On the 1st of November 1814 the diplomatists who were to resettle Europe as arranged by the definitive Treaty of Paris met at Vienna. But many of the monarchs most concerned felt that they could not give their entire confidence to any diplomatist, however faithful or distinguished, and they therefore came to Vienna in person to support their views. The final decision of disputes obviously lay in the hands of the four powers which by their union had conquered Napoleon. These four powers solemnly agreed to act in harmony and to prepare all questions privately, and then lay them before the Congress. In fact they intended to impose their will upon the smaller states of Europe just as Napoleon had done. That they did not succeed and that their concert was broken was due to the extraordinary ability of Talleyrand, the first French plenipotentiary. The history of the Congress is the history of Talleyrand’s skilful diplomacy, and the resettlement of Europe which it effected was therefore largely the work of France.

The Emperor Francis of Austria acted as host to his illustrious guests. The royalties present were the Emperor Alexander of Russia, with his Empress, the Grand Duke Constantine, and his sisters, the Grand Duchesses Marie of Saxe-Weimar and Catherine of Oldenburg; the King of Prussia with his nephew Prince William; the King and Queen of Bavaria, the King and Crown Prince of WÜrtemburg, the King of Denmark, the Prince of Orange, the Grand Dukes of Baden, Saxe-Weimar, and Hesse-Cassel, the Dukes of Brunswick, Nassau, and Saxe-Coburg. The King of Saxony was a prisoner of war and absent.

The plenipotentiaries of Russia were Count Razumovski, Count von Stackelberg, and Count Nesselrode, who were assisted by Stein, the former Prussian minister, and one of Alexander’s most trusted advisers, by Pozzo di Borgo, the Corsican, now appointed Russian ambassador to Paris, by Count Capo d’Istria, the future President of Greece, by Prince Adam Czartoryski, one of the most patriotic Poles, and by some of the most famous Russian Generals, such as Chernishev and Wolkonski. The Austrian plenipotentiaries were Prince Metternich, the State Chancellor, the Baron von Wessenberg-Ampfingen, and Friedrich von Gentz, who was appointed to act as Secretary to the Congress.

England was represented by Lord Castlereagh, Lord Cathcart, Lord Clancarty, and Lord Stewart, Castlereagh’s brother, who as Sir Charles Stewart had played so great a part in the negotiations in 1813, and who had been created a peer for his services. The English plenipotentiaries were also aided by Count von Hardenberg, and Count von MÜnster, who were deputed to represent Hanoverian interests. The Prussian plenipotentiaries were Prince von Hardenberg, the State Chancellor, and William von Humboldt, who in military matters were advised by General von Knesebeck. The French representatives, whose part was to be so important, were Talleyrand, Prince of Benevento, the Duc de Dalberg, nephew of the Prince Primate, the Marquis de la Tour du Pin, and the Comte Alexis de Noailles. These were the representatives of the great powers. Among the representatives of the lesser powers may be noted from the importance of their action, Cardinal Consalvi, who represented the Pope, the Count of Labrador for Spain, Count Palmella for Portugal, Count Bernstorf for Denmark, Count LÖwenhielm for Sweden, the Marquis de Saint-Marsan for Sardinia, the Duke di Campo-Chiaro for Murat, King of Naples, Ruffo, for Ferdinand King of the Two Sicilies, Prince von Wrede for Bavaria, Count Wintzingerode for WÜrtemburg, and Count von Schulemburg for Saxony. In addition to these plenipotentiaries representing powers of the first and second rank, were innumerable representatives of petty principalities, deputies for the free cities of Germany, and even agents for petty German princes mediatised by Napoleon in 1806.

When Talleyrand with the French legation arrived in Vienna he found, as has been said, that the four great powers had formed a close union in order to control the Congress. His first step therefore was to set France forth as the champion of the second-rate states of Europe. The Count of Labrador, the Spanish representative, strongly resented the conduct of the great powers in pretending to arrange matters, as they called it, for the Congress. Talleyrand skilfully made use of Labrador, and through him and Palmella, Bernstorf and LÖwenhielm managed to upset the preconcerted ideas of the four allies, and insisted on every matter being brought before the Congress as a whole, and being prepared by small committees specially selected for that purpose. His next step was to sow dissension amongst the great powers. As the champion of the smaller states he had already made France of considerable importance, and he then claimed that she too had a right to be treated as a great power and not as an enemy. His argument was that Europe had fought Napoleon and not France; that Louis XVIII. was the legitimate monarch of France; and that any disrespect shown to him or his ambassadors would recoil on the heads of all other legitimate monarchs. He claimed that France had as much right to make her voice heard in the resettlement of Europe as any other country, because the allied monarchs had distinctly recognised that she was only to be thrust back into her former limits and not to be expunged from the map of Europe. Having made his claim good on the right of the legitimacy of his master to speak for France as a great power equal in all respects to the others, he proceeded to sow dissension among the representatives of the four allied monarchs. This was not a difficult thing to do, for the seeds of dissension had long existed. The difference he introduced was that in speaking as a fifth great power, and as the champion of the smaller states, France became the arbiter in the chief questions before the Congress.

The division between the great powers was caused by the desire of Russia and Prussia for the aggrandisement of their territories. The Emperor Alexander wished to receive the whole of Poland. His idea, which was inspired by his friend, Prince Adam Czartoryski, was to form Poland into an independent kingdom ruled, however, by himself as Emperor of Russia. The Poles were to have a new Constitution based on that propounded in 1791, and the Czar of Russia was to be also King of Poland, just as in former days the Electors of Saxony had been Kings of Poland, but he was to be an hereditary, not an elected, sovereign. To form once more a united Poland, Austria and Prussia were to surrender their gains in the three partitions of Poland. Austria was to receive compensation for her loss of Galicia in Italy; Prussia was to be compensated for the loss of Prussian Poland by receiving the whole of Saxony. As it had been already arranged that Prussia was to receive the bulk of the Rhenish territory on the left bank of the Rhine in addition to her great extensions of 1803, the result would be to make Prussia by far the greatest power in Germany. Talleyrand was acute enough to perceive that Lord Castlereagh did not approve of the extension of the influence of Russia, and that Metternich was equally indisposed to allow Prussia to obtain such a wholesale aggrandisement. Saxony had been the faithful ally of France to the very last, and Talleyrand felt that it would be an indelible stain on the French name if it were thus sacrificed. He was cordially supported in this view by his new master, for though the King of Saxony had been the faithful ally of Napoleon, Louis XVIII. did not forget that his own mother was a Saxon princess. Working, therefore, on the feelings of Castlereagh and Metternich, he induced England and Austria to declare against the scheme of Russia and Prussia.

The Emperor Alexander and Frederick William blustered loudly; they declared that they were in actual military possession of Poland and of Saxony, and that they would hold those states by force of arms against all comers. In answer, Talleyrand, Castlereagh, and Metternich signed a treaty of mutual alliance between France, England, and Austria, on the 3d of January 1815. By this secret treaty the three powers bound themselves to resist by arms the schemes of Russia and Prussia, and in the face of their determined opposition the Emperor Alexander gave way. Immediately Napoleon returned from Elba he found the draft treaty between the three powers on the table of Louis XVIII. and at once sent it to Alexander. That monarch, confronted with the danger threatened by Napoleon’s landing in France, contented himself with showing the draft to Metternich and then threw it in the fire. The whole of this strange story is of the utmost interest; it proves not only the ability of Talleyrand, but the inherent strength of France. It is most significant that within a few months after the occupation of Paris by the allies for the first time France should again be recognised as a great power, and form the main factor in breaking up the cohesion of the alliance, which had been formed against her.

The result of Talleyrand’s skilful policy was thus to unite England, Austria, and France, supported by many of the secondary states, such as Bavaria and Spain, against the pretensions of Prussia and Russia. Powerful armies were immediately set on foot. France in particular raised her military forces from 130,000 to 200,000 men, and her new army was in every way superior to that with which Napoleon had fought his defensive campaigns in 1814, for it contained the veteran soldiers who had been blockaded in the distant fortresses or had been prisoners of war. England too was enabled to make adequate preparations, for on December the 24th, 1814, a treaty had been signed at Ghent between the United States and England which put an end to the war which had been proceeding ever since 1812 on account of England’s naval pretensions. Bavaria also promised to put in the field 30,000 men for every 100,000 supplied by Austria. Although the secret treaty of January 3d was not divulged until after the return of Napoleon from Elba, the determined attitude of the opposition caused the Emperor Alexander to give way. It was decided that instead of the whole of Saxony, Prussia should only receive the district of Lusatia, together with the towns of Torgau and Wittenberg; a territory which embraced half the area of Saxony and one-third of its population. The King of Saxony, who had been treated as a prisoner of war, and whom the Emperor of Russia had even threatened to send to Siberia, was released from captivity, and induced by the Duke of Wellington, who succeeded Lord Castlereagh as English plenipotentiary in February 1815, to agree to these terms. The salvation of Saxony was a matter of great gratification to Louis XVIII., who remembered that though the king had been the faithful ally of Napoleon, he was also his own near relative.

Since Prussia was obliged to give up her claim to the whole of Saxony, Russia also had to withdraw from her scheme of uniting the whole of Poland. Nevertheless, Russia retained the lion’s share of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw; in 1774 her frontier had reached the Dwina and the Dnieper; in 1793 she obtained half of Lithuania as far as Wilna; in 1795 she annexed the rest of Lithuania and touched the NiÉmen and the Bug; in 1809 Napoleon had granted her the territory containing the sources of the Bug; and now in 1815 her borders crossed the Vistula, and by the annexation of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, including that city, penetrated for some distance between Eastern Prussia and Galicia. Prussia received back its share of the two first partitions of Poland, with the addition of the province of Posen and the city of Thorn, but lost Warsaw and its share in the last partition; while Austria received Cracow, which was to be administered as a free city. Alexander was deeply disappointed by the frustration of his Polish schemes, but he nevertheless kept his promise to Prince Adam Czartoryski and granted a representative constitution and a measure of independence to Russian Poland.

Though the great diplomatic struggle arose over the combined question of Saxony and Poland, the most important work of the Congress was not confined to it alone. Committees were appointed to make new arrangements for Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and to settle other miscellaneous questions. Of these committees the most important was that which reorganised Germany. It had been arranged by the secret articles of the Treaty of Paris that a Germanic Confederation should take the place of the Holy Roman Empire. The example of Napoleon and his institution of the Confederation of the Rhine was followed and developed. Instead of the hundreds of small states which had existed at the commencement of the French Revolution, Germany, apart from Austria and Prussia, was organised into only thirty-eight states. These were the four kingdoms of Hanover, Bavaria, WÜrtemburg, and Saxony; the seven grand duchies of Baden, Oldenburg, Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Hesse-Cassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Saxe-Weimar; the nine duchies of Nassau, Brunswick, Saxe-Gotha, Saxe-Coburg, Saxe-Meiningen, Saxe-Hildburghausen, Anhalt-Dessau, Anhalt-Bernburg, and Anhalt-KÖthen; eleven principalities, two of Schwartzburg, two of Hohenzollern, two of Lippe, two of Reuss, Hesse-Homburg, Liechtenstein, and Waldeck, and the four free cities of Hamburg, Frankfort, Bremen, and LÜbeck. The number of thirty-eight was made up by the duchies of Holstein and Lauenburg, belonging to the King of Denmark, and the grand duchy of Luxembourg, granted to the King of the Netherlands. In its organisation the Germanic Confederation resembled the Confederation of the Rhine. The Diet of the Confederation was to be always presided over by Austria and was to consist of two Chambers. The Ordinary Assembly was composed of seventeen members, one for each of the larger states, one for the free cities combined, one for Brunswick, one for Nassau, one for the four duchies of Saxony united, one for the three duchies of Anhalt united, and one for the smaller principalities. This Assembly was to sit permanently at Frankfort and to settle all ordinary matters. In addition there was to be a General Assembly to be summoned intermittently for important subjects, consisting of sixty-nine members returned by the different states in proportion to their size and population. Each state was to be supreme in internal matters, but private wars against each other were forbidden as well as external wars by individual states on powers outside the limits of the Confederacy. In the territorial arrangements of the new Confederation, the most important point is the disappearance of all ecclesiastical states. The Prince-Primacy, which Napoleon had established in his Confederation of the Rhine, was not maintained, and Dalberg, who had filled that office throughout the Empire, was restricted to his ecclesiastical functions.

The most difficult problem to be decided was the final disposition of the districts on the left bank of the Rhine, which had been ruled by France ever since 1794. It had been settled by the secret articles at Paris that these dominions should be used for the establishment of strong powers upon the borders of France. The main difficulty was as to the disposition of the important border fortresses of Mayence and Luxembourg. Prussia laid claim to both these places, but was strongly resisted by Austria, France, and the smaller states of Germany. It was eventually resolved that Prussia should receive the northern territory on the left bank of the Rhine, stretching from Elten to Coblentz, and including Cologne, TrÈves, and Aix-la-Chapelle. In compensation for the Tyrol and Salzburg, which she was forced to return to Austria, and in recognition of her former sovereignty in the Palatinate, Bavaria was granted a district from the Prussian borders to Alsace, including Mayence, which was designated Rhenish Bavaria. Finally, Luxembourg was formed into a grand duchy, and given as a German state to the House of Orange. It was not united to the new kingdom of the Netherlands, which was formed out of Holland and Belgium, but was to retain its independence under the sovereignty of the King of the Netherlands. The union of the provinces of the Netherlands was one of the favourite schemes of England, and was carried into effect in spite of the well-known feeling of opposition between the Catholic provinces of Belgium and the Protestant provinces of Holland.

As in its reorganisation of Germany, so in the settlement of Switzerland, the Congress of Vienna followed the example set by Napoleon. The Emperor had quite given up the idea which had fascinated the French Directory of forming Switzerland into a Republic, one and indivisible. He had yielded to the wishes of the Swiss people themselves, and organised them on the basis of a confederation of independent cantons. The Congress of Vienna continued Napoleon’s policy of forbidding the existence of subject cantons in spite of the protests of the Canton of Berne. Napoleon’s cantons of Argau, Thurgau, Saint-Gall, the Grisons, the Ticino, and the Pays de Vaud were maintained, but the number of the cantons was raised from nineteen to twenty-two by the formation of the three new cantons of Geneva, the Valais, and NeufchÂtel, which had formed part of the French Empire. The Canton of Berne received in reply to its importunities the greater part of the former Bishopric of Basle. The Swiss Confederation as thus constituted was placed under the guarantee of the great powers and declared neutral for ever. The Helvetic Constitution, which was promulgated by a Federal Act dated the 7th of April 1815, was not quite so liberal as Napoleon’s Constitution. Greater independence was secured in that the constitutions of the separate cantons and organic reforms in them had not to be submitted to the Federal Diet. The prohibition against internal custom houses was removed. The presidency of the Diet was reserved to Zurich, Berne, and Lucerne alternately, and the Helvetic Diet became a Congress of Delegates like the Germanic Diet rather than a Legislative Assembly. It is to be noted that in spite of the declaration of the Congress of Vienna, Prussia refused to renounce her claims on her former territory of NeufchÂtel, the independence of which as a Swiss canton was not recognised by her until 1857.

The resettlement of Italy presented more than one special problem. The most difficult of these to solve was caused by the engagements entered into by the allies with Murat in 1814. Talleyrand, on behalf of the King of France, insisted on the dethronement and expulsion of Murat, while Metternich from friendship for Caroline Murat wished to retain him in his kingdom. The Emperor Alexander, whoever prided himself on his fidelity to his engagements, wished to protect Murat, and had at Vienna struck up a warm friendship with EugÈne de Beauharnais, Napoleon’s Viceroy of Italy. Murat, ungrateful though he was personally toward Napoleon, had yet imbibed his master’s ideas in favour of the unity and independence of Italy. During the campaign of 1814, he had led his army to the banks of the Po, and he persisted in remaining there after the Congress of Vienna had met. But the diplomatists at Vienna had no wish to accept the great idea of Italian unity. Murat’s aspirations in this direction were most annoying to them, and it was with real pleasure that they heard after the landing of Napoleon from Elba that Murat had by an indiscreet proclamation given them an excuse for an open declaration of war. The Duke di Campo-Chiaro, Murat’s representative at Vienna, had kept him informed of the differences between the allied powers, and an indiscreet note asking whether he was to be considered as at peace or at war with the House of Bourbon gave the plenipotentiaries their opportunity. War was immediately declared against him; an Austrian army defeated him at Tolentino on the 3d of May 1815, and he was forced to fly from Italy. The acceptance of Murat’s ambassador, who spoke in his name as King of the Two Sicilies, made it difficult for the Congress to know how to treat with Ruffo who had been sent as ambassador by Ferdinand, the Bourbon King of the Two Sicilies, who had maintained his power in the island of Sicily through the presence of the English garrison. Acting on the ground of legitimacy, it was difficult to reject Ferdinand’s claims, which were warmly supported by France and Spain, but Murat’s ill-considered behaviour solved the difficulty, and after his defeat Ferdinand was recognised as King of the Two Sicilies. Murat, later in the year, landed in his former dominions, but he was taken prisoner and promptly shot.

Another Italian question which presented considerable difficulty was the disposal of Genoa and the surrounding territory. When Lord William Bentinck occupied that city, he had in the name of England promised it independence and even hinted at the unity of Italy. Castlereagh unfortunately felt it to be his duty to disavow Bentinck’s declaration, and Genoa was united to Piedmont as part of the kingdom of Sardinia. The third difficult question was the creation of a state for the Empress Marie Louise. An independent sovereignty had been promised to her. She was naturally supported by her father, the Emperor Francis of Austria, and was ably represented at Vienna by her future husband, Count Neipperg. It was eventually resolved that she should receive the duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla, but the succession was not secured to her son, the King of Rome, but was granted to the rightful heir, the King of Etruria, who, until the succession fell in, was to rule at Lucca. The other arrangements in Italy were comparatively simple. Austria received the whole of Venetia and Lombardy, in the place of Mantua and the Milanese, which she had possessed before 1789. The Grand Duchy of Tuscany, with the principality of Piombino, was restored to the Grand Duke Ferdinand, the uncle of the Emperor Francis of Austria, with the eventual succession to the Duchy of Lucca. The Pope received back his dominions including the Legations of Bologna and Ferrara, and Duke Francis, the grandson of Hercules III., was recognised as Duke of Modena, to which duchy he would have succeeded had not Napoleon absorbed it in his kingdom of Italy.

The arrangements with regard to the other states of Europe made at the Congress of Vienna were comparatively unimportant, and did not present the same difficult problems as the resettlement of Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. Norway in spite of its disinclination was definitely ceded to Sweden, but Bernadotte had to restore to France the West-Indian island of Guadeloupe, which had been handed over to him by England in 1813, as part of the price of his alliance. Denmark had by the Treaty of Kiel with Bernadotte been promised Swedish Pomerania in the place of Norway. This promise was not carried out. Denmark like Saxony had been too faithful an ally of Napoleon not to be made to suffer. Swedish Pomerania was given to Prussia, and Denmark only received the small Duchy of Lauenburg. By these arrangements both Sweden and Denmark were greatly weakened, and the Scandinavian States, by the loss of Finland and Pomerania, surrendered to their powerful neighbours, Prussia and Russia, the command of the Baltic Sea. Spain, owing to the ability of the Count of Labrador, and the support of Talleyrand, not only lost nothing except the island of Trinidad, which had been conquered by England, but was allowed to retain the district round Olivenza, which had been ceded to her by Portugal in 1801. The desertion of Portugal by England in this particular is the chief blot on Lord Castlereagh’s policy at Vienna. The Portuguese army had fought gallantly with Wellington, and there was no reason why she should have been forced to consent to the definite cession of Olivenza to Spain when other countries were winning back their former borders. Portugal was also made to surrender French Guiana and Cayenne to France. England, though she had borne the chief pecuniary stress of the war and had been more instrumental than any other power in overthrowing Napoleon, received less compensation than any other country. She kept Malta, thus settling the question which led to the rupture of the Peace of Amiens; she received Heligoland, which was ceded to her by Denmark, as commanding the mouth of the Elbe; and she was also granted the protectorate of the Ionian Islands, which enabled her to close the Adriatic. Among colonial possessions England took from France the Mauritius, Tobago, and Saint Lucia, but she returned Martinique and the Isle of Bourbon, and forced Sweden and Portugal to restore Guadeloupe and French Guiana. With regard to Holland, England retained Ceylon and the Cape of Good Hope, but she restored Java, CuraÇao, and the other Dutch possessions. In the West Indies also, she retained, as has been said, the former Spanish island of Trinidad.

One reason for Castlereagh’s moderation at Vienna is to be found in the pressure that was exerted upon him in England to secure the abolition of the slave trade. It is a curious fact that while the English plenipotentiary was taking such an important share in the resettlement of Europe, the English people were mainly interested in the question of the slave trade. The great changes which were leading to new combinations in Europe, the aggrandisement of Prussia, the reconstitution of Germany, the extension of Austria, all passed without notice, but meetings, in Lord Castlereagh’s own words, were held in nearly every village to insist upon his exerting his authority to abolish the trade in negro slaves. Castlereagh therefore lent his best efforts, in obedience to his constituents, to this end. The other ambassadors could not understand why he troubled so much about what seemed to them a trivial matter. They suspected a deep design, and thought that the reason of England’s humanity was that her West Indian colonies were well stocked with negroes, whereas the islands she was restoring were empty of them. The plenipotentiaries of other powers possessing colonies in the tropics therefore refused to comply with Castlereagh’s request and it was eventually settled that the slave trade should be abolished by France after five, and by Spain after eight years. Castlereagh had to be content with this concession, but to satisfy his English constituents he got a declaration condemning the slave trade assented to by all the powers at the Congress. Another point of great importance which was settled at the Congress of Vienna was with regard to the navigation of rivers which flow through more than one state. It had been the custom for all the petty sovereigns to impose such heavy tolls on river traffic that such rivers as the Rhine were made practically useless for commerce. This question was discussed by a committee at the Congress, and a code for the international regulation of rivers was drawn up and generally agreed to.

These matters took long to discuss, and might have taken longer had not the news arrived at the beginning of March 1815 that Napoleon had left Elba and become once more undisputed ruler of France. In the month of February the Duke of Wellington had succeeded Lord Castlereagh as English representative at Vienna, for the latter nobleman had to return to London to take his place in Parliament. At the news of the striking event of Napoleon’s being once more at the head of a French army all jealousies at Vienna ceased for the time. The Duke of Wellington was taken into consultation by the allied monarchs, and it was resolved to carry into effect the provisions of the Treaty of Chaumont. The great armies which had been prepared for a struggle amongst themselves were now turned by the allies against France. A treaty of alliance was signed at Vienna between Austria, Russia, Prussia, and England, on the 25th of March 1815, by which those powers promised to furnish 180,000 men each for the prosecution of war, and stipulated that none of them should lay down arms until the power of Napoleon was completely destroyed. It was arranged that three armies should invade France, the first of 250,000 Austrians, Russians, and Bavarians under Schwartzenberg across the Upper Rhine, the second of 150,000 Prussians under BlÜcher across the Lower Rhine, and the third of 150,000 English, Hanoverians and Dutch from the Netherlands. Subsidies to the extent of £11,000,000 were promised by England to the allies. These arrangements made, the allied monarchs and their ministers left Vienna. But the final general Act of the Congress was not drawn up and signed until the 8th of June 1815, ten days before the battle of Waterloo.

It has been said that the allied armies after the abdication of Napoleon at Fontainebleau had retired and left France to the rule of Louis XVIII. That King on returning to France had made most liberal promises in the declaration known as the Declaration of Saint Ouen. These principles were embodied in a Charter, which was granted on the 4th of June 1814. By this Charter representative institutions and entire individual liberty were promised, and also the maintenance of the administrative creations of the Empire. Under the new Constitution there were to be two chambers, the one of hereditary peers, the other of elected representatives. The promises of the Charter were very fair, and had they been duly carried out, France might have been entirely contented, but unfortunately for himself Louis XVIII. had not learned experience in his exile. In spite of the Charter he regarded himself as a ruler by right divine. EmigrÉs, even ÉmigrÉs who had borne arms against France and consistently abused their fatherland, were promoted to the highest offices in the State. The King surrounded himself with reactionary courtiers, and what was worse with reactionary ministers. The favour shown to returned ÉmigrÉs, the haughty attitude of the Princes of the blood, and the violent proclamations of the returned bishops and clergy made the people of France fear that the promises made in the Charter were but a sham, and that the next step would be that the estates of the Church and of the Crown which had been sold during the Revolution would be resumed. The feeling of distrust was universal. The rule of Louis XVIII. had been accepted only as a guarantee of peace. It was never popular, and the former subordinates of Napoleon began to regret the Imperial rÉgime. If this was the feeling among the civil population, it was still more keenly felt in the army. Prisoners of war, and the blockaded garrisons, who had returned to France, felt sure that Napoleon’s defeat in 1814 had been but accidental and wished to try conclusions once more with Europe. In all ranks a desire was expressed to wipe out the disgrace of the occupation of Paris by the allies.

On the 1st of March 1815, Napoleon, who had been informed of the universal feeling in France, landed in the Gulf of San Juan, and began the short reign which is known as the Hundred Days. He was accompanied by the 800 men of the Guard whom he had been allowed to have at Elba, and was received with the utmost enthusiasm by all classes. His journey through France was a triumphal procession. The King’s brother, the Comte d’Artois, vainly attempted to organise resistance at Lyons. Marshal Ney, who had promised to arrest his patron, joined him with the army under his command on the 17th of March, and on the 20th Napoleon re-entered Paris and took up his quarters at the Tuileries. Louis XVIII. had fled on the news of Ney’s defection, and escaping from France took shelter at Ghent. Napoleon had learnt bitter lessons from his misfortunes. He declared that he would grant full and complete individual liberty, and also the freedom of the press, and on the 23d of April he promulgated what he called the Additional Act consecrating these principles. He felt his error in depending too entirely upon his bureaucracy, and he appealed on the ground of patriotism to the men of the Revolution whom he had in the days of his power carefully kept from office. These men rallied round him, and he appointed their most noteworthy representative, Carnot, his Minister of the Interior. He declared his acceptance of the two chambers ordained by the Charter, and most of the peers created by Louis XVIII. took the oath of allegiance once again to Napoleon.

After rousing national enthusiasm by appeals to patriotism and by the liberal provisions of the Additional Act, Napoleon organised his army, and in his favourite fashion decided to strike before any invasion of France took place. Of the three armies prepared for the invasion the one nearest within reach was that commanded by the Duke of Wellington. That General on leaving Vienna had been placed at the head of a miscellaneous force of English, Hanoverians, Dutch, and Belgians. He greatly regretted the absence of most of his veterans of the Peninsula who were still in America, and complained of the number of raw troops under his command. He agreed to act in harmony with the Prussians under BlÜcher, who brought his army into the Netherlands. Napoleon determined to strike before Wellington and BlÜcher had united. He crossed the frontier at the head of 130,000 men, and by his skilful and rapid movements practically surprised the allied generals. On the 16th of June 1815, he defeated BlÜcher at Ligny, while Ney with his left fought a drawn battle with the English advanced divisions at Quatre Bras. By these engagements the English and Prussian armies were separated. Napoleon then resolved to attack the English with the bulk of his army, and detached Marshal Grouchy to pursue the Prussians. BlÜcher, however, promised to come to Wellington’s assistance if the English were attacked, and Wellington relying on this promise took up his position at Waterloo. On the 18th of June the battle of Waterloo was fought. The English army held its position in spite of repeated and furious attacks, until BlÜcher came up on the French right. Unable to continue the struggle against two foes, the French army was obliged to give way, and after the repulse of the Guard, which might have covered his retreat, Napoleon recognised that he was completely routed. He fled to Paris, and on the 22d of June he abdicated in favour of his son, the King of Rome. He nominated an executive commission of government, and then went on board ship in the hope of escaping to America. In this project he failed, and on 15th July he surrendered to Captain Maitland on board H.M.S. Bellerophon. The army of Wellington and BlÜcher pursued the defeated foe, but the rout had been too complete for the French to make another stand. Cambrai the only place that attempted to resist was easily taken, and on the 3d of July Wellington and BlÜcher reoccupied Paris. Meanwhile the grand army of Schwartzenberg had also invaded France, and the country was once more in the possession of the allies.

The terms of the second Treaty of Paris proved that the allied monarchs understood the difference between the opposition made by France to Europe in 1814 and 1815. In 1814 the Treaty of Paris which was then concluded was, if not particularly liberal to France, at least perfectly just. The allied monarchs and their ministers had appreciated the fact that in 1814 they were fighting Napoleon and not France. The campaign of 1815 had been of a different character. The French nation and not merely the French army had given proof of their attachment both to the Empire and to Napoleon’s person. It was therefore considered necessary, not only to impose harsher terms upon France, but to exact securities for the future. Several schemes were proposed, of which one was to detach Alsace, Lorraine, and French Flanders, if not the whole of Picardy, and to reduce the limits of France to what they were before the conquests of Louis XIV. This scheme, which was earnestly supported by Prussia, who hoped to get the lion’s share of the districts taken from France, was warmly opposed by Austria and England. The latter power was not to be bribed by the proposed extension of the frontier of its new creation, the Kingdom of the Netherlands. And the former objected entirely to any increase of the power of Prussia. Lord Castlereagh in his opposition to these extravagant suggestions of Prussia was supported by the Emperor Alexander and his minister, Nesselrode, and eventually it was agreed that France should be reduced to its exact limits of 1789. This meant that France lost all the cessions made to it in 1814, except Avignon and the Venaissin. ChambÉry and the part of Savoy then granted to France were restored to the King of Sardinia; the districts in the neighbourhood of Geneva were also returned to that canton, and the fortress of Huningen on the borders of Switzerland was ordered to be dismantled; and the various rectifications of the frontier on the eastern and north-eastern borders were no longer sanctioned. A war contribution of 700,000,000 francs was laid upon France, in addition to which she was to maintain, at the cost of 250,000,000 francs a year, an army of 150,000 men in the possession of her chief frontier fortresses for a period of five years.

These were the most important conditions of peace contained in the second Treaty of Paris, which was signed on 20th of November 1815. But what France felt more bitterly than pecuniary contributions, or even the loss of territory, was the decision of the allied powers that the numerous pictures and works of art, which had been accumulated in Paris during the wars of the Revolution and the Empire, should be returned to their former owners. The Prussians were not satisfied with this, they wished to punish Paris more severely. BlÜcher was only prevented by the intervention of Lord Castlereagh and the Duke of Wellington from exacting a contribution of a 110,000,000 francs from the inhabitants of Paris alone. The Prussians even made preparations to blow up the Bridge of Jena, whose name perpetuated their greatest military humiliation, and were only prevented from their purpose by the expressed determination of Louis XVIII. to stand upon the bridge and be blown up with it if they persisted, and BlÜcher had to be satisfied with the alteration of the name of the bridge from the Bridge of Jena to the Bridge of the Military School. The question of the disposition of the person of Napoleon was one of some difficulty. He reached Torbay on board the Bellerophon on the 24th of July 1815, and the English Ministers did not know what to do with their illustrious prisoner. They dared not trust him in any part of Europe or America from which he could repeat his expedition from Elba. BlÜcher loudly declared that he ought to be shot at Vincennes like the Duc d’Enghien, but the English Government thought it would be sufficient to confine him on an isolated island. For this purpose they borrowed the island of Saint Helena from the East India Company, and on the 8th of August, Napoleon set sail for his place of exile on board H.M.S. Northumberland.

A month after the departure of Napoleon for St. Helena, the Emperor Alexander, the Emperor Francis, and King Frederick William signed the treaty which is known as the Holy Alliance. By this treaty it was declared that the Christian religion was the sole base of government, and the contracting monarchs promised to aid each other on all occasions like brothers, and to recommend to their peoples the exercise of the duties of the Christian religion. Lord Castlereagh declined on behalf of the Prince Regent to join the Holy Alliance, but on the 28th of November 1815, after the signature of the Peace of Paris, he agreed to an alliance that should include all the four powers, of which the aims were to keep from the throne of France either Napoleon or any relation of his, to combine together for the security of their separate states, and the general tranquillity of Europe, and to hold at fixed dates congresses for the settlement of disputed questions.

The second restoration of Louis XVIII. differed from the first as the second Treaty of Paris differed from its predecessor. After the events of the Hundred Days, the Bourbon King could no more delude himself with the idea that he was welcome to the people of France. He owed his seat upon the throne only to the absence of Napoleon and the presence of the allied armies in France, and he prepared on this occasion to punish those who had deserted him. He refused to grant an amnesty, and on the 24th of July 1815, he proscribed fifty-seven of the leading men in France, of whom nineteen were ordered to be tried by court-martial, and thirty-eight were banished. The most illustrious of the victims who perished under this proscription was Marshal Ney, who was shot at Paris on the 7th of December, after being condemned to death by the Chamber of Peers. This procedure was rendered necessary because it would have been difficult to find a court-martial to condemn the bravest of the French marshals. Marshal Moncey, who was nominated to preside over such a court-martial, refused in an eloquent letter which caused him to be sent to prison for three months. Far worse than these executions was the result of the outbreak of brigandage in the south of France. Under the pretext of being Royalists, the Companies of Jehu, which had ravaged the south of France in the days of the Thermidorians and of the Directory, again set to work. Political, religious, and personal passions excited to massacre. Pillage and murder were rife throughout the south of France, and among the victims who were slain in this White Terror of 1815 were Marshal Brune, and Generals Ramel and Lagarde. Special courts were formed by a law voted on the 12th of December 1815, to punish political offences. These provost’s courts were as severe and almost as unjust as the revolutionary tribunals in the provinces during the Reign of Terror, and many hundreds of executions took place. Finally, in January 1816, what was ironically called a Law of Amnesty was passed. This law, from the list of its exceptions, was practically a gigantic proscription. Among others, all surviving members of the Convention who had voted for the death of Louis XVI. were exiled if they had in any way accepted the authority of Napoleon during the Hundred Days, which most of them had done. Under this Law of Amnesty most of the great statesmen who had been concerned in the government of France since 1793 were driven into exile. Conspicuous among them were Carnot, Merlin of Douai, SieyÈs, CambacÉrÈs, and David, the greatest painter of his time.

Restored for a second time to the throne of France, Louis XVIII. declined to take warning from the result of his former policy. He again showered his favours on returned ÉmigrÉs, and pursued a thoroughly reactionary policy. As soon as he was firmly seated at the Tuileries, with the Prussians and the English encamped round Paris, he dismissed Talleyrand and FouchÉ from office and formed a new and strongly Royalist ministry under the presidency of the Duc de Richelieu, who had spent the last twenty years of his life in exile as one of the chief administrators of Russia. The king avowed his intention of keeping the promises he made in the Charter of 1814, but those promises were carried out in such a way as to make them absolutely illusory. He took advantage of the general adhesion given to Napoleon on his return from Elba to exclude from the Upper Chamber or House of Peers most of the leading men in France, leaving the majority entirely in the hands of former ÉmigrÉs, and of men who by the excess of their royalism wished to palliate their offence in not having emigrated. The Lower House, or Chamber of Representatives, even exceeded the House of Peers in its violent royalism. The deputies, chiefly elected under the direct pressure of threats of vengeance, were ready to adopt any reactionary measure suggested to them. Louis XVIII. gave this Assembly the name of the ‘Chambre Introuvable,’ which he intended as a compliment, but which has survived as a term of derision. Among the first laws voted were the suspension of individual liberty, and of the liberty of the press, and the request was then made that the King, in his goodness, would revise fourteen articles of the Charter which were too liberal. But even this chamber, aided by the presence of foreign armies, could not make France revert to the condition in which it had been before 1789. A hint of the resumption of ecclesiastical or national domains would have set the whole country in an uproar, and the Chamber had to be satisfied with voting a large sum of money out of the ordinary taxes as compensation to the ÉmigrÉs for their sufferings in exile.

The spirit of reaction went much further in Spain than in France. Ferdinand VII., on returning to his capital in May 1814, issued a proclamation attacking the Cortes, which had done so much to recover the country from the hands of the French. In his own words: ‘A Cortes convoked in a manner never before known in Spain has been profiting by my captivity in France, and has usurped my rights by imposing on my people an anarchical and seditious Constitution based on the democratic principles of the French Revolution.’ The King of Spain then proceeded to annul by his own absolute authority everything that had been done during his absence. He re-established the Inquisition, and proscribed and condemned to death all who had taken part in reforming the institutions of Spain, whether under the authority of Joseph Bonaparte or under that of the National Cortes. Many hundreds, if not thousands, of Spanish patriots were put to death in a vain attempt of Ferdinand VII. to restore things as they had been in former days. The attempt to carry out a complete reaction resulted in utter failure. Insurrections broke out in all directions, and the Spanish colonies in South America took advantage of the troubles in the fatherland to strike a blow for their own freedom. It is satisfactory to be able to state that the head of the third reigning branch of the House of Bourbon behaved with more moderation and wisdom than Ferdinand VII. of Spain or Louis XVIII. of France. Ferdinand IV., King of the Two Sicilies, returned to his capital at Naples in June 1815. He can hardly be blamed for ordering the execution of Murat whom he had always regarded as a usurper, and it is greatly to his credit that he made some endeavour to retain the excellent administration on the French system which had been established by Joseph Bonaparte and Murat.

The final overthrow of Napoleon and his exile to St. Helena allowed the new system for the government of Europe as laid down by the Congress of Vienna to be tried. That system may be roughly designated as the system of the Great Powers. Before 1789, certain states, such as France and England and Spain, were, from fortuitous circumstances, or the course of their history, larger, more united, and therefore more fitted for war, than others, but the greater part of the Continent was split up into small, and in the case of Germany, into very small states. Several of these small states, such as Sweden and Holland, had at different times exercised a very considerable influence, and the policy of Frederick the Great had added another to them, in the military state of Prussia. At the Congress of Vienna the tendency was to diminish the number and power of the secondary states, and to destroy minute sovereignties. Sweden and Denmark were relegated to the rank of third-rate powers; the petty principalities of Germany were built up into third-rate states. Austria and Prussia were established as great powers, but the increase of their territory brought with it dissimilar results. Prussia became the preponderant state of Germany, while Austria, whose Imperial House had so long held the position of Holy Roman Emperor, became less German, and now depended for its strength on its Italian, Magyar, and Slavonic provinces. The irruption of Russia into the European comity of nations was another significant feature. By its annexation of the greater part of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, Russia thrust itself between Prussia and Austria territorially, while its leading share in the overthrow of Napoleon made its place as a European power unassailable. It may be doubted if the policy of Peter the Great and the Empress Catherine was thus carried out. The tendency of those rulers was to make the Baltic and the Black Sea Russian lakes, and to build up an Empire of the East; affairs in Central Europe only interested them in so far as they prevented interference with their Eastern designs, and did not lead to the erection of powerful states on the Russian border.

Nothing is more remarkable in the settlement of Europe by the Congress of Vienna than the entire neglect of the principle of nationality. Yet it was the sentiment of national patriotism which had enabled France to repulse Europe in arms, and had trained the soldiers with whom Napoleon had given the law to the Continent and had overthrown the mercenary armies of his opponents. It was the principle of nationality which had crippled Napoleon’s finest armies in Spain, and which had produced his expulsion from Russia. It was the feeling of intense national patriotism which had made the Prussian army of 1813, and enabled Prussia after its deepest humiliation to take rank as a first-class power. But the diplomatists at Vienna treated the idea as without force. They had not learnt the great lesson of the French Revolution, that the first result of rousing a national consciousness of political liberty is to create a spirit of national patriotism. The Congress of Vienna trampled such notions under foot. The partition of Poland was consecrated by Europe; Italy was placed under foreign rulers; Belgium and Holland, in spite of the hereditary opposition of centuries, were united under one king. The territories on the left bank of the Rhine, which were happy under French rule, and had been an integral part of France for twenty years, were roughly torn away, and divided between Prussia, Bavaria, and the House of Orange, under the fancied necessity, induced by the exploded notion of maintaining the balance of power in Europe, of building up a bulwark against France. Such short-sighted policy was certain to be undone. Holland and Belgium separated; Italy became united; Poland maintained the consciousness of her national unity, and has more than once endeavoured to regain her independence; France has never ceased to yearn after her ‘natural’ frontier, the Rhine; the states of Germany have developed a national German patriotism which has led to the creation of the modern German Empire. This feeling of conscious nationality was the result of the French Revolution and the wars of Napoleon; its existence is the strength of England, France, Russia, and Germany, its absence is the weakness of Austria. In so far as the spirit of nationality was neglected at the Congress of Vienna, its work was but temporary; in its resurrection, which has filled the history of the present century, the work of the French Revolution has been permanent.

But after all, the growth of the spirit of nationality is only a secondary result of the French Revolution upon Europe; it did not arise in France until foreign powers attempted to interfere with the development of the French people after their own fashion; it did not arise in Europe until Napoleon began to interfere with the development of other nations. The primary results of the French Revolution,—the recognition of individual liberty, which implied the abolition of serfdom and of social privileges; the establishment of political liberty, which implied the abolition of despots, however benevolent, and of political privileges; the maintenance of the doctrine of the sovereignty of the people, which implied the right of the people, through their representatives, to govern themselves,—have also survived the Congress of Vienna. When Europe tried to interfere, the French people sacrificed these great gains to the spirit of nationality, and bowed before the despotism of the Committee of Public Safety and of Napoleon; they have since regained them. The French taught these principles to the rest of Europe, and the history of Europe since 1815 has been the history of their growth side by side with the idea of nationality. How the two, liberty and nationality, can be preserved in harmony is the great problem of the future; the history of Europe from 1789 to 1815 affords many examples of the difficulty of the problem and of the dangers which beset its solution.