their feelings had they known that the calling of the Diet at Warsaw,
and the tone of its address to Napoleon; had all been sketched out
five weeks before by the imperial stage manager himself? Yet such was
the case.

The scene-shifter was the Abbe de Pradt, Archbishop of Malines, whom
Napoleon sent as ambassador to Warsaw, with elaborate instructions as
to the summoning of the Diet, the whipping-up of Polish enthusiasm,
the revolutionizing of Russian Poland, and the style of the address to
him. Nay, his passion for the regulation of details even led him to
inform the ambassador that the imperial reply would be one of praise
of Polish patriotism and of warning that Polish liberty could only be
won by their "zeal and their efforts." The trickery was like that
which he had played upon the Poles shortly before Eylau. In effect, he
said now, as then: "Pour out your blood for me first, and I will do
something for you." But on this occasion the scenic setting was more
impressive, the rush of the Poles to arms more ardent, the diplomatic
reply more astutely postponed, and the finale more awful.[262]

Still, the Poles marched on; but their devotion became more
questioning. The feelings of the Lithuanians were also ruffled by
Napoleon's reply to the Polish deputies: nor were they consoled by his
appointment of seven magnates to regulate the affairs of the districts
of Lithuania, under the aegis of French commissioners, who proved to be
the real governors. Worst of all was the marauding of Napoleon's
troops, who, after their long habituation to the imperial maxim that
"war must support war," could not now see the need of enduring the
pangs of hunger in order that Lithuanian enthusiasm might not cool.

[Illustration: CAMPAIGN IN RUSSIA]

Meanwhile the war had not progressed altogether as he desired. His aim
had been to conceal his advance across the Niemen, to surprise the two
chief Russian armies while far separated, and thus to end the war on
Lithuanian soil by a blow such as he had dealt at Friedland. The
Russian arrangements seemed to favour his plan. Their two chief
arrays, that led by the Czar and by General Barclay de Tolly, some
125,000 strong north of Vilna, and that of Prince Bagration mustering
now about 45,000 effectives, in the province of Volhynia, were
labouring to carry out the strategy devised by Phull. The former was
directly to oppose the march of Napoleon's main army, while the
smaller Russian force was t