Talleyrand’s notorious mercurial streak. All his extensive properties in France, which had been impounded on Napoleon’s return, would be restored, along with a salary of some 200,000 livres, if Talleyrand “behaves like a Frenchman and renders me a few services.” Refusal to comply, of course, would be interpreted by Napoleon as an insult and a sign of hostility.

W
HEN
K
ING
L
OUIS
XVIII fled Paris in March, he risked appearing as a cowardly and unpopular ruler desperate only to protect himself. The king, however, clung to the belief that he maintained the support of the vast majority of Frenchmen. It was only a matter of time before his faithful subjects would rise up against the outlaw. All they needed was a spark to ignite the explosion of support. Perhaps the Vienna Congress could assist in providing that spark.

Yet, as Talleyrand knew, it was going to be a difficult task to convince Vienna’s leaders to restore the Bourbons on the throne for a second time. The king had, among other things, purged the Senate, imposed a strict censorship, and made a mockery of the freedoms that had been promised to the French on the Bourbons’ return. Their blunders seemed endless: “They had learned nothing, forgotten nothing,” as was commonly said of the Bourbon family.

The Russian tsar, for one, regretted putting them on the throne the last time, and did not wish to repeat that mistake. Metternich, too, was secretly looking into other options. As he confided that spring to the Duchess of Sagan, the Bourbons looked “morally sick” and unable to cope. Opposition to the Bourbons, then, was bringing Metternich and Alexander almost into agreement.

The most prominent spokesmen for the Bourbons, on the other hand, were the British delegates. It was Britain, after all, who had supported Louis’ restoration the first time, just as they did before, when he spent many years in exile at Hartwell House in Buckinghamshire. They had, in a sense, invested heavily in him, and presumably did not want to abandon him now. Louis was the best bet, Castlereagh gambled, for a friendly France and a more stable peace.