russians. "Bluecher
would be mad if he attempted any serious movement," so Napoleon wrote
to Berthier on the 20th, apparently on the strength of his former
suggestion that Joseph should persuade Bernadotte to desert the allies
and attack Bluecher's rear.[439] At least, it is difficult to find any
other reason for Napoleon's strange belief that Bluecher would sit
still while his allies were being beaten; unless, indeed, we accept
Marmont's explanation that Napoleon's brain now rejected all
unpleasing news and registered wishes as facts.

Fortune seemed to smile on his enterprise. Though he failed to take
Vitry from the allied garrison, yet near St. Dizier he fell on a
Prussian convoy, captured 800 men and 400 wagons filled with stores.
Everywhere he ordered the tocsin to proclaim a _levee en masse_, and
sent messengers to warn his Lorraine garrisons to cut their way to his
side. His light troops spread up the valley of the Marne towards
Chaumont, capturing stores and couriers; and he seized this
opportunity, when he pictured the Austrians as thoroughly demoralized,
to send Caulaincourt from Doulevant with offers to renew the
negotiations for peace (March 25th).[440] But while Napoleon awaits
the result of these proposals, his rear is attacked: he retraces his
steps, falls on the assailants, and finds that they belong to Bluecher.
But how can Prussians be there in force? Is not Bluecher resting on the
banks of the Aisne? And where is Schwarzenberg? The Emperor pushes a
force on to Vitry to solve this riddle, and there the horrible truth
unfolds itself little by little that he stands on the brink of ruin.

It is a story instinct with an irony like that of the infatuation of
King Oedipus in the drama of Sophocles. Every step that the warrior
has taken to snatch at victory increases the completeness of the
disaster. The Emperor Francis, scared by the approach of the French
horsemen, and not wishing to fall into the hands of his son-in-law,
has withdrawn with Metternich to Dijon.

Napoleon's letter to him is lost.[441] Metternich, well guarded by
Castlereagh, is powerless to meet Caulaincourt's offer, and their
flight leaves Schwarzenberg under the influence of the Czar.[442]
Moreover, Bluecher has not been idle. While Napoleon is hurrying
eastwards to Vitry, the Prussian leader drives back Marmont's weak
corps, his vanguard crosses the Marne near Epernay on the 23rd, his
Cossacks capture a courier bearing a letter written