lence, had marked the spirit of hatred which animated our enemies, and the moderation of our soldiers, who, tranquil at the aspect of all their movements, astonished only at receiving no orders, rested under the double confidence of courage and a just cause. Our first duty has been to pass the Rhine ourself, to form our camps, and to cause the sound of war to be heard. It has spread into the hearts of all our warriors. Rapid and combined marches have brought them, in the twinkling of an eye, to the spot we had indicated. All our camps are formed; we are going to march against the Prussian armies, and to repel force by force. At all times, we ought to say it, our heart is sorely affected at this constant preponderance which the genius of mischief obtains in Europe, occupied incessantly in traversing the designs we form for the tranquillity of Europe, the repose and happiness of the present generation-besieging every cabinet by every kind of seduction leading those astray whom it cannot corrupt-blinding them to their true interests, and launching them into the midst of disputes, without any other guide than the passions it has known how to inspire them with. The cabinet of Berlin itself has not chosen with deliberation the part it takes it has been thrown into it with art, and with malicious address. The king has found himself, all at once, an hundred leagues from his capital, on the frontiers of the confederation of the Rhine, in the midst of his army, and opposite the French troops dispersed in their cantonments, and who thought themselves justified in counting upon the ties which unite the two states, and upon the lavish protestations made in all circumstances by the court of Berlin. In a war so just, in which we take arms only to defend ourself, who have provoked by no act, by no pretension, and of which it would be impossible to assign the true cause, we reckon entirely on the support of the laws and the people; whom circumstances call upon, to give us new proofs of their love, of their devotion, and of their courage. On our part, no personal sacrifice will be painful to us, no danger will stop us, whenever it is the question to assure the rights, the honour, and the prosperity of our people. Given at our imperial quarters, at Bamberg, the 7th Oct. 1806. By the emperor, (Signed) Napoleon. The minister secretary of state. (Signed) H. B. Maret. Copy of the Note of M. de Knobelsdorff, to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Sept. 12, 1806. The undersigned, feeling how much it is of the first importance to answer immediately the note which his excellency the prince of Benevento, minister for foreign affairs, has done him the honour of addressing to him this evening, feels himself compelled to limit himself to the representation of the following observations. The motives which have engaged the king, my master, to make armaments, have been the effect of a scheme of the enemies of France and Prussia; who, jealous of the intimacy which exists between these two powers, have done every thing in their power to alarm, by false reports, coming at once from every quarter. But above all, what proves the spirit of this measure is, that his majesty has concerted it with no person whatsoever, and that the intelligence respecting it arrived sooner at Paris than at Vienna, St. Petersburgh, and London. But the king, my master, has ordered to be made to the envoy of his majesty the emperor of the French and king of Italy, an amicable communication on the subject of these measures. That minister had not yet returned an answer upon this communication. The relation of the interesting conversations that his imperial majesty has deigned to entertain with the undersigned, and the marquis de Lucchesini, could not yet have arrived at Berlin. After this explanation, the undersigned can only testify to his excellency, his most ardent wish, that public acts may yet rest suspended, till the return of the courier dispatched to Berlin. The undersigned begs his excellency, &c. (Signed) General Knobelsdorff. Copy of the second Note to M. de Knobelsdorf, dated Sept. 13th. 1806. The undersigned has laid before his majesty, the emperor and king, the note that his excellency M. de Knobelsdorff yesterday did him the honour to address to him. His majesty has found therein, with pleasure, the assurance that Prussia had not entered into any concert hostile to France; that the armament she has made, had no other cause than a misunderstanding; that the departure of the garrison of Berlin, though it happened since the letter written by his ma jesty the king of Prussia, ought only to be considered as the execution of an anterior order; and that the movements marked out for the Prussian troops would cease as soon as it was known at Berlin, what his majesty the emperor and king was pleased to say to M. M. Knobelsdorff and Lucchesiui, in the pri vate audiences which he granted them. His majesty has ordered, in consequence, that the communications which were to have been made to the senate on Monday next, shall be deferred; and that no troops, beside those which are actually on their march towards the Rhine, shall be put in motion, until his majesty learns the determinations and the measures that the court of Berlin shall have taken, after the report that M. M. de Knobelsdorff and Lucchesini have made; and if these determinations are such that the French army in Germany shall be no longer menaced, and that all things shall be replaced between France and Prussia on the same footing as they were a month ago, his majesty will immediately order the retrograde march of the troops who were actually advancing to the Rhine. His majesty expects that this singular misunderstanding will be cleared up. He expects to be enabled, without any mixture of uncertainty or doubt, to restore him self to those sentiments of which he has given so many proofs to the court of Berlin, and which have always been those of a faithful ally. The undersigned prays M. de Knobelsdorff to receive the assur ances of his high consideration. (Signed) C. M. Talleyrand, Prince of Benevento. Copy Copy of the third Note addressed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to M. Knobelsdorff. The undersigned minister of foreign relations has expressed to his excellency M. Knobelsdorff, in the note which he had the honour to write to him on the 13th of Sept. the confiding dispositions with which his majesty the emperor received the assurances given by M. Knobelsdorff, that the military movements of the court of Berlin were not the result of any hostile concert against France, but simply the effect of a misunderstanding; and that they would cease the moment when the first communication of his excellency should have arrived at Berlin. Nevertheless, the news received every day bears so much all the character of an impending war, that his imperial majesty must feel some regret at the engagement he made, not yet to call out his reserve, and to defer the constitutional notification, after which all the forces of the nation would be placed at his disposal. He will fulfil that engagement; but he shall think it contrary to prudence and to the interest of his people, not to order, in the interim, all the measures, and all the movements of the troops, which can take place without previous notifi cation. His majesty has, at the same time, charged the undersigned to express again to M. Knobelsdorff, that he cannot yet conceive, by what forgetfulness of her interests, Prus. sia should be willing to renounce her ties of amity with France. War between the two countries appears to him a real political monstrosity; and from the moment that the cabinet of Berlin shall return to her pacific dispositions, and shall cease to menace the armies of Germany, his majesty engages to countermand all the measures which prudence commanded him to take. He will cease with pleasure, as he does not cease to do in all circumstances, the occasion of testifying to his majesty the king of Prussia the price he attaches to his friendship; to a union founded on a wise policy, and on reciprocal interests; and to prove to him that his sentiments are always the same, and that no provocation has been able to alter them. The undersigned is happy in being able to give to his excellency M. de Knobelsdorff so formal an assurance of the dispositions of his majesty, which are so foreign to all ideas of war with Prussia, that he has already committed a very grave military fault, in retarding his military preparations for one month, and in consenting to let fifteen days more pass over, without calling out his reserves and his national guards. This confidence, which his majesty loves to preserve, proves what a value he sets upon what was stated to him by M. Knobelsdorff, that Prussia had entered into no concert with the enemies of France, and that the assurances that he had received, in putting a term to the misunder. standing which has just arisen, would cause the cessation of those armaments which were the consequences of it. (Signed) C. M. Talleyrand, &c. Paris, Sept. 19, 1806. ordinary and minister plenipotentiary of his majesty the king of Prussia, received yesterday the note addressed to him by his excellency the prince of Benevento, minister for foreign affairs. If, in this communication, the undersigned has found again, with extreme satisfaction, the assurance formerly given, in the note of the 13th of September, that his majesty the emperor and king would fulfil the engage. ment which he had made to wait the result of the explanations given to M. de Lucchesini and the general Knobelsdorff, before taking any measures respecting the constitutional notification, which would put all the forces of the French nation at the disposal of government, he has learned, with infinite pain, that his majesty should have had any regret at that engagement; and that in fulfilling it, he thinks it necesary to order all the measures and all the movements of troops, which can be taken without previous notification. to The undersigned hastens reiterate to his excellency M. the prince of Benevento, the assurance that his majesty the king of Prussia, far from ever having had an idea of renouncing his relations of amity with France, participates in that respect all the sentiments of his imperial and royal majesty, expressed in the communication to which this note is an answer; that, far from having entered into a concert with the enemies of France, his Prussian majesty has always sought to calm all resentments for facilitating the re-establishment of a general peace; in fine, that far from menacing the French armies in Germany by his armaments, these only took place in consequence of the advice received at Berlin, and which was so alarm ing, that it was not possible to neglect measures of precaution, de manded by prudence for the welfare of the state. The undersigned is pleased, in renewing to his excellency the prince of Benevento the assurance, that in taking these measures his majesty the king of Prussia has not renounced, for a single instant, the assurance of seeing the clouds dispersed that have been raised between him and France; and general Knobelsdorff is pursuaded, that such will be the result of the explanations that have taken place. In begging M. the prince of Benevento to make known to his majesty the emperor and king this answer to his communication, the undersigned has the honour to renew to his excellency the assurance of his high consideration. When in the report that a few days back I had the honour to address your majesty, I established, that if Prussia had any personal reasons which led her to make war, it could only be from a desire to en. slave Saxony, and the Hanseatic Towns, I was far from perceiving, that she would ever dare avow such a motive. It is, nevertheless, an avowal which she has not feared to make, and to express in a note that M. de Knobelsdorff has sent me from Metz, and which I have the honour honour to address to your majesty. Of the three demands which that note contains, the first and the third are only made to disguise, if it be possible, that no real importance may be attached to the second. be made, on the part of France, to the formation of the northern league, which shall embrace, without any exception, all the states not named in the fundamental act of the confederation of the Rhine. Thus, to satisfy the most unjust ambition, Prussia consents to break the bonds that united her to France, to call down new calamities Prussia, after having seen with a tranquil eye the French armies in Germany during a year, could not be alarmed at their presence when their numbers were diminished-upon the continent, of which your when they were dispersed in small bodies in distant cantonmentswhen, above all, your majesty had solemnly announced, that they should return to France, as soon as the affair of Cattaro, the cause of the prolongation of their stay in Germany, should be settled by an agreement with Austria, and that already the order for their return was given. Prussia, who speaks of a negotiation to fix all the interests in question, knows well that there is no point of interest whatever, in question between the two states; the amicable discussion which should definitively fix the fate of the Abbies of Essen and Werden, has not been deferred by any delay of the French cabinet. The French troops have evacuated those territories which the grand duke of Berg had caused to be occupied, in the perfect persuasion that numerous documents had given him, that they made part of the duchy of Cleves, and that they were comprehended in the cession of that duchy. Thus the demands of Prussia, on these different points, and others of the same nature, and the pretended grievances which she seems to indicate, do not offer the real mind of the cabinet of Berlin. It does not reveal it. It lets its secret escape only, when it demands that no farther obstacle whatever shall majesty would wish to cicatrice the wounds, and to assure the tranquillity, to provoke a faithful ally, to put him under the cruel necessity of repelling force by force, and once more to snatch his army from the repose which he aspires to make it enjoy, after so many fatigues and triumphs. I say it with grief, I lose the hope of the ability to preserve peace, from the moment it is made to depend upon conditions that equity and honour equally oppose-proposed, as they are, in a tone, and in forms, that the French people endured in no time, and from no power, and which it can less than ever endure under your majesty's reign. (Signed) C. M. Talleyrand, &c. Mayence, Oct. 6, 1806. Note. The undersigned ainister of his Prussian majesty, by the same courier who brought the letter to his imperial majesty, which he has had the honour to transmit to-day to his excellency the prince of Benevento, has received orders to make the following communications.— Their object is to have the relations of the two courts no longer in suspense. Each of them is so imminently interested in remaining no longer in doubt upon the sentiments |