General Vincent had been despatched from Vienna nominally to explain away at Erfurt the Austrian armaments; in reality, to observe what was going on. Although he found no difficulty in winning the versatile Talleyrand to his cause, he was treated with scant courtesy by Napoleon, and sent back with a letter from him to Francis containing bitter reproaches and menaces. Stein, after his withdrawal, found, like Hardenberg, a refuge in Vienna. There he formed one of an influential coterie composed of Alexander's envoy, Pozzo di Borgo, and others of like mind, who were steadily consolidating the war sentiment. The activity of these men explained a phrase in the letter to Francis,--"The last rising in mass would infallibly have brought on war if I could have supposed that that levy and those preparations had been arranged with Russia,"--which hinted at Russia's possible interest in the military preparations; and one day at Erfurt, as Napoleon's grenadiers were marching by, the Czar had to listen while their Emperor vaunted the courage they had displayed at Pultusk and Friedland. Apropos of Napoleon's lack of delicacy, it is said that once in the Tuileries he significantly addressed one of his court ladies, not renowned for purity, with the words, "You are fond of men, I understand." "Yes; when they are polite," was the rejoinder. At Erfurt Talleyrand gave the same explanation of his master's vagaries. "We French are more civilized than our monarch," he said to Montgelas, the Bavarian minister of state; "his is only the civilization of Roman history."
But there was another incident at Erfurt more pregnant of ultimate changes than any of these. Thanks to Fouché's Mephistophelian insinuations, and the details which leaked out concerning the quarrels between Queen Hortense, representing her mother, and the Grand Duchess of Berg, representing the Bonapartes, the subject of Napoleon's divorce had become common talk. The new position at Tilsit as the recognized head of Europe's kingly hierarchy seems as early as that to have tempted the Emperor to a course distasteful to the man; but what occurred there is uncertain, and did not commit him. At Fontainebleau, the following autumn, his harsh and distant treatment of Josephine gave color to the suspicion that he was again under temptation. Whom would he choose? asked the gossips. Sometime during the year a list of marriageable princesses was prepared by the Emperor's orders. It included Maria Louisa of Austria, aged sixteen; Maria Amelia, niece of the King of Saxony; and the two sisters of the Czar, the younger of whom was not quite thirteen. The general opinion seemed to fix on one or the other of the Czar's unmarried sisters. This rumor soon reached St. Petersburg, and the scandal-mongers of that capital promptly designated the Grand Duchess Catherine, for she was of marriageable age, and they said she was learning French country dances. Alexander was in consternation; the Russian party would be aghast if he should consent, while a refusal might endanger the alliance on which hung all his ambitions.