“I don’t understand it,” he says, returning the papers. “I don’t know of anything being done on these dates.” The only date he knows anything of is October 1st, when the Congress is to begin. The other ministers, thrown off their guard by his unforeseen tactics, abandon their protocol as unimportant, and it is not seen again. They then produce a document regulating the procedure of the Congress, and invite him and Labrador to sign it. He reads it, hesitates, and says it needs leisurely consideration. It may be that only the Congress itself can give the representatives of the four Powers the faculties they have assumed. Castlereagh and himself, he points out, are responsible to their nations, and must proceed cautiously. Castlereagh rather assents, and the Prussians fume. Something is said of “the King of Naples.” “Who is he?” asks Talleyrand. Humboldt ventures to say that the Powers have guaranteed Murat his territory. “But they could not, and, therefore, they did not,” insists Talleyrand. The conference broke up amid a general air of embarrassment. I have taken the account of it from Talleyrand’s memoirs and his report to the King. But the Secretary of the Congress, Gentz, who soon formed a profound admiration of Talleyrand, describes it as a scene he could never forget, and says that all the intrigues of the ministers were defeated. Like Napoleon, Talleyrand believed in setting ajar the nerves of his diplomatic opponents, but he had also made a substantial attack on the plot to exclude France. The minutes of the previous meetings were destroyed, and no more meetings were held to which the French Minister was not invited.