forces of reactionary Europe; all the powers of feudalism had combined
to crush an emperor who had no royal blood in his veins; he raged over
Germany like an infuriated beast with a genius for military tactics,
scattering armies which dispersed only to join together and face him
again. While Richard was in his cradle the whole of Saxony was filled
with the squalor and misery and loathsome terrors of war. Leipzig was
occupied by the French; Marshal Davoust was left there as commandant,
with power of life and death, and all the other privileges of a
military governor; and in the deputy-registrar of the law-court he
found the man for the post of provisional chief of the police "of
public safety." Who kept the public safe from the police I am unable
to say. Fighting was going on perpetually in the neighbourhood; the
dead and dying lay scattered in all directions; the stench bred
epidemics more murderous than all Napoleon's cannon. Friedrich must
have found his hands full day and night. Richard was baptized on
August 16; the following day Napoleon won a victory which cost him
dear; the 18th, being Sunday, was observed as such by a soldiery in
need of a rest; on the 19th Napoleon was a beaten man, and ran to save
his skin past the windows of the house of the Red and White Lion on
the Brühl. Richard's mother had been trembling for her own safety and
that of her children and husband; but when, as she herself afterwards
told, she saw the dreaded conqueror bolt in haste without his hat, she
breathed again. Whether she and the family were any better off under
the deliverers is a question that does not concern us here: the point
is that she thought she was. It was all one to Richard, who, aged
three months, slept peacefully on.

After the deliverance Friedrich's work became even heavier than
before. The town through its length and breadth was shattered and
dilapidated; whole families were homeless and packed like rabbits in