“Nothing,” he wrote to Eugene on June 2nd, “can be more perfidious than that Court.  If I granted her present demands, she would afterwards ask for Italy and Germany.  Certainly she shall have nothing from me.”  Events served to strengthen his resolve.  The French entered Breslau in triumph, and raised the siege of Glogau.  The coalition seemed to be tottering.  That the punishment dealt to the allies and Austria might be severe and final, he only needed a few weeks for the reorganization of his once formidable cavalry.  Then he could vent his rage upon Austria.  Then he could overthrow the Hungarian horse, and crumple up the ill-trained Austrian foot.  A short truce, he believed, was useless:  it would favour the allies more than the French.  And, under the specious plea that the discussion of a satisfactory peace must take up at least forty days, he ordered his envoy, Caulaincourt, to insist on a space of time which would admit of the French forces being fully equipped in Saxony, Bavaria, and Illyria.  “If,” he wrote to Caulaincourt on June 4th, “we did not wish to treat with a view to peace, we should not be so stupid as to treat for an armistice at the present time.”  And he urged him to insist on the limit of July 20th, “always on the same reasoning, namely, that we must have forty full days to see if we can come to an understanding.”  Far different was his secret warning to General Clarke, the Minister of War.  To him he wrote on June 2nd: 

“If I can, I will wait for the month of September to deal great blows.  I wish then to be in a position to crush my enemies, though it is possible that, when Austria sees me about to do so, she may make use of her pathetic and sentimental style, in order to recognize the chimerical and ridiculous nature of her pretensions.  I have wished to write you this letter so that you may thoroughly know my thoughts once for all.”

And to Maret, his Minister for Foreign Affairs, he wrote on the same day: 

“We must gain time, and to gain time without displeasing Austria, we must use the same language we have used for the last six months—­that we can do everything if Austria is our ally....  Work on this, beat about the bush, and gain time....  You can embroider on this canvas for the next two months, and find matter for sending twenty couriers."[301]

In such cases, where Napoleon’s diplomatic assurances are belied by his secret military instructions, no one who has carefully studied his career can doubt which course would be adopted.  The armistice was merely the pause that would be followed by a fiercer onset, unless the allies and Austria bent before his will.  Of this they gave no sign even after the blow of Bautzen.  In the negotiations concerning the armistice they showed no timidity; and when, on June 4th, it was signed at Poischwitz up to July 20th, Napoleon felt some doubts whether he had not shown too much complaisance.

It was so:  in granting a suspension of arms he had signed his own death warrant.