population was perfectly friendly); the Russian portion of it was his
by right of conquest; and Austria and Prussia, then his allies, and
almost his subjects, would gladly have resigned their portions in
exchange for some of the provinces they had ceded to France, and
which were, to him, of little value, but, to them, important. And,
indeed, Prussia was (as we are told) so thoroughly humbled and
weakened that he might easily have enforced the cession of
Prussian-Poland, even without any compensation. And the
re-establishment of the Polish kingdom would have been as evidently
politic as it was reasonable. The independence of a faithful and
devoted ally, at enmity with the surrounding nations—the very nations
that were the most likely to combine (as they often had done) against
him,—this would have given him, at no cost, a kind of strong garrison
to maintain his power, and keep his enemies in check.

Yet this most obvious step, the history tells us, he did not take; but
made flattering speeches to the Poles, used their services, and did
nothing for them!

This is, alone, sufficiently improbable. But we are required moreover
to believe that the Poles,—instead of _execrating_ this man, who had
done them the unpardonable wrong of wantonly disappointing the
expectations he had, for his own purposes, excited, thus adding
treachery to ingratitude—instead of this, continued to the last as
much devoted to him as ever, and even now idolize his memory! We are
to believe, in short, that this Buonaparte, not only in his own
conduct and adventures violated all the established rules of
probability, but also caused all other persons, as many as came in
contact with him, to act as no mortals ever did act before: may we not
add, as no mortals ever did act at all?