e of all dreams."

"And I swear to your majesty that you may believe in me," exclaimed
Alexander. "My whole policy, the new course upon which I have entered,
will prove to you, more convincingly than words, sire, that I am most
anxious to establish a firm alliance between Russia and France; oh,
believe me, sire, I gladly acknowledge you as my superior; all
promptings of jealousy are extinct in my heart; and when, in the face of
the enormous territorial aggrandizements of Franco, I desire an
enlargement of Russia, too, I do so not for my sake, but in order to
satisfy my people, that they may bear more patiently your operations in
Spain. For my part, I approve all you have done in that country. King
Charles and his son Ferdinand have abundantly deserved their present
fate by their incapacity and baseness, and I do not pity them. But one
must comprehend the system of the great Napoleon as clearly and
thoroughly as I do, to be able to pass over the great catastrophes which
your majesty has caused the world to witness. My people, and, above all,
my nobility, have not yet progressed so far as that, and hence the
attention of the Russians should be turned to important changes in the
Orient that they may look more indifferently at what you are undertaking
in the Occident. As for myself, I am your most faithful friend, and I
have proved it to your majesty by becoming the enemy of your enemies. In
accordance with your wishes, I have declared war against England, and
shall probably soon have to do the same against Austria, for I shall
require her in the most energetic manner to explain why she is secretly
arming; and, if her explanations should not be satisfactory, draw the
sword against her. Then, I suppose, your majesty will believe in my
friendship?"

"Oh, I believe in it now," exclaimed Napoleon, pressing the proffered
hand of Alexander. "For this friendship is my hope. United, we shall be
able to carry out the grand schemes which we formed at Tilsit. Striding
across the world, we shall lay it at our feet, and one day there will be
only two thrones; but in the beginning we must proceed carefully. It
took the Creator six days to make the world, and each day, most likely,
comprehended a vast number of our years. We shall create our world in
six years, and then we shall look at it, and pronounce it 'very good.'
But caution is indispensable, for our empires labor under many burdens.
You are waging war in Finland, and I am doing s