departments.

There was the complaint of exhausted population, and loudest was the
complaint of mothers whose sons had been killed in the war.

Napoleon was aware of these evils and understood well their gravity, but he
counted on his usual remedy, new victories; saying to himself that a great
blow dealt in the north, throwing Russia and indirectly England at his
feet, would again be the salvation of the situation.

Caulaincourt, his ambassador to the Tzar, had told him in several
conversations, one of which had lasted seven hours, that he would find more
terrible disaster in Russia than in Spain, that his army would be destroyed
in the vastness of the country by the iron climate, that the Tzar would
retire to the farthest Asiatic provinces rather than accept a dishonorable
peace, that the Russians would retreat but never cede.


Napoleon listened attentively to these prophetic words, showing surprise
and emotion; then he fell into a profound reflection, but at the end of his
revery, having enumerated once more his armies, all his people, he said:
"Bah! a good battle will bring to reason the good determination of your
friend Alexander."

And in his entourage there were many who shared his optimism. The brilliant
youth of that new aristocracy which had begun to fill his staff was anxious
to equal the old soldiers of the revolution, the plebeian heroes.

They prepared for war in a luxurious way and ordered sumptuous outfits and
equipages which later on encumbered the roads of Germany, just as the