Bonaparte's Position — The Absence of Enthusiasm — The Provisional Consulate — Measures of Security — The New Constitution — An Autocratic Executive — The Plebiscite — Bonaparte the First Consul — New Officials — Efforts to Appease the Church — The Feeling in France — Confidence Restored — Financial Stability.
When Bonaparte returned to Paris on the evening of the eighteenth of Brumaire he was the arbiter of French destiny; for the great powers of government, both executive and legislative, were in the hands of himself and his creatures. To the multitude it was not, perhaps, much of a feat to disperse by force a legislature which rested on force, and by means of the army to turn the tables on the very Jacobins who had themselves been ever ready to appeal to the army. Moreover, in their minds another constitution more or less was of small importance: the next one would doubtless be only a rearrangement of the old devices. TheRevolution was in the hands of its friends, and the world must go its way. Talleyrand and the royalists understood that the day's work had turned the oligarchy of the Directory into a powerful monarchy of some kind: a temporary one, they hoped, which would enable them eventually to bring back the Bourbons.
But Napoleon Bonaparte was, as ever, wise in his generation, and, as he understood himself, knew that though both these notions were illusory, he must proceed cautiously. As a gambler he had staked everything, and had won: he meant to pocket the stakes. But yet how narrowly had he won! The shouts of "traitor" and "outlaw" were still in his ears; no doubt the terrible alternative to his perilous escape was in his mind. Though determined to go on, he was nevertheless sobered. There was temporary exultation in the army and the people. He knew that among the latter it would soon die out, as it did. Already it was rumored that although Mme. Bonaparte had been in pecuniary straits, her husband had thirty millions on deposit in various banks. This was certainly untrue, because the general had recourse to the brokers of Paris for the funds needed to reward his abettors. The merciless extortion of the lenders engendered in him a bitterness against their class which he entertained to the latest day of his life. It was estimated that the day had cost him one and a half millions; every man under his command had received a new uniform, twelve francs in cash, and a drink of spirits; the rest was spent in rewarding his generals and political supporters. The constitutional and moderate republicans felt that their cause and the fate of the nation were in the balance. The royalists were the only faction which would have been glad to see Bonaparte usurp the power at once. He and his friends understood that a nation still infatuatedwith the Revolution in theory must be led by a parade of constitutional measures.
The mutilated chambers began work on the very night of their reassembling at St. Cloud. Lucien harangued them on the familiar theme of Roman liberties, recalling the commonwealth in which the consular fasces had been the symbol of freedom. The country would approve and its enemies would be disarmed if these insignia should again be displayed. Boulay de la Meurthe presented the temporary plan: a provisional consulate composed of Bonaparte, Sieyès, and Roger-Ducos; the adjournment of the legislature until February twentieth, 1800; the appointment of two committees of twenty-five, one from each council, to aid the consuls in the proposed renovation; the proscription of fifty-seven delegates who had made themselves obnoxious. To preserve the appearance of legality and historic continuity, the committee from the Five Hundred was to propose, that of the Ancients to adopt; the new constitution must uphold the one and indivisible republic, respect popular sovereignty, and secure representative government with the division of powers, while property, liberty, and equality must be guaranteed beyond a peradventure. After a formal declaration that the Directory had ceased to exist, each of these measures was duly adopted by both houses in turn, and the consuls were sworn in, promising unswerving fidelity to popular sovereignty, to the French republic one and indivisible, to liberty and equality, and to representative government. With a resolution that Bonaparte had that day deserved well of his country, the chambers adjourned at an early hour in the morning. When the sun rose over Paris and France, the land had found its despot; to all appearances he was to be a beneficent despot. The consuls met that very day in the Luxembourgpalace: the general's name came first in alphabetical order, and on the suggestion of Roger-Ducos he took the presidency and the executive for the twenty-four hours, the others to follow in turn. Their first work was the construction of a provisional ministry: three of the old members were without discussion retained: Cambacérès for justice, Bourdon for the navy, and Reinhard for foreign affairs. Dubois-Crancé was replaced by Berthier for war, Robert Lindet by Gaudin for finance, Quinette by Laplace for the interior. There was much debate concerning Fouché as minister of police, but on Bonaparte's urgent representations he was reappointed. It was rumored that the Jacobins intended to rally at Toulouse, and Lannes was ordered to take command in that city at once. To the public a simple and safe announcement was issued, promising better days for the republic.
The men and measures worked well. A treasury absolutely depleted was slowly replenished by the practice of simple honesty; a disintegrated military force was cautiously reassembled and brought into order, but the garrison of Paris was not enlarged above nine thousand men, and there was no show of force. The Bonaparte family moved into the Luxembourg, but its head appeared always in civilian garb. He was much abroad, visiting and conversing with men of science, letters, and finance. Thoroughly restored in balance of mind, he did and said kind things, joking about the scenes of St. Cloud, and explaining away the unhappy words he had uttered. His sayings were repeated far and near, and within a few days there were throngs of influential visitors in his parlors. It may well be believed that shrewd observers noted his appearance and manners, his hollow cheeks, pale face, stern brow; his insatiate, all-embracing curiosity, keen questionings, and tactful rejoinders,the irresistible magnetism of his vigor, his mind, and his youth. The family connections were not in evidence; Lucien especially was kept in the background. There were no oracular statements, no boastful professions, yet every one felt profoundly that the consuls were a force, an active force, saying little, toiling to exhaustion, and that results of importance would emerge in due time. Indeed the ameliorations of administration were in evidence from the very first.
The industry of Sieyès and Bonaparte was indeed unexampled. There was friction, but one was indispensable to the other; they must work together, and the supple Talleyrand was then to keep the peace. Sieyès's "perfect" constitution propounded a singularly cumbersome plan of government, but it contained much that was Bonaparte's own, and therefore suited to Bonaparte's purposes. It was accordingly taken as a starting-point. In the end, the document actually adopted and promulgated proved to be outwardly similar but inwardly antipodal to that of Sieyès. While skilfully blinding all classes to its possibilities as an instrument for controlling the nation by a central power, its provisions were perfectly adapted to conciliate every faction except that of the Jacobins, who were by flight or conversion to all intents annihilated. Sixty-two members of the Five Hundred were deposed. The rest, as a reward for their late complacency, were invited in the name of the public welfare to accept office as foreign ministers, or diplomatic agents, and, in some cases, as government representatives in the provinces; their position as delegates was not to be jeopardized by acceptance. The purpose of this was to remove the majority of the old republican politicians from Paris, under the guise of compensating them for past service. Sieyès's great fundamental notion was to secure the form ofpopular representation without its substance,—"confidence coming from below," as he expressed it, "power coming from above." In order to secure this he had devised a plan nearly identical with that laid down to Talleyrand by Bonaparte three years before. It was adopted for the new constitution. Every one of the five million citizens of France was to have a vote. From among them one in every ten was to be chosen by universal suffrage to be a candidate for local office; this formed the "communal list." These "notables of the communes" were then to choose one in ten of their number as a "notable of the department," a candidate for departmental office, thus constituting the "departmental list"; and these, in turn, one in every ten of their number as "notables of France," candidates for the national legislature and the higher offices of state, thus forming the "national list." From among these last the administration and the senate, by the exercise of the appointing power, were to select the great officers of state. This was Bonaparte's popular representation, "without eyes, ears, or power."
The legislative was also to be silent and powerless. It was divided into council, tribunate, legislature, and senate. The first, chosen at will by the executive, had the initiative; in the second three speakers might discuss the measures proposed, but no vote could be taken; in the third there was no discussion, but the members voted; the fourth was also mute, but it had the veto power. All except the senate were to sit with closed doors, and publicity was to be controlled by the administration. Sieyès had a plan whereby a chief magistrate, to be called the "great elector," should be chosen by the senators, since they also chose the representatives of the people from the elected candidates. This titled personage was to appoint all civil and military functionaries,together with two consuls to overlook the administration. Bonaparte contemptuously wondered how any man "of some talent and a little honor would consent to play the part of a hog to be fatted on so and so many millions." He called on Daunou for suggestions, but that ardent republican desired both a strong executive and a strong direct expression of the popular will. The new autocrat felt that the latter must be avoided at any cost, and proposed, through one of his creatures, an executive of three consuls, of whom the first should serve for ten years and be the head of the state. His should be the right to execute the laws, and his alone the appointing power. Since he was to nominate the members of the council of state, he should also have the power to initiate legislation. In case of need he might act by administrative process; that is, he might legalize any regulation whatsoever as an administrative necessity. He might rule by decree. This centralizing engine of despotism was made complete by a system of prefects modeled on that of the royal intendants, and intended to be the copestone of the structure. It was adopted, and still prevails in republican France. In every administrative division of town or country the local councils, under stringent regulations as to the scope of their deliberations and decisions, were intrusted to the charge of a prefect. This petty dictator was the sworn servant of the central power, appointed or removed by it at pleasure. Through these men the hand of the First Consul was on every hamlet, village, town, and city. In fact, even the mayors of the great towns were his appointees.
Napoleon Exposition, 1895NAPOLEON WORKING BY THE GLIMMER OF THE LAMPFrom sketch by Ingres, belonging to M. Germain Bapst.
Napoleon Exposition, 1895
NAPOLEON WORKING BY THE GLIMMER OF THE LAMPFrom sketch by Ingres, belonging to M. Germain Bapst.
This monstrous but marvelous charter, though nominally prepared by them, was offered for discussion neither to the two committees nor to the councils themselves. During the weeks spent in its elaboration, thenation was skilfully prepared for its reception. In the capital a proscription list drawn up by the wily Fouché, as police minister, was by a studied inadvertence put into reporters' hands. It contained a jumble of names, gentle and simple, criminal and innocent, friend and foe, and was absurd on its face. No one would assume the responsibility, though it was said to have emanated from the police prematurely and irregularly. The consuls, especially Bonaparte, displayed a most engaging activity in erasing one name after another, until nothing of importance remained. By the ordinary course of criminal procedure a few notorious characters were removed from the scene; the persons of importance who were menaced made grateful submission and joined the ranks of the trusty, notably Jourdan. As news came in from the departments it became clear that Jacobinism was everywhere discomfited and could be neglected. The scanty garrisons and the administrative functionaries were all with the new government, the people of the cities and towns were enthusiastic. The horrors and terrors of the passing régime had moderated for the time the frenzies of the royalist party. Indeed, moderation became the watchword. France, in the parlance of the hour, was to drink the waters of Lethe. The example was given in Paris and twenty-four choice men were sent one into each of the military departments to exhibit and emphasize the fact, to study and mold public opinion. They were mostly men of the older régime, who had heartily accepted the consular idea. They worked faithfully and successfully. None knew as yet the provisions of the new constitution, though all approved its provisions, whatever they were, because they must be better than those of the old. On December fifteenth, 1799, six weeks after the completion of the document, it was presented directly to the nationat large, under the proposal of a national or popular decree—a plebiscite. Those then living were amazed at the general apathy, only about three million votes having been cast. To us it appears as if the whole people were in a plague of Egyptian darkness. As each voter could but adhere to or dissent from the proposition for the adoption of the constitution as offered, the result was an overwhelming approval, the negative votes being only one thousand five hundred and sixty-seven in number.
On December twenty-second, before the result of the plebiscite was known, the new charter was put in operation. It is difficult to determine exactly the composition of the assembly which met at the Luxembourg palace to determine who should be the permanent consuls. According to an anecdote of the time, Sieyès opened its proceedings by explaining the dangers of a military despotism should the First Consul be a soldier. Bonaparte impressively whispered to his supporters that they should scatter themselves throughout the room, and that when they saw him take Sieyès's hand they should shout, "Bravo—Bonaparte!" Then, stepping forward at the close of Sieyès's address, he assumed an air of generous friendliness, and said, "Let us have no difference of opinion, my friend; for my part, I vote for the Abbé Sieyès. For whom do you vote?" Taken all aback, Sieyès murmured, "I vote for General Bonaparte." Instantly the latter put out his hand, and the speaker grasped it. "Bravo—Bonaparte!" rang from all sides, and Sieyès's supporters joined in the shout. Thus, apparently by general consent, the shrewd intriguer, as the story runs, was acclaimed First Consul. At all events, Bonaparte took the office to himself without a question on the part of the public. His two colleagues were to be chosen by the constitutional committee.They named Daunou as one, but Bonaparte threw the ballots into the fire. Sieyès obligingly presented two other names,—"the right men," as he assured the committee,—Cambacérès and Lebrun. The former was an eminent jurist, the latter the ablest financier of his time. Both were appointed, and both rendered excellent service to the Consulate. Sieyès had already been made "keeper" of the Directory's secret funds,—six hundred thousand francs,—which he called "une poire pour la soif." Soon afterward he accepted from the First Consul the great estate of Crôsne, and was then relegated to obscurity as chief of the senate. The other great officials were all appointed in much the same way. "The pike is eating the two other fish," said Mme. Permon to the First Consul's mother soon after.
The safeguard of so-called popular adhesion having been secured, the next step was to adopt and execute a comprehensive policy of conciliation. The royalist emigrants were encouraged to return, provided they would accept the new power and lend it the grace of their presence and manners. Amnesty was likewise proclaimed for the victims of Fructidor. Gaudin, who had been an experienced financier under the Bourbons, and had shown his mettle as provisional minister, was put permanently in charge of the treasury. The moderate and able Cambacérès became minister of justice, and Forfait undertook the navy. Carnot, whose castigation of the Directory in his widely read defense had done so much to undermine their prestige and hasten their fall, was recalled and made minister of war. Talleyrand was forgiven for his base desertion on the eve of the Egyptian expedition. As will be recalled, it had been arranged that as the fleet left Toulon for Alexandria he was to start for Constantinople in order to hoodwinkthe Sultan and prevent the very resistance which afterward proved so disastrous. But at the last moment he refused. In consequence of his scandalous attempt to extort a bribe from the American envoys he was forced to resign his office soon afterward, and he then sought retirement to await results. There never was greed more dishonest than his, a life more licentious, nor a deceit more subtle; but at the same time he was the most adroit diplomat of an age devoted to diplomacy as a political power, and more familiar with the intrigues of courts and the aspirations of European dynasties than were any of his contemporaries, unless possibly Metternich, who did not become prominent until later. He was therefore indispensable, and was reappointed minister of foreign affairs. The great Laplace had been provisionally appointed minister of the interior; but so marked was his unfitness for the post that he soon was transferred to the senate and made way for Lucien Bonaparte.
But all this was little compared with the contemplated reconciliation with the Church for which the way was now carefully prepared. Pius VI had died a prisoner on French soil, and had been buried without honor. Befitting memorial ceremonies having been performed, the priesthood were released from the ban which the Jacobins had laid upon them. No oath in support of the new charter was required from the many priests who could not accept the civil constitution of the clergy, enacted in 1790; they could minister to their adherents without fear of persecution; they at once returned from exile or emerged from their hiding-places in large numbers. In the rôle of philosopher the First Consul professed to see the necessity of the Church as the main prop of a strong social organism and good government. As a far-seeing schemer he clearly felt that militarypower was a stanch support, but that in the end a firm moral foundation would likewise be needed in the hearts of hundreds of thousands in Europe, who would bless the man that should restore to them the institution which was the visible sign of their hopes for eternity. This desirable affection and approbation Bonaparte meant from the outset to secure. Had the scoffer, the worshiper of science, the would-be Mohammedan prophet, himself experienced a change of heart? Perhaps. Responsibility often breaks down indifference.
This policy of tolerance was well understood to be an interim measure, to be succeeded by a permanent settlement satisfactory to all the faithful. Furthermore, the ban having been removed from the exiled royalists as well, a number of emigrants had likewise returned: these and their clergy soon conceived the idea that Bonaparte was preparing a restoration of the monarchy, and would consider propositions for reëstablishing the close alliance of church and state, the identity almost, which had been the one outstanding feature of French absolutism. For this reason the insurrectionary West made overtures to the First Consul, and emissaries were passed through the lines, admitted to an audience, and permitted to state their case. Bonaparte gave heed and attention. Andigné proved exacting and impossible, Hyde was smooth and uncertain; it was only later that in Bernier, a simple village priest, he found a man to his liking, shrewd and scheming, but reasonable and efficient. He soon became an important agent in resolving the knotty problem of restoring the West to French nationality. Hitherto the rebels of lower Normandy and Brittany had followed either the resident nobility, of whom Andigné and Frotté were types, or peasant reactionaries like Georges Cadoudal, bold, desperate, irreconcilable men who demanded eitherwar or their king. Bonaparte determined to ignore alike the high and the low, the desperate men with everything to gain and little to lose; he therefore appealed to the middle sort of gentle and simple through the intermediation of Hédouville for the government and Bernier for the people. The latter, accompanied by Count Bourmont, finally came to Paris, and both were won, Bourmont to the undoing of Napoleon, as it turned out. A method of pacification was arranged and soon put into successful operation, largely through the superlative adroitness of Bernier. Frotté was captured and executed, Cadoudal fled to England. The royalist agitation of the West was ended for a time: the efforts of the party in Provence, though carefully studied and widely exerted, proved ineffectual, and the internal reforms of administration were there, as throughout all France, efficiently put in operation. The policy of tolerance and moderation won over thousands upon thousands, and reduced the sullen minority to inactivity.
The upheaval of Brumaire is unique in French history. When consummated, there appeared among the people no remnant of fear or distrust. The radical side of the Revolution had ceased to exist. Its ideals of civil liberty were embodied in Bonaparte, the national spirit was invigorated, and hopes ran high. Such was the testimony of all the most disinterested observers. Brinkmann, a Swede of great ability, wrote on November eighteenth that no legitimate monarch had ever found on his accession a people more submissive than Bonaparte had found. "It is literally true," runs his letter: "France will perform the impossible to help him. Excepting the despicable horde of anarchists, the people are so weary, so disgusted with revolutionary horrors and follies, that they are sure any change will be for the better. Every class in society makes fun of theheroism of the demagogues, and from all sides comes a call for their expulsion rather than for the realization of their ideal visions. Even the royalists of every shade are honestly devoted to Bonaparte; for they attribute to him the intention of gradually restoring the old order. The indifferent are attached to him as being the man best fitted to give peace to France; and enlightened republicans, though trembling for their institutions, prefer to see a single man of talent, rather than a club of intriguers, seize and hold the public power."
None of Bonaparte's measures was more masterly than the financial policy whereby he won the devotion of the capitalists. If the country had been exhausted by the old régime, what had the recklessness of the Jacobins done for it? Bankruptcy, disorder, and utter distrust—chaos, in short—held sway in all departments of finance. The new order restored public confidence to such an extent that the revival of credit seemed miraculous. After the events of Brumaire the five per cents., which had fallen to one and a half per cent. of their par value, immediately rose to twelve per cent.; and on the final, satisfactory fulfilment of what the day appeared to foreshadow, they advanced to seventeen. The disgraceful laws for enforcing compulsory loans which had been passed under the Directory disappeared, with their companion the Hostage Law. Instantaneously order was brought into the system of direct taxation, and regularity into the collection of the taxes. The mysterious anti-Jacobin measures, promulgated as a warning, and then modified so as to paralyze and drive away the worthless spendthrifts of the Directory, while sobering and retaining for public use the able and sensible men like Jourdan, worked as a charm; they were a notification that the irregularities of all visionaries whatsoever were ended, and that wasteof capacity as well as of money was to be succeeded by wholesome economy. For measures of temporary relief the new constitution permanently substituted a financial system of far-sighted regulations which completely revived general confidence, and with it the public credit, thereby restoring the producing capacity of the country. The Bank of France, organized in January, 1800, fixed a norm for the rates of discount, gave a sound currency to the country, and was the visible sign of a new era.
End of the Revolution — The Alternatives — French Glory — Bonaparte as an Idealist — Reconstruction of the Army — Russia and the Great Powers — Slackness of the Coalition — The Policy of England — Debates in Parliament — Canning's Influence — Austrian Schemes — French Opinion and the Press — Consolidation of French Power — Bonaparte in the Tuileries — The Washington Festival.
No one understood better than Bonaparte the connection in a state between external and internal affairs. The second coalition, so far as Russia, Austria, England, and Turkey were concerned, was very loosely cemented indeed. They were united in their determination to subdue revolutionary France, but they had not an interest in common beyond that. Such was their jealousy as regarded the control of the Mediterranean that a strong government at Paris might hope to create discord among them. When, therefore, on December fifteenth, 1799, the provisional consulate came to an end, and the new constitution, known in French history as that of the twenty-second of Frimaire, year VIII, came into operation, the government enteredupon life, as was most essential for French interests, not as an empty scheme, but as a full-fledged organism, with every office filled, the machinery actually in motion, and the administration ready for intercourse with the other governments of Europe. The words of Bonaparte's proclamation were: "Citizens, the Revolution is planted on the principles from which it proceeded. It is ended." As regarded the internal life of France, no truer words could have been written. There had never been true liberty nor true brotherhood under its banners; the leveling had been more successful, and equality in the matter of civil rights might be considered as won. What was left of those principles, as the event proved, was embodied for France herself in the First Consul and in his beneficent measures. To Europe at large this embodiment of the Revolution in the new sovereign was soon made equally evident. France had adopted him. Would the surviving dynasties admit him, as the representative of French nationality, to a seat on their Olympus? Nothing but an imperative necessity would compel them to do so, and then only for the moment.
1799—1800
Two courses were therefore open to the new power: first, to extort an acquiescence, however distasteful, by consolidating France as the nation and the homogeneous people which the Revolution had made it, by increasing her prosperity, by fostering her genius, by showing an example to the world of what the people of a peaceful, enlightened, industrious state could be in contrast to the case-hardened, unreceptive, and sullen populations who still remained passive under dynastic rule; or, second, to restore the expansive anti-national character of the Revolution, and, using the magnificent military system created in that epoch as a destroying power, to menace the dynasties in their veryexistence, and thus make them first respectful neutrals and then subservient tools both in their own reconstruction and in the liberation of their subjects. These seemed, in this emergency, the two alternatives at the First Consul's command. Choosing neither permanently, but one or the other at will, as each rising question made it expedient, the result was an interference which brought first this and then that policy into prominence, made both partly successful, but neither entirely so, and ended in the ruin of the schemer.
The responsibility was not his own: he so behaved under the compulsion of the national spirit. The revolutionary tyrannies, one after the other, had adopted the foreign policies of Richelieu and Louis XIV. Nothing could be more definite, nothing more ingrained as the fiber of French existence. France itself must have the boundaries of ancient Gaul, and the Mediterranean must be a French lake. To this end the dynasties must be indemnified: Spain might have Portugal, Prussia the hegemony of North Germany, Austria might expand in Bavaria and Italy. For a bulwark of defence the land frontier must be girt with little buffer states, semi-autonomous but dependent: Batavia, Helvetia, Cisalpina. The still more important sea frontier must be fortified by the exclusion of Great Britain absolutely from the Continent; Italy was to be rearranged, with Piedmont and Tuscany occupied and subdued, the States of the Church distributed among the secular powers of which Roman and Neapolitan republics were to be the chief. It was a stupendous task, but ideals have no physical limits. Glory is the circumambient ether of the French spirit. Repose, order, material prosperity, domestic life, religion—these must be the preëstablished basis of existence, but life is triumph, splendor, power. It was not, therefore, as inheritorand incarnation of the Revolution, but as the embodiment of France and her immemorial policies, that Bonaparte became a student of foreign affairs. With the prospect of peace must be envisaged the prospect of war: war for the frontiers, the heritage of the Gauls; for propagating French thought and influence; for the invasion of irreconcilable lands. The voluminous and careful studies of foreign affairs which he caused to be made by able councilors still exist to show his painstaking zeal in the perpetuation of time-honored and sacred policies, which no man aspiring to capture the heart of the French dared neglect or permit to lapse into oblivion.
Taking advantage of the temporary abdication of all power, and of the momentary renunciation of all activities, even of interest, by the people, the unconscious idealist began his work. Never was a man more practical in his own eyes, or, from his own point of view, more concrete and direct in his motives or conduct. Seizing every opportunity as it arose, he was the type of what is to-day called in France an opportunist. But for all that, not the least element of his supernal greatness was an ever-present idealism. In view of his birth and early training, it is easy to see that if, as Mme. de Staël first suggested, nature had brought that quality down in his line from some far-off Italian of the early Renascence, it would develop under Rousseau's and Raynal's influence. Whencesoever it came, it is not least among the causes of the later political renascence which saw the creation of a new and modern society, the completion of a process which began with the English revolution. It is this quality alone which makes Napoleon an element of the first importance in universal history. Other traits make him so in the epoch now called by his name.
His first thought was for the army. It is probablethat Moreau's participation in the latest political stroke—a fact to which, in the initial stages, it owed its success—was due to personal ambition; he probably thought that when Bonaparte had once become a civilian, his only military rival would be disposed of. Accordingly, when the plan for the coming campaign was published, it was found that Moreau was to command a great central European force composed of the recruited armies of the Rhine and of Helvetia, to be called by the name of the former. Masséna, whose brilliant victories in Switzerland had moderated the gloom occasioned by the disasters of the previous year in Italy, was to have supreme command of the forces which were still to be called the Army of Italy—the name made so glorious at Lodi, at Arcola, at Castiglione, and at Rivoli. It seemed, indeed, as if the First Consul had himself renounced all ambition as a soldier in order to become entirely a statesman. The imperious and jealous but prudent Moreau was to have full scope for his powers, the brilliant Masséna was to wear his old commander's laurels. But there was a reserve army, not talked of nor paraded, which was quietly, silently, and unostentatiously formed, under Berthier's master-hand, from new conscripts skilfully intermingled with selected veterans. The divisions were gathered in different places, apparently with no unity, and thus were drilled, trained, and organized without observation. While most of it was kept within the French borders, ready for instant mobilization, and with headquarters ostensibly at Dijon, a part was sent under the nominal command of the devoted adjutant to Geneva in order to maintain the French honor in Switzerland.
The French people, however, desired not war, but peace. The list of competent and admirable administrators chosen by the government was sufficient proofthat public affairs were to be carefully transacted. The reconstruction of the army gave evidence that peace was to be made with honor. The next step was so to behave that France should think her new chief magistrate eager for a general pacification. Since Bonaparte's return from Egypt there had been a combination of circumstances which pointed to an easy solution of this problem. The Czar of Russia was much exasperated with George III because the Russian soldiers included in the capitulation of Alkmaar were coolly received when transported to England, and then virtually imprisoned in the island of Guernsey. When, soon afterward, the English laid siege to Malta, of which he yearned to be grand master, he was ready to accuse Great Britain of treachery. But he was still more incensed with Austria. As has been told, a portion of his army, under Korsakoff, was overwhelmed by Masséna at Zurich on September twenty-fifth, 1799. Suvoroff, with the other wing, was at the time in full possession of Piedmont; and in accordance with his master's instructions he had invited the fugitive Charles Emmanuel IV to return from Sardinia and reinstate himself at Turin.
The Austrian archduke Charles had withdrawn, after his defeat of Masséna by the first battle of Zurich in June, 1799, to take command in central Germany. Francis, being fully determined to keep all northern Italy for himself, and therefore to prevent the reëstablishment of the house of Savoy on the mainland, speciously ordered Suvoroff to the assistance of his fellow-countrymen north of the Alps. The Russian general found nothing prepared for his passage of the St. Gotthard; on the contrary, he was so hindered at every turn by the absence of mules for his baggage-train, and so harassed by the attacks of the French, that his expeditionwas one long disaster. He attributed his misfortunes to Austrian indifference or worse. Driven from valley to valley, over icy peaks and barren passes, his troops perished in great numbers, and their panic was complete when they heard of Korsakoff's terrible defeat. Before a junction could be effected with the remnants of that army, Masséna turned and attacked Suvoroff himself, compelling him to flee eastward as best he could until he reached the confines of Bavaria. This put a climax to the Czar's fury; he demanded that the Italian princes should be restored to their governments, and that Thugut should be dismissed, as a guarantee of good faith. Finally he heard that when Ancona fell before the combined attacks of Austrians, Russians, and Turks, his own standard had been taken down, and only the Austrian left flying. To a gloomy enthusiast, claiming to be the mirror of chivalry and magnanimity, this was a crowning insult; and he determined, in December, 1799, to withdraw from the coalition. This was Bonaparte's opportunity, and he began at once a series of the most flattering attentions to Paul, which made the Czar for the rest of his short life a passionate admirer of the schemes and person of the First Consul. England and Austria were thus the only formidable opponents left in the coalition against France.
With ostentatious simplicity, Bonaparte wrote both to George III and to Francis II, as man to man, announcing his accession to power, and pleading, in the interest of commerce, of national well-being, and of domestic happiness, for a cessation of hostilities after eight years of warfare. The French people, who looked upon the First Consul as a ruler made by themselves, were delighted with this simple straightforwardness, and gratified by the notion of their representativetreating on equal terms with the divine-right monarchs of Europe. Pitt mistakenly thought that Bonaparte still personified Jacobinism, and labored under the delusion that France was completely exhausted. An English army was ready and about to disembark on the west coast of France. Kléber in Egypt, having maintained himself superbly thus far, was about to yield to pitiless fate, and accept humiliating terms for evacuating the country. Could the flames of the civil war which was once more raging in France be further fanned, and the control of the Levant secured in English hands, the great English premier would be able in a few months to make terms far more advantageous than any he could hope for at the moment. Lord Grenville therefore wrote a brusque letter to Talleyrand, refusing negotiation with a government the stability of which was not assured, and suggesting in a weak, impolitic way that while the French had a right to choose their own government, the return of the Bourbons would be the best guarantee of a permanent and settled administration. This clause afforded the opportunity for a smart reply by Bonaparte, denouncing England as the author of the war which had raged through 1799 and was about to be renewed, and reminding the King that he himself ruled by consent of his people.
The debate which ensued in Parliament was most instructive, because the First Consul was entirely right. Great Britain was the mainspring of the coalition. The wits of London said in public that England had contracted half of her national debt to destroy the Bourbons and the other half to restore them to power. This was the key-note of the Liberal opposition. Lord Holland was willing to be sponsor for Bonaparte's sincerity, but the Lords laughed at him. In the Commons Whitbread charged the excesses of the FrenchRevolution to the unwarrantable interference of other powers; England owed it to herself to make peace when she could, even with a usurper. Erskine could see in England's course nothing but a blind obstinacy which had overwhelmed the nation with debt and disaster. "What would you say," said Tierney, "if Bonaparte victorious should refuse to treat except with the Stuarts?" But the temper of Parliament and the people was for continuing the war. Grenville, in the upper house, declared that Bonaparte was merely a new exponent of the revolutionary wickedness of the Directory. He had made treaties or armistices with Sardinia, Tuscany, Modena, and the minor Italian states, only to violate them; he had scorned the neutrality of Parma; he had dragged Venice into war for her own destruction; he had trampled Genoa underfoot; and he had destroyed the liberty of Switzerland while uttering false promises of peace and friendship. His hearers sustained him by an overwhelming majority.
In the lower house Canning denounced the First Consul as a usurper who, like a specter, wore on his head something which resembled a crown. Pitt rose to the height of his majestic powers in one of the great orations of his life. Minor political considerations must be waived. Bonaparte was the destroyer of Europe. The sole refuge from the calamities with which he was about to flood the nations was England. He himself had unwillingly consented to the negotiations at Lille; it was Fructidor which had broken them off, and it was Bonaparte who was the author of Fructidor. He might be reproached for desiring the restoration of the ancient monarchy to France, but an exhausted and desperate country could not find the long repose essential for recuperation except under the Bourbons. The success of his plea was even greater than Grenville's.Thus by an appeal to the old detestation of revolutionary excess which was so deep-seated in the English masses, and by an adroit insinuation that it was this for which Bonaparte stood,—a fact which seemed to be shown by his career,—the ministry gained a new lease of life, and men believed that a few months would see France fall in utter exhaustion before the coalition.
Bonaparte's personal letter to the Emperor was, as the writer doubtless foresaw it would be, equally unsuccessful. Austria, thanks to her double-dealings with Russia in the last campaign, was now occupying Lombardy, Piedmont, and the Papal States; she meant to keep them, and moderately but firmly refused to treat on the basis proposed, which was that of Campo Formio.
Among other unfortunate surrenders which France under the Directory had made for the sake of quiet and security was that of freedom for the press. A consular decree of January seventeenth, 1800, further emphasized this undemocratic policy, and suppressed all but thirteen political journals. This was nominally a measure to be enforced only during the war. For its justification there was the plea of necessity. The serious indiscretions which a free and enterprising press always has committed, and is sure to commit, during hostilities, uniformly call out the angry denunciations of military writers. The "spurred and booted ruler" of whom Napoleon spoke at St. Helena could not well be expected to act otherwise than he did. Unfortunately, the only papers which continued to be published became at once mere administrative organs. When, therefore, with a skilful display of facts the course of negotiations in both England and Austria was laid before the public, the people of Paris and the provinces were easily roused to warlike ardor. The clever andwitty pasquinades, the abusive and scathing paragraphs, in which all the papers indulged, from the "Moniteur" downward, increased the excitement. It pleased the French fancy to read a supposed summons to George, inviting him, as a convert to legitimacy, to abdicate in favor of the surviving Stuart heir. Forgetful of the immediate past, the nation was ready to maintain French honor at any cost against its embittered and inveterate foe. The Pactolus streams of English gold could not, the French felt sure, much longer subsidize the Continental powers; for it was Great Britain, and not France, which was really exhausted.
Led by a man whose genius was believed to be as fertile in political, administrative, and fiscal expedients as it had always been in military measures, with an admirable machinery of government and a general confidence in their ruler, the French people became ever more certain that they might now and finally conquer in the struggle with England for mastery. This opinion was further strengthened because the inveterate rancor of civil conflict in the west was again quieted, temporarily at least, perhaps permanently. The devastator of Egypt and Syria still held out with one hand the mildest offers of conciliation to the malcontent communities of that district, with the other he displayed his powerful sword, while in his proclamations he threatened measures as severe as those he had practised against the rebellious Bedouin. This course had the desired effect, and, having brought the French rebels to terms, seemed likely to soothe them into habits of submission. The Army of the West could therefore be reduced in numbers; and as at the same time the Batavian Republic was in a fervor of enthusiastic loyalty, so also could the Army of Holland. In this way more than thirty thousand excellent soldiers were freed for use elsewhere.
Simultaneously with these events the most careful preparation was made for a step which might redound to Bonaparte's credit if properly taken, but could easily be detrimental to the complete success of his schemes. Under the new constitution every department of government had an assigned dwelling-place. That of the consuls was to be the Tuileries. How could an absolute dictator install his penates in the sometime home of absolute royalty without inspiring general distrust? The first step was to rechristen the pile as "the palace of the government," the next to consecrate it to glory. From far and near the statues of the great were gathered to adorn its halls. The choice of these displayed in significant confusion the generals and statesmen of all times in all places. Alexander, Cæsar, Frederick; Cato, Cicero, Brutus; Mirabeau, Marceau, and Joubert; and many others of lesser note, were assembled in effigy. But highest of all was set the image of Washington, the news of whose death had just reached Europe. His example was to be held up as the real inspiration of the new ruler. In order both to arouse the imagination of the people and to convince their understanding, the army was put into mourning for the great American, and a festival was instituted in his honor. To exalt the man who was universally considered as the typical and ideal republican of the age was a conspicuously effective idea, since it accorded thoroughly with the approved traditions of the Revolution.
The celebration was set for February ninth, 1800, and proved a great success. It had already been decided to reawaken public enthusiasm by instituting great military ceremonies when the captured standards from Aboukir were finally deposited in the Hospital of the Invalides. These and the Washington festival were interwoven with consummate art: while the First Consul'svictories were recalled in the imposing parade, the simple and impressive words of an able orator, M. de Fontanes, reminded the nation that the immortal Washington had shown as a general more strength than brilliancy, and had awakened little enthusiasm but great confidence; that he was one of the men inspired to rule who appear from time to time in the world; that he was neither partizan nor demagogue; and that when peace had once been signed he had laid down his arms to become the wisest of constructive legislators. "Yes, Washington! thy counsels shall be heard—thou warrior, legislator, administrator! He who in his youth surpassed thee in battle, like thee shall close with conquering hands the wounds of his country." Minds less quick than those of the Parisians would have discovered the moral of the address even without the peroration. When the official journal next day published the glowing words and described the brilliant ceremony, the coming monarch was already lodged under the roof of the Bourbons. Since Bonaparte had made the liberation of Lafayette an indispensable condition of the treaty ratified at Campo Formio, it might have been expected that this name, so long used elsewhere in a natural juxtaposition, would on such an occasion have been mentioned in connection with that of Washington; but the honors of that day were to be shared with the dead foreigner, not with the living Frenchman.
Policy of the First Consul — His Family — The New Officials — The Council of State — Bonaparte's Ubiquity — Foreign Affairs — France and Russia — The Mistake of Prussia — Peace Impossible — Bonaparte's Plans — His Aims — The Temper of Great Britain — Bonaparte's Appeal to the Army — The Military Situation.
1800
The makers of a paper constitution cannot foresee every detail in the working of its provisions; and contrary to the expectation at least of Sieyès, the form which the new government took at the outset was largely personal. The Consulate and the ministry were entirely so, their members being chosen with a keen business instinct, like that of a great industrial or commercial master, for personal character, integrity, capacity, and devotion. "What revolutionary," said Napoleon to his brother Joseph, "would not have confidence in an order of things where Fouché is minister? What gentleman would not expect to find existence possible under the former Bishop of Autun? One keeps my left, the other my right. I open a broad path where all may walk." This was so far true, but such nice discrimination could not be exercised in filling the hundreds of minor offices. France is second to no land in the ambition of its people for office-holding, and amongthe thousands of greedy claimants it was not easy to choose. There were many mistakes made in selecting the petty officials, and the disappointed formed a large class of embittered malcontents from the very inauguration of the consular system. There were the senate, the legislature, the council of state, the tribunate, the whole judicial administration, all to be filled. It was understood that the official emoluments would not be niggardly. When finally fixed, the salary of a senator was twenty-five thousand francs; that of a tribune, fifteen thousand; that of a legislator, ten thousand. As a measure of relative importance it is interesting to note that the First Consul had five hundred thousand a year, and each of his colleagues one hundred and fifty thousand.
So swiftly and thoroughly did Paris and France absorb the concept of monarchy in the Consulate, that the powers and fortunes of the First Consul were scarcely considered in relation to those of the other two, who, far from parity, were barely coadjutant. What the nation felt and accepted, but scarcely whispered, the Bonaparte family discussed with shameless greediness. How far soever Napoleon removed himself in other respects from the primitive institutions of Corsican barbarism, in one he never so far had varied: the sense of clanship. His brothers and sisters were men and women of parts, but they were undisciplined in language and behavior: their natural appetites were never concealed, nor their tongues bridled. Napoleon acknowledged the fraternal bond in the tribal sense; for every one of them he desired to provide handsomely in money and honor, and he expected the return of affection and loyalty. Behind his back they discussed his death and the succession, formed cabals of supporters, wrangled for influence and power. Of this their brother was not unaware, and the dangerof their irregular conduct was ever present to him. But he could not bring himself to check them. At this moment when their activities were most pernicious, he intended Lucien to be the master politician, Joseph the master negotiator, Louis a general, and Jerome an admiral. Their intercourse with official France might make or mar the fortunes not only of their brother but also of themselves.
The new officials were selected from every walk of life, from every shade of opinion, from every stratum of society. The intention was that they should have no bond but a common interest in the new order. The senate became a high place for the successful among the old, the men whose day was over. Monge, Berthollet, Volney, and the like were found on its benches. The silent legislature was filled with the majority of those whose ardent and uninstructed ambitions were easily muzzled by the tenure of place, and found a sufficient vent in casting a voiceless vote. The tribunes, "legislative eunuchs," as they have been called, were men such as Daunou, Benjamin Constant, and J. B. Say—the elect among the able and intelligent of the day. Their duty was to debate the nature and utility of all bills with the proposers, the council of state; and it was expected that the fiery logic and merciless criticism which they were sure to employ would rebound harmlessly from the benches on which their opponents sat. If freedom of debate and liberty of speech became too dangerous even in such remoteness from action, the superfluous institution could be suppressed without a jar in the machinery of state. There was possibly a hint of this in the fact that the tribunes found shelter in the Palais Royal, then the haunt of prostitutes and the refuge of the great gambling-hells which were so numerous. To the end of its days thetribunate was the one asylum of liberty under the constitution of the year VIII. It was supposed, as has just been said, that the impotence of the tribunes would be offset by the independence of the council of state.
In this last body, therefore, were assembled three important classes: sincere Bonapartists like Roederer, Regnault de St.-Jean-d'Angély, and Boulay de la Meurthe; clever specialists like Ganteaume, Chaptal, and Fourcroy, who were quite willing to serve the First Consul; and a number of proselytes from among the royalists and other factions. For the most part these were men of great ability, and for a time they found in the First Consul a disinterestedness in serving France which made them his devoted servants. The personality of the council was Bonaparte's, and whatever independence it possessed was his. The court of appeals was duly organized by the senate, which had this right as being the guardian of the constitution. The justices and councilors of a supreme court, the copestone of the judiciary, were nominated by the same body. The other courts were also ably manned with officials who, though not servile, were stanch supporters of the new government.
Before the time when the campaign could open in the spring of 1800, all these parts were intended to be, and actually were, running smoothly; but they were running by the inspiration and activity of a single man. The council of state was his greater self, the senate his instrument of governing; the legislative body was as silent as the tribunate was noisy—neither was a serious check on his plans. Legislation of the greatest importance was under way; it was all devised for purposes of centralization, and was studied in detail by the First Consul. Administration was proceeding with scarcely any friction whatsoever; but this was because Bonapartekept his eye on each separate office, and carefully superintended its working. By special arrangement foreign relations were considered and settled in secret consultation by the chief of state and Talleyrand; but the latter dared not pretend that in unraveling the threads of so tangled a web, or in their skilful rearrangement, the initiative was his. Carnot, at his old work, with his old genius unimpaired, needed little encouragement; but even in his department every corps, every battalion, every regiment, every company of all the arms,—cavalry, infantry, and artillery of every class, conscript, soldier, reserve, and home guard,—each and all were known to the First Consul. Incredible and exaggerated as such statements must appear, the testimony to their truth is so abundant and unimpeachable that it seems to the reader as if at this crisis there had appeared in Europe a being neither human, demoniac, nor celestial, but a man with superhuman powers of endurance, apprehension, and labor, an angel without perfection, a demon without malevolence. For, on the whole, Bonaparte's work, while replete with dangerous expedients, and, as the future conclusively proved, inspired by self-seeking, was beneficent, constructive, and permanent in regard not merely to France, but to Europe and the world.
In the opening months of 1800 the Continental situation was even more peculiar than usual. In 1799 the Directory had, as a financial measure, incorporated Belgium with France, and her provinces, like all other parts of the country, paid heavy taxes. This could not be changed; and in regard to the minor states still nominally independent, but really under French control, the old policy of the Directory could likewise not immediately be dropped. Masséna had just made a forced levy in Switzerland. Genoa was laid under afresh contribution of two million francs, and menaced with a forced levy. It was arranged that Holland should pay forty million francs for the restitution of Flushing; and Amsterdam was invited to lend ten more, but refused. Hamburg was secretly held out to Prussia as the price of an alliance with France. Publicly the Hohenzollern monarchy was praised for its refusal to surrender some important political refugees to the coalition, and was offered the friendship of France at the price of four to six millions of francs. It was determined that Portugal, which, having been exhausted by a long alliance with England, now earnestly desired peace, should be told informally by Talleyrand that it could be purchased by a contribution of from eight to ten millions for the Army of Italy. Paul I of Russia, already angry with Austria, was confirmed in his friendship for France by many acts of courtesy. The Russian prisoners of war received new clothes, and were released; the First Consul, recognizing the Czar's quixotic interest in the Knights of Malta, sent to him the sword of Valetta, captured on the seizure of the island. A treaty of peace between France and Russia speedily ensued.
This of course effectually checked Turkey, and soon afterward competent experts were appointed by Paul to consider the details of a combined Franco-Russian expedition for the invasion of India by land, and to parcel out Asia between the two powers. The scheme originated with an agent of the Directory, named Guttin, who after a sojourn in Russia had boldly suggested that as Russia could never be even touched by modern ideas, and as the international propaganda of cosmopolitan republicanism must needs stop at her frontiers, there was but one course open: to seek her alliance. Bonaparte carefully studied the long and persuasive report,began his preparations to realize the policy in the far future, was mindful of it at Tilsit, and, thwarted in his hope of keeping Russia an eastern power, found his first serious check in the campaign fought to coerce her. The expedition planned by him and Paul, as a side thrust at Great Britain, embraced both India and Persia in its details. Should it succeed, even the island kingdom might one day find itself a tamed and trained unit in the federation of western and central Europe under the ægis of a new western emperor, dividing the world with him who claimed to be the eastern; the heir and successor of those Romans who had reigned from Byzantium.
The center of gravity on the Continent remained in Prussia. As the land of Frederick, and the rival of Austria, she supposed herself to represent the liberal side of German life. In fact, there was a strong French party at Berlin, which felt that the republic had been fighting Prussia's battle in weakening the house of Austria. But Frederick William III, the young King, was timid, cautious, and full of self-esteem. He was overmastered by the specious idea, also cherished by his prime minister, that a firm neutrality would recuperate the strength of his country and people while internecine warfare was exhausting the rest of Europe. On this ground he had so far stood unshaken; and though the sympathies of his house had always been, in the main, on the side of absolutism, he refused the alliance of the absolutist coalition, and remained obstinate between the two alternatives. Nor did he falter until he destroyed his own prestige. The country itself would have been sacrificed but for the national uprising which some years later compelled him to take a decided stand. The Directory had longed to secure Prussia as part of the French system in Europe, and finally sent Sieyès to engage her as an ally. But the envoy spentmore energy in intriguing against his employers, and in devising schemes for the monarchical system which was to supplant them in France, than in his proper work, and succeeded only in confirming the King of Prussia in his policy. Bonaparte sent two representatives, Duroc and Beurnonville, to renew the negotiation and obtain Prussia's active assistance. They were received with much show of kindness, and the hopes of the latter envoy rose high, but only to be shattered. Privately the King notified Sandoz, his minister in Paris, that if France were defeated in the inevitable impending conflict, Prussia would reclaim her territories on the left bank of the Rhine, and declare war to secure them. The treaties in which she had renounced them were waste paper in this case; but until the event were decided she would stir neither hand nor foot.
With Prussia persistently neutral, and all the minor states exasperated not only by the continued billeting of French troops upon them, but by new demands for money, France was virtually left alone against Austria and England in the coming campaign. This situation was perfectly clear to the French people; but in view of all that had happened since the change of government, it appeared to every one not only as if reasonable offers of peace on the part of the First Consul had been refused, but as if French honor were inseparably united with the policy of war forced upon him. Though not proved, it is reiterated that this was what Bonaparte wanted. Subsequent events support the hypothesis; and if it be true, no schemer ever met with such perfect success. A career of aggressive extension was apparently forced upon him.
Three great revolutionary concepts of foreign policy were therefore the outcome of Bonaparte's studies in the exhibition of Austrian and British policy, of Frenchtemperament and personal ambition: the mastery of the Mediterranean basin and thereby of the Orient; the extension of a revolutionary liberal system in Europe by the conquest and protectorate of the Continent; and the leadership of the world for the French nation, still as ever enthusiastic for lofty ideals and great deeds. Similar notions had not been foreign to the ancient régime, but England had prevented their fulfilment. The republic, having vaguely enlarged them, had fought for them as France had never fought before, because these things were not to be achieved for a dynasty, and were now illuminated by visions of human regeneration. Still England stood in the way. Bonaparte had given them new shape and new intensity with new definition; logically his success would stand for that most splendid of ideals which has ever dazzled poets, theologians, and kings—the universality of empire for peace and its arts, and the consequent elevation of all mankind. By the conquests of Alexander, Cæsar, and Charles the Great, animated as was each in turn by ambition and fiery zeal, nations, tribes, and institutions had been melted in one crucible. Each of those heroes had done a wondrous work in the advance of civilization, but their gains had been indirect. The experiment was to be tried for a fourth time. Would England again and finally dash the French Utopia into ruins?
For the moment Great Britain might be well content. India was safer for the overthrow of Tippoo, Ceylon was conquered, Egypt blockaded, and supremacy regained in the West Indies as well. Malta was in her hands, the Dutch fleet had been destroyed, the French and Spanish fleets were imprisoned at Brest. It is true the liberal agitations inaugurated and kept alive by the discontent of her middle and lower classes were hard to repress; but they were mercilessly crushed as theycame to the surface, and on the whole, public opinion supported the policy. That Grenville was subsidizing Georges Cadoudal with half a million francs to reorganize the Chouannerie of western France, and strike the "essential blow," was barely suspected. The proof has only come to light a century later. Assassination is an ugly word: it was not used, but it was contemplated. If this were the temper of Great Britain, that of Austria, her ally, was even more irreconcilable. Expansion in Italy was the focal concept of her policy. There was no expense of money and men she would refuse to consider for erasing the blot of Campo Formio. She had recruited her treasury and her army by British aid, and was defiant. The letter to her Emperor from the First Consul, as of equal to equal, was a crowning insult.
The first four months of the Consulate had not left the First Consul without enemies at home both numerous and bitter; moreover, many narrow minds—men who, like Talleyrand, were ignorant of how impossible the permanent return of the Bourbons had become—considered Bonaparte's tenure of power only as a transition to the old order. But at the critical instant, in April of the last year of the eighteenth century, France as a whole, including even the factions which had hoped to use him as a tool, felt that her doctrines, her aspirations, and her fate were personified in the great Corsican. His own motives may properly be stigmatized as those of personal ambition; but they were much more. Half educated and half barbarous as he was in his disdain of human limitations, there was in his heart a clear conception that good can come only of good, and therefore he had a definite purpose to do the most possible in order to illuminate his own rise by the regeneration of society. Himself a man without a country,—forall his patriotic aspirations perished in Corsica's desperate failure,—he cared little for territorial limits, and utterly failed to comprehend the strength of national ties. Without sincere ecclesiastical feeling or an earnest faith, he partly understood the value of religious sentiment in the individual, but underrated utterly its moral preponderance in the social organism. The church to him was little more than a "white" police force. A consummate actor, he estimated at its full the influence of the dramatic word and situation on the common mind, but was often self-deceived while believing others misled or beguiled by his acting.
It is not at all inconsistent with a possible sincerity in the ostensibly pacific foreign policy he was pursuing that, even before the decision to fight had apparently been forced upon him, two manifestoes rang out to the troops. To the Army of the Rhine he said: "You have conquered Holland, the Rhine, and Italy, and have dictated peace under the walls of terrified Vienna. Now it is not a question of defending your borders, but of overpowering hostile states." To the Army of Italy in particular he said, with reference to a too notorious instance in which during the previous year a half-brigade had shown the white feather: "Are they all dead, the brave men of Castiglione, of Rivoli, and of Neumarkt? They would rather have perished than have been untrue to their colors; and they surely would have dragged their younger comrades on to honor and to duty. Soldiers, you say your rations are not regularly distributed. What would you have done if, like Four and Twenty-two of the light infantry, like Eighteen and Thirty-two of the line, you had found yourselves in the midst of the desert, without bread, without water, with nothing to eat but the flesh of horses and mules? 'Victory will give us bread,' said they; andyou—you desert your standards!" Such words, from such a man, could leave no soldier of any nation unmoved. The Frenchmen in the ranks were thrilled by them; the general who wrote them understood that peace without glory was a broken reed for an aspiring ruler. He had proffered the olive-branch, but he must, in order completely to win his people, chastise those who had spurned it. Austria, in particular, must get another lesson in humility.
On the eve of active operations in the first months of 1800 the military situation was as follows: The Italian line stretched from Genoa around by Savona to the Col di Tenda. On it were thirty thousand men, under Masséna, while ten thousand more guarded the passes of the Alps. Confronting it was an Austrian force of eighty thousand men, under Melas, a general of the old formal school, hampered by tradition and by the machinery of the Aulic Council in Vienna. In Tuscany, in the Papal States, and in Piedmont were twenty thousand Austrian soldiers in garrison. On the Rhine stood Moreau, with a hundred and twenty thousand men, facing a less able antagonist than Melas in the person of Kray, whose army was about equal in number to his own. The Austrian lines stretched from the falls of the Rhine northward by their headquarters at Donaueschingen to Kinzig. The greatest of the Austrian generals, the Archduke Charles, was not in the field. A sensitive epileptic, he had been wounded by the incessant and meddling interference of the Vienna bureaucrats, and had temporarily withdrawn from service. The plan of Francis and his ministry was to drive back Masséna's inferior force; then, with the aid of the English fleet, which arrived in March, under Keith, to reduce Genoa, where Masséna was sure to make a stand; then to cross the Var, and increase thenumerical superiority of the Austrians still further by a union with the royalists of Provence, who were organizing under Pichegru, just escaped from Guiana; and finally to carry the war into the heart of France, while Kray held Moreau in check.