Napoleon did not conduct the war in Spain in person during the first campaign; the tranquillity of the North had first to be secured. For this purpose, he held a personal conference, in October, 1808, with the emperor Alexander at Erfurt, whither the princes of Germany hastened to pay their devoirs, humbly as their ancestors of yore to conquering Attila. The company of actors brought in Napoleon's train from Paris boasted of gaining the plaudits of a royal parterre, and a French sentinel happening to call to the watch to present arms to one of the kings there dancing attendance was reproved by his officer with the observation, "Ce n'est qu un roi."[2] Both emperors, for the purpose of offering a marked insult to Prussia, attended a great harehunt on the battlefield of Jena. It was during this conference that Napoleon and Alexander divided between themselves the sovereignty of Europe, Russia undertaking the subjugation of Sweden and the seizure of Finland, France the conquest of Spain and Portugal. The period immediately subsequent to the fall of the ancient empire forms the blackest page in the history of Germany. The whole of the left bank of the Rhine was annexed to France. The people, notwithstanding the improvement that took place in the administration under Bon Jean St. André, groaned beneath the exorbitant taxes and the conscription. The commerce on the Rhine had almost entirely ceased.[3]--The grandduchy of Berg was, until 1808, governed with great mildness by Avar, the French minister.--Holland had, since 1801, remained under the administration of her benevolent governor, Schimmelpenninck, but had been continually drained by the imposition of additional income taxes, which, in 1804, amounted to six per cent on the capital in the country. Commerce had entirely ceased, smuggling alone excepted. In 1806, the Dutch were commanded to entreat Napoleon to grant them a king in the person of his brother Louis, who fixed his residence in the venerable council-house at Amsterdam, and, it must be confessed, endeavored to promote the real interests of his new subjects.[4] The Swiss, with characteristic servility, testified the greatest zeal on every occasion for the emperor Napoleon, celebrated his fete-day, and boasted of his protection,[5] and of the freedom they were still permitted to enjoy. Freedom of thought was expressly prohibited. Sycophants, in the pay of the foreign ruler, as, for instance, Zschokke, alone guided public opinion. In Zug, any person who ventured to speak disparagingly of the Swiss in the service of France was declared an enemy to his country and exposed to severe punishment.[6] The Swiss shed their blood in each and all of Napoleon's campaigns, and aided him to reduce their kindred nations to abject slavery.[7]