finally fatal. [Illustration: Napoleon Exposition, 1895 NAPOLEON, FIRST CONSUL, BY INGRES Belonging to M. Germain Bapst.] He was almost immediately confronted by a new foe, but there is no link between the destruction of his sea power and that fact. While the French had been crossing from the valley of the Rhine into that of the Danube, they had treated the minor German states with scant courtesy, using their territories as those of either conquered people or dependent allies. This ruthless treatment did not, however, awaken a spirit of resentment among them. But Prussia, still considering herself a great power, grew furious when Bernadotte rashly violated her neutrality and marched over her lands at Ansbach. The Czar, who had already directed his troops toward the Prussian frontier in order to coerce Frederick William into joining the coalition, and intended, if necessary, to violate Prussian neutrality as Napoleon had done, appeared in Berlin about the middle of October. The court party, headed by Queen Louisa, sympathized with the coalition, and used the French ruthlessness to arouse public opinion for itself. Aided by Alexander's presence, it then gained a temporary victory in the treaty with Russia, signed at Potsdam on November third, which virtually ended the policy of neutrality so carefully cherished for ten years by Frederick William, and in the pursuit of which Prussia had lost her vigor and her political importance. The wavering king finally bound himself to armed mediation, to put his army on a war footing, and then either to secure from the Emperor of the French the liberties of Naples, Holland, and Switzerland, with the separation of the crown of Italy from that of France, and an indemnification for the King of Sardinia, or else to enter the coalition with one hundred and eighty thousand men. The Russian troops might occupy or cross Prussian territory whenever needful. It was believed that the necessary negotiations with Napoleon would turn one way or the other by the middle of December. Shortly afterward the two monarchs, who had wrought themselves into an exalted fervor, swore eternal friendship over the tomb of Frederick the Great. Their dramatic oath initiated the policy of secret dealing in everything pertaining to the imperial usurper who had defied all Europe, and with whom no faith in any literal sense could be kept. There was some momentary compensation to the Emperor of the French for the serious blow he had received by this new alliance in the fact that he could now openly consolidate his power in western and southern Germany, relying on the interested friendship of the three electors who had gained so much by the enactment of the imperial delegates, so called, in 1803--those, namely, of Baden, Würtemberg, and Bavaria. The grateful Elector of Bavaria personally thanked Napoleon for his condescension, and again occupied Munich, from which the Austrians had driven him. His visit