Soult had occupied Königsberg, evacuated by Generals Lestocq and Kaminsky. The King of Prussia possessed nothing more than the little town of Memel. The Emperor Alexander had rejoined his troops, vanquished and decimated in spite of their courage; the King Frederick William placed himself close to his ally, at Tilsit. Peace had become necessary for the Russians; for the Prussians it had long been so. Napoleon resolved on negotiating for himself. In response to the request for an armistice, he proposed an interview, with the Emperor Alexander. It was in the middle of the Niemen, upon a raft constructed for this purpose, that the two emperors met. Alexander was young, amiable, winning, drawn along at times by chivalrous or mystical sentiments and enthusiasms, at other times under the dominion of Oriental tastes and passions. No one could be more capable of being influenced by the charm of a superior genius and an extraordinary destiny, and the personal ascendancy of a man who knew at once how to please and how to vex. Napoleon wished to captivate his vanquished enemy, whom he desired to make his ally; he succeeded in doing so with ease. Master of the destinies of the world--in his own idea more so than he even was in reality--he had resolved upon offering to Alexander compensations which might satisfy him, whilst distracting his attention from the conquests and encroachments which Napoleon reserved for himself. On the eve of Austerlitz, Napoleon had said to Prince Dolgorouki: "Ah well! let Russia extend herself at the expense of her neighbors!" It was the same thought that he was about to present to the young monarch, humiliated and conquered, wishing to display it before his eyes in order to blind him more completely. The Russians and Prussians were equally irritated against England. She had granted them money, but her military efforts had not corresponded with her promises; and it was to her obstinate hatred of France that the two monarchs attributed the origin of their defeats. "If you have a grudge against England," said Alexander, "we shall easily understand each other, for I have myself to complain of her as much as you have." It was in this first interview the sole effort of Napoleon to develop in the mind of Alexander the sentiments of anger and weariness by which he had been inspired by the selfishness which he imputed to Great Britain and the inability and weakness which he recognized in Prussia, and to engage the Russian emperor to become friendly with the only power which could offer him a glorious and profitable alliance. In the mind of the emperor, we have already said, the necessity for a continental alliance had long since made itself felt. "Austria or Russia," he had said to Talleyrand. Napoleon offered his hand to the Emperor Alexander.