The Twin Lieutenants | Page 6

but during the gestation of their mother Justice, before they
were born. Well, the Code of criminal examination does not move,
does not advance: I told you that I wished it to be terminated in the year
1808, but, here we are at the 23rd of January, 1809, and, although the
legislative body will remain assembled during my absence, this code is
not finished and may not be perhaps for three months yet."
"Will your Majesty permit me to say, upon that subject, the whole
truth?" hazarded the Archchancellor,
"Proceed," said the Emperor.
"Well, sire, I see--I do not say with fear, for I should have no fear while
your Majesty holds the sword or the scepter--I see, with regret, that a
spirit of inquietude and indiscipline commences to glide over all."
"You have no need to say that, sir, I see it! and it is as much to combat
that spirit as to contest the Austrians that I came here."
"So, for instance, sire," resumed Cambaceres, "the legislative body--"
"The legislative body," repeated Napoleon, accenting the two words
and shrugging his shoulders.
"The legislative body," continued Cambaceres, like a man determined
to finish his thought, "the legislative body, where the rare opposers
never can unite more than twelve or fifteen votes against the projects
that we submit, the legislative body still resist us, and twice put eighty
black balls, once one hundred."
"Well, I will overturn the legislative body!"
"No, sire, you will select a moment when it will be more disposed for

approbation. Remain in Paris--when your Majesty is at Paris, all goes
swimmingly."
"I know that; but, unfortunately. I cannot stay."
"So much the worse !"
"Yes, so much the worse! Just now I recollected the word, and it
reminds me of a certain Malet."
"Does your Majesty say that he cannot remain in Paris?"
"Do yon think that it was to remain in Paris that I came in four days
from Valladolid? No; in three months I must be in Vienna."
"Oh, sire !" said Cambaceres, with a sigh, "still war."
"You, also, Cambaceres? But it is I who has made this war?"
"Sire, Spain," ventured the Archchancellor.
"Yes, that was, perhaps; but why have I undertaken it? Because I
believe myself sure of the peace with the North. Can I doubt that with
Russia for ally, Westphalia and Holland for sisters, Bavaria for friend,
Prussia reduced to an army of forty thousand men, can I doubt that
from Austria I will cut one of her two heads--Italy? Can I doubt that
Austria will find means to raise and arm five hundred thousand men
against me? But they are in the waters of the Lethe, and not in those of
the Danube, which runs to Vienna. They have forgotten even the
lessons of experience! They must learn new ones ! They shall, and, this
time, terrible ones, I answer for it !
"I do not wish war--I have no interest in it--and the whole of Europe is
witness that all my efforts, all my attentions, were directed toward that
field of battle which England has chosen, namely, Spain. Austria, who
has once already saved the English, in 1805, at the moment when I was
about to cross the Straits of Dover, saves them again today, at the
moment when I was about to drive them, from the first to the last, into

the sea ! I know quite well that, disappearing in one place, they would
re-appear in another; but England is not, like France, a warlike nation:
it is a commercial nation, it is Carthage, without Hannibal. I shall have
finished by exhausting its soldiers, or by forcing it to leave India; and,
if the Emperor Alexander is true to his word, it is there that I
expect--Oh, Austria ! Austria ! She shall pay dearly for this diversion !
She shall instantly disarm, or she shall be made to sustain a war of
destruction. If she disarms in a manner that will leave me no doubts of
her future intentions, I will myself replace the sword in the sheath, for I
am not desirous to draw it save in Spain and against the English.
Otherwise I will throw four hundred thousand men upon Vienna, and,
for the future, England will have no more allies on the Continent."
"Four hundred thousand men, sire," repeated Cambaceres.
"You ask me where they are, do you not?"
"Yes, sire: I can scarce see a hundred thousand disposable."
"Ah! they commence to count my soldiers, and you are one of first, the
Archchancellor !"
"Sire--"
"They say; 'He has no more than two hundred thousand men: but a
hundred and fifty thousand, but a hundred thousand!' They say; 'We
may escape the master enfeebled, the master is no more than two