The Twin Lieutenants | Page 3

at
Espinosa, killed eight thousand men, ten generals, making twelve
thousand prisoners, and capturing fifty cannon.
The 23rd saw Marshal Lannes destroy the army of Palafox and
Castanos, gaining thirty guns and three thousand prisoners, and slaying
or drowning four thousand men at Tudela.
The road to Madrid is open ! Enter the city of Philip the Fifth, sire. Are
you not the heritor of Louis XIV., and do you not know the way to all
capitals? Beside, a deputation from the city of Madrid awaits you, and
comes before you to ask the pardon you would accord. Now, ascend
upon the platform of the Escurial. and listen; you will hear nothing
more than echoes of victory !
Stay, here comes a wind from the east, bearing the sound of the actions

of Cardeden Clinas, Slobregat, San Felice, and Molino-del-Rey; five
new names to write in the journals, and five the more enemies in
Catalonia.
Hold, here is the west wind, in its turn, which wafts gently to your ear
the tidings that Soult has beaten Moore's rear guard and has made a
Spanish division lay down its arms: then, better still, your lieutenant
has passed over the body of the Spaniards; he has reached the English,
who have thrown themselves into their vessels, which have opened
their sails and disappeared, leaving upon the field of battle the
general-in-chief and two generals slain,
Here comes the north wind which, all charged with flames, bears you
the news of the taking of Saragossa. They fought twenty-eight days
before entering the place, sire! and, twenty-eight days more after
entering, where they cut their way from house to house, as at Sagonte,
Numance and Calahorra! Men have resisted, women have struggled,
children have fought, priests have encouraged! The French are masters
of Saragossa, that is to say of what was a city and what is now but a
ruin!
Here is the south wind bringing you the news of the taking of Oporto.
The insurrection is smothered, or else extinguished in Spain; Portugal
is overrun, that is reconquered; you have kept your word, sire! your
eagles are planted upon the towers of Lisbon.
But where are you, O vanquisher! and why, as you have come, have
you departed with a bound?
Ah! yes, your old enemy, England, has seduced Austria; she tells her
that you are seven hundred leagues from Vienna, that you have need of
all your forces around you, and that the moment is good to retake from
you, whom Pope Pius the Seventh is going to excommunicate, like
Henry IV. of Germany and Philip Augustus of France, the land of Italy
and to drive you from Germany. Austria, the presumptuous, has
believed it ! she has formed together five hundred thousand men, she
has put them in the hands of her three Archdukes Charles, Louis and
John, and has said to them: "Go, my black eagles! I give to your talons

the red eagle of France."
On the 17th of January, Napoleon set off for Valladolid; the 18th, at
midnight, he struck at the door of the Tuileries, saying "Open, it is the
future conqueror of Eckmuhl and Wagram!"
The future conqueror of Eckmuhl and Wagram, however, returned to
Paris in very bad humor.
The Spanish war, which he had believed useful, was one he had no
sympathy for; but once engaged, it had had, at least this advantage, the
drawing the English to the continent.
Like the Libyan giant, it was when he touched the earth that Napoleon
felt really strong. If he had been Themistocles, he would have awaited
the Persians at Athens, and not have detached Athens to transport it to
the gulf of Salamis.
Fortune, that mistress who had always been so faithful to him, whom
he had forced to accompany him from the Adige to the Nile, or to
follow him from Niemen to Mancanarez, Fortune had betrayed him at
Aboukir and at Trafalgar.
And it was at the moment when he had gained three victories over the
English, killing two of their generals, wounding a third, and repulsing
them into the sea as Hector had done to the Greeks in the absence of
Achilles, that he had been forced to quit the Peninsula, upon the
announcement of what was passing in Austria and also in France.
So, arriving at the Tuileries and entering his apartments, scarce
throwing a glance upon the bed although it was two o'clock in the
morning, and passing from his bed-chamber into his cabinet, he said:
"Let some one go and awaken the Archchancellor, and warn the
Minister of Police and the Grand Elector that I await them, the first at
four o'clock, the second at five."
"Ought her Majesty the Empress to be told of your Majesty's return?"

inquired the usher to