The French also were wearied by their exertions in the fierce heats of September. Murmurs were heard in the ranks and at the mess tables that Bonaparte's reports of these exploits were tinged by favouritism and by undue severity against those whose fortune had been less conspicuous than their merits. One of these misunderstandings was of some importance. Masséna, whose services had been brilliant at Bassano but less felicitous since the crossing of the Adige, reproached Bonaparte for denying praise to the most deserving and lavishing it on men who had come in opportunely to reap the labours of others. His written protest, urged with the old republican frankness, only served further to cloud over the relations between them, which, since Lonato, had not been cordial.[63] Even thus early in his career Bonaparte gained the reputation of desiring brilliant and entire success, and of visiting with his displeasure men who, from whatever cause, did not wrest from Fortune her utmost favours. That was his own mental attitude towards the fickle goddess. After entering Milan he cynically remarked to Marmont: "Fortune is a woman; and the more she does for me, the more I will require of her." Suggestive words, which explain at once the splendour of his rise and the rapidity of his fall.
During the few weeks of comparative inaction which ensued, the affairs of Italy claimed his attention. The prospect of an Austrian re-conquest had caused no less concern to the friends of liberty in the peninsula than joy to the reactionary coteries of the old sovereigns. At Rome and Naples threats against the French were whispered or openly vaunted. The signature of the treaties of peace was delayed, and the fulminations of the Vatican were prepared against the sacrilegious spoilers. After the Austrian war-cloud had melted away, the time had come to punish prophets of evil. The Duke of Modena was charged with allowing a convoy to pass from his State to the garrison of Mantua, and with neglecting to pay the utterly impossible fine to which Bonaparte had condemned him. The men of Reggio and Modena were also encouraged to throw off his yoke and to confide in the French. Those of Reggio succeeded; but in the city of Modena itself the ducal troops repressed the rising. Bonaparte accordingly asked the advice of the Directory; but his resolution was already formed. Two days after seeking their counsel, he took the decisive step of declaring Modena and Reggio to be under the protection of France. This act formed an exceedingly important departure in the history of France as well as in that of Italy. Hitherto the Directory had succeeded in keeping Bonaparte from active intervention in affairs of high policy. In particular, it had enjoined on him the greatest prudence with regard to the liberated lands of Italy, so as not to involve France in prolonged intervention in the peninsula, or commit her to a war à outrance with the Hapsburgs; and its warnings were now urged with all the greater emphasis because news had recently reached Paris of a serious disaster to the French arms in Germany. But while the Directors counselled prudence, Bonaparte forced their hand by declaring the Duchy of Modena to be under the protection of France; and when their discreet missive reached him, he expressed to them his regret that it had come too late. By that time (October 24th) he had virtually founded a new State, for whose security French honour was deeply pledged. This implied the continuance of the French occupation of Northern Italy and therefore a prolongation of Bonaparte's command.
It was not the Duchy of Modena alone which felt the invigorating influence of democracy and nationality. The Papal cities of Bologna and Ferrara had broken away from the Papal sway, and now sent deputies to meet the champions of liberty at Modena and found a free commonwealth. There amidst great enthusiasm was held the first truly representative Italian assembly that had met for many generations; and a levy of 2,800 volunteers, styled the Italian legion, was decreed. Bonaparte visited these towns, stimulated their energy, and bade the turbulent beware of his vengeance, which would be like that of "the exterminating angel." In a brief space these districts were formed into the Cispadane Republic, destined soon to be merged into a yet larger creation. A new life breathed from Modena and Bologna into Central Italy. The young republic forthwith abolished all feudal laws, decreed civic equality, and ordered the convocation at Bologna of a popularly elected Assembly for the Christmas following. These events mark the first stage in the beginning of that grand movement, Il Risorgimento, which after long delays was finally consummated in 1870.
This period of Bonaparte's career may well be lingered over by those who value his invigorating influence on Italian life more highly than his military triumphs. At this epoch he was still the champion of the best principles of the Revolution; he had overthrown Austrian domination in the peninsula, and had shaken to their base domestic tyrannies worse than that of the Hapsburgs. His triumphs were as yet untarnished. If we except the plundering of the liberated and conquered lands, an act for which the Directory was primarily responsible, nothing was at this time lacking to the full orb of his glory. An envoy bore him the welcome news that the English, wearied by the intractable Corsicans, had evacuated the island of his birth; and he forthwith arranged for the return of many of the exiles who had been faithful to the French Republic. Among these was Salicetti, who now returned for a time to his old insular sphere; while his former protégé was winning a world-wide fame. Then, turning to the affairs of Central Italy, the young commander showed his diplomatic talents to be not a whit inferior to his genius for war. One instance of this must here suffice. He besought the Pope, who had broken off the lingering negotiations with France, not to bring on his people the horrors of war.[64] The beauty of this appeal, as also of a somewhat earlier appeal to the Emperor Francis at Vienna, is, however, considerably marred by other items which now stand revealed in Bonaparte's instructive correspondence. After hearing of the French defeats in Germany, he knew that the Directors could spare him very few of the 25,000 troops whom he demanded as reinforcements.
He was also aware that the Pope, incensed at his recent losses in money and lands, was seeking to revivify the First Coalition. The pacific precepts addressed by the young Corsican to the Papacy must therefore be viewed in the light of merely mundane events and of his secret advice to the French agent at Rome: "The great thing is to gain time…. Finally, the game really is for us to throw the ball from one to the other, so as to deceive this old fox."[65]
From these diplomatic amenities the general was forced to turn to the hazards of war. Gauging Bonaparte's missive at its true worth, the Emperor determined to re-conquer Italy, an enterprise that seemed well within his powers. In the month of October victory had crowned the efforts of his troops in Germany. At Würzburg the Archduke Charles had completely beaten Jourdan, and had thrown both his army and that of Moreau back on the Rhine. Animated by reviving hopes, the Imperialists now assembled some 60,000 strong. Alvintzy, a veteran of sixty years, renowned for his bravery, but possessing little strategic ability, was in command of some 35,000 men in the district of Friuli, north of Trieste, covering that seaport from a threatened French attack. With this large force he was to advance due west, towards the River Brenta, while Davidovich, marching through Tyrol by the valley of the Adige, was to meet him with the remainder near Verona. As Jomini has observed, the Austrians gave themselves infinite trouble and encountered grave risks in order to compass a junction of forces which they might quietly have effected at the outset. Despite all Bonaparte's lessons, the Aulic Council still clung to its old plan of enveloping the foe and seeking to bewilder them by attacks delivered from different sides. Possibly also they were emboldened by the comparative smallness of Bonaparte's numbers to repeat this hazardous manoeuvre.
The French could muster little more than 40,000 men; and of these at least 8,000 were needed opposite Mantua.
At first the Imperialists gained important successes; for though the French held their own on the Brenta, yet their forces in the Tyrol were driven down the valley of the Adige with losses so considerable that Bonaparte was constrained to order a general retreat on Verona. He discerned that from this central position he could hold in check Alvintzy's troops marching westwards from Vicenza and prevent their junction with the Imperialists under Davidovich, who were striving to thrust Vaubois' division from the plateau of Rivoli.
But before offering battle to Alvintzy outside Verona, Bonaparte paid a flying visit to his men posted on that plateau in order to rebuke the wavering and animate the whole body with his own dauntless spirit. Forming the troops around him, he addressed two regiments in tones of grief and anger. He reproached them for abandoning strong positions in a panic, and ordered his chief staff officer to inscribe on their colours the ominous words: "They are no longer of the Army of Italy."[66] Stung by this reproach, the men begged with sobs that the general would test their valour before disgracing them for ever. The young commander, who must have counted on such a result to his words, when uttered to French soldiers, thereupon promised to listen to their appeals; and their bravery in the ensuing fights wiped every stain of disgrace from their colours. By such acts as these did he nerve his men against superior numbers and adverse fortune.
Their fortitude was to be severely tried at all points. Alvintzy occupied a strong position on a line of hills at Caldiero, a few miles to the east of Verona. His right wing was protected by the spurs of the Tyrolese Alps, while his left was flanked by the marshes which stretch between the rivers Alpon and Adige; and he protected his front by cannon skilfully ranged along the hills. All the bravery of Masséna's troops failed to dislodge the right wing of the Imperialists. The French centre was torn by the Austrian cannon and musketry. A pitiless storm of rain and sleet hindered the advance of the French guns and unsteadied the aim of the gunners; and finally they withdrew into Verona, leaving behind 2,000 killed and wounded, and 750 prisoners (November 12th). This defeat at Caldiero—for it is idle to speak of it merely as a check—opened up a gloomy vista of disasters for the French; and Bonaparte, though he disguised his fears before his staff and the soldiery, forthwith wrote to the Directors that the army felt itself abandoned at the further end of Italy, and that this fair conquest seemed about to be lost. With his usual device of under-rating his own forces and exaggerating those of his foes, he stated that the French both at Verona and Rivoli were only 18,000, while the grand total of the Imperialists was upwards of 50,000. But he must have known that for the present he had to deal with rather less than half that number. The greater part of the Tyrolese force had not as yet descended the Adige below Roveredo; and allowing for detachments and losses, Alvintzy's array at Caldiero barely exceeded 20,000 effectives.
Bonaparte now determined to hazard one of the most daring turning movements which history records. It was necessary at all costs to drive Alvintzy from the heights of Caldiero before the Tyrolese columns should overpower Vaubois' detachment at Rivoli and debouch in the plains west of Verona. But, as Caldiero could not be taken by a front attack, it must be turned by a flanking movement. To any other general than Bonaparte this would have appeared hopeless; but where others saw nothing but difficulties, his eye discerned a means of safety. South and south-east of those hills lies a vast depression swamped by the flood waters of the Alpon and the Adige. Morasses stretch for some miles west of the village of Arcola, through which runs a road up the eastern bank of the Alpon, crossing that stream at the aforenamed village and leading to the banks of the Adige opposite the village of Ronco; another causeway, diverging from the former a little to the north of Ronco, leads in a north-westerly direction towards Porcil. By advancing from Ronco along these causeways, and by seizing Arcola, Bonaparte designed to outflank the Austrians and tempt them into an arena where the personal prowess of the French veterans would have ample scope, and where numbers would be of secondary importance. Only heads of columns could come into direct contact; and the formidable Austrian cavalry could not display its usual prowess. On these facts Bonaparte counted as a set-off to his slight inferiority in numbers.
In the dead of night the divisions of Augereau and Masséna retired through Verona. Officers and soldiers were alike deeply discouraged by this movement, which seemed to presage a retreat towards the Mincio and the abandonment of Lombardy. To their surprise, when outside the gate they received the order to turn to the left down the western bank of the Adige. At Ronco the mystery was solved. A bridge of boats had there been thrown across the Adige; and, crossing this without opposition, Augereau's troops rapidly advanced along the causeway leading to Arcola and menaced the Austrian rear, while Masséna's column denied north-west, so as directly to threaten his flank at Caldiero. The surprise, however, was by no means complete; for Alvintzy himself purposed to cross the Adige at Zevio, so as to make a dash on Mantua, and in order to protect his flank he had sent a detachment of Croats to hold Arcola. These now stoutly disputed Augereau's progress, pouring in from the loopholed cottages volleys which tore away the front of every column of attack. In vain did Augereau, seizing the colours, lead his foremost regiment to the bridge of Arcola. Riddled by the musketry, his men fell back in disorder. In vain did Bonaparte himself, dismounting from his charger, seize a flag, rally these veterans and lead them towards the bridge. The Croats, constantly reinforced, poured in so deadly a fire as to check the advance: Muiron, Marmont, and a handful of gallant men still pressed on, thereby screening the body of their chief; but Muiron fell dead, and another officer, seizing Bonaparte, sought to drag him back from certain death. The column wavered under the bullets, fell back to the further side of the causeway, and in the confusion the commander fell into the deep dyke at the side. Agonized at the sight, the French rallied, while Marmont and Louis Bonaparte rescued their beloved chief from capture or from a miry death, and he retired to Ronco, soon followed by the wearied troops.[67]
[Illustration: PLAN TO ILLUSTRATE THE VICTORY OF ARCOLA.]
This memorable first day of fighting at Arcola (November 15th) closed on the strange scene of two armies encamped on dykes, exhausted by an almost amphibious conflict, like that waged by the Dutch "Beggars" in their war of liberation against Spain. Though at Arcola the republicans had been severely checked, yet further west Masséna had held his own; and the French movement as a whole had compelled Alvintzy to suspend any advance on Verona or on Mantua, to come down from the heights of Caldiero, and to fight on ground where his superior numbers were of little avail. This was seen on the second day of fighting on the dykes opposite Arcola, which was, on the whole, favourable to the smaller veteran force. On the third day Bonaparte employed a skilful ruse to add to the discouragement of his foes. He posted a small body of horsemen behind a spinney near the Austrian flank, with orders to sound their trumpets as if for a great cavalry charge. Alarmed by the noise and by the appearance of French troops from the side of Legnago and behind Arcola, the demoralized white-coats suddenly gave way and retreated for Vicenza.
Victory again declared for the troops who could dare the longest, and whose general was never at a loss in face of any definite danger. Both armies suffered severely in these desperate conflicts;[68] but, while the Austrians felt that the cup of victory had been snatched from their very lips, the French soldiery were dazzled by this transcendent exploit of their chief. They extolled his bravery, which almost vied with the fabulous achievement of Horatius Cocles, and adored the genius which saw safety and victory for his discouraged army amidst swamps and dykes. Bonaparte himself, with that strange mingling of the practical and the superstitious which forms the charm of his character, ever afterwards dated the dawn of his fortune in its full splendour from those hours of supreme crisis among the morasses of Arcola. But we may doubt whether this posing as the favourite of fortune was not the result of his profound knowledge of the credulity of the vulgar herd, which admires genius and worships bravery, but grovels before persistent good luck.
Though it is difficult to exaggerate the skill and bravery of the French leader and his troops, the failure of his opponents is inexplicable but for the fact that most of their troops were unable to manoeuvre steadily in the open, that Alvintzy was inexperienced as a commander-in-chief, and was hampered throughout by a bad plan of campaign. Meanwhile the other Austrian army, led by Davidovich, had driven Vaubois from his position at Rivoli; and had the Imperialist generals kept one another informed of their moves, or had Alvintzy, disregarding a blare of trumpets and a demonstration on his flank and rear, clung to Arcola for two days longer—the French would have been nipped between superior forces. But, as it was, the lack of accord in the Austrian movements nearly ruined the Tyrolese wing, which pushed on triumphantly towards Verona, while Alvintzy was retreating eastwards. Warned just in time, Davidovich hastily retreated to Roveredo, leaving a whole battalion in the hands of the French. To crown this chapter of blunders, Würmser, whose sortie after Caldiero might have been most effective, tardily essayed to break through the blockaders, when both his colleagues were in retreat. How different were these ill-assorted moves from those of Bonaparte. His maxims throughout this campaign, and his whole military career, were: (1) divide for foraging, concentrate for fighting; (2) unity of command is essential for success; (3) time is everything. This firm grasp of the essentials of modern warfare insured his triumph over enemies who trusted to obsolete methods for the defence of antiquated polities.[69]
The battle of Arcola had an important influence on the fate of Italy and Europe. In the peninsula all the elements hostile to the republicans were preparing for an explosion in their rear which should reaffirm the old saying that Italy was the tomb of the French. Naples had signed terms of peace with them, it is true; but the natural animosity of the Vatican against its despoilers could easily have leagued the south of Italy with the other States that were working secretly for their expulsion. While the Austrians were victoriously advancing, these aims were almost openly avowed, and at the close of the year 1796 Bonaparte moved south to Bologna in order to guide the Italian patriots in their deliberations and menace the Pope with an invasion of the Roman States. From this the Pontiff was for the present saved by new efforts on the part of Austria. But before describing the final attempt of the Hapsburgs to wrest Italy from their able adversary, it will be well to notice his growing ascendancy in diplomatic affairs.
While Bonaparte was struggling in the marshes of Arcola, the Directory was on the point of sending to Vienna an envoy, General Clarke, with proposals for an armistice preliminary to negotiations for peace with Austria. This step was taken, because France was distracted by open revolt in the south, by general discontent in the west, and by the retreat of her Rhenish armies, now flung back on the soil of the Republic by the Austrian Arch-duke Charles. Unable to support large forces in the east of France out of its bankrupt exchequer, the Directory desired to be informed of the state of feeling at Vienna. It therefore sent Clarke with offers, which might enable him to look into the political and military situation at the enemy's capital, and see whether peace could not be gained at the price of some of Bonaparte's conquests. The envoy was an elegant and ambitious young man, descended from an Irish family long settled in France, who had recently gained Carnot's favour, and now desired to show his diplomatic skill by subjecting Bonaparte to the present aims of the Directory.
The Directors' secret instructions reveal the plans which they then harboured for the reconstruction of the Continent. Having arranged an armistice which should last up to the end of the next spring, Clarke was to set forth arrangements which might suit the House of Hapsburg. He might discuss the restitution of all their possessions in Italy, and the acquisition of the Bishopric of Salzburg and other smaller German and Swabian territories: or, if she did not recover the Milanese, Austria might gain the northern parts of the Papal States as compensation; and the Duke of Tuscany—a Hapsburg—might reign at Rome, yielding up his duchy to the Duke of Parma; while, as this last potentate was a Spanish Bourbon, France might for her good offices to this House gain largely from Spain in America.[70] In these and other proposals two methods of bargaining are everywhere prominent. The great States are in every case to gain at the expense of their weaker neighbours; Austria is to be appeased; and France is to reap enormous gains ultimately at the expense of smaller Germanic or Italian States. These facts should clearly be noted. Napoleon was afterwards deservedly blamed for carrying out these unprincipled methods; but, at the worst, he only developed them from those of the Directors, who, with the cant of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity on their lips, battened on the plunder of the liberated lands, and cynically proposed to share the spoil of weaker States with the potentates against whom they publicly declaimed as tyrants.
The chief aim of these negotiations, so Clarke was assured, was to convince the Court of Vienna that it would get better terms by treating with France directly and alone, rather than by joining in the negotiations which had recently been opened at Paris by England. But the Viennese Ministers refused to allow Clarke to proceed to their capital, and appointed Vicenza as the seat of the deliberations.
They were brief. Through the complex web of civilian intrigue, Bonaparte forthwith thrust the mailed hand of the warrior. He had little difficulty in proving to Clarke that the situation was materially altered by the battle of Arcola. The fall of Mantua was now only a matter of weeks. To allow its provisions to be replenished for the term of the armistice was an act that no successful general could tolerate. For that fortress the whole campaign had been waged, and three Austrian armies had been hurled back into Tyrol and Friuli. Was it now to be provisioned, in order that the Directory might barter away the Cispadane Republic? He speedily convinced Clarke of the fatuity of the Directors' proposals. He imbued him with his own contempt for an armistice that would rob the victors of their prize; and, as the Court of Vienna still indulged hopes of success in Italy, Clarke's negotiations at Vicenza came to a speedy conclusion.
In another important matter the Directory also completely failed. Nervous as to Bonaparte's ambition, it had secretly ordered Clarke to watch his conduct and report privately to Paris. Whether warned by a friend at Court, or forearmed by his own sagacity, Bonaparte knew of this, and in his intercourse with Clarke deftly let the fact be seen. He quickly gauged Clarke's powers, and the aim of his mission. "He is a spy," he remarked a little later to Miot, "whom the Directory have set upon me: he is a man of no talent—only conceited." The splendour of his achievements and the mingled grace and authority of his demeanour so imposed on the envoy that he speedily fell under the influence of the very man whom he was to watch, and became his enthusiastic adherent.
Bonaparte was at Bologna, supervising the affairs of the Cispadane Republic, when he heard that the Austrians were making a last effort for the relief of Mantua. Another plan had been drawn up by the Aulic Council at Vienna. Alvintzy, after recruiting his wearied force at Bassano, was quickly to join the Tyrolese column at Roveredo, thereby forming an army of 28,000 men wherewith to force the position of Rivoli and drive the French in on Mantua: 9,000 Imperialists under Provera were also to advance from the Brenta upon Legnago, in order to withdraw the attention of the French from the real attempt made by the valley of the Adige; while 10,000 others at Bassano and elsewhere were to assail the French front at different points and hinder their concentration. It will be observed that the errors of July and November, 1796, were now yet a third time to be committed: the forces destined merely to make diversions were so strengthened as not to be merely light bodies distracting the aim of the French, while Alvintzy's main force was thereby so weakened as to lack the impact necessary for victory.
Nevertheless, the Imperialists at first threw back their foes with some losses; and Bonaparte, hurrying northwards to Verona, was for some hours in a fever of uncertainty as to the movements and strength of the assailants. Late at night on January 13th he knew that Provera's advance was little more than a demonstration, and that the real blow would fall on the 10,000 men marshalled by Joubert at Monte Baldo and Rivoli. Forthwith he rode to the latter place, and changed retreat and discouragement into a vigorous offensive by the news that 13,000 more men were on the march to defend the strong position of Rivoli.
The great defensive strength of this plateau had from the first attracted his attention. There the Adige in a sharp bend westward approaches within six miles of Lake Garda. There, too, the mountains, which hem in the gorge of the river on its right bank, bend away towards the lake and leave a vast natural amphitheatre, near the centre of which rises the irregular plateau that commands the exit from Tyrol. Over this plateau towers on the north Monte Baldo, which, near the river gorge, sends out southward a sloping ridge, known as San Marco, connecting it with the plateau. At the foot of this spur is the summit of the road which leads the traveller from Trent to Verona; and, as he halts at the top of the zigzag, near the village of Rivoli, his eye sweeps over the winding gorge of the river beneath, the threatening mass of Monte Baldo on the north, and on the west of the village he gazes down on a natural depression which has been sharply furrowed by a torrent. The least experienced eye can see that the position is one of great strength. It is a veritable parade ground among the mountains, almost cut off from them by the ceaseless action of water, and destined for the defence of the plains of Italy. A small force posted at the head of the winding roadway can hold at bay an army toiling up from the valley; but, as at Thermopylae, the position is liable to be outflanked by an enterprising foe, who should scale the footpath leading over the western offshoots of Monte Baldo, and, fording the stream at its foot, should then advance eastwards against the village. This, in part, was Alvintzy's plan, and having nearly 28,000 men,[71] he doubted not that his enveloping tactics must capture Joubert's division of 10,000 men. So daunted was even this brave general by the superior force of his foes that he had ordered a retreat southwards when an aide-de-camp arrived at full gallop and ordered him to hold Rivoli at all costs. Bonaparte's arrival at 4 a.m. explained the order, and an attack made during the darkness wrested from the Austrians the chapel on the San Marco ridge which stands on the ridge above the zigzag track. The reflection of the Austrian watch-fires in the wintry sky showed him their general position. To an unskilled observer the wide sweep of the glare portended ruin for the French. To the eye of Bonaparte the sight brought hope. It proved that his foes were still bent on their old plan of enveloping him: and from information which he treacherously received from Alvintzy's staff he must have known that that commander had far fewer than the 45,000 men which he ascribed to him in bulletins.
[Illustration: NEIGHBOURHOOD OF RIVOLI.]
Yet the full dawn of that January day saw the Imperialists flushed with success, as their six separate columns drove in the French outposts and moved towards Rivoli. Of these, one was on the eastern side of the Adige and merely cannonaded across the valley: another column wound painfully with most of the artillery and cavalry along the western bank, making for the village of Incanale and the foot of the zigzag leading up to Rivoli: three others denied over Monte Baldo by difficult paths impassable to cannon: while the sixth and westernmost column, winding along the ridge near Lake Garda, likewise lacked the power which field-guns and horsemen would have added to its important turning movement. Never have natural obstacles told more potently on the fortunes of war than at Rivoli; for on the side where the assailants most needed horses and guns they could not be used; while on the eastern edge of their broken front their cannon and horse, crowded together in the valley of the Adige, had to climb the winding road under the plunging fire of the French infantry and artillery. Nevertheless, such was the ardour of the Austrian attack, that the tide of battle at first set strongly in their favour. Driving the French from the San Marco ridge and pressing their centre hard between Monte Baldo and Rivoli, they made it possible for their troops in the valley to struggle on towards the foot of the zigzag; and on the west their distant right wing was already beginning to threaten the French rear. Despite the arrival of Masséna's troops from Verona about 9 a.m., the republicans showed signs of unsteadiness. Joubert on the ground above the Adige, Berthier in the centre, and Masséna on the left, were gradually forced back. An Austrian column, advancing from the side of Monte Baldo by the narrow ravine, stole round the flank of a French regiment in front of Masséna's division, and by a vigorous charge sent it flying in a panic which promised to spread to another regiment thus uncovered. This was too much for the veteran, already dubbed "the spoilt child of victory "; he rushed to its captain, bitterly upbraided him and the other officers, and finally showered blows on them with the flat of his sword. Then, riding at full speed to two tried regiments of his own division, he ordered them to check the foe; and these invincible heroes promptly drove back the assailants. Even so, however, the valour of the best French regiments and the skill of Masséna, Berthier, and Joubert barely sufficed to hold back the onstreaming tide of white-coats opposite Rivoli.
Yet even at this crisis the commander, confident in his central position, and knowing his ability to ward off the encircling swoops of the Austrian eagle, maintained that calm demeanour which moved the wonder of smaller minds. His confidence in his seasoned troops was not misplaced. The Imperialists, overburdened by long marches and faint now for lack of food, could not maintain their first advantage. Some of their foremost troops, that had won the broken ground in front of St. Mark's Chapel, were suddenly charged by French horse; they fled in panic, crying out, "French cavalry!" and the space won was speedily abandoned to the tricolour. This sudden rebuff was to dash all their hopes of victory; for at that crisis of the day the chief Austrian column of nearly 8,000 men was struggling up the zigzag ascent leading from the valley of the Adige to the plateau, in the fond hope that their foes were by this time driven from the summit. Despite the terrible fire that tore their flanks, the Imperialists were clutching desperately at the plateau, when Bonaparte put forth his full striking power. He could now assail the crowded ranks of the doomed column in front and on both flanks. A charge of Leclerc's horse and of Joubert's infantry crushed its head; volleys of cannon and musketry from the plateau tore its sides; an ammunition wagon exploded in its midst; and the great constrictor forthwith writhed its bleeding coils back into the valley, where it lay crushed and helpless for the rest of the fight.
Animated by this lightning stroke of their commander, the French turned fiercely towards Monte Baldo and drove back their opponents into the depression at its foot. But already at their rear loud shouts warned them of a new danger. The western detachment of the Imperialists had meanwhile worked round their rear, and, ignorant of the fate of their comrades, believed that Bonaparte's army was caught in a trap. The eyes of all the French staff officers were now turned anxiously on their commander, who quietly remarked, "We have them now." He knew, in fact, that other French troops marching up from Verona would take these new foes in the rear; and though Junot and his horsemen failed to cut their way through so as to expedite their approach, yet speedily a French regiment burst through the encircling line and joined in the final attack which drove these last assailants from the heights south of Rivoli, and later on compelled them to surrender.
Thus closed the desperate battle of Rivoli (January 14th). Defects in the Austrian position and the opportune arrival of French reinforcements served to turn an Austrian success into a complete rout. Circumstances which to a civilian may seem singly to be of small account sufficed to tilt the trembling scales of warfare, and Alvintzy's army now reeled helplessly back into Tyrol with a total loss of 15,000 men and of nearly all its artillery and stores. Leaving Joubert to pursue it towards Trent, Bonaparte now flew southwards towards Mantua, whither Provera had cut his way. Again his untiring energy, his insatiable care for all probable contingencies, reaped a success which the ignorant may charge to the account of his fortune. Strengthening Augereau's division by light troops, he captured the whole of Provera's army at La Favorita, near the walls of Mantua (January 16th). The natural result of these two dazzling triumphs was the fall of the fortress for which the Emperor Francis had risked and lost five armies. Würmser surrendered Mantua on February 2nd with 18,000 men and immense supplies of arms and stores. The close of this wondrous campaign was graced by an act of clemency. Generous terms were accorded to the veteran marshal, whose fidelity to blundering councillors at Vienna had thrown up in brilliant relief the prudence, audacity, and resourcefulness of the young war-god.
It was now time to chastise the Pope for his support of the enemies of France. The Papalini proved to be contemptible as soldiers. They fled before the republicans, and a military promenade brought the invaders to Ancona, and then inland to Tolentino, where Pius VI. sued for peace. The resulting treaty signed at that place (February 19th) condemned the Holy See to close its ports to the allies, especially to the English; to acknowledge the acquisition of Avignon by France, and the establishment of the Cispadane Republic at Bologna, Ferrara, and the surrounding districts; to pay 30,000,000 francs to the French Government; and to surrender 100 works of art to the victorious republicans.
It is needless to describe the remaining stages in Bonaparte's campaign against Austria. Hitherto he had contended against fairly good, though discontented and discouraged troops, badly led, and hampered by the mountain barrier which separated them from their real base of operations. In the last part of the war he fought against troops demoralized by an almost unbroken chain of disasters. The Austrians were now led by a brave and intelligent general, the Archduke Charles; but he was hampered by rigorous instructions from Vienna, by senile and indolent generals, by the indignation or despair of the younger officers at the official favouritism which left them in obscurity, and by the apathy of soldiers who had lost heart. Neither his skill nor the natural strength of their positions in Friuli and Carinthia could avail against veterans flushed with victory and marshalled with unerring sagacity. The rest of the war only served to emphasize the truth of Napoleon's later statement, that the moral element constitutes three-fourths of an army's strength. The barriers offered by the River Tagliamento and the many commanding heights of the Carnic and the Noric Alps were as nothing to the triumphant republicans; and from the heights that guard the province of Styria, the genius of Napoleon flashed as a terrifying portent to the Court of Vienna and the potentates of Central Europe. When the tricolour standards were nearing the town of Leoben, the Emperor Francis sent envoys to sue for peace;[72] and the preliminaries signed there, within one hundred miles of the Austrian capital, closed the campaign which a year previously had opened with so little promise for the French on the narrow strip of land between the Maritime Alps and the petty township of Savona.
These brilliant results were due primarily to the consummate leadership of Bonaparte. His geographical instincts discerned the means of profiting by natural obstacles and of turning them when they seemed to screen his opponents. Prompt to divine their plans, he bewildered them by the audacity of his combinations, which overbore their columns with superior force at the very time when he seemed doomed to succumb. Genius so commanding had not been displayed even by Frederick or Marlborough. And yet these brilliant results could not have been achieved by an army which rarely exceeded 45,000 men without the strenuous bravery and tactical skill of the best generals of division, Augereau, Masséna, and Joubert, as well as of officers who had shown their worth in many a doubtful fight; Lannes, the hero of Lodi and Arcola; Marmont, noted for his daring advance of the guns at Castiglione; Victor, who justified his name by hard fighting at La Favorita; Murat, the beau sabreur, and Junot, both dashing cavalry generals; and many more whose daring earned them a soldier's death in order to gain glory for France and liberty for Italy. Still less ought the soldiery to be forgotten; those troops, whose tattered uniforms bespoke their ceaseless toils, who grumbled at the frequent lack of bread, but, as Masséna observed, never before a battle, who even in retreat never doubted the genius of their chief, and fiercely rallied at the longed-for sign of fighting. The source of this marvellous energy is not hard to discover. Their bravery was fed by that wellspring of hope which had made of France a nation of free men determined to free the millions beyond their frontiers. The French columns were "equality on the march"; and the soldiery, animated by this grand enthusiasm, found its militant embodiment in the great captain who seemed about to liberate Italy and Central Europe.
* * * * *
CHAPTER VII
LEOBEN TO CAMPO FORMIO
In signing the preliminaries of peace at Leoben, which formed in part the basis for the Treaty of Campo Formio, Bonaparte appears as a diplomatist of the first rank. He had already signed similar articles with the Court of Turin and with the Vatican. But such a transaction with the Emperor was infinitely more important than with the third-rate powers of the peninsula. He now essays his first flight to the highest levels of international diplomacy. In truth, his mental endowments, like those of many of the greatest generals, were no less adapted to success in the council-chamber than on the field of battle; for, indeed, the processes of thought and the methods of action are not dissimilar in the spheres of diplomacy and war. To evade obstacles on which an opponent relies, to multiply them in his path, to bewilder him by feints before overwhelming him by a crushing onset, these are the arts which yield success either to the negotiator or to the commander.
In imposing terms of peace on the Emperor at Leoben (April 18th, 1797), Bonaparte reduced the Directory, and its envoy, Clarke, who was absent in Italy, to a subordinate rôle. As commander-in-chief, he had power only to conclude a brief armistice, but now he signed the preliminaries of peace. His excuse to the Directory was ingenious. While admitting the irregularity of his conduct, he pleaded the isolated position of his army, and the absence of Clarke, and that, under the circumstances, his act had been merely "a military operation." He could also urge that he had in his rear a disaffected Venetia, and that he believed the French armies on the Rhine to be stationary and unable to cross that river. But the very tardy advent of Clarke on the scene strengthens the supposition that Bonaparte was at the time by no means loth to figure as the pacifier of the Continent. Had he known the whole truth, namely, that the French were gaining a battle on the east bank of the Rhine while the terms of peace were being signed at Leoben, he would most certainly have broken off the negotiations and have dictated harsher terms at the gates of Vienna. That was the vision which shone before his eyes three years previously, when he sketched to his friends at Nice the plan of campaign, beginning at Savona and ending before the Austrian capital; and great was his chagrin at hearing the tidings of Moreau's success on April 20th. The news reached him on his return from Leoben to Italy, when he was detained for a few hours by a sudden flood of the River Tagliamento. At once he determined to ride back and make some excuse for a rupture with Austria; and only the persistent remonstrances of Berthier turned him from this mad resolve, which would forthwith have exhibited him to the world as estimating more highly the youthful promptings of destiny than the honour of a French negotiator.
The terms which he had granted to the Emperor were lenient enough. The only definitive gain to France was the acquisition of the Austrian Netherlands (Belgium), for which troublesome possession the Emperor was to have compensation elsewhere. Nothing absolutely binding was said about the left, or west, bank of the Rhine, except that Austria recognized the "constitutional limits" of France, but reaffirmed the integrity of "The Empire."[73] These were contradictory statements; for France had declared the Rhine to be her natural boundary, and the old "Empire" included Belgium, Trèves, and Luxemburg. But, for the interpretation of these vague formularies, the following secret and all-important articles were appended. While the Emperor renounced that part of his Italian possessions which lay to the west of the Oglio, he was to receive all the mainland territories of Venice east of that river, including Dalmatia and Istria, Venice was also to cede her lands west of the Oglio to the French Government; and in return for these sacrifices she was to gain the three legations of Romagna, Ferrara, and Bologna—the very lands which Bonaparte had recently formed into the Cispadane Republic! For the rest, the Emperor would have to recognize the proposed Republic at Milan, as also that already existing at Modena, "compensation" being somewhere found for the deposed duke.
From the correspondence of Thugut, the Austrian Minister, it appears certain that Austria herself had looked forward to the partition of the Venetian mainland territories, and this was the scheme which Bonaparte actually proposed to her at Leoben. Still more extraordinary was his proposal to sacrifice, ostensibly to Venice but ultimately to Austria, the greater part of the Cispadane Republic. It is, indeed, inexplicable, except on the ground that his military position at Leoben was more brilliant than secure. His uneasiness about this article of the preliminaries is seen in his letter of April 22nd to the Directors, which explains that the preliminaries need not count for much. But most extraordinary of all was his procedure concerning the young Lombard Republic. He seems quite calmly to have discussed its retrocession to the Austrians, and that, too, after he had encouraged the Milanese to found a republic, and had declared that every French victory was "a line of the constitutional charter."[74] The most reasonable explanation is that Bonaparte over-estimated the military strength of Austria, and undervalued the energy of the men of Milan, Modena, and Bologna, of whose levies he spoke most contemptuously. Certain it is that he desired to disengage himself from their affairs so as to be free for the grander visions of oriental conquest that now haunted his imagination. Whatever were his motives in signing the preliminaries at Leoben, he speedily found means for their modification in the ever-enlarging area of negotiable lands.
It is now time to return to the affairs of Venice. For seven months the towns and villages of that republic had been a prey to pitiless warfare and systematic rapacity, a fate which the weak ruling oligarchy could neither avert nor avenge. In the western cities, Bergamo and Brescia, whose interests and feelings linked them with Milan rather than Venice, the populace desired an alliance with the nascent republic on the west and a severance from the gloomy despotism of the Queen of the Adriatic. Though glorious in her prime, she now governed with obscurantist methods inspired by fear of her weakness becoming manifest; and Bonaparte, tearing off the mask which hitherto had screened her dotage, left her despised by the more progressive of her own subjects. Even before he first entered the Venetian territory, he set forth to the Directory the facilities for plunder and partition which it offered. Referring to its reception of the Comte de Provence (the future Louis XVIII.) and the occupation of Peschiera by the Austrians, he wrote (June 6th, 1796):
"If your plan is to extract five or six million francs from Venice, I have expressly prepared for you this sort of rupture with her…. If you have intentions more pronounced, I think that you ought to continue this subject of contention, instruct me as to your desires, and wait for the favourable opportunity, which I will seize according to circumstances, for we must not have everybody on our hands at the same time."
The events which now transpired in Venetia gave him excuses for the projected partition. The weariness felt by the Brescians and Bergamesques for Venetian rule had been artfully played on by the Jacobins of Milan and by the French Generals Kilmaine and Landrieux; and an effort made by the Venetian officials to repress the growing discontent brought about disturbances in which some men of the "Lombard legion" were killed. The complicity of the French in the revolt is clearly established by the Milanese journals and by the fact that Landrieux forthwith accepted the command of the rebels at Bergamo and Brescia.[75] But while these cities espoused the Jacobin cause, most of the Venetian towns and all the peasantry remained faithful to the old Government. It was clear that a conflict must ensue, even if Bonaparte and some of his generals had not secretly worked to bring it about. That he and they did so work cannot now be disputed. The circle of proof is complete. The events at Brescia and Bergamo were part of a scheme for precipitating a rupture with Venice; and their success was so far assured that Bonaparte at Leoben secretly bargained away nearly the whole of the Venetian lands. Furthermore, a fortnight before the signing of these preliminaries, he had suborned a vile wretch, Salvatori by name, to issue a proclamation purporting to come from the Venetian authorities, which urged the people everywhere to rise and massacre the French. It was issued on April 5th, though it bore the date of March 20th. At once the Doge warned his people that it was a base fabrication, But the mischief had been done. On Easter Monday (April 17th) a chance affray in Verona let loose the passions which had been rising for months past: the populace rose in fury against the French detachment quartered on them: and all the soldiers who could not find shelter in the citadel, even the sick in the hospitals, fell victims to the craving for revenge for the humiliations and exactions of the last seven months.[76] Such was Easter-tide at Verona—les Pâques véronaises—an event that recalls the Sicilian Vespers of Palermo in its blind southern fury.
The finale somewhat exceeded Bonaparte's expectations, but he must have hailed it with a secret satisfaction. It gave him a good excuse for wholly extinguishing Venice as an independent power. According to the secret articles signed at Leoben, the city of Venice was to have retained her independence and gained the Legations. But her contumacy could now be chastised by annihilation. Venice could, in fact, indemnify the Hapsburgs for the further cessions which France exacted from them elsewhere; and in the process Bonaparte would free himself from the blame which attached to his hasty signature of the preliminaries at Leoben.[77] He was now determined to secure the Rhine frontier for France, to gain independence, under French tutelage, not only for the Lombard Republic, but also for Modena and the Legations. These were his aims during the negotiations to which he gave the full force of his intellect during the spring and summer of 1797.
The first thing was to pour French troops into Italy so as to extort better terms: the next was to declare war on Venice. For this there was now ample justification; for, apart from the massacre at Verona, another outrage had been perpetrated. A French corsair, which had persisted in anchoring in a forbidden part of the harbour of Venice, had been riddled by the batteries and captured. For this act, and for the outbreak at Verona, the Doge and Senate offered ample reparation: but Bonaparte refused to listen to these envoys, "dripping with French blood," and haughtily bade Venice evacuate her mainland territories.[78] For various reasons he decided to use guile rather than force. He found in Venice a secretary of the French legation, Villetard by name, who could be trusted dextrously to undermine the crumbling fabric of the oligarchy.[79] This man persuaded the terrified populace that nothing would appease the fury of the French general but the deposition of the existing oligarchy and the formation of a democratic municipality. The people and the patricians alike swallowed the bait; and the once haughty Senate tamely pronounced its own doom. Disorders naturally occurred on the downfall of the ancient oligarchy, especially when the new municipality ordered the removal of Venetian men-of-war into the hands of the French and the introduction of French troops by help of Venetian vessels. A mournful silence oppressed even the democrats when 5,000 French troops entered Venice on board the flotilla. The famous State, which for centuries had ruled the waters of the Levant, and had held the fierce Turks at bay, a people numbering 3,000,000 souls and boasting a revenue of 9,000,000 ducats, now struck not one blow against conquerors who came in the guise of liberators.
On the same day Bonaparte signed at Milan a treaty of alliance with the envoys of the new Venetian Government. His friendship was to be dearly bought. In secret articles, which were of more import than the vague professions of amity which filled the public document, it was stipulated that the French and Venetian Republics should come to an understanding as to the exchange of certain territories, that Venice should pay a contribution in money and in materials of war, should aid the French navy by furnishing three battleships and two frigates, and should enrich the museums of her benefactress by 20 paintings and 500 manuscripts. While he was signing these conditions of peace, the Directors were despatching from Paris a declaration of war against Venice. Their decision was already obsolete: it was founded on Bonaparte's despatch of April 30th; but in the interval their proconsul had wholly changed the situation by overthrowing the rule of the Doge and Senate, and by setting up a democracy, through which he could extract the wealth of that land. The Directors' declaration of war was accordingly stopped at Milan, and no more was heard of it. They were thus forcibly reminded of the truth of his previous warning that things would certainly go wrong unless they consulted him on all important details.[80]
This treaty of Milan was the fourth important convention concluded by the general, who, at the beginning of the campaign of 1796, had been forbidden even to sign an armistice without consulting Salicetti!
It was speedily followed by another, which in many respects redounds to the credit of the young conqueror. If his conduct towards Venice inspires loathing, his treatment of Genoa must excite surprise and admiration. Apart from one very natural outburst of spleen, it shows little of that harshness which might have been expected from the man who had looked on Genoa as the embodiment of mean despotism. Up to the summer of 1796 Bonaparte seems to have retained something of his old detestation of that republic; for at midsummer, when he was in the full career of his Italian conquests, he wrote to Faypoult, the French envoy at Genoa, urging him to keep open certain cases that were in dispute, and three weeks later he again wrote that the time for Genoa had not yet come. Any definite action against this wealthy city was, indeed, most undesirable during the campaign; for the bankers of Genoa supplied the French army with the sinews of war by means of secret loans, and their merchants were equally complaisant in regard to provisions. These services were appreciated by Bonaparte as much as they were resented by Nelson; and possibly the succour which Genoese money and shipping covertly rendered to the French expeditions for the recovery of Corsica may have helped to efface from Bonaparte's memory the associations clustering around the once-revered name of Paoli. From ill-concealed hostility he drifted into a position of tolerance and finally of friendship towards Genoa, provided that she became democratic. If her institutions could be assimilated to those of France, she might prove a valuable intermediary or ally.
The destruction of the Genoese oligarchy presented no great difficulties. Both Venice and Genoa had long outlived their power, and the persistent violation of their neutrality had robbed them of that last support of the weak, self-respect. The intrigues of Faypoult and Salicetti were undermining the influence of the Doge and Senate, when the news of the fall of the Venetian oligarchy spurred on the French party to action, But the Doge and Senate armed bands of mountaineers and fishermen who were hostile to change; and in a long and desperate conflict in the narrow streets of Genoa the democrats were completely worsted (May 23rd). The victors thereupon ransacked the houses of the opposing faction and found lists of names of those who were to have been proscribed, besides documents which revealed the complicity of the French agents in the rising. Bonaparte was enraged at the folly of the Genoese democrats, which deranged his plans. As he wrote to the Directory, if they had only remained quiet for a fortnight, the oligarchy would have collapsed from sheer weakness. The murder of a few Frenchmen and Milanese now gave him an excuse for intervention. He sent an aide-de-camp, Lavalette, charged with a vehement diatribe against the Doge and Senate, which lost nothing in its recital before that august body. At the close a few senators called out, "Let us fight": but the spirit of the Dorias flickered away with these protests; and the degenerate scions of mighty sires submitted to the insults of an aide-de-camp and the dictation of his master.
The fate of this ancient republic was decided by Bonaparte at the Castle of Montebello, near Milan, where he had already drawn up her future constitution. After brief conferences with the Genoese envoys, he signed with them the secret convention which placed their republic—soon to be renamed the Ligurian Republic—under the protection of France and substituted for the close patrician rule a moderate democracy. The fact is significant. His military instincts had now weaned him from the stiff Jacobinism of his youth; and, in conjunction with Faypoult and the envoys, he arranged that the legislative powers should be intrusted to two popularly elected chambers of 300 and 150 members, while the executive functions were to be discharged by twelve senators, presided over by a Doge; these officers were to be appointed by the chambers: for the rest, the principles of religious liberty and civic equality were recognized, and local self-government was amply provided for. Cynics may, of course, object that this excellent constitution was but a means of insuring French supremacy and of peacefully installing Bonaparte's regiments in a very important city; but the close of his intervention may be pronounced as creditable to his judgment as its results were salutary to Genoa. He even upbraided the demagogic party of that city for shivering in pieces the statue of Andrea Doria and suspending the fragments on some of the innumerable trees of liberty recently planted.
"Andrea Doria," he wrote, "was a great sailor and a great statesman. Aristocracy was liberty in his time. The whole of Europe envies your city the honour of having produced that celebrated man. You will, I doubt not, take pains to rear his statue again: I pray you to let me bear a part of the expense which that will entail, which I desire to share with those who are most zealous for the glory and welfare of your country."
In contrasting this wise and dignified conduct with the hatred which most Corsicans still cherished against Genoa, Bonaparte's greatness of soul becomes apparent and inspires the wish: Utinam semper sic fuisses!
Few periods of his life have been more crowded with momentous events than his sojourn at the Castle of Montebello in May-July, 1797. Besides completing the downfall of Venice and reinvigorating the life of Genoa, he was deeply concerned with the affairs of the Lombard or Cisalpine Republic, with his family concerns, with the consolidation of his own power in French politics, and with the Austrian negotiations. We will consider these affairs in the order here indicated.
The future of Lombardy had long been a matter of concern to Bonaparte. He knew that its people were the fittest in all Italy to benefit by constitutional rule, but it must be dependent on France. He felt little confidence in the Lombards if left to themselves, as is seen in his conversation with Melzi and Miot de Melito at the Castle of Montebello. He was in one of those humours, frequent at this time of dawning splendour, when confidence in his own genius betrayed him into quite piquant indiscretions. After referring to the Directory, he turned abruptly to Melzi, a Lombard nobleman:
"As for your country, Monsieur de Melzi, it possesses still fewer elements of republicanism than France, and can be managed more easily than any other. You know better than anyone that we shall do what we like with Italy. But the time has not yet come. We must give way to the fever of the moment. We are going to have one or two republics here of our own sort. Monge will arrange that for us."
He had some reason for distrusting the strength of the democrats in Italy. At the close of 1796 he had written that there were three parties in Lombardy, one which accepted French guidance, another which desired liberty even with some impatience, and a third faction, friendly to the Austrians: he encouraged the first, checked the second, and repressed the last. He now complained that the Cispadanes and Cisalpines had behaved very badly in their first elections, which had been conducted in his absence; for they had allowed clerical influence to override all French predilections. And, a little later, he wrote to Talleyrand that the genuine love of liberty was feeble in Italy, and that, as soon as French influences were withdrawn, the Italian Jacobins would be murdered by the populace. The sequel was to justify his misgivings, and therefore to refute the charges of those who see in his conduct respecting the Cisalpine Republic nothing but calculating egotism. The difficulty of freeing a populace that had learnt to hug its chains was so great that the temporary and partial success which his new creation achieved may be regarded as a proof of his political sagacity.
After long preparations by four committees, which Bonaparte kept at Milan closely engaged in the drafting of laws, the constitution of the Cisalpine Republic was completed. It was a miniature of that of France, and lest there should be any further mistakes in the elections, Bonaparte himself appointed, not only the five Directors and the Ministers whom they were to control, but even the 180 legislators, both Ancients and Juniors. In this strange fashion did democracy descend on Italy, not mainly as the work of the people, but at the behest of a great organizing genius. It is only fair to add that he summoned to the work of civic reconstruction many of the best intellects of Italy. He appointed a noble, Serbelloni, to be the first President of the Cisalpine Republic, and a scion of the august House of the Visconti was sent as its ambassador to Paris. Many able men that had left Lombardy during the Austrian occupation or the recent wars were attracted back by Bonaparte's politic clemency; and the festival of July 9th at Milan, which graced the inauguration of the new Government, presented a scene of civic joy to which that unhappy province had long been a stranger. A vast space was thronged with an enormous crowd which took up the words of the civic oath uttered by the President. The Archbishop of Milan celebrated Mass and blessed the banners of the National Guards; and the day closed with games, dances, and invocations to the memory of the Italians who had fought and died for their nascent liberties. Amidst all the vivas and the clash of bells Bonaparte took care to sound a sterner note. On that very day he ordered the suppression of a Milanese club which had indulged in Jacobinical extravagances, and he called on the people "to show to the world by their wisdom, energy, and by the good organization of their army, that modern Italy has not degenerated and is still worthy of liberty."
The contagion of Milanese enthusiasm spread rapidly. Some of the Venetian towns on the mainland now petitioned for union with the Cisalpine Republic; and the deputies of the Cispadane, who were present at the festival, urgently begged that their little State might enjoy the same privilege. Hitherto Bonaparte had refused these requests, lest he should hamper the negotiations with Austria, which were still tardily proceeding; but within a month their wish was gratified, and the Cispadane State was united to the larger and more vigorous republic north of the River Po, along with the important districts of Como, Bergamo, Brescia, Crema, and Peschiera. Disturbances in the Swiss district of the Valteline soon enabled Bonaparte to intervene on behalf of the oppressed peasants, and to merge this territory also in the Cisalpine Republic, which consequently stretched from the high Alps southward to Rimini, and from the Ticino on the west to the Mincio on the east.[81]
Already, during his sojourn at the Castle of Montebello, Bonaparte figured as the all-powerful proconsul of the French Republic. Indeed, all his surroundings—his retinue of complaisant generals, and the numerous envoys and agents who thronged his ante-chambers to beg an audience—befitted a Sulla or a Wallenstein, rather than a general of the regicide Republic. Three hundred Polish soldiers guarded the approaches to the castle; and semi-regal state was also observed in its spacious corridors and saloons. There were to be seen Italian nobles, literati, and artists, counting it the highest honour to visit the liberator of their land; and to them Bonaparte behaved with that mixture of affability and inner reserve, of seductive charm alternating with incisive cross-examination which proclaimed at once the versatility of his gifts, the keenness of his intellect, and his determination to gain social, as well as military and political, supremacy. And yet the occasional abruptness of his movements, and the strident tones of command lurking beneath his silkiest speech, now and again reminded beholders that he was of the camp rather than of the court. To his generals he was distant; for any fault even his favourite officers felt the full force of his anger; and aides-de-camp were not often invited to dine at his table. Indeed, he frequently dined before his retinue, almost in the custom of the old Kings of France.
With him was his mother, also his brothers, Joseph and Louis, whom he was rapidly advancing to fortune. There, too, were his sisters; Elise, proud and self-contained, who at this period married a noble but somewhat boorish Corsican, Bacciocchi; and Pauline, a charming girl of sixteen, whose hand the all-powerful brother offered to Marmont, to be by him unaccountably refused, owing, it would seem, to a prior attachment. This lively and luxurious young creature was not long to remain unwedded. The adjutant-general, Leclerc, became her suitor; and, despite his obscure birth and meagre talents, speedily gained her as his bride. Bonaparte granted her 40,000 francs as her dowry; and—significant fact—the nuptials were privately blessed by a priest in the chapel of the Palace of Montebello.
There, too, at Montebello was Josephine.
Certainly the Bonapartes were not happy in their loves: the one dark side to the young conqueror's life, all through this brilliant campaign, was the cruelty of his bride. From her side he had in March, 1796, torn himself away, distracted between his almost insane love for her and his determination to crush the chief enemy of France: to her he had written long and tender letters even amidst the superhuman activities of his campaign. Ten long despatches a day had not prevented him covering as many sheets of paper with protestations of devotion to her and with entreaties that she would likewise pour out her heart to him. Then came complaints, some tenderly pleading, others passionately bitter, of her cruelly rare and meagre replies. The sad truth, that Josephine cares much for his fame and little for him himself, that she delays coming to Italy, these and other afflicting details rend his heart. At last she comes to Milan, after a passionate outburst of weeping—at leaving her beloved Paris. In Italy she shows herself scarcely more than affectionate to her doting spouse. Marlborough's letters to his peevish duchess during the Blenheim campaign are not more crowded with maudlin curiosities than those of the fierce scourge of the Austrians to his heartless fair. He writes to her agonizingly, begging her to be less lovely, less gracious, less good—apparently in order that he may love her less madly: but she is never to be jealous, and, above all, never to weep: for her tears burn his blood: and he concludes by sending millions of kisses, and also to her dog! And this mad effusion came from the man whom the outside world took to be of steel-like coldness: yet his nature had this fevered, passionate side, just as the moon, where she faces the outer void, is compact of ice, but turns a front of molten granite to her blinding, all-compelling luminary.
Undoubtedly this blazing passion helped to spur on the lover to that terrific energy which makes the Italian campaign unique even amidst the Napoleonic wars. Beaulieu, Würmser, and Alvintzy were not rivals in war; they were tiresome hindrances to his unsated love. On the eve of one of his greatest triumphs he penned to her the following rhapsody:
"I am far from you, I seem to be surrounded by the blackest night: I need the lurid light of the thunder-bolts which we are about to hurl on our enemies to dispel the darkness into which your absence has plunged me. Josephine, you wept when we parted: you wept! At that thought all my being trembles. But be consoled! Würmser shall pay dearly for the tears which I have seen you shed."
What infatuation! to appease a woman's fancied grief, he will pile high the plains of Mincio with corpses, recking not of the thousand homes where bitter tears will flow. It is the apotheosis of sentimental egotism and social callousness. And yet this brain, with its moral vision hopelessly blurred, judged unerringly in its own peculiar plane. What power it must have possessed, that, unexhausted by the flames of love, it grasped infallibly the myriad problems of war, scanning them the more clearly, perchance, in the white heat of its own passion.
At last there came the time of fruition at Montebello: of fruition, but not of ease or full contentment; for not only did an average of eight despatches a day claim several hours, during which he jealously guarded his solitude; but Josephine's behaviour served to damp his ardour. As, during the time of absence, she had slighted his urgent entreaties for a daily letter, so too, during the sojourn at Montebello, she revealed the shallowness and frivolity of her being. Fêtes, balls, and receptions, provided they were enlivened by a light crackle of compliments from an admiring circle, pleased her more than the devotion of a genius. She had admitted, before marriage, that her "Creole nonchalance" shrank wearily away from his keen and ardent nature; and now, when torn away from the salons of Paris, she seems to have taken refuge in entertainments and lap-dogs.[82] Doubtless even at this period Josephine evinced something of that warm feeling which deepened with ripening years and lit up her later sorrows with a mild radiance; but her recent association with Madame Tallien and that giddy cohue had accentuated her habits of feline complaisance to all and sundry. Her facile fondnesses certainly welled forth far too widely to carve out a single channel of love and mingle with the deep torrent of Bonaparte's early passion. In time, therefore, his affections strayed into many other courses; and it would seen that even in the later part of this Italian epoch his conduct was irregular. For this Josephine had herself mainly to thank. At last she awakened to the real value and greatness of the love which her neglect had served to dull and tarnish, but then it was too late for complete reunion of souls: the Corsican eagle had by that time soared far beyond reach of her highest flutterings.[83]
At Montebello, as also at Passeriano, whither the Austrian negotiations were soon transferred, Bonaparte, though strictly maintaining the ceremonies of his proconsular court, yet showed the warmth of his social instincts. After the receptions of the day and the semi-public dinner, he loved to unbend in the evening. Sometimes, when Josephine formed a party of ladies for vingt-et-un, he would withdraw to a corner and indulge in the game of goose; and bystanders noted with amusement that his love of success led him to play tricks and cheat in order not to "fall into the pit." At other times, if the conversation languished, he proposed that each person should tell a story; and when no Boccaccio-like facility inspired the company, he sometimes launched out into one of those eerie and thrilling recitals, such as he must often have heard from the improvisatori of his native island. Bourrienne states that Bonaparte's realism required darkness and daggers for the full display of his gifts, and that the climax of his dramatic monologue was not seldom enhanced by the screams of the ladies, a consummation which gratified rather than perturbed the accomplished actor.
A survey of Bonaparte's multifarious activity in Italy enables the reader to realize something of the wonder and awe excited by his achievements. Like an Athena he leaped forth from the Revolution, fully armed for every kind of contest. His mental superiority impressed diplomats as his strategy baffled the Imperialist generals; and now he was to give further proofs of his astuteness by intervening in the internal affairs of France.
In order to understand Bonaparte's share in the coup d'état of Fructidor, we must briefly review the course of political events at Paris. At the time of the installation of the Directory the hope was widely cherished that the Revolution was now entirely a thing of the past. But the unrest of the time was seen in the renewal of the royalist revolts in the west, and in the communistic plot of Babeuf for the overthrow of the whole existing system of private property. The aims of these desperadoes were revealed by an accomplice; the ringleaders were arrested, and after a long trial Babeuf was guillotined and his confederates were transported (May, 1797). The disclosure of these ultra-revolutionary aims shocked not only the bourgeois, but even the peasants who were settled on the confiscated lands of the nobles and clergy. The very class which had given to the events of 1789 their irresistible momentum was now inclined to rest and be thankful; and in this swift revulsion of popular feeling the royalists began to gain ground. The elections for the renewal of a third part of the Councils resulted in large gains for them, and they could therefore somewhat influence the composition of the Directory by electing Barthélemy, a constitutional royalist. Still, he could not overbear the other four regicide Directors, even though one of these, Carnot, also favoured moderate opinions more and more. A crisis therefore rapidly developed between the still Jacobinical Directory and the two legislative Councils, in each of which the royalists, or moderates, had the upper hand. The aim of this majority was to strengthen the royalist elements in France by the repeal of many revolutionary laws. Their man of action was Pichegru, the conqueror of Holland, who, abjuring Jacobinism, now schemed with a club of royalists, which met at Clichy, on the outskirts of Paris. That their intrigues aimed at the restoration of the Bourbons had recently been proved. The French agents in Venice seized the Comte d'Entraigues, the confidante of the soi-disant Louis XVIII.; and his papers, when opened by Bonaparte, Clarke, and Berthier at Montebello, proved that there was a conspiracy in France for the recall of the Bourbons. With characteristic skill, Bonaparte held back these papers from the Directory until he had mastered the difficulties of the situation. As for the count, he released him; and in return for this signal act of clemency, then very unusual towards an émigré, he soon became the object of his misrepresentation and slander.
The political crisis became acute in July, when the majority of the Councils sought to force on the Directory Ministers who would favour moderate or royalist aims. Three Directors, Barras, La Réveillière-Lépeaux, and Rewbell, refused to listen to these behests, and insisted on the appointment of Jacobinical Ministers even in the teeth of a majority of the Councils. This defiance of the deputies of France was received with execration by most civilians, but with jubilant acclaim by the armies; for the soldiery, far removed from the partisan strifes of the capital, still retained their strongly republican opinions. The news that their conduct towards Venice was being sharply criticised by the moderates in Paris aroused their strongest feelings, military pride and democratic ardour.
Nevertheless, Bonaparte's conduct was eminently cautious and reserved. In the month of May he sent to Paris his most trusted aide-de-camp, Lavalette, instructing him to sound all parties, to hold aloof from all engagements, and to report to him dispassionately on the state of public opinion.[84] Lavalette judged the position of the Directory, or rather of the Triumvirate which swayed it, to be so precarious that he cautioned his chief against any definite espousal of its cause; and in June-July, 1797, Bonaparte almost ceased to correspond with the Directors except on Italian affairs, probably because he looked forward to their overthrow as an important step towards his own supremacy. There was, however, the possibility of a royalist reaction sweeping all before it in France and ranging the armies against the civil power. He therefore waited and watched, fully aware of the enhanced importance which an uncertain situation gives to the outsider who refuses to show his hand.