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Updated: July 11, 2025
In spite of the obstinate refusal of the Emperor, I was still entreating him when M. de Caulaincourt and M. Yvan entered the room. His Majesty made a sign to the Duke of Vicenza to approach his bed, and said to him, "Caulaincourt, I recommend to you my wife and child; serve them as you have served me. I have not long to live!"
Only two persons were in the apartment, the Duke of Bassano; who was at a little distance from the Emperor, and Caulaincourt, who was near the fireplace. So profound was Napoleon's reverie that he did not hear Macdonald enter, and the Duke of Vicenza was obliged to inform him of the Marshal's presence.
M. de Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza, was extremely severe towards the household; but he was just and of a chivalrous loyalty, and his word was as good as a contract: He was feared and yet beloved. He had a piercing eye, spoke quickly and with great ease. The Emperor's regard for him was well known, and certainly no one was more worthy of it than he.
The terrors of war were, therefore, approaching, and yet Paris was in hope that peace would be concluded; Caulaincourt was still at the headquarters of the allies, treating with them about the congress.
Some days after the execution of this measure, his Majesty charged me with a commission, which necessitated a carriage; and I was obliged to inform him that, no longer having mine, I should not be able to execute his orders. The Emperor then exclaimed that he had not intended this, and M. Caulaincourt must have a poor idea of economy.
She knew, moreover, the truth of many circumstances which M. de Caulaincourt seemed to doubt, and which her situation with respect to Bonaparte prevented her from communicating to him.
General Auguste de Caulaincourt was killed in a redoubt to which he had led the cuirassiers of General Montbrun, who had just been fatally wounded by a cannon-ball in the attack on this same redoubt. The Emperor often said, in speaking of generals killed in the army, "Such an one is happy in having died on the field of honor, while I shall perhaps be so unfortunate as to die in my bed."
But this fear, which did not restrain Caulaincourt and several others, had as little influence upon Duroc, Daru, Lobau, Rapp, Lauriston, and sometimes even Berthier. These ministers and generals, each in his sphere, did not spare the emperor when the truth was to be told.
Napoleon had ere then, as we have seen, desired Caulaincourt to assume "a less humble attitude," and instead of ratifying, as he was bound on every principle of honour and law to do, the signature which his ambassador had had full powers to affix, he returned no answer whatever to Schwartzenberg, but despatched a private letter to the Emperor of Austria, once more endeavouring to seduce him from the European league.
The golden visions of Tilsit were thus once more relegated to a distant future, and the keenness of the Czar's disappointment may be measured by his striking statement quoted by Caulaincourt in one of his earlier reports from St. Petersburg: "Let the world be turned upside down provided that Russia gains Constantinople and the Dardanelles." The Erfurt interview left another hidden sore.
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