“You are a thief, a coward, a man without honor; you do not believe in God; you have all your life been a traitor to your duties; you have deceived and betrayed everybody; nothing is sacred to you; you would sell your own father. I have loaded you down with gifts, and there is nothing you would not undertake against me. For the past ten months you have been shameless enough, because you supposed, rightly or wrongly, that my affairs in Spain were going astray, to say to all who would listen to you that you always blamed my undertakings there; whereas it was you yourself who first put it into my head, and who persistently urged it. And that man, _that unfortunate_ [he meant the Duc d’Enghien], by whom was I advised of the place of his residence? Who drove me to deal cruelly with him? What, then, are you aiming at? What do you wish for? What do you hope? Do you dare to say? You deserve that I should smash you like a wineglass. I can do it, but I despise you too much to take the trouble.” All of this was undoubtedly true, but, after having publicly said it, there was but one safe course for Napoleon—to put Talleyrand where he could no longer continue his plotting. He made the mistake, however, of leaving him at large. The disturbance of the Continental peace came from Austria. Encouraged by Napoleon’s absence in Spain, and the withdrawal of troops from Germany, and urged by England to attempt to again repair her losses, Austria had hastily armed herself, hoping to be able to reach the Rhine before Napoleon could collect his forces and meet her. At this moment Napoleon could command about the same number of troops as the Austrians, but they were scattered in all directions, while the enemy’s were already consolidated. The question became, then, whether he could get his troops together before the Austrians attacked. From every direction he hurried them across France and Germany towards Ratisbonne. On the 12th of April he heard in Paris that the Austrians had crossed the Inn. On the 17th the emperor was in his headquarters at Donauwörth, his army well in hand. “Neither in ancient or modern times,” says Jomini, “will one find anything which equals in celerity and admirable precision the opening of this campaign.” In the next ten days a series of combats broke the Austrian army, drove the Archduke Charles, with his main force, north of the Danube, and opened the road to Vienna to the French. On the 12th of May, one month from the day he left Paris, Napoleon wrote from Schönbrunn, “We are masters of Vienna.” The city had been evacuated.