new military monarchy.  Talleyrand, whose designs could never be fathomed by the most astute of diplomatists, had succeeded also in isolating Russia and Prussia from the rest of Europe, and raising France into a great power, although her territories were now confined to the limits which had existed in 1792.  He had succeeded in detaching Austria and the southern States of Germany from Prussia.  He had split Germany into two rival powers, just what Louis Napoleon afterwards aspired to do, hoping to derive from their mutual jealousies some great advantage to France in case of war.  Neither of them, however, realized the intense common love of both Austria and Prussia, and indeed of all the German States at heart, for “Fatherland,” needing only the genius of a very great man finally to unite them together in one great nation, impossible to be hereafter vanquished by any single power.

Austria retained for her share Lombardy, Venice, Parma, Placentia,—­the finest part of Italy, that which was known in the time of Julius Caesar as Cisalpine Gaul.  She did not care for the Low Countries, which formed a part of the old empire of Charles V., since to keep that territory would cost more than it would pay.  She also received from Bavaria the Tyrol.  As further results of the Congress of Vienna, the Netherlands and Holland were united in one kingdom, under a prince of the house of Nassau; Naples returned to the rule of the Bourbons; Genoa became a part of Piedmont.  The petty independent States of Germany (some three hundred) were united into a confederation of thirty-seven, called the German Confederacy, to afford mutual support in time of war, and to be directed by a Diet, in which Austria and Prussia were to have two votes each, while Bavaria, Wuertemberg, and Hanover were to have one vote each.  Thus, Prussia and Austria had four votes out of seven; which practically gave to these two powers, if they chose to unite, the control of all external relations.  As to internal affairs, the legislative power was vested in representatives from all the States, both small and great.  It will be seen that the higher interests of Germany were not considered in this Congress at all, attention being directed solely to a division of spoils.

But while the Congress was dividing between the princes who composed it its acquisition of territory by conquest, and quarrelling about their respective shares like the members of a family that had come into a large fortune, news arrived of the escape of Napoleon from Elba, after a brief ten months’ detention, the adherence to him of the French army, and the consequent dethronement of Louis XVIII.  The Congress at once dispersed, forgetting all its differences, while the great monarchs united once more in pouring such an avalanche of troops into France and Belgium that Napoleon stood no chance of retaining his throne, whatever military genius he might display.  After his defeat at Waterloo the allies occupied Paris, and this time exacted a large war indemnity of L40,000,000, and left an army of occupation of one hundred and fifty thousand men in France until the money should be paid.  They also returned to their owners the pictures of the Louvre which Napoleon had taken in his various conquests.