CHAPTER TWENTY -SIXOn I I April I8I4 the Allies signed the Treaty of Fontainebleau, which
was meant to settle the fate of the Bonapartes. Napoleon was granted the
title of Emperor and given sovereignty over the island of Elba, where he
was to receive a stipend of two million francs from the French
Government; the rest of the Bonapartes were given pensions, while
Marie-Louise received the Duchy of Parma with reversion to her son, the
King of Rome. It was a dismal end to a dynasty that once bestrode
Europe.
It was Czar Alexander who originally proposed Elba to Caulaincourt,
at the time when the provisional abdication was being discussed.
Caulaincourt loyally nudged Alexander to keep the offer on the table even
when the abdication became absolute. The other allies thought the
proposal too generous - Metternich considered Elba was too close to Italy
while Castlereagh thought it too close to France. In the end they
reluctantly acquiesced for fe ar of offending the Czar, who was known to
despise the Bourbons; if he suddenly recanted on a Bourbon restoration
and opted instead for the King of Rome, Europe would face another
CriSIS.
Yet Elba was chosen only after a host of other candidates had been
considered and rejected. Fouche urged the Allies to deport the 'ogre' to
the United States, but this was considered mere extremism. Corsica and
Sardinia were thought dangerously large -Napoleon might be able to
turn them into formidable strongholds - while Corfu was too small,
distant and unacceptable to Napoleon. Most of the proposed sites for the
Emperor's exile were British possessions - Gibraltar, St Helena and even
Botany Bay were mentioned - but Tory backbenchers argued that
Bonaparte would sully these places by his presence. Castlereagh came up
with the ingenious idea of keeping Napoleon under a form of house arrest
on the British fo rt of St George on the Beauly Firth, where Dr Johnson
and Boswell had dined with the garrison in I783. But his Cabinet
colleagues objected that if Napoleon was there, Whig opposition leaders
would serve a writ of habeas corpus, forcing the government either to free