navian seer. She was usually found by him reclining upon a low divan supported by curtains of crimson velvet, which, we are assured, set off her clear complexion and the dazzling whiteness of her dress to the greatest advantage.
Talleyrand, in his memoir, gives a graphic description of one of such interviews between the prophetess and her august admirers: “On one side stood the Emperor Alexander, attired in a suit of black, with no mark of his high rank save the glittering of brilliants on his bosom. On the other side, leaning backward in the chair with the most perfect nonchalance, sat the King of Prussia. Bergasse and the sombre Jungstilling (two German illuminés) sat on a low stool at the feet of the prophetess. All on a sudden deadly silence ensued. Madame started from her seat, her long robe dropping in graceful folds about her person, and the loose sleeves falling back from the extended arms. ‘Let us pray!’ she exclaimed; and in a moment every person present, from Czar Alexander to the very footman, sank down upon their knees.”
The Congress had been assembled already more than four months, but nothing had yet been done for a settlement of the pending European difficulties, which on the contrary threatened to be embroiled more and more, when suddenly, on the 8th of March, the news arrived at Vienna of Napoleon’s landing in the Bay of Juan. What a sense of duty had not been able to do before, was now suddenly brought about by the impulse of fear—the plenipotentiaries at the Congress began to work, to work in real downright earnest. The different committee-rooms were filled at once, as if by magic; and after but a few days’ deliberation a treaty was concluded between Austria, England, Prussia, and Russia, by which each party engaged to furnish 150,000 men, with the proviso of England being allowed to give money instead of soldiers. In a declaration, issued March 31, the above-named powers further announced to the world that by entering France Napoleon had deprived himself of the protection of law, and therefore was now declared “hors des relations civiles et sociales,” an enemy and disturber of the peace of Europe, delivered up to public vengeance.
While these decrees were being promulgated, vast columns of troops kept on moving towards the French frontier, but before even their arrival the fate of Napoleon was decided a second time on the field of Waterloo. The great Congress now saw itself once more undisturbed by outward events to pursue its deliberations. This was done henceforth with more earnestness, the serious intermezzo of the Hundred Days having turned the eyes of all away from balls and masquerades; and before another month was over the fruit of these labours became visible in the gradual sketch of the new map of Europe. This new map, however, looked rather differently from what politicians had expected it to be at the beginning of the Congress. It was then generally thought that the real object of this great meeting was to efface the traces of the revolutionary wars, and to place the whole of Europe in the status quo ante bellum. Conformable to this rule, the petty Princes of Germany ought to have been called to take possession of the territories from which they were driven by force; Saxony, Russia, and Bavaria, enriched by Napoleon at the expense of Austria and Prussia, to have been stripped of their spoil; Venice called to resume her independence, again occupying the Ionian Islands and other of her colonies; and the minor Italian States to be once more parcelled out between scions of the Houses of Hapsburg and Bourbon. This would have been in accordance with the professed object of the Congress, defined by Prince Metternich in one of his first speeches as of “strictly reparatory character;” but this did not fully suit the plan of the great Continental powers who had taken the chief part in the struggles against France. They wished to be recompensed for the sacrifices they had made of men and money, and as France was not well able to reimburse them sufficiently in the shape of either cash or territory, another expedient had to be found. Poland and Saxony were discovered to be the most available objects for this purpose; and accordingly the division of these two countries was determined on, after several months’ deliberations, between the high contracting powers.
By a secret agreement between the Czar and King Frederick William, the former consented to the incorporation of Saxony with Prussia, while the latter entirely abandoned Poland to Russia. To this however Austria, already startled at the progress of Muscovite power in Europe, showed her dissent, and pointing to the unreasonableness of the spoliation of the King of Saxony, proposed another plan for the enlargement of Prussia. A part of the Duchy of Warsaw was, under the title of Grand Duchy of Posen, to be made over to Prussia, while Austria kept her share of what was known as the province of Gallicia, and Russia received the rest. Prussia besides was to have one-half of Saxony, part of Swedish Pomerania, and several provinces in Westphalia and on the left bank of the Rhine, hitherto under Austria and Holland. The latter country was to be recompensed for this loss by Austrian Belgium and the Duchy of Luxemburgh; and Austria in its turn was to get in exchange the whole of Venice and the province extending to the Lago Maggiore, the Ticino, and the Po, including the territory of Mantua. Thus all was comfortably arranged at the expense of Italy, Poland, and Saxony; and after these and some minor points had been settled, the real secret working at the Congress was at an end, and the more formal public one had to be gone through. This consisted chiefly in the arrangement of the affairs of Germany, which was soon finished, inasmuch as the great powers were unanimous that the “heart of Europe” should remain in a state of dilapidation. Accordingly, it was settled that Germany should receive a federal organisation, with a central Diet, under the presidency of the House of Austria. The members of the Confederation, thirty-five in number, besides the four free cities, Hamburgh, Bremen, Lübeck, and Frankfurt, bound themselves by the new constitution to make no war upon each other under any pretence whatever, but to submit their differences to the Diet. As regards Switzerland, which likewise received a new constitution, three cantons, Valais, Neufchatel, and Geneva, were added to its