A young prince of the house of Conde, the duke of Enghien, one of the Bourbons, was forcibly seized on the territory of the duchy of Baden, summarily tried and shot. Bonaparte has been universally condemned for this judicial murder, which set "a ditch filled with royal blood" between the older dynasty and the throne upon whose steps he stood. His regicide monarchy was no longer suspect even to the fiercest republicans. Just as the infernal machine had contributed to the success of the first plebiscite, the conspiracy of Cadoudal and Pichegru facilitated the proclamation of the empire. The first consul had escaped the conspirators, and the danger helped his cause.
The consulate for life seemed too precarious; a Napoleonic dynasty would survive its founder. Since his enemies, who were the enemies of the revolution, wished to destroy him "he must be made king or emperor, so that heredity should rein force his power by ensuring him of natural and unquestioned successors and, by rendering useless crimes against his person, should remove the temptation to commit them." (Thiers.) Thus France returned to hereditary monarchy, approved by a unanimous vote of the Senate, and by a plebiscite. The empire was pi °claimed on May i8th, 1804, the title of emperor being chosen because the word king was inseparably connected with the Bourbons, and because it sounded more impressive, more military. It evoked, moreover, memories of Rome and of Charle magne And, like Charlemagne, Napoleon wished to be crowned by the Pope, not in Rome but in Paris. After some hesitation Pius VII. granted his request. On Dec. 2, at Notre Dame the amazing ceremony took place, and the soldier of the revolution became the anointed of the Lord. Moreover he took the crown from the hands of the Pope, and placed it on his own head. And Josephine the Creole adventuress, became empress. But Na poleon could dare all. He built up a new nobility, he gathered together a court. France approved of everything. When the wife of Marshal Lefebvre (the celebrated Madame Sans-Gene, who had been a washer-woman) became the duchess of Dantzig he dared even ridicule.
Boulogne, Ulm and Cadiz.—The empire united the old France with the new; in it revolutionary and monarchical ideas were combined. There was general satisfaction. Prosperity had re turned with ordered government. No one troubled about the one weak point. The empire could not be really established, nor the conquests of the revolution assured, without the defeat of the British power. Napoleon did not forget it, and in the midst of
his re-organization of home affairs, his thoughts were on the camp at Boulogne. He knew that to settle finally with England he must overcome her on her own ground, and must have there fore, were it only for one day, free passage across the Channel. A third coalition was forming. He could, he was sure, defeat its forces by land, but this new victory would be no more effective than earlier ones, so long as the British navy was undefeated. With the help of Admiral Decres, Napoleon had laboured since the days of the consulate to re-establish the French navy, ruined by the Revolution. But a navy is not built in a day. Failure at Boulogne was to change the fortunes of the empire.
Yet the plan was bold and simple. France had two squadrons. The destruction of one mattered little if, while it fought, the other could slip into the Channel and for 24 hours assure the transport of the troops gathered at Boulogne. On this strategy everything turned; it failed. Villeneuve failed Napoleon, as Grouchy was to fail him at Waterloo. The admiral was uneasy about his equipment, his officers, and his raw and untrained crews. His anxiety was shared by Decres, the minister of marine. Na poleon spent the month of Aug. 1805 in cruel suspense. Vil leneuve, he learnt at last, had not dared to enter the Channel and instead of bearing towards Brest, was making sail to the south. Once more the invasion of England must be abandoned, or at least postponed. Austria was openly threatening, Russia was arming, Prussia could not be depended upon. Austria must be brought to the knees without delay. Napoleon broke up the camp at Boulogne, marched into Germany with amazing rapidity ("The emperor makes war with our legs," said his soldiers) and forced General Mack to surrender at Ulm on Oct. 19.
Two days later this magnificent victory, with all those which were to follow it, was nullified. Villeneuve, blockaded by Nelson in Cadiz, had tried to escape. The British fleet, though smaller in numbers, had destroyed the Franco-Spanish off Cape Trafal gar. From that day the French empire was doomed. Napoleon was faced with the hopeless task of subduing England, absolute mistress of the seas. All his future was governed by that impossi bility.