CHAPTER XX.

CHAPTER XX.Napoleon offers, and the Austrian Envoy accepts, a new Treaty—The Emperor refuses it, unless England is included—Negotiations with England—fail—Renewal of the War—Armistice—Resumption of Hostilities—Battle of Hohenlinden—Other Battles—The Austrians agree to a separate Peace—Treaty of Luneville—Convention between France and the United States—The Queen of Naples repairs to Petersburgh—Paul receives her with cordiality, and applies in her behalf to Buonaparte—His Envoy received at Paris with the utmost distinction, and the Royal Family of Naples saved for the present—Rome restored to the authority of the Pope—Napoleon demands of the King of Spain to declare War against Portugal—Olivenza and Almeida taken—Malta, after a Blockade of Two Years, obliged to submit to the English.Napoleon proceeded to manage with great skill and policy the popularity which his success had gained for him. In war it was always his custom, after he had struck some venturous and apparently decisive blow, to offer such conditions as might induce the enemy to submit, and separate his interest from that of his allies. Upon this system of policy he offered the Count de St. Julien, an Austrian envoy, the conditions of a treaty, having for its basis that of Campo Formio, which, after the loss of Italy on the fatal field of Marengo, afforded terms much more favourable than the Emperor of Germany was entitled to have expected from the victors. The Austrian envoy accordingly took upon him to subscribe these preliminaries; but they did not meet the approbation of the Emperor, who placed his honour on observing accurately the engagements which he had formed with England, and who refused to accede to a treaty in which she was not included. It was added, however, that Lord Minto, the British ambassador at Vienna, had intimated Britain's willingness to be included in a treaty for general pacification.[569]NEGOTIATIONS WITH ENGLAND.Aug. 24.This proposal occasioned a communication between France and Britain, through Monsieur Otto, commissioner for the care of French prisoners. The French envoy intimated that as a preliminary to Britain's entering on the treaty, she must consent to an armistice by sea, and suspend the advantages which she received from her naval superiority, in the same manner as the first consul of France had dispensed withprosecuting his victories by land. This demand would have withdrawn the blockade of the British vessels from the French seaports, and allowed the sailing of reinforcements to Egypt and Malta, which last important place was on the point of surrendering to the English. The British ministers were also sensible that there was, besides, a great difference between a truce betwixt two land armies, stationed in presence of each other, and a suspension of naval hostilities over the whole world; since in the one case, on breaking off the treaty, hostilities can be almost instantly resumed; on the other, the distance and uncertainty of communication may prevent the war being recommenced for many months; by which chance of delay, the French, as being inferior at sea, were sure to be the gainers. The British statesmen, therefore, proposed some modifications, to prevent the obvious inequality of such armistice. But it was replied on the part of France, that though they would accept of such a modified armistice, if Great Britain would enter into a separate treaty, yet the chief consul would not consent to it if Austria was to be participant of the negotiation.[570]Here, therefore, the overtures of peace betwixt France and England were shipwrecked, and the Austrian Emperor was reduced to the alternative of renewing the war, or entering into a treaty without his allies. He appears to have deemed himself obliged to prefer the more dangerous and more honourable course.This was a generous resolution on the part of Austria; but by no means politic at the period, when their armies were defeated, their national spirit depressed, and when the French armies had penetrated so far into Germany. Even Pitt himself, upon whose declining health the misfortune made a most unfavourable impression, had considered the defeat of Marengo as a conclusion to the hopes of success against France for a considerable period. "Fold up the map," he said, pointing to that of Europe; "it need not be again opened for these twenty years."Yet, unwilling to resign the contest, even while a spark of hope remained, it was resolved upon in the British councils to encourage Austria to farther prosecution of the war. Perhaps, in recommending such a measure to her ally, at a period when she had sustained such great losses, and was in the state of dejection to which they gave rise, Great Britain too much resembled an eager and over-zealous second, who urges his principal to continue a combat after his strength is exhausted. Austria, a great and powerful nation, if left to repose, would have in time recruited her strength, and constituted once again a balance against the power of France on the continent; but if urged to farther exertions in the hour of her extremity, she was likely to sustain such additionallosses, as might render her comparatively insignificant for a number of years. Such at least is the conclusion which we, who have the advantage of considering the measure with reference to its consequences, are now enabled to form. At the emergency, things were viewed in a different light. The victories of Suwarrow and of the Archduke Charles were remembered, as well as the recent defeats sustained by France in the year 1799, which had greatly tarnished the fame of her arms. The character of Buonaparte was not yet sufficiently estimated. His failure before Acre had made an impression in England, which was not erased by the victory of Marengo; the extreme prudence which usually tempered his most venturous undertakings was not yet generally known; and the belief and hope were received, that one who ventured on such new and daring manœuvres as Napoleon employed, was likely to behold them miscarry at length, and thus to fall as rapidly as he had risen.Influenced by such motives, it was determined in the British cabinet to encourage the Emperor, by a loan of two millions, to place himself and his brother, the Archduke John, in command of the principal army, raise the whole national force of his mighty empire, and at the head of the numerous forces which he could summon into the field, either command a more equal peace, or try the fortunes of the most desperate war.The money was paid, and the Emperor joined the army; but the negotiations for peace were not broken off. On the contrary, they were carried on much on the terms which Saint Julien had subscribed to, with this additional and discreditable circumstance, that the first consul, as a pledge of the Austrian sincerity, required that the three fortified towns of Ingoldstadt, Ulm, and Philipstadt, should be placed temporarily in the hands of the French; a condition to which the Austrians were compelled to submit. But the only advantage purchased by this surrender, which greatly exposed the hereditary dominions of Austria, was an armistice of forty-five days, at the end of which hostilities were again renewed.[571]In the action of Haag, the Archduke John, whose credit in the army almost rivalled that of his brother Charles, obtained considerable advantages;[572]and, encouraged by them, he ventured on the 3d of December, 1800, two days afterwards, a great and decisive encounter with Moreau. This was the occasion on which that general gained over the Austrians the bloody and most important victory of Hohenlinden,—an achievement which did muchto keep his reputation for military talents abreast with that of the first consul himself. Moreau pursued his victory, and obtained possession of Salzburg. At the same time Augereau, at the head of the Gallo-Batavian army, pressed forward into Bohemia; and Macdonald, passing from the country of the Grisons into the Valteline, forced a division of his army across the Mincio, and communicated with Massena and the French army in Italy. The Austrian affairs seemed utterly desperate. The Archduke Charles was again placed at the head of her forces, but they were so totally discouraged, that a retreat on all points was the only measure which could be executed.ARMISTICE.Another and a final cessation of arms was now the only resource of the Austrians; and, in order to obtain it, the Emperor was compelled to agree to make a peace separate from his allies. Britain, in consideration of the extremity to which her ally was reduced, voluntarily relieved him from the engagement by which he was restrained from doing so without her participation. An armistice shortly afterwards took place, and the Austrians being now sufficiently humbled, it was speedily followed by a peace. Joseph Buonaparte, for this purpose, met with the Austrian minister, Count Cobentzel, at Luneville, where the negotiations were carried on.There were two conditions of the treaty, which were peculiarly galling to the Emperor. Buonaparte peremptorily exacted the cession of Tuscany, the hereditary dominions of the brother of Francis, which were to be given up to a prince of the House of Parma, while the archduke was to obtain an indemnity in Germany. The French Consul demanded, with no less pertinacity, that Francis (though not empowered to do so by the Germanic constitution) should confirm the peace, as well in his capacity of Emperor of Germany, as in that of sovereign of his own hereditary dominions. This demand, from which Buonaparte would on no account depart, involved a point of great difficulty and delicacy. One of the principal clauses of the treaty included the cession of the whole territories on the left bank of the Rhine to the French Republic; thereby depriving not only Austria, but Prussia, and various other princes of the German empire, of their possessions in the districts, which were now made over to France. It was provided that the princes who should suffer such deprivations, were to be remunerated by indemnities, as they were termed, to be allotted to them at the expense of the Germanic body in general. Now, the Emperor had no power to authorise the alienation of these fiefs of the empire, without consent of the Diet, and this was strongly urged by his envoy.Buonaparte was, however, determined to make peace on no other terms than those of the Emperor's giving away what was not his to bestow. Francis was compelled to submit, and, as the necessity of the case pleaded its apology, the act of the Emperor was afterwards ratified by the Diet. Except in these mortifyingclaims, the submission to which plainly intimated the want of power to resist compulsion, the treaty of Luneville[573]was not much more advantageous to France than that of Campo Formio; and the moderation of the first consul indicated at once his desire of peace upon the continent, and considerable respect for the bravery and strength of Austria, though enfeebled by such losses as those of Marengo and Hohenlinden.We have already noticed the disputes betwixt France and America, and the scandalous turn of the negotiations, by which the French Directory attempted to bully or wheedle the United States out of a sum of money, which, in part at least, was to be dedicated to their own private use. Since that time the aggressions committed by the French on the American navy had been so numerous, that the two republics seemed about to go to war, and the United States actually issued letters of marque for making reprisals on the French. New communications and negotiations, however, were opened, which Buonaparte studied to bring to maturity. His brother Joseph acted as negotiator, and on the 30th of September, 1800, a convention[574]was entered into, to subsist for the space of eight years, agreeing on certain modifications of the right of search, declaring that commerce should be free between the countries, and that the captures on either side, excepting such as were contraband, and destined for an enemy's harbour, should be mutually restored. Thus Buonaparte established peace between France and the United States, and prevented the latter, in all probability, from throwing themselves into a closer union with Britain, to which their common descent, with the similarity of manners, language, and laws, overcoming the recollection of recent hostilities, might have otherwise strongly inclined them.NAPLES.Still more important results were derived by Napoleon, from the address and political sagacity, with which, in accommodating matters with the court of Naples, he contrived to form what finally became a strong and predominating interest in the councils, and even the affections of a monarch, whose amity was, of all others, the most important to his plans. The prince alluded to was the Emperor of Russia, who had been, during the preceding year, the most formidable and successful enemy encountered by France since her Revolution. A short resumption of facts is necessary, to understand the circumstances in which the negotiation with Naples originated.When Buonaparte departed for Egypt, all Italy, excepting Tuscany, and the dominions assigned to Austria by the treaty of Campo Formio, was in the hands of the French; while Naples was governed by the ephemeral Parthenopean republic, and the city of the Popes by that which assumed the superb title of Roman. These authorities, however, were only nominal; the French generalsexercised the real authority in both countries. Suddenly, and as if by magic, this whole state of affairs was changed by the military talents of Suwarrow. The Austrians and Russians gained great successes in the north of Italy, and General Macdonald found himself obliged to evacuate Naples, and to concentrate the principal resistance of the French in Lombardy and Piedmont. Cardinal Ruffo, a soldier, churchman, and politician, put himself at the head of a numerous body of insurgents, and commenced war against such French troops as had been left in the south, and in the middle of Italy. This movement was actively supported by the British fleet. Lord Nelson recovered Naples; Rome surrendered to Commodore Trowbridge. Thus, the Parthenopean and Roman republics were extinguished for ever.[575]The royal family returned to Naples, and that fine city and country were once more a kingdom. Rome, the capital of the world, was occupied by Neapolitan troops, generally supposed the most indifferent of modern times.Replaced in his richest territories by the allies, the King of Naples was bound by every tie to assist them in the campaign of 1800. He accordingly sent an army into the March of Ancona, under the command of Count Roger de Damas, who, with the assistance of insurrectionary forces[576]among the inhabitants, and a body of Austrians, was to clear Tuscany of the French. Undeterred by the battle of Marengo, the Count de Damas marched against the French general Miollis, who commanded in Tuscany, and sustained a defeat by him near Sienna. Retreat became now necessary, the more especially as the armistice which was entered into by general Melas deprived the Neapolitans of any assistance from the Austrians, and rendered their whole expedition utterly hopeless. They were not even included by name in the armistice, and were thus left exposed to the whole vengeance of the French. Damas retreated into the territories of the Church, which were still occupied by the Neapolitan forces. The consequence of these events was easily foreseen. The Neapolitan troops, so soon as the French could find leisure to look towards them, must be either destroyed entirely, or driven back upon Naples, and that city must be again forsaken by the royal family, happy if they were once more able to make their escape to Sicily, as on the former occasion.[577]At this desperate crisis, the Queen of the two Sicilies took a resolution which seemed almost as desperate, and could only have been adopted by a woman of a bold and decisive character. She resolved, notwithstanding the severity of the season, to repair in person to the court of the Emperor Paul, and implore his intercessionwith the first consul, in behalf of her husband and his territories.We have not hitherto mentioned, except cursorily, the powerful prince whose mediation she implored. The son and successor of the celebrated Catherine, far from possessing the prudence and political sagacity of his mother, seemed rather to display the heady passions and imperfect judgment of his unfortunate father. He was capricious in the choice of his objects, pursuing for the time, with uncommon and irregular zeal and pertinacity, projects which he afterwards discarded and abandoned, swelling trifles of dress or behaviour into matters of importance, and neglecting, on the other hand, what was of real consequence;—governed, in short, rather by imagination than by his reasoning qualities, and sometimes affording room to believe that he actually laboured under a partial aberration of mind. Such characters are often to be met with in private society, the restraints of which keep them within such limits, that they pass through life without attracting much notice, unless when creating a little mirth, or giving rise to some passing wonder. But an absolute prince, possessed of such a disposition, is like a giddy person placed on the verge of a precipice, which would try the soundest head, and must overpower a weak one.The Emperor had first distinguished himself by an energetic defence of the rights of sovereigns, and a hatred of whatever belonged to or was connected with the French Revolution, from a political maxim to the shape of a coat or a hat. The brother of Louis XVI., and inheritor of his rights, found a refuge in the Russian dominions; and Paul, fond, as most princes are, of military glory, promised himself that of restoring the Bourbon dynasty by force of arms.SUWARROW.The train of victories acquired by Suwarrow was well calculated to foster these original partialities of the Emperor; and, accordingly, while success continued to wait on his banners, he loaded his general with marks of his regard, elevated him to the rank of a prince, and conferred on him the title of Italiansky, or Italicus.The very first and only misfortune which befell Suwarrow, seems to have ruined him in the opinion of his capricious master. The defeat of Korsakow by Massena, near Zurich, had involved Suwarrow in great momentary danger as he advanced into Switzerland, reckoning on the support of that general, whose disaster left his right uncovered. Now, although Suwarrow saved his army on this occasion by a retreat, which required equal talent to that which achieved his numerous victories, yet the bare fact of his having received a check was sufficient to ruin him with his haughty sovereign. Paul was yet more offended with the conduct of the Austrians. The Archduke Charles having left Switzerland to descend into Germany, had given occasion and opportunity for Massena to cross the Limmat and surprise Korsakow; and this,notwithstanding every explanation and apology, rankled in the mind of the Czar.[578]He recalled his armies from the frontiers of Germany, and treated his veteran and victorious general with such marks of neglect and displeasure, that the old man's heart sunk under them.In the meanwhile, Paul gathered up farther subjects of complaint against the Austrian government, and complained of their having neglected to provide for some Russian prisoners,[579]under a capitulation which they made in behalf of their own, at the surrender of Ancona to the French.The Austrians could not afford to lose so powerful and efficient an ally in the day of their adversity. They endeavoured to explain, that the movement of the Archduke Charles was inevitably necessary, in consequence of an invasion of the Austrian territory—they laid the blame of the omission of the Russians in the capitulation upon the commandant Frœlich, and offered to place him under arrest. The Emperor of Austria even proposed, in despite of the natural pride which is proper to his distinguished house, to place Suwarrow at the head of the Austrian armies,—a proffer, which, if it had been accepted, might have given rise to an extraordinary struggle betwixt the experience, determination, and warlike skill of the veteran Scythian, and the formidable talents of Buonaparte, and which perhaps contained the only chance which Europe possessed at the time, of opposing to the latter a rival worthy of himself; for Suwarrow had never yet been conquered, and possessed an irresistible influence over the minds of his soldiers. These great generals, however, were not destined ever to decide the fate of the world by their meeting.Suwarrow, a Russian in all his feelings, broke his heart, and died under the unmerited displeasure of his Emperor, whom he had served with so much fidelity.[580]If the memory of his unfortunate sovereign were to be judged of according to ordinary rules, his conduct towards his distinguished subject would have left on it an indelible stigma. As it is, the event must pass as another proof, that the Emperor Paul was not amenable, fromthe construction of his understanding and temperament, to the ordinary rules of censure.Meanwhile, the proposals of Austria were in vain. The Czar was not to be brought back to his former sentiments. He was like a spoiled child, who, tired of his favourite toy, seems bent to break asunder and destroy what was lately the dearest object of his affection.When such a character as Paul changes his opinion of his friends, he generally runs into the opposite extreme, and alters also his thoughts of his enemies. Like his father, and others whose imagination is indifferently regulated, the Czar had need of some one of whom to make his idol. The extravagant admiration which the Emperor Peter felt for Frederick of Prussia, could not well be entertained for any one now alive, unless it were the first consul of France; and on him, therefore, Paul was now disposed to turn his eyes with a mixture of wonder, and of a wish to imitate what he wondered at.[581]This extravagance of admiration is a passion natural to some minds, (never strong ones,) and may be compared to that tendency which others have to be in love all their lives, in defiance of advancing age and other obstacles.When Paul was beginning to entertain this humour, the arrival of the Queen of Sicily at his court gave him a graceful and even dignified opportunity to approach towards a connexion with Napoleon Buonaparte. His pride, too, must have been gratified by seeing the daughter of the renowned Maria Theresa, the sister of the Emperor of Austria, at his court of St. Petersburgh, soliciting from the Czar of Russia the protection which her brother was totally unable to afford her; and a successful interference in her behalf would be a kind of insult to the misfortunes of that brother, against whom, as we have noticed, Paul nourished resentful feelings. He therefore resolved to open a communication with France, in behalf of the royal family of Naples. Lewinshoff, grand huntsman of Russia, was despatched to make the overtures of mediation. He was received with the utmost distinction at Paris, and Buonaparte made an instant and graceful concession to the request of the Emperor Paul. The first consul agreed to suspend his military operations against Naples, and to leave the royal family in possession of their sovereignty; reserving to himself, however, the right of dictating the terms under which he was to grant them such an amnesty.NAPLES.It was time that some effectual interposition should take place in defence of the King of Naples, who, though he had around him a nation individually brave and enthusiastic, was so ill-served, that his regular army was in the worst and most imperfect state of discipline. Murat, to whom Buonaparte had committed the task of executing his vengeance on Naples, had already crossed the Alps, and placed himself at the head of an army of ten thousand chosen men; a force then judged sufficient not only to drive the Neapolitan general Damas out of the Ecclesiastical States, but to pursue him as far as Naples, and occupy that beautiful capital of a prince, whose regular army consisted of more than thirty thousand soldiers, and whose irregular forces might have been increased to any number by the mountaineers of Calabria, who form excellent light troops, and by the numerous Lazzaroni of Naples, who had displayed their valour against Championet, upon the first invasion of the French. But the zeal of a nation avails little when the spirit of the government bears no proportion to it. The government of Naples dreaded the approach of Murat as that of the Angel of Death; and they received the news that Lewinshoff had joined the French general at Florence, as a condemned criminal might have heard the news of a reprieve. The Russian envoy was received with distinguished honours at Florence. Murat appeared at the theatre with Lewinshoff, where the Italians, who had so lately seen the Russian and French banners placed in bloody opposition to each other, now beheld them formally united in presence of these dignitaries; in sign, it was said, that the two nations were combined for the peace of the world, and general benefit of humanity.[582]Untimely augury! How often after that period did these standards meet in the bloodiest fields history ever recorded; and what a long and desperate struggle was yet in reserve ere the general peace so boldly predicted was at length restored!The respect paid by the first consul to the wishes of Paul, saved for the present the royal family of Naples; but Murat, nevertheless, made them experience a full portion of the bitter cup which the vanquished are generally doomed to swallow. General Damas[583]was commanded in the haughtiest terms to evacuate the Roman States, and not to presume to claim any benefit from the armistice which had been extended to the Austrians. At the same time, while the Neapolitans were thus compelled hastily to evacuate the Roman territories, general surprise was exhibited, when, instead of marching to Rome, and re-establishing the authority of the Roman republic, Murat, according to the orders which he had received from the first consul, carefully respected the territory of the Church, and re-installed the officers of the Popein what had been long termed the patrimony of St Peter.[584]This unexpected turn of circumstances originated in high policy on the part of Buonaparte.[585]We certainly do Napoleon no injustice in supposing, that personally he had little or no influential sense of religion. Some obscure yet rooted doctrines of fatality, seem, so far as we can judge, to have formed the extent of his metaphysical creed. We can scarce term him even a deist; and he was an absolute stranger to every modification of Christian belief and worship. But he saw and valued the use of a national religion as an engine of state policy. In Egypt, he was desirous of being thought an envoy of Heaven; and though uncircumcised, drinking wine and eating pork, still claimed to be accounted a follower of the law of the Prophet. He had pathetically expostulated with the Turks on their hostility towards him. The French, he said, had ceased to be followers of Jesus; and now that they were almost, if not altogether, Moslemah, would the true believers make war on those who had overthrown the cross, dethroned the Pope, and extirpated the order of Malta, the sworn persecutors of the Moslem faith? On his return to France, all this was to be forgotten, or only remembered as a trick played upon the infidels. He was, as we have said, aware of the necessity of a national faith to support the civil government; and as, while in Egypt, he affected to have destroyed the Catholic religion in honour of that of Mahomed, so, returned to Europe, he was now desirous to become the restorer of the temporal territories of the Pope, in order to obtain such a settlement of church affairs in France, as might procure for his own government the countenance of the Sovereign Pontiff, and for himself an admission into the pale of Christian princes. This restitution was in some measure consistent with his policy in 1798, when he had spared the temporalities of the Holy See. Totally indifferent as Napoleon was to religion in his personal capacity, his whole conduct shows his sense of its importance to the existence of a settled and peaceful state of society.Besides evacuating the Ecclesiastical States, the Neapolitans were compelled by Murat to restore various paintings, statues, and other objects of art, which they had, in imitation of Buonaparte, taken forcibly from the Romans,—so captivating is the influence of bad example. A French army of about eighteen thousand men was to be quartered in Calabria, less for the purpose of enforcing the conditions of peace, than to save France the expense of supporting the troops, and to have them stationed where they might be embarked for Egypt at the shortest notice.The harbours of the Neapolitan dominions were of course to be closed against the English. A cession of part of the isle of Elba, and the relinquishment of all pretensions upon Tuscany, summed up the sacrifices of the King of Naples, who, considering how often he had braved Napoleon, had great reason to thank the Emperor of Russia for his effectual mediation in his favour.[586]ROME—PEACE WITH PORTUGAL.These various measures respecting foreign relations, the treaty of Luneville, the acquisition of the good-will of the Emperor Paul, the restoration of Rome to the Pope's authority, and the mildness of the penalty inflicted on the King of Naples, seemed all to spring from a sound and moderate system, the object of which was rather the consolidation of Napoleon's government, than any wish to extend its influence or its conquests. His plans, in after times, often exhibited a mixture of the greatest good sense and prudence, with rash and splenetic explosions of an over-eager ambition, or a temper irritated by opposition; but it is to be remembered that Buonaparte was not yet so firm in the authority which he had but just acquired, as to encourage any display of the infirmities of his mind and temper.His behaviour towards Portugal was, however, of a character deviating from the moderation he had in general displayed. Portugal, the ancient and faithful ally of England, was on that account the especial object of the first consul's displeasure. He, therefore, demanded of the King of Spain, who, since the peace between the countries, had been the submissive vassal of France, to declare war on the Prince Regent of Portugal, although the husband of his daughter. War accordingly was declared, in obedience to the mandate of the first consul, and the Spanish armies, together with an auxiliary army of French under Leclerc, entered Portugal, took Olivenza and Almeida, and compelled the prince regent, 6th of June, 1801, to sign a treaty, engaging to shut his ports against the English, and surrendering to Spain, Olivenza, and other places on the frontier of the Guadiana. Buonaparte was highly discontented with this treaty, to which he would not accede; and he refused, at the same time, to withdraw from Spain the army of Leclerc. On the 29th September, he condescended to grant Portugal peace under some additional terms,[587]which were not in themselves of much consequence, although the overbearing and peremptory conduct which he exhibited towards the Peninsular powers, was a sign of the dictatorial spirit which he was prepared to assume in the affairs of Europe.The same disposition was manifested in the mode by which Buonaparte was pleased to show his sense of the King of Spain's complaisance. He chose for that purpose to create a kingdom and a king—a king, too, of the house of Bourbon. An infant of Spain obtained the throne of Tuscany, under the name of Etruria,rent from the house of Austria.[588]Madame de Staël terms this the commencement of the great masquerade of Europe; but it was more properly the second act. The stage, during the first, was occupied by a quadrille of republics, who were now to be replaced by an anti-mask of kings. This display of power pleased the national vanity, and an uproar of applause ensued, while the audience at the theatre applied to Buonaparte the well-known line—"J'ai fait des rois, madame, et n'ai pas voulu l'être."While all the continent appeared thus willing to submit to one so ready to avail himself of their subjection, Britain alone remained at war; without allies, without, it might seem, a direct object; yet on the grand and unalterable principle, that no partial distress should induce her to submit to the system of degradation, which seemed preparing for all nations under the yoke of France, and which had placed France herself, with all her affected zeal for liberty, under the government of an arbitrary ruler. On every point the English squadrons annihilated the commerce of France, crippled her revenues, blockaded her ports, and prevented those combinations which would have crowned the total conquest of Europe, could the master, as he might now be called, of the land, have enjoyed, at the same time, the facilities which can only be afforded in communication by sea.It was in vain that Buonaparte, who, besides his natural hardiness of perseverance, connected a part of his own glory with the preservation of Egypt, endeavoured by various means to send supplies to that distant province. His convoys were driven back into harbour by the English fleets; and he directed against his admirals, who could not achieve impossibilities, the unavailing resentment natural to one who was so little accustomed to disappointment.The chance of relieving Egypt was rendered yet more precarious by the loss of Malta, which, after a distressing blockade of two years, was obliged to submit to the English arms on the 5th of September, 1800. The English were thus in possession of a strong, and almost impregnable citadel, in the midst of the Mediterranean, with an excellent harbour, and every thing required for a naval station of the first importance; above all, they had obtained the very spot which Buonaparte had fixed upon for maintaining the communication with Egypt, which was now in greater danger than ever.The capture of Malta was, however, by its consequences, favourable to Napoleon's views in one important respect. The Emperor Paul imagined he had rights upon that island, in consequence of his having declared himself Grand Master of the Order of Saint John; and although, by his deserting the coalition, andabandoning the common cause, he had lost all right to expect that Great Britain should surrender to him an important acquisition made by her own arms, yet, with his usual intemperate indulgence of passion, he conceived himself deeply injured by its being withheld,[589]and nourished from that time an implacable resentment against England and her government, the effects of which are afterwards to be traced.

Napoleon offers, and the Austrian Envoy accepts, a new Treaty—The Emperor refuses it, unless England is included—Negotiations with England—fail—Renewal of the War—Armistice—Resumption of Hostilities—Battle of Hohenlinden—Other Battles—The Austrians agree to a separate Peace—Treaty of Luneville—Convention between France and the United States—The Queen of Naples repairs to Petersburgh—Paul receives her with cordiality, and applies in her behalf to Buonaparte—His Envoy received at Paris with the utmost distinction, and the Royal Family of Naples saved for the present—Rome restored to the authority of the Pope—Napoleon demands of the King of Spain to declare War against Portugal—Olivenza and Almeida taken—Malta, after a Blockade of Two Years, obliged to submit to the English.

Napoleon offers, and the Austrian Envoy accepts, a new Treaty—The Emperor refuses it, unless England is included—Negotiations with England—fail—Renewal of the War—Armistice—Resumption of Hostilities—Battle of Hohenlinden—Other Battles—The Austrians agree to a separate Peace—Treaty of Luneville—Convention between France and the United States—The Queen of Naples repairs to Petersburgh—Paul receives her with cordiality, and applies in her behalf to Buonaparte—His Envoy received at Paris with the utmost distinction, and the Royal Family of Naples saved for the present—Rome restored to the authority of the Pope—Napoleon demands of the King of Spain to declare War against Portugal—Olivenza and Almeida taken—Malta, after a Blockade of Two Years, obliged to submit to the English.

Napoleon proceeded to manage with great skill and policy the popularity which his success had gained for him. In war it was always his custom, after he had struck some venturous and apparently decisive blow, to offer such conditions as might induce the enemy to submit, and separate his interest from that of his allies. Upon this system of policy he offered the Count de St. Julien, an Austrian envoy, the conditions of a treaty, having for its basis that of Campo Formio, which, after the loss of Italy on the fatal field of Marengo, afforded terms much more favourable than the Emperor of Germany was entitled to have expected from the victors. The Austrian envoy accordingly took upon him to subscribe these preliminaries; but they did not meet the approbation of the Emperor, who placed his honour on observing accurately the engagements which he had formed with England, and who refused to accede to a treaty in which she was not included. It was added, however, that Lord Minto, the British ambassador at Vienna, had intimated Britain's willingness to be included in a treaty for general pacification.[569]

NEGOTIATIONS WITH ENGLAND.

Aug. 24.

This proposal occasioned a communication between France and Britain, through Monsieur Otto, commissioner for the care of French prisoners. The French envoy intimated that as a preliminary to Britain's entering on the treaty, she must consent to an armistice by sea, and suspend the advantages which she received from her naval superiority, in the same manner as the first consul of France had dispensed withprosecuting his victories by land. This demand would have withdrawn the blockade of the British vessels from the French seaports, and allowed the sailing of reinforcements to Egypt and Malta, which last important place was on the point of surrendering to the English. The British ministers were also sensible that there was, besides, a great difference between a truce betwixt two land armies, stationed in presence of each other, and a suspension of naval hostilities over the whole world; since in the one case, on breaking off the treaty, hostilities can be almost instantly resumed; on the other, the distance and uncertainty of communication may prevent the war being recommenced for many months; by which chance of delay, the French, as being inferior at sea, were sure to be the gainers. The British statesmen, therefore, proposed some modifications, to prevent the obvious inequality of such armistice. But it was replied on the part of France, that though they would accept of such a modified armistice, if Great Britain would enter into a separate treaty, yet the chief consul would not consent to it if Austria was to be participant of the negotiation.[570]

Here, therefore, the overtures of peace betwixt France and England were shipwrecked, and the Austrian Emperor was reduced to the alternative of renewing the war, or entering into a treaty without his allies. He appears to have deemed himself obliged to prefer the more dangerous and more honourable course.

This was a generous resolution on the part of Austria; but by no means politic at the period, when their armies were defeated, their national spirit depressed, and when the French armies had penetrated so far into Germany. Even Pitt himself, upon whose declining health the misfortune made a most unfavourable impression, had considered the defeat of Marengo as a conclusion to the hopes of success against France for a considerable period. "Fold up the map," he said, pointing to that of Europe; "it need not be again opened for these twenty years."

Yet, unwilling to resign the contest, even while a spark of hope remained, it was resolved upon in the British councils to encourage Austria to farther prosecution of the war. Perhaps, in recommending such a measure to her ally, at a period when she had sustained such great losses, and was in the state of dejection to which they gave rise, Great Britain too much resembled an eager and over-zealous second, who urges his principal to continue a combat after his strength is exhausted. Austria, a great and powerful nation, if left to repose, would have in time recruited her strength, and constituted once again a balance against the power of France on the continent; but if urged to farther exertions in the hour of her extremity, she was likely to sustain such additionallosses, as might render her comparatively insignificant for a number of years. Such at least is the conclusion which we, who have the advantage of considering the measure with reference to its consequences, are now enabled to form. At the emergency, things were viewed in a different light. The victories of Suwarrow and of the Archduke Charles were remembered, as well as the recent defeats sustained by France in the year 1799, which had greatly tarnished the fame of her arms. The character of Buonaparte was not yet sufficiently estimated. His failure before Acre had made an impression in England, which was not erased by the victory of Marengo; the extreme prudence which usually tempered his most venturous undertakings was not yet generally known; and the belief and hope were received, that one who ventured on such new and daring manœuvres as Napoleon employed, was likely to behold them miscarry at length, and thus to fall as rapidly as he had risen.

Influenced by such motives, it was determined in the British cabinet to encourage the Emperor, by a loan of two millions, to place himself and his brother, the Archduke John, in command of the principal army, raise the whole national force of his mighty empire, and at the head of the numerous forces which he could summon into the field, either command a more equal peace, or try the fortunes of the most desperate war.

The money was paid, and the Emperor joined the army; but the negotiations for peace were not broken off. On the contrary, they were carried on much on the terms which Saint Julien had subscribed to, with this additional and discreditable circumstance, that the first consul, as a pledge of the Austrian sincerity, required that the three fortified towns of Ingoldstadt, Ulm, and Philipstadt, should be placed temporarily in the hands of the French; a condition to which the Austrians were compelled to submit. But the only advantage purchased by this surrender, which greatly exposed the hereditary dominions of Austria, was an armistice of forty-five days, at the end of which hostilities were again renewed.[571]

In the action of Haag, the Archduke John, whose credit in the army almost rivalled that of his brother Charles, obtained considerable advantages;[572]and, encouraged by them, he ventured on the 3d of December, 1800, two days afterwards, a great and decisive encounter with Moreau. This was the occasion on which that general gained over the Austrians the bloody and most important victory of Hohenlinden,—an achievement which did muchto keep his reputation for military talents abreast with that of the first consul himself. Moreau pursued his victory, and obtained possession of Salzburg. At the same time Augereau, at the head of the Gallo-Batavian army, pressed forward into Bohemia; and Macdonald, passing from the country of the Grisons into the Valteline, forced a division of his army across the Mincio, and communicated with Massena and the French army in Italy. The Austrian affairs seemed utterly desperate. The Archduke Charles was again placed at the head of her forces, but they were so totally discouraged, that a retreat on all points was the only measure which could be executed.

ARMISTICE.

Another and a final cessation of arms was now the only resource of the Austrians; and, in order to obtain it, the Emperor was compelled to agree to make a peace separate from his allies. Britain, in consideration of the extremity to which her ally was reduced, voluntarily relieved him from the engagement by which he was restrained from doing so without her participation. An armistice shortly afterwards took place, and the Austrians being now sufficiently humbled, it was speedily followed by a peace. Joseph Buonaparte, for this purpose, met with the Austrian minister, Count Cobentzel, at Luneville, where the negotiations were carried on.

There were two conditions of the treaty, which were peculiarly galling to the Emperor. Buonaparte peremptorily exacted the cession of Tuscany, the hereditary dominions of the brother of Francis, which were to be given up to a prince of the House of Parma, while the archduke was to obtain an indemnity in Germany. The French Consul demanded, with no less pertinacity, that Francis (though not empowered to do so by the Germanic constitution) should confirm the peace, as well in his capacity of Emperor of Germany, as in that of sovereign of his own hereditary dominions. This demand, from which Buonaparte would on no account depart, involved a point of great difficulty and delicacy. One of the principal clauses of the treaty included the cession of the whole territories on the left bank of the Rhine to the French Republic; thereby depriving not only Austria, but Prussia, and various other princes of the German empire, of their possessions in the districts, which were now made over to France. It was provided that the princes who should suffer such deprivations, were to be remunerated by indemnities, as they were termed, to be allotted to them at the expense of the Germanic body in general. Now, the Emperor had no power to authorise the alienation of these fiefs of the empire, without consent of the Diet, and this was strongly urged by his envoy.

Buonaparte was, however, determined to make peace on no other terms than those of the Emperor's giving away what was not his to bestow. Francis was compelled to submit, and, as the necessity of the case pleaded its apology, the act of the Emperor was afterwards ratified by the Diet. Except in these mortifyingclaims, the submission to which plainly intimated the want of power to resist compulsion, the treaty of Luneville[573]was not much more advantageous to France than that of Campo Formio; and the moderation of the first consul indicated at once his desire of peace upon the continent, and considerable respect for the bravery and strength of Austria, though enfeebled by such losses as those of Marengo and Hohenlinden.

We have already noticed the disputes betwixt France and America, and the scandalous turn of the negotiations, by which the French Directory attempted to bully or wheedle the United States out of a sum of money, which, in part at least, was to be dedicated to their own private use. Since that time the aggressions committed by the French on the American navy had been so numerous, that the two republics seemed about to go to war, and the United States actually issued letters of marque for making reprisals on the French. New communications and negotiations, however, were opened, which Buonaparte studied to bring to maturity. His brother Joseph acted as negotiator, and on the 30th of September, 1800, a convention[574]was entered into, to subsist for the space of eight years, agreeing on certain modifications of the right of search, declaring that commerce should be free between the countries, and that the captures on either side, excepting such as were contraband, and destined for an enemy's harbour, should be mutually restored. Thus Buonaparte established peace between France and the United States, and prevented the latter, in all probability, from throwing themselves into a closer union with Britain, to which their common descent, with the similarity of manners, language, and laws, overcoming the recollection of recent hostilities, might have otherwise strongly inclined them.

NAPLES.

Still more important results were derived by Napoleon, from the address and political sagacity, with which, in accommodating matters with the court of Naples, he contrived to form what finally became a strong and predominating interest in the councils, and even the affections of a monarch, whose amity was, of all others, the most important to his plans. The prince alluded to was the Emperor of Russia, who had been, during the preceding year, the most formidable and successful enemy encountered by France since her Revolution. A short resumption of facts is necessary, to understand the circumstances in which the negotiation with Naples originated.

When Buonaparte departed for Egypt, all Italy, excepting Tuscany, and the dominions assigned to Austria by the treaty of Campo Formio, was in the hands of the French; while Naples was governed by the ephemeral Parthenopean republic, and the city of the Popes by that which assumed the superb title of Roman. These authorities, however, were only nominal; the French generalsexercised the real authority in both countries. Suddenly, and as if by magic, this whole state of affairs was changed by the military talents of Suwarrow. The Austrians and Russians gained great successes in the north of Italy, and General Macdonald found himself obliged to evacuate Naples, and to concentrate the principal resistance of the French in Lombardy and Piedmont. Cardinal Ruffo, a soldier, churchman, and politician, put himself at the head of a numerous body of insurgents, and commenced war against such French troops as had been left in the south, and in the middle of Italy. This movement was actively supported by the British fleet. Lord Nelson recovered Naples; Rome surrendered to Commodore Trowbridge. Thus, the Parthenopean and Roman republics were extinguished for ever.[575]The royal family returned to Naples, and that fine city and country were once more a kingdom. Rome, the capital of the world, was occupied by Neapolitan troops, generally supposed the most indifferent of modern times.

Replaced in his richest territories by the allies, the King of Naples was bound by every tie to assist them in the campaign of 1800. He accordingly sent an army into the March of Ancona, under the command of Count Roger de Damas, who, with the assistance of insurrectionary forces[576]among the inhabitants, and a body of Austrians, was to clear Tuscany of the French. Undeterred by the battle of Marengo, the Count de Damas marched against the French general Miollis, who commanded in Tuscany, and sustained a defeat by him near Sienna. Retreat became now necessary, the more especially as the armistice which was entered into by general Melas deprived the Neapolitans of any assistance from the Austrians, and rendered their whole expedition utterly hopeless. They were not even included by name in the armistice, and were thus left exposed to the whole vengeance of the French. Damas retreated into the territories of the Church, which were still occupied by the Neapolitan forces. The consequence of these events was easily foreseen. The Neapolitan troops, so soon as the French could find leisure to look towards them, must be either destroyed entirely, or driven back upon Naples, and that city must be again forsaken by the royal family, happy if they were once more able to make their escape to Sicily, as on the former occasion.[577]

At this desperate crisis, the Queen of the two Sicilies took a resolution which seemed almost as desperate, and could only have been adopted by a woman of a bold and decisive character. She resolved, notwithstanding the severity of the season, to repair in person to the court of the Emperor Paul, and implore his intercessionwith the first consul, in behalf of her husband and his territories.

We have not hitherto mentioned, except cursorily, the powerful prince whose mediation she implored. The son and successor of the celebrated Catherine, far from possessing the prudence and political sagacity of his mother, seemed rather to display the heady passions and imperfect judgment of his unfortunate father. He was capricious in the choice of his objects, pursuing for the time, with uncommon and irregular zeal and pertinacity, projects which he afterwards discarded and abandoned, swelling trifles of dress or behaviour into matters of importance, and neglecting, on the other hand, what was of real consequence;—governed, in short, rather by imagination than by his reasoning qualities, and sometimes affording room to believe that he actually laboured under a partial aberration of mind. Such characters are often to be met with in private society, the restraints of which keep them within such limits, that they pass through life without attracting much notice, unless when creating a little mirth, or giving rise to some passing wonder. But an absolute prince, possessed of such a disposition, is like a giddy person placed on the verge of a precipice, which would try the soundest head, and must overpower a weak one.

The Emperor had first distinguished himself by an energetic defence of the rights of sovereigns, and a hatred of whatever belonged to or was connected with the French Revolution, from a political maxim to the shape of a coat or a hat. The brother of Louis XVI., and inheritor of his rights, found a refuge in the Russian dominions; and Paul, fond, as most princes are, of military glory, promised himself that of restoring the Bourbon dynasty by force of arms.

SUWARROW.

The train of victories acquired by Suwarrow was well calculated to foster these original partialities of the Emperor; and, accordingly, while success continued to wait on his banners, he loaded his general with marks of his regard, elevated him to the rank of a prince, and conferred on him the title of Italiansky, or Italicus.

The very first and only misfortune which befell Suwarrow, seems to have ruined him in the opinion of his capricious master. The defeat of Korsakow by Massena, near Zurich, had involved Suwarrow in great momentary danger as he advanced into Switzerland, reckoning on the support of that general, whose disaster left his right uncovered. Now, although Suwarrow saved his army on this occasion by a retreat, which required equal talent to that which achieved his numerous victories, yet the bare fact of his having received a check was sufficient to ruin him with his haughty sovereign. Paul was yet more offended with the conduct of the Austrians. The Archduke Charles having left Switzerland to descend into Germany, had given occasion and opportunity for Massena to cross the Limmat and surprise Korsakow; and this,notwithstanding every explanation and apology, rankled in the mind of the Czar.[578]He recalled his armies from the frontiers of Germany, and treated his veteran and victorious general with such marks of neglect and displeasure, that the old man's heart sunk under them.

In the meanwhile, Paul gathered up farther subjects of complaint against the Austrian government, and complained of their having neglected to provide for some Russian prisoners,[579]under a capitulation which they made in behalf of their own, at the surrender of Ancona to the French.

The Austrians could not afford to lose so powerful and efficient an ally in the day of their adversity. They endeavoured to explain, that the movement of the Archduke Charles was inevitably necessary, in consequence of an invasion of the Austrian territory—they laid the blame of the omission of the Russians in the capitulation upon the commandant Frœlich, and offered to place him under arrest. The Emperor of Austria even proposed, in despite of the natural pride which is proper to his distinguished house, to place Suwarrow at the head of the Austrian armies,—a proffer, which, if it had been accepted, might have given rise to an extraordinary struggle betwixt the experience, determination, and warlike skill of the veteran Scythian, and the formidable talents of Buonaparte, and which perhaps contained the only chance which Europe possessed at the time, of opposing to the latter a rival worthy of himself; for Suwarrow had never yet been conquered, and possessed an irresistible influence over the minds of his soldiers. These great generals, however, were not destined ever to decide the fate of the world by their meeting.

Suwarrow, a Russian in all his feelings, broke his heart, and died under the unmerited displeasure of his Emperor, whom he had served with so much fidelity.[580]If the memory of his unfortunate sovereign were to be judged of according to ordinary rules, his conduct towards his distinguished subject would have left on it an indelible stigma. As it is, the event must pass as another proof, that the Emperor Paul was not amenable, fromthe construction of his understanding and temperament, to the ordinary rules of censure.

Meanwhile, the proposals of Austria were in vain. The Czar was not to be brought back to his former sentiments. He was like a spoiled child, who, tired of his favourite toy, seems bent to break asunder and destroy what was lately the dearest object of his affection.

When such a character as Paul changes his opinion of his friends, he generally runs into the opposite extreme, and alters also his thoughts of his enemies. Like his father, and others whose imagination is indifferently regulated, the Czar had need of some one of whom to make his idol. The extravagant admiration which the Emperor Peter felt for Frederick of Prussia, could not well be entertained for any one now alive, unless it were the first consul of France; and on him, therefore, Paul was now disposed to turn his eyes with a mixture of wonder, and of a wish to imitate what he wondered at.[581]This extravagance of admiration is a passion natural to some minds, (never strong ones,) and may be compared to that tendency which others have to be in love all their lives, in defiance of advancing age and other obstacles.

When Paul was beginning to entertain this humour, the arrival of the Queen of Sicily at his court gave him a graceful and even dignified opportunity to approach towards a connexion with Napoleon Buonaparte. His pride, too, must have been gratified by seeing the daughter of the renowned Maria Theresa, the sister of the Emperor of Austria, at his court of St. Petersburgh, soliciting from the Czar of Russia the protection which her brother was totally unable to afford her; and a successful interference in her behalf would be a kind of insult to the misfortunes of that brother, against whom, as we have noticed, Paul nourished resentful feelings. He therefore resolved to open a communication with France, in behalf of the royal family of Naples. Lewinshoff, grand huntsman of Russia, was despatched to make the overtures of mediation. He was received with the utmost distinction at Paris, and Buonaparte made an instant and graceful concession to the request of the Emperor Paul. The first consul agreed to suspend his military operations against Naples, and to leave the royal family in possession of their sovereignty; reserving to himself, however, the right of dictating the terms under which he was to grant them such an amnesty.

NAPLES.

It was time that some effectual interposition should take place in defence of the King of Naples, who, though he had around him a nation individually brave and enthusiastic, was so ill-served, that his regular army was in the worst and most imperfect state of discipline. Murat, to whom Buonaparte had committed the task of executing his vengeance on Naples, had already crossed the Alps, and placed himself at the head of an army of ten thousand chosen men; a force then judged sufficient not only to drive the Neapolitan general Damas out of the Ecclesiastical States, but to pursue him as far as Naples, and occupy that beautiful capital of a prince, whose regular army consisted of more than thirty thousand soldiers, and whose irregular forces might have been increased to any number by the mountaineers of Calabria, who form excellent light troops, and by the numerous Lazzaroni of Naples, who had displayed their valour against Championet, upon the first invasion of the French. But the zeal of a nation avails little when the spirit of the government bears no proportion to it. The government of Naples dreaded the approach of Murat as that of the Angel of Death; and they received the news that Lewinshoff had joined the French general at Florence, as a condemned criminal might have heard the news of a reprieve. The Russian envoy was received with distinguished honours at Florence. Murat appeared at the theatre with Lewinshoff, where the Italians, who had so lately seen the Russian and French banners placed in bloody opposition to each other, now beheld them formally united in presence of these dignitaries; in sign, it was said, that the two nations were combined for the peace of the world, and general benefit of humanity.[582]Untimely augury! How often after that period did these standards meet in the bloodiest fields history ever recorded; and what a long and desperate struggle was yet in reserve ere the general peace so boldly predicted was at length restored!

The respect paid by the first consul to the wishes of Paul, saved for the present the royal family of Naples; but Murat, nevertheless, made them experience a full portion of the bitter cup which the vanquished are generally doomed to swallow. General Damas[583]was commanded in the haughtiest terms to evacuate the Roman States, and not to presume to claim any benefit from the armistice which had been extended to the Austrians. At the same time, while the Neapolitans were thus compelled hastily to evacuate the Roman territories, general surprise was exhibited, when, instead of marching to Rome, and re-establishing the authority of the Roman republic, Murat, according to the orders which he had received from the first consul, carefully respected the territory of the Church, and re-installed the officers of the Popein what had been long termed the patrimony of St Peter.[584]This unexpected turn of circumstances originated in high policy on the part of Buonaparte.[585]

We certainly do Napoleon no injustice in supposing, that personally he had little or no influential sense of religion. Some obscure yet rooted doctrines of fatality, seem, so far as we can judge, to have formed the extent of his metaphysical creed. We can scarce term him even a deist; and he was an absolute stranger to every modification of Christian belief and worship. But he saw and valued the use of a national religion as an engine of state policy. In Egypt, he was desirous of being thought an envoy of Heaven; and though uncircumcised, drinking wine and eating pork, still claimed to be accounted a follower of the law of the Prophet. He had pathetically expostulated with the Turks on their hostility towards him. The French, he said, had ceased to be followers of Jesus; and now that they were almost, if not altogether, Moslemah, would the true believers make war on those who had overthrown the cross, dethroned the Pope, and extirpated the order of Malta, the sworn persecutors of the Moslem faith? On his return to France, all this was to be forgotten, or only remembered as a trick played upon the infidels. He was, as we have said, aware of the necessity of a national faith to support the civil government; and as, while in Egypt, he affected to have destroyed the Catholic religion in honour of that of Mahomed, so, returned to Europe, he was now desirous to become the restorer of the temporal territories of the Pope, in order to obtain such a settlement of church affairs in France, as might procure for his own government the countenance of the Sovereign Pontiff, and for himself an admission into the pale of Christian princes. This restitution was in some measure consistent with his policy in 1798, when he had spared the temporalities of the Holy See. Totally indifferent as Napoleon was to religion in his personal capacity, his whole conduct shows his sense of its importance to the existence of a settled and peaceful state of society.

Besides evacuating the Ecclesiastical States, the Neapolitans were compelled by Murat to restore various paintings, statues, and other objects of art, which they had, in imitation of Buonaparte, taken forcibly from the Romans,—so captivating is the influence of bad example. A French army of about eighteen thousand men was to be quartered in Calabria, less for the purpose of enforcing the conditions of peace, than to save France the expense of supporting the troops, and to have them stationed where they might be embarked for Egypt at the shortest notice.The harbours of the Neapolitan dominions were of course to be closed against the English. A cession of part of the isle of Elba, and the relinquishment of all pretensions upon Tuscany, summed up the sacrifices of the King of Naples, who, considering how often he had braved Napoleon, had great reason to thank the Emperor of Russia for his effectual mediation in his favour.[586]

ROME—PEACE WITH PORTUGAL.

These various measures respecting foreign relations, the treaty of Luneville, the acquisition of the good-will of the Emperor Paul, the restoration of Rome to the Pope's authority, and the mildness of the penalty inflicted on the King of Naples, seemed all to spring from a sound and moderate system, the object of which was rather the consolidation of Napoleon's government, than any wish to extend its influence or its conquests. His plans, in after times, often exhibited a mixture of the greatest good sense and prudence, with rash and splenetic explosions of an over-eager ambition, or a temper irritated by opposition; but it is to be remembered that Buonaparte was not yet so firm in the authority which he had but just acquired, as to encourage any display of the infirmities of his mind and temper.

His behaviour towards Portugal was, however, of a character deviating from the moderation he had in general displayed. Portugal, the ancient and faithful ally of England, was on that account the especial object of the first consul's displeasure. He, therefore, demanded of the King of Spain, who, since the peace between the countries, had been the submissive vassal of France, to declare war on the Prince Regent of Portugal, although the husband of his daughter. War accordingly was declared, in obedience to the mandate of the first consul, and the Spanish armies, together with an auxiliary army of French under Leclerc, entered Portugal, took Olivenza and Almeida, and compelled the prince regent, 6th of June, 1801, to sign a treaty, engaging to shut his ports against the English, and surrendering to Spain, Olivenza, and other places on the frontier of the Guadiana. Buonaparte was highly discontented with this treaty, to which he would not accede; and he refused, at the same time, to withdraw from Spain the army of Leclerc. On the 29th September, he condescended to grant Portugal peace under some additional terms,[587]which were not in themselves of much consequence, although the overbearing and peremptory conduct which he exhibited towards the Peninsular powers, was a sign of the dictatorial spirit which he was prepared to assume in the affairs of Europe.

The same disposition was manifested in the mode by which Buonaparte was pleased to show his sense of the King of Spain's complaisance. He chose for that purpose to create a kingdom and a king—a king, too, of the house of Bourbon. An infant of Spain obtained the throne of Tuscany, under the name of Etruria,rent from the house of Austria.[588]Madame de Staël terms this the commencement of the great masquerade of Europe; but it was more properly the second act. The stage, during the first, was occupied by a quadrille of republics, who were now to be replaced by an anti-mask of kings. This display of power pleased the national vanity, and an uproar of applause ensued, while the audience at the theatre applied to Buonaparte the well-known line—

"J'ai fait des rois, madame, et n'ai pas voulu l'être."

"J'ai fait des rois, madame, et n'ai pas voulu l'être."

While all the continent appeared thus willing to submit to one so ready to avail himself of their subjection, Britain alone remained at war; without allies, without, it might seem, a direct object; yet on the grand and unalterable principle, that no partial distress should induce her to submit to the system of degradation, which seemed preparing for all nations under the yoke of France, and which had placed France herself, with all her affected zeal for liberty, under the government of an arbitrary ruler. On every point the English squadrons annihilated the commerce of France, crippled her revenues, blockaded her ports, and prevented those combinations which would have crowned the total conquest of Europe, could the master, as he might now be called, of the land, have enjoyed, at the same time, the facilities which can only be afforded in communication by sea.

It was in vain that Buonaparte, who, besides his natural hardiness of perseverance, connected a part of his own glory with the preservation of Egypt, endeavoured by various means to send supplies to that distant province. His convoys were driven back into harbour by the English fleets; and he directed against his admirals, who could not achieve impossibilities, the unavailing resentment natural to one who was so little accustomed to disappointment.

The chance of relieving Egypt was rendered yet more precarious by the loss of Malta, which, after a distressing blockade of two years, was obliged to submit to the English arms on the 5th of September, 1800. The English were thus in possession of a strong, and almost impregnable citadel, in the midst of the Mediterranean, with an excellent harbour, and every thing required for a naval station of the first importance; above all, they had obtained the very spot which Buonaparte had fixed upon for maintaining the communication with Egypt, which was now in greater danger than ever.

The capture of Malta was, however, by its consequences, favourable to Napoleon's views in one important respect. The Emperor Paul imagined he had rights upon that island, in consequence of his having declared himself Grand Master of the Order of Saint John; and although, by his deserting the coalition, andabandoning the common cause, he had lost all right to expect that Great Britain should surrender to him an important acquisition made by her own arms, yet, with his usual intemperate indulgence of passion, he conceived himself deeply injured by its being withheld,[589]and nourished from that time an implacable resentment against England and her government, the effects of which are afterwards to be traced.

CHAPTER XXI.Internal Government of France—General Attachment to the Chief Consul—Plot to remove him by Assassination—Defeated—Vain hopes of the Royalists, that Napoleon would restore the Bourbons—Infernal Machine—It fails—Suspicion first falls on the Republicans—The actual Conspirators executed—Use made by Buonaparte of the Conspiracy to consolidate Despotism—System of Police—Fouché—His Skill, Influence, and Power—Apprehension entertained by the Chief Consul of the effects of Literature—Persecution of Madame de Staël—The Concordat—Plan for a general System of Jurisprudence—Amnesty granted to the Emigrants—Plans of Public Education—Hopes of a General Peace.INTERNAL GOVERNMENT OF FRANCE.We return to the internal government of France under the chief consul.The events subsequent to the revolution of the 18th Brumaire, seemed to work a miraculous change on the French nation. The superior talents of Napoleon, with the policy exercised by Talleyrand and Fouché, and the other statesmen of ability whom he had called into administration, and who desired at all events to put an end to further revolutionary movements—but, above all, the victory of Marengo, had at once created and attached to the person of the chief consul an immense party, which might be said to comprehend all those, who, being neither decided Royalists nor determined Republicans, were indifferent about the form of the government, so they found ease and protection while living under it.[590]But, on the other hand, the heads of the two factions continued to exist; and, as the power of the first consul became at once more absolute and more consolidated, it grew doubly hateful and formidable to them. His political existence was a total obstruction to the systems of both parties, and yet one which it was impossible to remove. There was no national council left, in which the authority of the first consul could be disputed, or his measures impeached. The strength of his military power bid defiance alike to popular commotions, if the Democrats had yet possessed the means of exerting them, and to the scattered bands of the Royalist insurgents. What chance remained for ridding themselves of the autocrat, in whom the Republicans saw a dictator, the Royalists an usurper? None, save that, being mortal, Napoleon was subject to be taken off by assassination.PLOT TO ASSASSINATE THE FIRST CONSUL.The Democrats were naturally the first to meditate an enterprise of this nature. The right of taking off a tyrant was, according to their creed, as proper to any private citizen as to those who opposed him armed in the field. The act of Harmodius and Aristogiton—the noble deed of Brutus and his associates—were consecrated in history, and esteemed so congenial to the nature of a free constitution, that the Convention, on the motion of Jean de Brie,[591]had at one time determined to raise a legion of assassins, armed with poniards, who should devote themselves to the pious task of exterminating all foreign princes, statesmen, and ministers—in short, all who were accounted the foes of freedom, without pity or distinction. In a party entertaining such principles, there could be no scruple on the score of morality; and where they had been so lately professed by thousands, it seemed natural that, amid the multitude, they must have made a deep impression on some enthusiastic and gloomy disposition, which might be easily provoked to act upon them.Oct. 10.It is no wonder, therefore, that some obscure Jacobins should have early nourished the purpose of assassinating Napoleon, as the enemy of his country's freedom, and the destroyer of her liberties; but it is singular, that most of the conspirators against his person were Italians. Arena, brother of the deputy[592]who was said to have aimed a dagger at Buonaparte in the Council of Five Hundred, was at the head of the conspiracy. He was a Corsican.[593]With him, Ceracchi[594]and Diana, two Italian refugees; a painter called Topino-Lebrun;[595]and two or three enthusiasts of low condition, formed a plot for the purpose of assassinating the chief consul at the Opera-house. Their intention was detected by the police; Ceracchi and Diana were arrested in the lobby,[596]armed, it was said, and prepared for the attempt, and Napoleon was congratulated by most of the constituted authorities upon having escaped a great danger.[597]Crassous, president of the Tribunate, made a singular speech on the occasion, which would almost bear a double interpretation. "There had been so many conspiracies," he said, "at so many different periods, and under so many different pretexts, which had never been followed up either by inquiry or punishment, that a great number of good citizens had become sceptical on the subject of their existence. This incredulity was dangerous," he argued; "it was time it should be ended." With this view, Monsieur Crassous recommended, that the persons guilty on the present occasion should be prosecuted and punished with all the solemnity and rigour of the laws.Buonaparte replied, with military indifference, that he had been in no real danger. "The contemptible wretches," he said, in something like a renewal of his Egyptian vein, "had no power to commit the crime they meditated. Besides the assistance of the whole audience, I had with me a piquet of my brave guard, from whom the wretches could not have borne a look."[598]So ended this singular discourse; and it is remarkable that neither were the circumstances of the plot made public, nor the conspirators punished, till the more memorable attempt on Napoleon's life by the Royalists.THE ROYALISTS.The Royalists, as a party, had far more interest with Buonaparte than the Democrats. The former approved of the principlesand form of his government,—it was only necessary for their conversion, that they should learn to endure his person; whereas the Jacobins being equally averse to the office to which he aspired, to his power, and to himself, there were no hopes of their being brought to tolerate either the monarch or the man. Of the latter, therefore, Napoleon entertained equal dislike and distrust; while, from obvious causes, his feelings towards the former were in some measure friendly.The Royalists, too, for some time entertained a good opinion of Buonaparte, and conceived that he intended, in his own time and in his own way, to act in behalf of the exiled royal family. The enthusiastic of the party were at a loss to conceive that the throne of France should be again erected, and that any one but a Bourbon should dare to ascend it. It seemed to them impossible that the monarchy should revive without the restoration of the legitimate monarch, and they could not believe that a Corsican soldier of fortune would meditate an usurpation, or that France would be for a moment tolerant of his pretensions. The word liberty had, indeed, misled the people of France for a time, but, that illusion being dissipated, their natural love to the royal race would return like a reviving spring, and again run in its old channel.So general was the belief among this class, that Buonaparte meditated the restoration of the Bourbons, that several agents of the family made their way so far as to sound his own mind upon the subject. Louis himself, afterwards XVIII., addressed to the first consul a letter of the following tenor:—"You cannot achieve the happiness of France without my restoration, any more than I can ascend the throne which is my right, without your co-operation. Hasten then to complete the good work, which none but you can accomplish, and name the rewards which you claim for your friends."[599]Buonaparte answered the letter with cold civility. He esteemed the person, he said, and pitied the misfortunes, of his Royal Highness the Comte de Provence, and should be glad to assist him, did an opportunity permit. But as his royal highness could not be restored to France, save at the expense of an hundred thousand lives, it was an enterprise in which he, Buonaparte, must decline to aid him.[600]A less direct, and more artful course, is said to have been attempted, by the mission of the Duchesse de Guiche, one of the most beautiful and pleasing women of the time, who, obtaining permission to come to Paris under pretext of her private affairs, was introduced at the Tuileries, and delighted Josephine with the elegance of her manners.[601]Napoleon did not escape the fascinationbut the instant she touched on the subject of politics, the interesting duchesse received an order to quit Paris.As soon as the Royalists discovered, by the failure of these and similar applications, as well as by the gradual tendency of Buonaparte's measures, that the restoration of the Bourbons was the thing farthest from his purpose, their disappointment exasperated them against the audacious individual, whose single person seemed now the only obstacle to that event. Monarchical power was restored, in spirit at least, if not in form; was it to be endured, the more zealous followers of the Bourbons demanded of each other, that it should become the prize of a military usurper? This party, as well as that of the Jacobins, contained doubtless many adherents, whom the enthusiasm of their political principles disposed to serve their cause, even at the expense of great crimes. The sentiments of the princes of the royal family upon such a subject, were becoming their high ranks.[602]They were resolved to combat Buonaparte's pretensions with open force, such as befitted their pretensions as head of the chivalry of France, but to leave to Jacobins the schemes of private assassination. Still there must have been many, among those characters which are found during the miseries and crimes of civil war, who conceived that the assassination of the chief consul would be received as good service when accomplished, although it might not be authorised beforehand. Nay, there may have been partisans zealous enough to take the crime and punishment on themselves, without looking farther than the advantage which their party would receive by the action.THE INFERNAL MACHINE.A horrible invention, first hatched, it is said, by the Jacobins,[603]was adopted by certain Royalists of a low description, remarkable as actors in the wars of the Chouans, of whom the leaders were named Carbon and St. Regent. It was a machine consisting of a barrel of gunpowder, placed on a cart to which it was strongly secured, and charged with grape-shot so disposed around the barrel, as to be dispersed in every direction by the explosion. The fire was to be communicated by a slow match. It was the purpose of the conspirators, undeterred by the indiscriminate slaughter which such a discharge must occasion, to place the machine in the street through which the first consul was to go to the opera, having contrived that it should explode, exactly as his carriage should pass the spot; and, strange to say, this stratagem, which seemed as uncertain as it was atrocious, was within a hair's-breadth of success.On the evening of the 24th December, 1800, Buonaparte has informed us, that though he himself felt a strong desire to remain at home, his wife and one or two intimate friends insisted that he should go to the opera. He was slumbering under a canopy when they awaked him. One brought his hat, another his sword. He was in a manner forced into his carriage, where he again slumbered and was dreaming of the danger which he had escaped in an attempt to pass the river Tagliamento some years before. On a sudden he awaked amidst thunder and flame.[604]The cart bearing the engine, which was placed in the street St. Nicaise, intercepted the progress of the chief consul's coach, which passed it with some difficulty. St. Regent had fired the match at the appointed instant; but the coachman, who chanced to be somewhat intoxicated, driving unusually fast, the carriage had passed the machine two seconds before the explosion took place; and that almost imperceptible fraction of time was enough to save the life which was aimed at. The explosion was terrible. Two or three houses were greatly damaged—twenty persons killed, and about fifty-three wounded; among the latter was the incendiary St. Regent. The report was heard several leagues from Paris. Buonaparte instantly exclaimed to Lannes and Bessières, who were in the carriage, "We are blown up!" The attendants would have stopped the coach, but with more presence of mind he commanded them to drive on, and arrived in safety at the opera;[605]his coachman during the whole time never discovering what had happened, but conceiving the consul had only received a salute of artillery.[606]A public officer, escaped from such a peril, became an object of yet deeper interest than formerly to the citizens in general; and the reception of the consul at the opera, and elsewhere, wasmore enthusiastic than ever. Relief was ostentatiously distributed amongst the wounded, and the relatives of the slain; and every one, shocked with the wild atrocity of such a reckless plot, became, while they execrated the perpetrators, attached in proportion to the object of their cruelty. A disappointed conspiracy always adds strength to the government against which it is directed; and Buonaparte did not fail to push this advantage to the uttermost.Notwithstanding that the infernal machine (for so it was not unappropriately termed) had in fact been managed by the hands of Royalists, the first suspicion fell on the Republicans; and Buonaparte took the opportunity, before the public were undeceived on the subject, of dealing that party a blow, from the effects of which they did not recover during his reign. An arbitrary decree of the Senate was asked and readily obtained for the transportation beyond seas of nearly one hundred and thirty of the chiefs of the broken faction of the Jacobins, among whom were several names which belonged to the celebrated Reign of Terror, and had figured in the rolls of the National Convention. These men were so generally hated, as connected with the atrocious scenes during the reign of Robespierre, that the unpopularity of their characters excused the irregularity of the proceedings against them, and their fate was viewed with complacency by many, and with indifference by all. In the end, the first consul became so persuaded of the political insignificance of these relics of Jacobinism, (who, in fact, were as harmless as the fragments of a bombshell after its explosion,) that the decree of deportation was never enforced against them; and Felix Lepelletier, Chaudieu, Talot, and their companions, were allowed to live obscurely in France, watched closely by the police, and under the condition that they should not venture to approach Paris.[607]The actual conspirators were proceeded against with severity. Chevalier and Veycer, Jacobins, said to have constructed the original model of the infernal machine, were tried before a military commission, condemned to be shot, and suffered death accordingly.Arena, Ceracchi, Topino-Lebrun, and Demerville, were tried before the ordinary court of criminal judicature, and condemned by the voice of a jury; although there was little evidence against them, save that of their accomplice Harel, by whom they had been betrayed. They also were executed.At a later period, Carbon and St. Regent, Royalists, the agents in the actual attempt of 24th December, were also tried, condemned, and put to death. Some persons tried for the same offence were acquitted; and justice seems to have been distributed with an impartiality unusual in France since the Revolution.But Buonaparte did not design that the consequences of these plots should end with the deaths of the wretches engaged in them. It afforded an opportunity not to be neglected to advance his principal object, which was the erection of France into a despotic kingdom, and the possessing himself of uncontrolled power over the lives, properties, thoughts, and opinions, of those who were born his fellow-subjects, and of whom the very meanest but lately boasted himself his equal. He has himself expressed his purpose respecting the Constitution of the year Eight, or Consular Government, in words dictated to General Gourgaud:—"The ideas of Napoleon were fixed; but the aid of time and events were necessary for their realization. The organization of the Consulate had presented nothing in contradiction to them; it taught unanimity, and that was the first step. This point gained, Napoleon was quite indifferent as to the form and denominations of the several constituted bodies. He was a stranger to the Revolution. It was natural that the will of these men, who had followed it through all its phases, should prevail in questions as difficult as they were abstract. The wisest plan was to go on from day to day—by the polar star by which Napoleon meant to guide the Revolution to the haven he desired."[608]If there is any thing obscure in this passage, it received but too luminous a commentary from the course of Buonaparte's actions; all of which tend to show that he embraced the Consular government as a mere temporary arrangement, calculated to prepare the minds of the French nation for his ulterior views of ambition, as young colts are ridden with a light bridle until they are taught by degrees to endure the curb and bit, or as water-fowl taken in a decoy are first introduced within a wider circuit of nets, in order to their being gradually brought within that strict enclosure where they are made absolute prisoners. He tells us in plain terms, he let the revolutionary sages take their own way in arranging the constitution; determined, without regarding the rules they laid down on the chart, to steer his course by one fixed point to one desired haven. That polar star was his own selfish interest—that haven was despotic power. What he considered as most for his own interest, he was determined to consider as the government most suited for France also. Perhaps he may have persuaded himself that he was actually serving his country as well as himself; and, indeed, justly considered, he was in both instances equally grievously mistaken.SPECIAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNAL.With the views which he entertained, the chief consul regarded the conspiracies against his life as affording a pretext for extending his power too favourable to be neglected. These repeated attacks on the Head of the state made it desirable that some mode should be introduced of trying such offences, briefer and more arbitrary than the slow forms required by ordinary jurisprudence.The prompt and speedy justice to be expected from a tribunal freed from the ordinary restraint of formalities and justice, was stated to be more necessary on account of the state of the public roads, infested by bands called Chauffeurs, who stopped the public carriages, intercepted the communications of commerce, and became so formidable, that no public coach was permitted to leave Paris without a military guard of at least four soldiers on the roof. This was used as a strong additional reason for constituting a special court of judicature.Buonaparte could be at no loss for models of such an institution. As hero of the Revolution, he had succeeded to the whole arsenal of revolutionary weapons forged in the name of Liberty, to oppress the dearest rights of humanity. He had but to select that which best suited him, and to mould it to the temper of the times. The country which had so long endured the Revolutionary Tribunal, was not likely to wince under any less stern judicature.The court which Government now proposed to establish, was to consist of eight members thus qualified. 1. The president and two judges of the ordinary criminal tribunal. 2. Three military men, bearing at least the rank of a captain. 3. Two citizens, to be suggested by Government, who should be selected from such as were by the constitution qualified to act as judges. Thus five out of eight judges were directly named by the Government for the occasion. The court was to decide without jury, without appeal, and without revision of any kind. As a boon to the accused, the court were to have at least six members present, and there was to be no casting vote; so that the party would have his acquittal, unless six members out of eight, or four members out of six, should unite in finding him guilty; whereas in other courts, a bare majority is sufficient for condemnation.With this poor boon to public opinion, the special Commission Court was to be the jurisdiction before whom armed insurgents, conspirators, and in general men guilty of crimes against the social compact, were to undergo their trial.The counsellor of state, Portalis, laid this plan before the Legislative Body, by whom it was, according to constitutional form, referred to the consideration of the Tribunate. It was in this body, the only existing branch of the constitution where was preserved some shadow of popular forms and of free debate, that those who continued to entertain free sentiments could have any opportunity of expressing them. Benjamin Constant, Daunon, Chenier, and others, the gleanings as it were of the liberal party, made an honourable but unavailing defence against this invasion of the constitution, studying at the same time to express their opposition in language and by arguments least likely to give offence to the Government. To the honour of the Tribunate, which was the frail but sole remaining barrier of liberty, the project had nearly made shipwreck, and was only passed by a small majority of forty-nine over forty-one. In the Legislative Body there wasalso a strong minority.[609]It seemed as if the friends of liberty, however deprived of direct popular representation, and of all the means of influencing public opinion, were yet determined to maintain an opposition to the first consul, somewhat on the plan of that of England.Another law, passed at this time, must have had a cooling effect on the zeal of some of these patriots. It was announced that there were a set of persons, who were to be regarded rather as public enemies than as criminals, and who ought to be provided against rather by anticipating and defeating their schemes than by punishing their offences. These consisted of Republicans, Royalists, or any others entertaining, or supposed to entertain, opinions inimical to the present state of affairs; and the law now passed entitled the government to treat them as suspected persons, and as such, to banish them from Paris or from France. Thus was the chief consul invested with full power over the personal liberty of every person whom he chose to consider as the enemy of his government.Buonaparte was enabled to avail himself to the uttermost of the powers which he had thus extracted from the constitutional bodies, by the frightful agency of the police. This institution may, even in its mildest form, be regarded as a necessary evil; for although, while great cities continue to afford obscure retreats for vice and crime of every description, there must be men, whose profession it is to discover and bring criminals to justice, as while there are vermin in the animal world, there must be kites and carrion-crows to diminish their number; yet, as the excellence of these guardians of the public depends in a great measure on their familiarity with the arts, haunts, and practices of culprits, they cannot be expected to feel the same horror for crimes, or criminals, which is common to other men. On the contrary, they have a sympathy with them of the same kind which hunters entertain for the game which is the object of their pursuit. Besides, as much of their business is carried on by the medium of spies, they must be able to personate the manners and opinions of those whom they detect; and are frequently induced, by their own interest, to direct, encourage, nay suggest crimes, that they may obtain the reward due for conviction of the offenders.Applied to state offences, the agency of such persons, though sometimes unavoidable, is yet more frightfully dangerous. Moral delinquencies can be hardly with any probability attributed to worthy or innocent persons; but there is no character so pure, that he who bears it may not be supposed capable of entertaining false and exaggerated opinions in politics, and, as such, become the victim of treachery and delation. In France, a prey to so many factions, the power of the police had become overwhelming; indeed, the very existence of the government seemed in some measure dependent upon the accuracy of their intelligence;and for this purpose their numbers had been enlarged, and their discipline perfected, under the administration of the sagacious and crafty Fouché. This remarkable person had been an outrageous Jacobin, and dipped deep in the horrors of the revolutionary government[610]—an adherent of Barras, and a partaker in the venality and peculation which characterised that period. He was, therefore, totally without principle; but his nature was not of that last degree of depravity, which delights in evil for its own sake, and his good sense told him, that an unnecessary crime was a political blunder. The lenity with which he exercised his terrible office, when left in any degree to his own discretion, while it never prevented his implicit execution of Buonaparte's commands, made the abominable system over which he presided to a certain extent endurable; and thus even his good qualities, while they relieved individual suffering, were of disservice to his country, by reconciling her to bondage.THE HAUTE POLICE.Thehaute police, as it is called by the French, meaning that department which applies to politics and state affairs, had been unaccountably neglected by the ministers of Louis XVI., and was much disorganized by the consequences of the Revolution. The demagogues of the Convention had little need of a regular system of the kind. Every affiliated club of Jacobins supplied them with spies, and with instruments of their pleasure. The Directory stood in a different situation. They had no general party of their own, and maintained their authority, by balancing the Moderates and Democrats against each other. They, therefore, were more dependent upon the police than their predecessors, and they intrusted Fouché with the superintendence. It was then that, destroying, or rather superseding, the separate offices where the agents of the police pretended to a certain independence of acting, he brought the whole system to concentrate within his own cabinet. By combining the reports of his agents, and of the various individuals with whom under various pretexts he maintained correspondence, the minister of police arrived at so accurate a knowledge of the purpose, disposition, adherents, and tools of the different parties in France, that he could anticipate their mode of acting upon all occasions that were likely to occur, knew what measures were likely to be proposed, and by whom they were to be supported; and when any particular accident took place, was able, from his previous general information, to assign it to the real cause, and the true actors.An unlimited system of espial, and that stretching through society in all its ramifications, was necessary to the perfection of this system, which had not arrived to its utmost height, till Napoleon ascended the throne. Still, before his reign, it existed all through France, controlling the most confidential expressions of opinion on public affairs, and, like some mephitic vapour, stifling the breath though it was invisible to the eye, and, by its mysteriousterrors, putting a stop to all discussion of public measures, which was not in the tone of implicit approbation.The expense of maintaining this establishment was immense; for Fouché comprehended amongst his spies and informers, persons whom no ordinary gratuity would have moved to act such a part. But this expense was provided for by the large sums which the minister of police received for the toleration yielded to brothels, gambling-houses, and other places of profligacy, to whom he granted licenses, in consideration of their observing certain regulations. His system of espial was also extended, by the information which was collected in these haunts of debauchery; and thus the vices of the capital were made to support the means by which it was subjected to a despotic government. His autobiography contains a boast, that the private secretary of the chief consul was his pensioner,[611]and that the lavish profusion of Josephine made even her willing to exchange intelligence concerning the chief consul's views and plans.[612]Thus was Fouché not only a spy upon the people in behalf of Buonaparte, but a spy also on Buonaparte himself.Indeed, the power of the director of this terrible enginery was so great, as to excite the suspicion of Napoleon, who endeavoured to counterbalance it by dividing the department of police into four distinct offices. There were established, 1st, The military police of the palace, over which Duroc, the grand master of the household, presided. 2d, The police maintained by the inspector of the gendarmes. 3d, That exercised over the city of Paris by the prefect. 4th, The general police, which still remained under the control of Fouché. Thus, the first consul received every day four reports of police, and esteemed himself secure of learning, through some one of them, information which the others might have an interest in concealing.[613]The agents of these different bodies were frequently unknown to each other; and it often happened, that when, in the exercise of their office, they were about to arrest some individual who had incurred suspicion, they found him protected against them, by his connexion with other bureaux of police. The system was, therefore, as complicated as it was oppressive and unjust; but we shall have such frequent opportunity to refer to the subject, that we need here only repeat, that, with reference to his real interest, it was unfortunate for Buonaparte that he found at his disposal so ready a weapon of despotism as the organized police, wielded by a hand so experienced as that of Fouché.THE POLICE.It was the duty of the police to watch the progress of public opinion, whether it was expressed in general society, and confidential communication, or by the medium of the press. Buonaparte entertained a feverish apprehension of the effects of literature on the general mind, and in doing so acknowledged the weak points in his government. The public journals were under the daily and constant superintendence of the police, and their editors were summoned before Fouché when any thing was inserted which could be considered as disrespectful to his authority. Threats and promises were liberally employed on such occasions, and such journalists as proved refractory, were soon made to feel that the former were no vain menaces. The suppression of the offensive newspaper was often accompanied by the banishment or imprisonment of the editor. The same measure was dealt to authors, booksellers, and publishers, respecting whom the jealousy of Buonaparte amounted to a species of disease.[614]No one can be surprised that an absolute government should be disposed to usurp the total management of the daily press, and such other branches of literature as are immediately connected with politics; but the interference of Buonaparte's police went much farther, and frequently required from those authors who wrote only on general topics, some express recognisance of his authority. The ancient Christians would not attend the theatre, because it was necessary that, previous to enjoying the beauties of the scene, they should sacrifice some grains of incense to the false deity, supposed to preside over the place. In like manner, men of generous minds in France were often obliged to suppress works on subjects the most alien to politics, because they could not easily obtain a road to the public unless they consented to recognise the right of the individual who had usurped the supreme authority, and extinguished the liberties of his country. The circumstances which subjected Madame de Staël to a long persecution by the police of Buonaparte, may be quoted as originating in this busy desire, of connecting his government with the publications of all persons of genius.We have been already led to notice, that there existed no cordiality betwixt Buonaparte and the gifted daughter of Necker. Their characters were far from suited to each other. She had manifestly regarded the first consul as a subject of close and curious observation, and Buonaparte loved not that any one should make him the subject of minute scrutiny. Madame de Staël was the centre also of a distinguished circle of society in France, several of whom were engaged to support the cause ofliberty; and the resolution of a few members of the Tribunate, to make some efforts to check the advance of Buonaparte to arbitrary power, was supposed to be taken in her saloon, and under her encouragement. For this she was only banished from Paris.[615]But when she was about to publish her excellent and spirited book on German manners and literature, in which, unhappily, there was no mention of the French nation, or its supreme chief, Madame de Staël's work was seized by the police, and she was favoured with a line from Savary, acquainting her that the air of France did not suit her health, and inviting her to leave it with all convenient speed.[616]While in exile from Paris, which she accounted her country, the worthy Prefect of Geneva suggested a mode by which she might regain favour. An ode on the birth of the King of Rome was recommended as the means of conciliation. Madame de Staël answered, she should limit herself to wishing him a good nurse; and became exposed to new rigours, even extending to the friends who ventured to visit her in her exile. So general was the French influence all over Europe, that to shelter herself from the persecutions by which she was everywhere followed, she was at length obliged to escape to England, by the remote way of Russia. Chenier, author of the Hymn of the Marseillois, though formerly the panegyrist of General Buonaparte, became, with other literary persons who did not bend low enough to his new dignity, objects of persecution to the first consul. The childish pertinacity with which Napoleon followed up such unreasonable piques, belongs indeed, chiefly, to the history of the Emperor, but it showed its blossoms earlier. The power of indulging such petty passions, goes, in a great measure, to foster and encourage their progress; and in the case of Buonaparte, this power, great in itself, was increased by the dangerous facilities which the police offered, for gratifying the spleen, or the revenge, of the offended sovereign.THE CONCORDAT.Another support of a very different kind, and grounded on the most opposite principles, was afforded to the rising power of Napoleon, through the re-establishment of religion in France, by his treaty with the Pope, called the Concordat. Two great steps had been taken towards this important point, by the edict opening the churches, and renewing the exercise of the Christian religion, and by the restoration of the Pope to his temporal dominionsafter the battle of Marengo. The further objects to be attained were the sanction of the first consul's government by the Pontiff on the one hand, and, on the other, the re-establishment of the rights of the Church in France, so far as should be found consistent with the new order of things.This important treaty was managed by Joseph Buonaparte, who, with three colleagues, held conferences for that purpose with the plenipotentiaries of the Pope. The ratifications were exchanged on the 18th of September 1801; and when they were published, it was singular to behold how submissively the once proud See of Rome lay prostrated before the power of Buonaparte, and how absolutely he must have dictated all the terms of the treaty. Every article innovated on some of those rights and claims, which the Church of Rome had for ages asserted as the unalienable privileges of her infallible head.I. It was provided, that the Catholic religion should be freely exercised in France, acknowledged as the national faith, and its service openly practised, subject to such regulations of police as the French Government should judge necessary. II. The Pope, in concert with the French Government, was to make a new division of dioceses, and to require of the existing bishops even the resignation of their sees, should that be found necessary to complete the new arrangement. III. The sees which should become vacant by such resignation, or by deprivation, in case a voluntary abdication was refused, as also all future vacancies, were to be filled up by the Pope, on nominations proceeding from the French Government. IV. The new bishops were to take an oath of fidelity to the Government, and to observe a ritual, in which there were to be especial forms of prayer for the consuls. V. The church-livings were to undergo a new division, and the bishops were to nominate to them, but only such persons as should be approved by the Government. VI. The Government was to make suitable provision for the national clergy, while the Pope expressly renounced all right competent to him and his successors, to challenge or dispute the sales of church property which had been made since the Revolution.[617]Such was the celebrated compact, by which Pius VII. surrendered to a soldier, whose name was five or six years before unheard of in Europe, those high claims to supremacy in spiritual affairs, which his predecessors had maintained for so many ages against the whole potentates of Europe. A puritan might have said of the power seated on the Seven Hills—"Babylon is fallen,—it is fallen that great city!" The more rigid Catholics were of the same opinion. The Concordat, they alleged, showed rather the abasement of the Roman hierarchy than the re-erection of the Gallic Church.The proceedings against the existing bishops of France, mostof whom were of course emigrants, were also but little edifying. Acting upon the article of the Concordat already noticed, and caused, as the letter[618]itself states, "by the exigencies of the times, which exercises its violence even on us," the Pope required of each of these reverend persons, by an especial mandate, to accede to the compact, by surrendering his see, as therein provided. The order was peremptory in its terms, and an answer was demanded within fifteen days. The purpose of this haste was to prevent consultation or combination, and to place before each bishop, individually, the choice of compliance, thereby gaining a right to be provided for in the new hierarchy; or of refusal, in which case the Pope would be obliged to declare the see vacant, in conformity to his engagement with Buonaparte.The bishops in general declined compliance with a request, which, on the part of the Pope, was evidently made by compulsion. They offered to lay their resignation at his Holiness's feet, so soon as they should be assured that there was regular canonical provision made for filling up their sees; but they declined, by any voluntary act of theirs, to give countenance to the surrender of the rights of the Church implied in the Concordat, and preferred exile and poverty to any provision which they might obtain, by consenting to compromise the privileges of the hierarchy. These proceedings greatly increased the unpopularity of the Concordat among the more zealous Catholics.Others of that faith there were, who, though they considered the new system as very imperfect, yet thought it might have the effect of preserving in France some sense of the Christian religion, which, under the total disuse of public worship, stood a chance of being entirely extinguished in the minds of the rising generation. They remembered, that though the Jews in the days of Esdras shed tears of natural sorrow when they beheld the inferiority of the second Temple, yet Providence had sanctioned its erection, under the warrant, and by permission, of an unbelieving task-master. They granted, that the countenance shown by Buonaparte to the religious establishment, was entirely from motives of self-interest; but still they hoped that God, who works his own will by the selfish passions of individuals, was now using those of the first consul to recall some sense of religion to France; and they anticipated that religion, as the best friend of all that is good and graceful in humanity, was likely, in course of time, to bring back and encourage a sense of rational liberty.The revolutionary part of France beheld the Concordat with very different eyes. The Christian religion was, as to the Jews and Greeks of old, a stumbling-block to the Jacobins, and foolishness to the philosophers. It was a system which they had attacked with a zeal even as eager as that which they had directed against monarchical institutions; and in the restoration of thealtar, they foresaw the re-erection of the throne. Buonaparte defended himself among the philosophers, by comparing his Concordat to a sort of vaccination of religion, which, by introducing a slighter kind into the system of the state, would gradually prepare for its entire extinction.[619]In the meantime, he proceeded to renew the ancient league betwixt the church and crown, with as much solemnity as possible. Portalis[620]was created minister of religion, a new office, for managing the affairs of the Church. He had deserved this preferment, by a learned and argumentative speech to the Legislative Body, in which he proved to the French statesmen, (what in other countries is seldom considered as matter of doubt,) that the exercise of religion is congenial to human nature, and worthy of being cherished and protected by the state. The Concordat was inaugurated at Notre Dame, [April 1802,] with the utmost magnificence. Buonaparte attended in person, with all the badges and pomp of royalty, and in the style resembling as nearly as possible that of the former Kings of France. The Archbishop of Aix was appointed to preach upon the occasion, being the very individual prelate who had delivered the sermon upon the coronation of Louis XVI. Some address, it was said, was employed to procure the attendance of the old republican generals. They were invited by Berthier to breakfast, and thence carried to the first consul's levee; after which it became impossible for them to decline attending him to the church of Notre Dame.[621]As he returned from the ceremony, surrounded by these military functionaries, Buonaparte remarked with complacency, that the former order of things was fast returning. One of his generals boldly answered,—"Yes!—all returns—excepting the two millions of Frenchmen, who have died to procure the proscription of the very system now in the act of being restored."[622]It is said that Buonaparte, when he found the Pope and the clergy less tractable than he desired, regretted having taken thestep of re-establishing religion, and termed the Concordat the greatest error of his reign. But such observations could only escape him in a moment of pique or provocation. He well knew the advantage which a government must derive from a national church, which recognises them in its ritual; and at Saint Helena, he himself at once acknowledged the advantage of his compact with the Pope as a measure of state, and his indifference to it in a religious point of view. "I never regretted the Concordat," he said. "I must have had either that or some thing equivalent. Had the Pope never before existed, he should have been made for the occasion."[623]The first consul took care, accordingly, to make his full advantage of the Concordat, by introducing his own name as much as possible into the catechism of the Church, which, in other respects, was that drawn up by Bossuet. To honour Napoleon, the catechumen was taught, was the same as to honour and serve God himself—to oppose his will, was to incur the penalty of eternal damnation.[624]In civil affairs, Buonaparte equally exerted his talents, in connecting the safety and interests of the nation with his own aggrandisement. He had already laughed at the idea of a free constitution. "The only free constitution necessary," he said, "or useful, was a good civil code;" not considering, or choosing to have it considered, that the best system of laws, when held by no better guarantee than the pleasure of an arbitrary prince and his council of state, is as insecure as the situation of a pearl suspended by a single hair. Let us do justice to Napoleon, however, by acknowledging, that he encountered with manly firmness the gigantic labour of forming a code of institutions, which, supplying the immense variety of provincial laws that existed in the different departments of France, and suppressing the partial and temporary regulations made in the various political crises of the Revolution, were designed to be the basis of a uniform national system. For this purpose, an order of the consuls convoked Messrs. Portalis, Tronchet,[625]Bigot de Préameneu,[626]and Maleville,[627]juris-consults of the highest character, and associated them with the Minister of Justice, Cambacérès, in the task of adjusting and reporting a plan for a general system of jurisprudence. The progress andtermination of this great work will be hereafter noticed. The chief consul himself took an active part in the deliberations.An ordinance, eminently well qualified to heal the civil wounds of France, next manifested the talents of Buonaparte, and, as men hoped, his moderation. This was the general amnesty granted to the emigrants. A decree of the Senate, 26th April, 1802, permitted the return of these unfortunate persons to France, providing they did so, and took the oath of fidelity to Government, within a certain period. There were, however, five classes of exceptions, containing such as seemed too deeply and strongly pledged to the house of Bourbon, ever to reconcile themselves to the government of Buonaparte. Such were, 1st, Those who had been chiefs of bodies of armed royalists;—2d, Who had held rank in the armies of the allies; 3d, Who had belonged to the household of the princes of the blood;—4th, Who had been agents or encouragers of foreign or domestic war;—5th, The generals and admirals, together with the representatives of the people, who had been guilty of treason against the Republic, together with the prelates, who declined to resign their sees in terms of the Concordat. It was at the same time declared, that not more than five hundred in all should be excepted from the amnesty. Buonaparte truly judged, that the mass of emigrants, thus winnowed and purified from all who had been leaders, exhausted in fortune and wearied out by exile, would in general be grateful for permission to return to France, and passive, nay, contented and attached subjects of his dominion; and the event in a great measure, if not fully, justified his expectations. Such part of their property as had not been sold, was directed to be restored to them;[628]but they were subjected to the special superintendence of the police for the space of ten years after their return.[629]PUBLIC EDUCATION.With similar and most laudable attention to the duties of his high office, Buonaparte founded plans of education,[630]and particularly, with Mongé's assistance, established the Polytechnic school, which has produced so many men of talent. He inquired anxiously into abuses, and was particularly active in correcting those which had crept into the prisons during the Revolution, where great tyranny was exercised by monopoly of provisions, and otherwise.[631]In amending such evils, Buonaparte, though not of kingly birth, showed a mind worthy of the rank to which he had ascended. It is only to be regretted, that in what interfered with his personal wishes or interest, he uniformly failed to manifest the sound and correct views, which on abstract questions he could form so clearly.Other schemes of a public character were held out as occupying the attention of the chief consul. Like Augustus, whose situation his own in some measure resembled, Napoleon endeavoured, by the magnificence of his projects for the improvement of the state, to withdraw attention from his inroads upon public freedom. The inland navigation of Languedoc was to be completed, and a canal, joining the river Yonne to the Saonne, was to connect the south part of the Republic so completely with the north, as to establish a communication by water between Marseilles and Amsterdam. Bridges were also to be built, roads to be laid out and improved, museums founded in the principal towns of France, and many other public labours undertaken, on a scale which should put to shame even the boasted days of Louis XIV. Buonaparte knew the French nation well, and was aware that he should best reconcile them to his government, by indulging his own genius for bold and magnificent undertakings, whether of a military or a civil character.But although these splendid proposals filled the public ear, and flattered the national pride of France, commerce continued to languish, under the effects of a constant blockade, provisions became dear, and discontent against the Consulate began to gain ground over the favourable sentiments which had hailed its commencement. The effectual cure for these heart-burnings was only to be found in a general peace; and a variety of circumstances, some of them of a character very unpleasing to the first consul, seemed gradually preparing for this desirable event.

Internal Government of France—General Attachment to the Chief Consul—Plot to remove him by Assassination—Defeated—Vain hopes of the Royalists, that Napoleon would restore the Bourbons—Infernal Machine—It fails—Suspicion first falls on the Republicans—The actual Conspirators executed—Use made by Buonaparte of the Conspiracy to consolidate Despotism—System of Police—Fouché—His Skill, Influence, and Power—Apprehension entertained by the Chief Consul of the effects of Literature—Persecution of Madame de Staël—The Concordat—Plan for a general System of Jurisprudence—Amnesty granted to the Emigrants—Plans of Public Education—Hopes of a General Peace.

Internal Government of France—General Attachment to the Chief Consul—Plot to remove him by Assassination—Defeated—Vain hopes of the Royalists, that Napoleon would restore the Bourbons—Infernal Machine—It fails—Suspicion first falls on the Republicans—The actual Conspirators executed—Use made by Buonaparte of the Conspiracy to consolidate Despotism—System of Police—Fouché—His Skill, Influence, and Power—Apprehension entertained by the Chief Consul of the effects of Literature—Persecution of Madame de Staël—The Concordat—Plan for a general System of Jurisprudence—Amnesty granted to the Emigrants—Plans of Public Education—Hopes of a General Peace.

INTERNAL GOVERNMENT OF FRANCE.

We return to the internal government of France under the chief consul.

The events subsequent to the revolution of the 18th Brumaire, seemed to work a miraculous change on the French nation. The superior talents of Napoleon, with the policy exercised by Talleyrand and Fouché, and the other statesmen of ability whom he had called into administration, and who desired at all events to put an end to further revolutionary movements—but, above all, the victory of Marengo, had at once created and attached to the person of the chief consul an immense party, which might be said to comprehend all those, who, being neither decided Royalists nor determined Republicans, were indifferent about the form of the government, so they found ease and protection while living under it.[590]

But, on the other hand, the heads of the two factions continued to exist; and, as the power of the first consul became at once more absolute and more consolidated, it grew doubly hateful and formidable to them. His political existence was a total obstruction to the systems of both parties, and yet one which it was impossible to remove. There was no national council left, in which the authority of the first consul could be disputed, or his measures impeached. The strength of his military power bid defiance alike to popular commotions, if the Democrats had yet possessed the means of exerting them, and to the scattered bands of the Royalist insurgents. What chance remained for ridding themselves of the autocrat, in whom the Republicans saw a dictator, the Royalists an usurper? None, save that, being mortal, Napoleon was subject to be taken off by assassination.

PLOT TO ASSASSINATE THE FIRST CONSUL.

The Democrats were naturally the first to meditate an enterprise of this nature. The right of taking off a tyrant was, according to their creed, as proper to any private citizen as to those who opposed him armed in the field. The act of Harmodius and Aristogiton—the noble deed of Brutus and his associates—were consecrated in history, and esteemed so congenial to the nature of a free constitution, that the Convention, on the motion of Jean de Brie,[591]had at one time determined to raise a legion of assassins, armed with poniards, who should devote themselves to the pious task of exterminating all foreign princes, statesmen, and ministers—in short, all who were accounted the foes of freedom, without pity or distinction. In a party entertaining such principles, there could be no scruple on the score of morality; and where they had been so lately professed by thousands, it seemed natural that, amid the multitude, they must have made a deep impression on some enthusiastic and gloomy disposition, which might be easily provoked to act upon them.

Oct. 10.

It is no wonder, therefore, that some obscure Jacobins should have early nourished the purpose of assassinating Napoleon, as the enemy of his country's freedom, and the destroyer of her liberties; but it is singular, that most of the conspirators against his person were Italians. Arena, brother of the deputy[592]who was said to have aimed a dagger at Buonaparte in the Council of Five Hundred, was at the head of the conspiracy. He was a Corsican.[593]With him, Ceracchi[594]and Diana, two Italian refugees; a painter called Topino-Lebrun;[595]and two or three enthusiasts of low condition, formed a plot for the purpose of assassinating the chief consul at the Opera-house. Their intention was detected by the police; Ceracchi and Diana were arrested in the lobby,[596]armed, it was said, and prepared for the attempt, and Napoleon was congratulated by most of the constituted authorities upon having escaped a great danger.[597]

Crassous, president of the Tribunate, made a singular speech on the occasion, which would almost bear a double interpretation. "There had been so many conspiracies," he said, "at so many different periods, and under so many different pretexts, which had never been followed up either by inquiry or punishment, that a great number of good citizens had become sceptical on the subject of their existence. This incredulity was dangerous," he argued; "it was time it should be ended." With this view, Monsieur Crassous recommended, that the persons guilty on the present occasion should be prosecuted and punished with all the solemnity and rigour of the laws.

Buonaparte replied, with military indifference, that he had been in no real danger. "The contemptible wretches," he said, in something like a renewal of his Egyptian vein, "had no power to commit the crime they meditated. Besides the assistance of the whole audience, I had with me a piquet of my brave guard, from whom the wretches could not have borne a look."[598]So ended this singular discourse; and it is remarkable that neither were the circumstances of the plot made public, nor the conspirators punished, till the more memorable attempt on Napoleon's life by the Royalists.

THE ROYALISTS.

The Royalists, as a party, had far more interest with Buonaparte than the Democrats. The former approved of the principlesand form of his government,—it was only necessary for their conversion, that they should learn to endure his person; whereas the Jacobins being equally averse to the office to which he aspired, to his power, and to himself, there were no hopes of their being brought to tolerate either the monarch or the man. Of the latter, therefore, Napoleon entertained equal dislike and distrust; while, from obvious causes, his feelings towards the former were in some measure friendly.

The Royalists, too, for some time entertained a good opinion of Buonaparte, and conceived that he intended, in his own time and in his own way, to act in behalf of the exiled royal family. The enthusiastic of the party were at a loss to conceive that the throne of France should be again erected, and that any one but a Bourbon should dare to ascend it. It seemed to them impossible that the monarchy should revive without the restoration of the legitimate monarch, and they could not believe that a Corsican soldier of fortune would meditate an usurpation, or that France would be for a moment tolerant of his pretensions. The word liberty had, indeed, misled the people of France for a time, but, that illusion being dissipated, their natural love to the royal race would return like a reviving spring, and again run in its old channel.

So general was the belief among this class, that Buonaparte meditated the restoration of the Bourbons, that several agents of the family made their way so far as to sound his own mind upon the subject. Louis himself, afterwards XVIII., addressed to the first consul a letter of the following tenor:—"You cannot achieve the happiness of France without my restoration, any more than I can ascend the throne which is my right, without your co-operation. Hasten then to complete the good work, which none but you can accomplish, and name the rewards which you claim for your friends."[599]

Buonaparte answered the letter with cold civility. He esteemed the person, he said, and pitied the misfortunes, of his Royal Highness the Comte de Provence, and should be glad to assist him, did an opportunity permit. But as his royal highness could not be restored to France, save at the expense of an hundred thousand lives, it was an enterprise in which he, Buonaparte, must decline to aid him.[600]

A less direct, and more artful course, is said to have been attempted, by the mission of the Duchesse de Guiche, one of the most beautiful and pleasing women of the time, who, obtaining permission to come to Paris under pretext of her private affairs, was introduced at the Tuileries, and delighted Josephine with the elegance of her manners.[601]Napoleon did not escape the fascinationbut the instant she touched on the subject of politics, the interesting duchesse received an order to quit Paris.

As soon as the Royalists discovered, by the failure of these and similar applications, as well as by the gradual tendency of Buonaparte's measures, that the restoration of the Bourbons was the thing farthest from his purpose, their disappointment exasperated them against the audacious individual, whose single person seemed now the only obstacle to that event. Monarchical power was restored, in spirit at least, if not in form; was it to be endured, the more zealous followers of the Bourbons demanded of each other, that it should become the prize of a military usurper? This party, as well as that of the Jacobins, contained doubtless many adherents, whom the enthusiasm of their political principles disposed to serve their cause, even at the expense of great crimes. The sentiments of the princes of the royal family upon such a subject, were becoming their high ranks.[602]They were resolved to combat Buonaparte's pretensions with open force, such as befitted their pretensions as head of the chivalry of France, but to leave to Jacobins the schemes of private assassination. Still there must have been many, among those characters which are found during the miseries and crimes of civil war, who conceived that the assassination of the chief consul would be received as good service when accomplished, although it might not be authorised beforehand. Nay, there may have been partisans zealous enough to take the crime and punishment on themselves, without looking farther than the advantage which their party would receive by the action.

THE INFERNAL MACHINE.

A horrible invention, first hatched, it is said, by the Jacobins,[603]was adopted by certain Royalists of a low description, remarkable as actors in the wars of the Chouans, of whom the leaders were named Carbon and St. Regent. It was a machine consisting of a barrel of gunpowder, placed on a cart to which it was strongly secured, and charged with grape-shot so disposed around the barrel, as to be dispersed in every direction by the explosion. The fire was to be communicated by a slow match. It was the purpose of the conspirators, undeterred by the indiscriminate slaughter which such a discharge must occasion, to place the machine in the street through which the first consul was to go to the opera, having contrived that it should explode, exactly as his carriage should pass the spot; and, strange to say, this stratagem, which seemed as uncertain as it was atrocious, was within a hair's-breadth of success.

On the evening of the 24th December, 1800, Buonaparte has informed us, that though he himself felt a strong desire to remain at home, his wife and one or two intimate friends insisted that he should go to the opera. He was slumbering under a canopy when they awaked him. One brought his hat, another his sword. He was in a manner forced into his carriage, where he again slumbered and was dreaming of the danger which he had escaped in an attempt to pass the river Tagliamento some years before. On a sudden he awaked amidst thunder and flame.[604]

The cart bearing the engine, which was placed in the street St. Nicaise, intercepted the progress of the chief consul's coach, which passed it with some difficulty. St. Regent had fired the match at the appointed instant; but the coachman, who chanced to be somewhat intoxicated, driving unusually fast, the carriage had passed the machine two seconds before the explosion took place; and that almost imperceptible fraction of time was enough to save the life which was aimed at. The explosion was terrible. Two or three houses were greatly damaged—twenty persons killed, and about fifty-three wounded; among the latter was the incendiary St. Regent. The report was heard several leagues from Paris. Buonaparte instantly exclaimed to Lannes and Bessières, who were in the carriage, "We are blown up!" The attendants would have stopped the coach, but with more presence of mind he commanded them to drive on, and arrived in safety at the opera;[605]his coachman during the whole time never discovering what had happened, but conceiving the consul had only received a salute of artillery.[606]

A public officer, escaped from such a peril, became an object of yet deeper interest than formerly to the citizens in general; and the reception of the consul at the opera, and elsewhere, wasmore enthusiastic than ever. Relief was ostentatiously distributed amongst the wounded, and the relatives of the slain; and every one, shocked with the wild atrocity of such a reckless plot, became, while they execrated the perpetrators, attached in proportion to the object of their cruelty. A disappointed conspiracy always adds strength to the government against which it is directed; and Buonaparte did not fail to push this advantage to the uttermost.

Notwithstanding that the infernal machine (for so it was not unappropriately termed) had in fact been managed by the hands of Royalists, the first suspicion fell on the Republicans; and Buonaparte took the opportunity, before the public were undeceived on the subject, of dealing that party a blow, from the effects of which they did not recover during his reign. An arbitrary decree of the Senate was asked and readily obtained for the transportation beyond seas of nearly one hundred and thirty of the chiefs of the broken faction of the Jacobins, among whom were several names which belonged to the celebrated Reign of Terror, and had figured in the rolls of the National Convention. These men were so generally hated, as connected with the atrocious scenes during the reign of Robespierre, that the unpopularity of their characters excused the irregularity of the proceedings against them, and their fate was viewed with complacency by many, and with indifference by all. In the end, the first consul became so persuaded of the political insignificance of these relics of Jacobinism, (who, in fact, were as harmless as the fragments of a bombshell after its explosion,) that the decree of deportation was never enforced against them; and Felix Lepelletier, Chaudieu, Talot, and their companions, were allowed to live obscurely in France, watched closely by the police, and under the condition that they should not venture to approach Paris.[607]

The actual conspirators were proceeded against with severity. Chevalier and Veycer, Jacobins, said to have constructed the original model of the infernal machine, were tried before a military commission, condemned to be shot, and suffered death accordingly.

Arena, Ceracchi, Topino-Lebrun, and Demerville, were tried before the ordinary court of criminal judicature, and condemned by the voice of a jury; although there was little evidence against them, save that of their accomplice Harel, by whom they had been betrayed. They also were executed.

At a later period, Carbon and St. Regent, Royalists, the agents in the actual attempt of 24th December, were also tried, condemned, and put to death. Some persons tried for the same offence were acquitted; and justice seems to have been distributed with an impartiality unusual in France since the Revolution.

But Buonaparte did not design that the consequences of these plots should end with the deaths of the wretches engaged in them. It afforded an opportunity not to be neglected to advance his principal object, which was the erection of France into a despotic kingdom, and the possessing himself of uncontrolled power over the lives, properties, thoughts, and opinions, of those who were born his fellow-subjects, and of whom the very meanest but lately boasted himself his equal. He has himself expressed his purpose respecting the Constitution of the year Eight, or Consular Government, in words dictated to General Gourgaud:—

"The ideas of Napoleon were fixed; but the aid of time and events were necessary for their realization. The organization of the Consulate had presented nothing in contradiction to them; it taught unanimity, and that was the first step. This point gained, Napoleon was quite indifferent as to the form and denominations of the several constituted bodies. He was a stranger to the Revolution. It was natural that the will of these men, who had followed it through all its phases, should prevail in questions as difficult as they were abstract. The wisest plan was to go on from day to day—by the polar star by which Napoleon meant to guide the Revolution to the haven he desired."[608]

If there is any thing obscure in this passage, it received but too luminous a commentary from the course of Buonaparte's actions; all of which tend to show that he embraced the Consular government as a mere temporary arrangement, calculated to prepare the minds of the French nation for his ulterior views of ambition, as young colts are ridden with a light bridle until they are taught by degrees to endure the curb and bit, or as water-fowl taken in a decoy are first introduced within a wider circuit of nets, in order to their being gradually brought within that strict enclosure where they are made absolute prisoners. He tells us in plain terms, he let the revolutionary sages take their own way in arranging the constitution; determined, without regarding the rules they laid down on the chart, to steer his course by one fixed point to one desired haven. That polar star was his own selfish interest—that haven was despotic power. What he considered as most for his own interest, he was determined to consider as the government most suited for France also. Perhaps he may have persuaded himself that he was actually serving his country as well as himself; and, indeed, justly considered, he was in both instances equally grievously mistaken.

SPECIAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNAL.

With the views which he entertained, the chief consul regarded the conspiracies against his life as affording a pretext for extending his power too favourable to be neglected. These repeated attacks on the Head of the state made it desirable that some mode should be introduced of trying such offences, briefer and more arbitrary than the slow forms required by ordinary jurisprudence.The prompt and speedy justice to be expected from a tribunal freed from the ordinary restraint of formalities and justice, was stated to be more necessary on account of the state of the public roads, infested by bands called Chauffeurs, who stopped the public carriages, intercepted the communications of commerce, and became so formidable, that no public coach was permitted to leave Paris without a military guard of at least four soldiers on the roof. This was used as a strong additional reason for constituting a special court of judicature.

Buonaparte could be at no loss for models of such an institution. As hero of the Revolution, he had succeeded to the whole arsenal of revolutionary weapons forged in the name of Liberty, to oppress the dearest rights of humanity. He had but to select that which best suited him, and to mould it to the temper of the times. The country which had so long endured the Revolutionary Tribunal, was not likely to wince under any less stern judicature.

The court which Government now proposed to establish, was to consist of eight members thus qualified. 1. The president and two judges of the ordinary criminal tribunal. 2. Three military men, bearing at least the rank of a captain. 3. Two citizens, to be suggested by Government, who should be selected from such as were by the constitution qualified to act as judges. Thus five out of eight judges were directly named by the Government for the occasion. The court was to decide without jury, without appeal, and without revision of any kind. As a boon to the accused, the court were to have at least six members present, and there was to be no casting vote; so that the party would have his acquittal, unless six members out of eight, or four members out of six, should unite in finding him guilty; whereas in other courts, a bare majority is sufficient for condemnation.

With this poor boon to public opinion, the special Commission Court was to be the jurisdiction before whom armed insurgents, conspirators, and in general men guilty of crimes against the social compact, were to undergo their trial.

The counsellor of state, Portalis, laid this plan before the Legislative Body, by whom it was, according to constitutional form, referred to the consideration of the Tribunate. It was in this body, the only existing branch of the constitution where was preserved some shadow of popular forms and of free debate, that those who continued to entertain free sentiments could have any opportunity of expressing them. Benjamin Constant, Daunon, Chenier, and others, the gleanings as it were of the liberal party, made an honourable but unavailing defence against this invasion of the constitution, studying at the same time to express their opposition in language and by arguments least likely to give offence to the Government. To the honour of the Tribunate, which was the frail but sole remaining barrier of liberty, the project had nearly made shipwreck, and was only passed by a small majority of forty-nine over forty-one. In the Legislative Body there wasalso a strong minority.[609]It seemed as if the friends of liberty, however deprived of direct popular representation, and of all the means of influencing public opinion, were yet determined to maintain an opposition to the first consul, somewhat on the plan of that of England.

Another law, passed at this time, must have had a cooling effect on the zeal of some of these patriots. It was announced that there were a set of persons, who were to be regarded rather as public enemies than as criminals, and who ought to be provided against rather by anticipating and defeating their schemes than by punishing their offences. These consisted of Republicans, Royalists, or any others entertaining, or supposed to entertain, opinions inimical to the present state of affairs; and the law now passed entitled the government to treat them as suspected persons, and as such, to banish them from Paris or from France. Thus was the chief consul invested with full power over the personal liberty of every person whom he chose to consider as the enemy of his government.

Buonaparte was enabled to avail himself to the uttermost of the powers which he had thus extracted from the constitutional bodies, by the frightful agency of the police. This institution may, even in its mildest form, be regarded as a necessary evil; for although, while great cities continue to afford obscure retreats for vice and crime of every description, there must be men, whose profession it is to discover and bring criminals to justice, as while there are vermin in the animal world, there must be kites and carrion-crows to diminish their number; yet, as the excellence of these guardians of the public depends in a great measure on their familiarity with the arts, haunts, and practices of culprits, they cannot be expected to feel the same horror for crimes, or criminals, which is common to other men. On the contrary, they have a sympathy with them of the same kind which hunters entertain for the game which is the object of their pursuit. Besides, as much of their business is carried on by the medium of spies, they must be able to personate the manners and opinions of those whom they detect; and are frequently induced, by their own interest, to direct, encourage, nay suggest crimes, that they may obtain the reward due for conviction of the offenders.

Applied to state offences, the agency of such persons, though sometimes unavoidable, is yet more frightfully dangerous. Moral delinquencies can be hardly with any probability attributed to worthy or innocent persons; but there is no character so pure, that he who bears it may not be supposed capable of entertaining false and exaggerated opinions in politics, and, as such, become the victim of treachery and delation. In France, a prey to so many factions, the power of the police had become overwhelming; indeed, the very existence of the government seemed in some measure dependent upon the accuracy of their intelligence;and for this purpose their numbers had been enlarged, and their discipline perfected, under the administration of the sagacious and crafty Fouché. This remarkable person had been an outrageous Jacobin, and dipped deep in the horrors of the revolutionary government[610]—an adherent of Barras, and a partaker in the venality and peculation which characterised that period. He was, therefore, totally without principle; but his nature was not of that last degree of depravity, which delights in evil for its own sake, and his good sense told him, that an unnecessary crime was a political blunder. The lenity with which he exercised his terrible office, when left in any degree to his own discretion, while it never prevented his implicit execution of Buonaparte's commands, made the abominable system over which he presided to a certain extent endurable; and thus even his good qualities, while they relieved individual suffering, were of disservice to his country, by reconciling her to bondage.

THE HAUTE POLICE.

Thehaute police, as it is called by the French, meaning that department which applies to politics and state affairs, had been unaccountably neglected by the ministers of Louis XVI., and was much disorganized by the consequences of the Revolution. The demagogues of the Convention had little need of a regular system of the kind. Every affiliated club of Jacobins supplied them with spies, and with instruments of their pleasure. The Directory stood in a different situation. They had no general party of their own, and maintained their authority, by balancing the Moderates and Democrats against each other. They, therefore, were more dependent upon the police than their predecessors, and they intrusted Fouché with the superintendence. It was then that, destroying, or rather superseding, the separate offices where the agents of the police pretended to a certain independence of acting, he brought the whole system to concentrate within his own cabinet. By combining the reports of his agents, and of the various individuals with whom under various pretexts he maintained correspondence, the minister of police arrived at so accurate a knowledge of the purpose, disposition, adherents, and tools of the different parties in France, that he could anticipate their mode of acting upon all occasions that were likely to occur, knew what measures were likely to be proposed, and by whom they were to be supported; and when any particular accident took place, was able, from his previous general information, to assign it to the real cause, and the true actors.

An unlimited system of espial, and that stretching through society in all its ramifications, was necessary to the perfection of this system, which had not arrived to its utmost height, till Napoleon ascended the throne. Still, before his reign, it existed all through France, controlling the most confidential expressions of opinion on public affairs, and, like some mephitic vapour, stifling the breath though it was invisible to the eye, and, by its mysteriousterrors, putting a stop to all discussion of public measures, which was not in the tone of implicit approbation.

The expense of maintaining this establishment was immense; for Fouché comprehended amongst his spies and informers, persons whom no ordinary gratuity would have moved to act such a part. But this expense was provided for by the large sums which the minister of police received for the toleration yielded to brothels, gambling-houses, and other places of profligacy, to whom he granted licenses, in consideration of their observing certain regulations. His system of espial was also extended, by the information which was collected in these haunts of debauchery; and thus the vices of the capital were made to support the means by which it was subjected to a despotic government. His autobiography contains a boast, that the private secretary of the chief consul was his pensioner,[611]and that the lavish profusion of Josephine made even her willing to exchange intelligence concerning the chief consul's views and plans.[612]Thus was Fouché not only a spy upon the people in behalf of Buonaparte, but a spy also on Buonaparte himself.

Indeed, the power of the director of this terrible enginery was so great, as to excite the suspicion of Napoleon, who endeavoured to counterbalance it by dividing the department of police into four distinct offices. There were established, 1st, The military police of the palace, over which Duroc, the grand master of the household, presided. 2d, The police maintained by the inspector of the gendarmes. 3d, That exercised over the city of Paris by the prefect. 4th, The general police, which still remained under the control of Fouché. Thus, the first consul received every day four reports of police, and esteemed himself secure of learning, through some one of them, information which the others might have an interest in concealing.[613]

The agents of these different bodies were frequently unknown to each other; and it often happened, that when, in the exercise of their office, they were about to arrest some individual who had incurred suspicion, they found him protected against them, by his connexion with other bureaux of police. The system was, therefore, as complicated as it was oppressive and unjust; but we shall have such frequent opportunity to refer to the subject, that we need here only repeat, that, with reference to his real interest, it was unfortunate for Buonaparte that he found at his disposal so ready a weapon of despotism as the organized police, wielded by a hand so experienced as that of Fouché.

THE POLICE.

It was the duty of the police to watch the progress of public opinion, whether it was expressed in general society, and confidential communication, or by the medium of the press. Buonaparte entertained a feverish apprehension of the effects of literature on the general mind, and in doing so acknowledged the weak points in his government. The public journals were under the daily and constant superintendence of the police, and their editors were summoned before Fouché when any thing was inserted which could be considered as disrespectful to his authority. Threats and promises were liberally employed on such occasions, and such journalists as proved refractory, were soon made to feel that the former were no vain menaces. The suppression of the offensive newspaper was often accompanied by the banishment or imprisonment of the editor. The same measure was dealt to authors, booksellers, and publishers, respecting whom the jealousy of Buonaparte amounted to a species of disease.[614]

No one can be surprised that an absolute government should be disposed to usurp the total management of the daily press, and such other branches of literature as are immediately connected with politics; but the interference of Buonaparte's police went much farther, and frequently required from those authors who wrote only on general topics, some express recognisance of his authority. The ancient Christians would not attend the theatre, because it was necessary that, previous to enjoying the beauties of the scene, they should sacrifice some grains of incense to the false deity, supposed to preside over the place. In like manner, men of generous minds in France were often obliged to suppress works on subjects the most alien to politics, because they could not easily obtain a road to the public unless they consented to recognise the right of the individual who had usurped the supreme authority, and extinguished the liberties of his country. The circumstances which subjected Madame de Staël to a long persecution by the police of Buonaparte, may be quoted as originating in this busy desire, of connecting his government with the publications of all persons of genius.

We have been already led to notice, that there existed no cordiality betwixt Buonaparte and the gifted daughter of Necker. Their characters were far from suited to each other. She had manifestly regarded the first consul as a subject of close and curious observation, and Buonaparte loved not that any one should make him the subject of minute scrutiny. Madame de Staël was the centre also of a distinguished circle of society in France, several of whom were engaged to support the cause ofliberty; and the resolution of a few members of the Tribunate, to make some efforts to check the advance of Buonaparte to arbitrary power, was supposed to be taken in her saloon, and under her encouragement. For this she was only banished from Paris.[615]But when she was about to publish her excellent and spirited book on German manners and literature, in which, unhappily, there was no mention of the French nation, or its supreme chief, Madame de Staël's work was seized by the police, and she was favoured with a line from Savary, acquainting her that the air of France did not suit her health, and inviting her to leave it with all convenient speed.[616]While in exile from Paris, which she accounted her country, the worthy Prefect of Geneva suggested a mode by which she might regain favour. An ode on the birth of the King of Rome was recommended as the means of conciliation. Madame de Staël answered, she should limit herself to wishing him a good nurse; and became exposed to new rigours, even extending to the friends who ventured to visit her in her exile. So general was the French influence all over Europe, that to shelter herself from the persecutions by which she was everywhere followed, she was at length obliged to escape to England, by the remote way of Russia. Chenier, author of the Hymn of the Marseillois, though formerly the panegyrist of General Buonaparte, became, with other literary persons who did not bend low enough to his new dignity, objects of persecution to the first consul. The childish pertinacity with which Napoleon followed up such unreasonable piques, belongs indeed, chiefly, to the history of the Emperor, but it showed its blossoms earlier. The power of indulging such petty passions, goes, in a great measure, to foster and encourage their progress; and in the case of Buonaparte, this power, great in itself, was increased by the dangerous facilities which the police offered, for gratifying the spleen, or the revenge, of the offended sovereign.

THE CONCORDAT.

Another support of a very different kind, and grounded on the most opposite principles, was afforded to the rising power of Napoleon, through the re-establishment of religion in France, by his treaty with the Pope, called the Concordat. Two great steps had been taken towards this important point, by the edict opening the churches, and renewing the exercise of the Christian religion, and by the restoration of the Pope to his temporal dominionsafter the battle of Marengo. The further objects to be attained were the sanction of the first consul's government by the Pontiff on the one hand, and, on the other, the re-establishment of the rights of the Church in France, so far as should be found consistent with the new order of things.

This important treaty was managed by Joseph Buonaparte, who, with three colleagues, held conferences for that purpose with the plenipotentiaries of the Pope. The ratifications were exchanged on the 18th of September 1801; and when they were published, it was singular to behold how submissively the once proud See of Rome lay prostrated before the power of Buonaparte, and how absolutely he must have dictated all the terms of the treaty. Every article innovated on some of those rights and claims, which the Church of Rome had for ages asserted as the unalienable privileges of her infallible head.

I. It was provided, that the Catholic religion should be freely exercised in France, acknowledged as the national faith, and its service openly practised, subject to such regulations of police as the French Government should judge necessary. II. The Pope, in concert with the French Government, was to make a new division of dioceses, and to require of the existing bishops even the resignation of their sees, should that be found necessary to complete the new arrangement. III. The sees which should become vacant by such resignation, or by deprivation, in case a voluntary abdication was refused, as also all future vacancies, were to be filled up by the Pope, on nominations proceeding from the French Government. IV. The new bishops were to take an oath of fidelity to the Government, and to observe a ritual, in which there were to be especial forms of prayer for the consuls. V. The church-livings were to undergo a new division, and the bishops were to nominate to them, but only such persons as should be approved by the Government. VI. The Government was to make suitable provision for the national clergy, while the Pope expressly renounced all right competent to him and his successors, to challenge or dispute the sales of church property which had been made since the Revolution.[617]

Such was the celebrated compact, by which Pius VII. surrendered to a soldier, whose name was five or six years before unheard of in Europe, those high claims to supremacy in spiritual affairs, which his predecessors had maintained for so many ages against the whole potentates of Europe. A puritan might have said of the power seated on the Seven Hills—"Babylon is fallen,—it is fallen that great city!" The more rigid Catholics were of the same opinion. The Concordat, they alleged, showed rather the abasement of the Roman hierarchy than the re-erection of the Gallic Church.

The proceedings against the existing bishops of France, mostof whom were of course emigrants, were also but little edifying. Acting upon the article of the Concordat already noticed, and caused, as the letter[618]itself states, "by the exigencies of the times, which exercises its violence even on us," the Pope required of each of these reverend persons, by an especial mandate, to accede to the compact, by surrendering his see, as therein provided. The order was peremptory in its terms, and an answer was demanded within fifteen days. The purpose of this haste was to prevent consultation or combination, and to place before each bishop, individually, the choice of compliance, thereby gaining a right to be provided for in the new hierarchy; or of refusal, in which case the Pope would be obliged to declare the see vacant, in conformity to his engagement with Buonaparte.

The bishops in general declined compliance with a request, which, on the part of the Pope, was evidently made by compulsion. They offered to lay their resignation at his Holiness's feet, so soon as they should be assured that there was regular canonical provision made for filling up their sees; but they declined, by any voluntary act of theirs, to give countenance to the surrender of the rights of the Church implied in the Concordat, and preferred exile and poverty to any provision which they might obtain, by consenting to compromise the privileges of the hierarchy. These proceedings greatly increased the unpopularity of the Concordat among the more zealous Catholics.

Others of that faith there were, who, though they considered the new system as very imperfect, yet thought it might have the effect of preserving in France some sense of the Christian religion, which, under the total disuse of public worship, stood a chance of being entirely extinguished in the minds of the rising generation. They remembered, that though the Jews in the days of Esdras shed tears of natural sorrow when they beheld the inferiority of the second Temple, yet Providence had sanctioned its erection, under the warrant, and by permission, of an unbelieving task-master. They granted, that the countenance shown by Buonaparte to the religious establishment, was entirely from motives of self-interest; but still they hoped that God, who works his own will by the selfish passions of individuals, was now using those of the first consul to recall some sense of religion to France; and they anticipated that religion, as the best friend of all that is good and graceful in humanity, was likely, in course of time, to bring back and encourage a sense of rational liberty.

The revolutionary part of France beheld the Concordat with very different eyes. The Christian religion was, as to the Jews and Greeks of old, a stumbling-block to the Jacobins, and foolishness to the philosophers. It was a system which they had attacked with a zeal even as eager as that which they had directed against monarchical institutions; and in the restoration of thealtar, they foresaw the re-erection of the throne. Buonaparte defended himself among the philosophers, by comparing his Concordat to a sort of vaccination of religion, which, by introducing a slighter kind into the system of the state, would gradually prepare for its entire extinction.[619]

In the meantime, he proceeded to renew the ancient league betwixt the church and crown, with as much solemnity as possible. Portalis[620]was created minister of religion, a new office, for managing the affairs of the Church. He had deserved this preferment, by a learned and argumentative speech to the Legislative Body, in which he proved to the French statesmen, (what in other countries is seldom considered as matter of doubt,) that the exercise of religion is congenial to human nature, and worthy of being cherished and protected by the state. The Concordat was inaugurated at Notre Dame, [April 1802,] with the utmost magnificence. Buonaparte attended in person, with all the badges and pomp of royalty, and in the style resembling as nearly as possible that of the former Kings of France. The Archbishop of Aix was appointed to preach upon the occasion, being the very individual prelate who had delivered the sermon upon the coronation of Louis XVI. Some address, it was said, was employed to procure the attendance of the old republican generals. They were invited by Berthier to breakfast, and thence carried to the first consul's levee; after which it became impossible for them to decline attending him to the church of Notre Dame.[621]As he returned from the ceremony, surrounded by these military functionaries, Buonaparte remarked with complacency, that the former order of things was fast returning. One of his generals boldly answered,—"Yes!—all returns—excepting the two millions of Frenchmen, who have died to procure the proscription of the very system now in the act of being restored."[622]

It is said that Buonaparte, when he found the Pope and the clergy less tractable than he desired, regretted having taken thestep of re-establishing religion, and termed the Concordat the greatest error of his reign. But such observations could only escape him in a moment of pique or provocation. He well knew the advantage which a government must derive from a national church, which recognises them in its ritual; and at Saint Helena, he himself at once acknowledged the advantage of his compact with the Pope as a measure of state, and his indifference to it in a religious point of view. "I never regretted the Concordat," he said. "I must have had either that or some thing equivalent. Had the Pope never before existed, he should have been made for the occasion."[623]

The first consul took care, accordingly, to make his full advantage of the Concordat, by introducing his own name as much as possible into the catechism of the Church, which, in other respects, was that drawn up by Bossuet. To honour Napoleon, the catechumen was taught, was the same as to honour and serve God himself—to oppose his will, was to incur the penalty of eternal damnation.[624]

In civil affairs, Buonaparte equally exerted his talents, in connecting the safety and interests of the nation with his own aggrandisement. He had already laughed at the idea of a free constitution. "The only free constitution necessary," he said, "or useful, was a good civil code;" not considering, or choosing to have it considered, that the best system of laws, when held by no better guarantee than the pleasure of an arbitrary prince and his council of state, is as insecure as the situation of a pearl suspended by a single hair. Let us do justice to Napoleon, however, by acknowledging, that he encountered with manly firmness the gigantic labour of forming a code of institutions, which, supplying the immense variety of provincial laws that existed in the different departments of France, and suppressing the partial and temporary regulations made in the various political crises of the Revolution, were designed to be the basis of a uniform national system. For this purpose, an order of the consuls convoked Messrs. Portalis, Tronchet,[625]Bigot de Préameneu,[626]and Maleville,[627]juris-consults of the highest character, and associated them with the Minister of Justice, Cambacérès, in the task of adjusting and reporting a plan for a general system of jurisprudence. The progress andtermination of this great work will be hereafter noticed. The chief consul himself took an active part in the deliberations.

An ordinance, eminently well qualified to heal the civil wounds of France, next manifested the talents of Buonaparte, and, as men hoped, his moderation. This was the general amnesty granted to the emigrants. A decree of the Senate, 26th April, 1802, permitted the return of these unfortunate persons to France, providing they did so, and took the oath of fidelity to Government, within a certain period. There were, however, five classes of exceptions, containing such as seemed too deeply and strongly pledged to the house of Bourbon, ever to reconcile themselves to the government of Buonaparte. Such were, 1st, Those who had been chiefs of bodies of armed royalists;—2d, Who had held rank in the armies of the allies; 3d, Who had belonged to the household of the princes of the blood;—4th, Who had been agents or encouragers of foreign or domestic war;—5th, The generals and admirals, together with the representatives of the people, who had been guilty of treason against the Republic, together with the prelates, who declined to resign their sees in terms of the Concordat. It was at the same time declared, that not more than five hundred in all should be excepted from the amnesty. Buonaparte truly judged, that the mass of emigrants, thus winnowed and purified from all who had been leaders, exhausted in fortune and wearied out by exile, would in general be grateful for permission to return to France, and passive, nay, contented and attached subjects of his dominion; and the event in a great measure, if not fully, justified his expectations. Such part of their property as had not been sold, was directed to be restored to them;[628]but they were subjected to the special superintendence of the police for the space of ten years after their return.[629]

PUBLIC EDUCATION.

With similar and most laudable attention to the duties of his high office, Buonaparte founded plans of education,[630]and particularly, with Mongé's assistance, established the Polytechnic school, which has produced so many men of talent. He inquired anxiously into abuses, and was particularly active in correcting those which had crept into the prisons during the Revolution, where great tyranny was exercised by monopoly of provisions, and otherwise.[631]In amending such evils, Buonaparte, though not of kingly birth, showed a mind worthy of the rank to which he had ascended. It is only to be regretted, that in what interfered with his personal wishes or interest, he uniformly failed to manifest the sound and correct views, which on abstract questions he could form so clearly.

Other schemes of a public character were held out as occupying the attention of the chief consul. Like Augustus, whose situation his own in some measure resembled, Napoleon endeavoured, by the magnificence of his projects for the improvement of the state, to withdraw attention from his inroads upon public freedom. The inland navigation of Languedoc was to be completed, and a canal, joining the river Yonne to the Saonne, was to connect the south part of the Republic so completely with the north, as to establish a communication by water between Marseilles and Amsterdam. Bridges were also to be built, roads to be laid out and improved, museums founded in the principal towns of France, and many other public labours undertaken, on a scale which should put to shame even the boasted days of Louis XIV. Buonaparte knew the French nation well, and was aware that he should best reconcile them to his government, by indulging his own genius for bold and magnificent undertakings, whether of a military or a civil character.

But although these splendid proposals filled the public ear, and flattered the national pride of France, commerce continued to languish, under the effects of a constant blockade, provisions became dear, and discontent against the Consulate began to gain ground over the favourable sentiments which had hailed its commencement. The effectual cure for these heart-burnings was only to be found in a general peace; and a variety of circumstances, some of them of a character very unpleasing to the first consul, seemed gradually preparing for this desirable event.

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