On the other side, the French emperor urged the matter no further; the
Spanish insurrection diverted his attention, and imperiously required
his presence with all his forces. Even previous to the interview at
Erfurt, after Sebastiani's return from Constantinople, although Napoleon
still seemed to adhere to the idea of dismembering Turkey in Europe, he
had admitted the correctness of his ambassador's reasoning: "That in
this partition, the advantages would be all against him; that Russia and
Austria would acquire contiguous provinces, which would make their
dominions more complete, while we should be obliged to keep 80,000 men
continually in Greece to retain it in subjection; that such an army,
from the distance and losses it would sustain from long marches, and the
novelty and unhealthiness of the climate, would require 30,000 recruits
annually, a number which would quite drain France: that a line of
operation extending from Athens to Paris, was out of all proportion;
that besides, it was strangled in its passage at Trieste, at which point
only two marches would enable the Austrians to place themselves across
it, and thereby cut off our army of observation in Greece from all
communication with Italy and France."

Here Napoleon exclaimed, "that Austria certainly complicated every
thing; that she was there like a dead weight; that she must be got rid
off; and Europe must be divided into two empires: that the Danube, from
the Black Sea to Passau, the mountains of Bohemia to Königsgratz, and
the Elbe to the Baltic, should be their lines of demarcation. Alexander
should become the emperor of the north, and he of the south of Europe."
Abandoning, subsequently, these lofty ideas, and reverting to
Sebastiani's observations on the partition of European Turkey, he
terminated the conferences, which had lasted three days, with these
words: "You are right, and no answer can be given to that! I give it up.