order to prove to the whole world their desire for peace. Each side was, however, fully aware that the palm of peace was alone to be found on the other side of the battle-field. Napoleon was generous in his concessions, but delayed granting full powers to his envoy, an opportune circumstance for the allies, who were by this means able to charge him with the whole blame of procrastination. Napoleon, in all his concessions, merely included Russia and Austria to the exclusion of Prussia.[18] But neither Russia nor Austria trusted to his promises, and the negotiations were broken off on the termination of the armistice, when Napoleon sent full powers to his plenipotentiary. Now, was it said, it is too late. The art with which Metternich passed from the alliance with Napoleon to neutrality, to mediation, and finally to the coalition against him, will, in every age, be acknowledged a master-piece of diplomacy. Austria, while coalescing with Russia and Prussia, in a certain degree assumed a rank conventionally superior to both. The whole of the allied armies was placed under the command of an Austrian general, Prince von Schwarzenberg, and if the proclamation published at Calisch had merely summoned the people of Germany to assert their independence, the manifesto of Count Metternich spoke already in the tone of the future regulator of the affairs of Europe.[19] Austria declared herself on the 12th of August, 1813, two days after the termination of the armistice. [Footnote 1: Literally, the general levy of the people.--_Trans._] [Footnote 2: The exasperation of the people had risen to the utmost pitch. The French rascals in office, especially the custom-house officers, set no bounds to their tyranny and license. No woman of whatever rank was allowed to pass the gates without being subjected to the most indecent inquisition. Goods that had long been redeemed were continually taken from the tradesmen's shops and confiscated. The arbitrary enrolment of a number of young men as conscripts at length produced an insurrection, in which the guard-houses, etc., were destroyed. It was, however, quelled by General St. Cyr, and six of the citizens were executed. On the approach of the Russians, St. Cyr fled with the whole of his troops. The bookseller Perthes, Prell, and von Hess, formed a civic guard.--_Von Hess's Agonies_.] [Footnote 3: The people rose _en masse_ at Ronsdorf, Solingen, and Barmen, and marched tumultuously to Elberfeld, the great manufacturing town, but were dispersed by the French troops. The French authorities afterward declared that the sole object of the revolt was to smuggle in English goods, and, under this pretext, seized all the foreign goods in Elberfeld.] [Footnote 4: Kutusow had, just at that conjuncture, expired at Bautzen.]