World's Best Histories — Volume 7: FranceGuizot, François
History
World's Best Histories — Volume 7: France
Guizot, François
France -- History
The Prince Regent of Portugal had thought it possible to arrest the march
of General Junot by sending to him emissaries charged to make all the
submissions required by Napoleon. The envoys had not been able to meet the
French army, scattered and decimated by the ills it had undergone; it
advanced, however, and the news of its approach drove the Court of
Portugal on board the ships which were still to be found at the mouth of
the Tagus. On November 27th the mad queen, her son the prince regent, her
daughters, and nearly all the families of distinction in Lisbon,
accompanied by their servants, crowded on board the Portuguese fleet,
resolved to take their flight to Brazil. From seven to eight thousand
persons, with all their portable property, thus obstructed the mouth of
the Tagus, protected by the English fleet; on the 28th a favorable wind
permitted them to sail. When General Junot entered Lisbon, on the 30th of
November, at eight o'clock in the morning, the treasures which he was
charged to seize were beyond his reach. He established himself without
resistance in the capital, soon overwhelmed with confiscations and war
contributions. "Everything is more easy in the first moment than
afterwards," wrote the Emperor to Junot on the 13th of December, 1807. "Do
not seek for popularity at Lisbon, nor for the means of pleasing the
nation; that would be failing in your aim, emboldening the people, and
preparing misfortunes for yourself. The hope that you conceive of commerce
and prosperity, is a chimera with which one is lulled asleep."
Jerome Bonaparte had been declared King of Westphalia on the 8th of
December. On the 10th the act announced by the treaty of Fontainebleau was
consummated. The Queen Regent of Etruria, Maria Louisa of Bourbon,
declared to her subjects, in the name of her son, that she was called upon
to reign over a new kingdom. Tuscany then fell directly into the hands of
the Emperor Napoleon, who confided its government to his sister, Eliza
Baciocchi, to whom he had already given the principality of Lucca and
Piombino.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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