“Make him see all the absurdity of it:  tell him that England will never get from me any other treaty than that of Amiens:  that I will never suffer her to have anything in the Mediterranean; that I will not treat with her about the Continent; that I am resolved to evacuate Holland and Switzerland; but that I will never stipulate this in an article.”

As for Russia, he continued, she talked much about the integrity of Turkey, but was violating it by the occupation of the Ionian Isles and her constant intrigues in Wallachia.  These facts were correct:  but the manner in which he stated them clearly revealed his annoyance that the Czar would not wholly espouse the French cause.  Talleyrand’s views on this question may be seen in his letter to Bonaparte, when he assures his chief that he has now reaped from his noble advance to the Russian Emperor the sole possible advantage—­“that of proving to Europe by a grand act of frankness your love of peace and to throw upon England the whole blame for the war.”  It is not often that a diplomatist so clearly reveals the secrets of his chief’s policy.[263]

The motives of Alexander were less questionable.  His chief desire at that time was to improve the lot of his people.  War would disarrange these noble designs:  France would inevitably overrun the weaker Continental States:  England would retaliate by enforcing her severe maritime code; and the whole world would be rent in twain by this strife of the elements.

These gloomy forebodings were soon to be realized.  Holland was the first to suffer.  And yet one effort was made to spare her the horrors of war.  Filled with commiseration for her past sufferings, the British Government at once offered to respect her neutrality, provided that the French troops would evacuate her fortresses and exact no succour either in ships, men, or money.[264] But such forbearance was scarcely to be expected from Napoleon, who not only had a French division in that land, supported at its expense, but also relied on its maritime resources.[265] The proposal was at once set aside at Paris.  Napoleon’s decision to drag the Batavian Republic into the war arose, however, from no spasm of the war fever; it was calmly stated in the secret instructions issued to General Decaen in the preceding January.  “It is now considered impossible that we could have war with England, without dragging Holland into it.”  Holland was accordingly once more ground between the upper and the nether millstone, between the Sea Power and the Land Power, pouring out for Napoleon its resources in men and money, and losing to the masters of the sea its ships, foreign commerce, and colonies.