Napoleon’s Dreams of Empire.

At the beginning of the century Napoleon was First Consul; and the France over which he ruled was already the mightiest nation in Europe, and yet had not reached the zenith of her power.  It was at this time that the French influence over Spain was most complete.  Both the Spanish King and the Spanish people were dazzled and awed by the splendor of Napoleon’s victories.  Napoleon’s magnificent and wayward genius was always striving after more than merely European empire.  As throne after throne went down before him he planned conquests which should include the interminable wastes of snowy Russia, and the sea-girt fields of England; and he always dreamed of yet vaster, more shadowy triumphs, won in the realms lying eastward of the Mediterranean, or among the islands and along the coasts of the Spanish Main.  In 1800 his dream of Eastern conquest was over, but his lofty ambition was planning for France the re-establishment in America of that colonial empire which a generation before had been wrested from her by England.

    The Treaty of San Ildefonso.

The need of the Spaniards seemed to Napoleon his opportunity.  By the bribe of a petty Italian principality he persuaded the Bourbon King of Spain to cede Louisiana to the French, at the treaty of San Ildefonso, concluded in October, 1800.  The cession was agreed to by the Spaniards on the express pledge that the territory should not be transferred to any other power; and chiefly for the purpose of erecting a barrier which might stay the American advance, and protect the rest of the Spanish possessions.

    The Right of Deposit Annulled.

Every effort was made to keep the cession from being made public, and owing to various political complications it was not consummated for a couple of years; but meanwhile it was impossible to prevent rumors from going abroad, and the mere hint of such a project was enough to throw the West into a fever of excitement.  Moreover, at this moment, before the treaty between France and Spain had been consummated, Morales, the Intendant of New Orleans, deliberately threw down the gage of battle to the Westerners. [Footnote:  Gayarre, III., 456.] On October 16, 1802, he proclaimed that the Americans had forfeited their right of deposit in New Orleans.  By Pinckney’s treaty this right had been granted for three years, with the stipulation that it should then be extended for a longer period, and that if the Spaniards chose to revoke the permit so far as New Orleans was concerned, they should make some other spot on the river a port of free entry.  The Americans had taken for granted that the privilege when once conferred would never be withdrawn; but Morales, under pretence that the Americans had slept on their rights by failing to discover some other spot as a treaty port, declared that the right of deposit had lapsed, and would not be renewed.  The Governor, Salcedo—­who had succeeded Gayoso, when