Though the Czar uttered some snappish words at the threatening increase to the Duchy of Warsaw, he still posed as Napoleon's ally.

The Swedes, weary of their hopeless strifes with France, Russia, and Denmark, deposed the still bellicose Gustavus IV.; and his successor, Charles XIII., made peace with those Powers, retaining Swedish Pomerania, but only at the cost of submitting to the Continental System.

Prussia seemed, to official eyes, utterly cowed.

The Hapsburgs, having failed in their bold championship of the cause of reform and of German nationality, now fell back into a policy marked by timid opportunism and decorously dull routine.
The change was marked by the retirement of Stadion, a man whose enterprising character, no less than his enthusiasm for reform, ill fitted him for the time of compromise and subservience now at hand.

He it was who had urged Austria forward in the paths of progress and had sought safety in the people: he was the Stein of Austria.