Whilst Paris, yet trembling, bowed under the bloody rule of the Convention, a spirit of opposition and horror began to stir in the provinces; fear of the terrorists, of the Convention, began to kindle the courage, to make defiance to these men of horror, and to put an end to terrorism. The province of Vendee, in her faithfulness and loyalty to the royal family, arose in deadly conflict against the republicans; the large cities of the south, with Toulon at their head, had shielded themselves from the horrors which the home government would have brought them, by uniting with the enemies who now from all sides pressed upon France.
Toulon gave itself up to the combined fleet of England and Spain. Marseilles, Lyons, and Nismes, contracted an alliance together, and declared their independence of the Convention and of the terrorists. Everywhere in all the cities and communities of the south the people rose up, and seditions and rebellions took place. Everywhere the Convention had to send its troops to re-establish peace by force, and to compel the people to submit to its rule. Whole army corps had to be raised to win back to the republic the rebellious cities, and only after hard fighting did General Carteaux subdue Marseilles.
But Toulon held out still, and within its protecting walls had the majority of the inhabitants of Marseilles taken refuge before the wrath of the Convention, which had already sent to the latter some of its representatives, to establish there the destructive work of the guillotine. Toulon offered them safety; it seemed impregnable, as much by its situation as by the number and strength of its defenders. It could also defy any siege, since the sea was open, and it could by this channel be provisioned through the English and Spanish fleet.
No one trembled before the little army of seventeen thousand men which, under General Carteaux, had invested Toulon.
But in this little army of the republicans was a young soldier whom yet none knew, none feared, but whose fame was soon to resound throughout the world, and before whom all Europe was soon tremblingly to bow.
This young man was Napoleon Bonaparte, the captain of artillery. He had come from Italy (where his regiment was) to France, to make there, by order of his general, some purchases for the park of artillery of the Italian army. But some of the people’s representatives had had an opportunity of recognizing the sharp eye and the military acquirements of the young captain of artillery; they interceded in his favor, and he was promoted to the army corps which was before Toulon, and at once sent in the capacity of assistant to General Carteaux, with whom also was Napoleon’s brother Joseph, as chief of the general’s staff.
From this moment the siege, which until now had not progressed favorably, was pushed on with renewed energy, and it was due to the cautious activity, the daring spirit of the captain of artillery, that marked advantages were gained over the English, and that from them many redoubts were taken, and the lines of the French drawn closer and closer to the besieged city.
But yet, after many months of siege, Toulon held out still. From the sea came provisions and ammunition, and on the land-side Toulon was protected against capture by a fort occupied by English troops, and which, on account of its impregnable position, was called “Little Gibraltar.” From this position hot-balls and howitzers had free range all over the seaboard, for this fort stood between the two harbors of the city and immediately opposite Toulon. The English, fully appreciating the importance of the position, had occupied it with six thousand men, and surrounded it with intrenchments.
It came to this, as Napoleon in a council of war declared to the general, that the English must be driven out of their position; then, when this fort was taken, in two days Toulon must yield.
The plan was decided upon, and from this moment the besiegers directed all their strength no more against Toulon, but against the important fort, “Little Gibraltar,” “for there,” as Napoleon said, “there was the key to Toulon.”
All Europe now watched with intense anxiety the events near Toulon; all France, which hitherto with divided sentiments had wished the victory to side now with the besieged, now with the besiegers, forgot its differences of opinion, and was united in the one wish to expel the hated enemy and rival, the English, from the French city, and to crown the efforts of the French army with victory.
The Convention, irritated that its orders should not have been immediately carried out, had in its despotic power recalled from his command General Carteaux, who could not succeed in capturing Toulon, and had appointed as chief of battalion the young captain of artillery, Napoleon Bonaparte, on account of his bravery in capturing some dangerous redoubts. The successor of Carteaux, the old General Dugommier, recognizing the superior mind of the young chief of battalion, willingly followed his plans, and was readily guided and led by the surer insight of the young man.
The position of new Gibraltar had to be conquered so as to secure the fall of Toulon; such was, such remained Napoleon’s unswerving judgment. No effort, no cost, no blood, was to be spared to attain this result. He placed new batteries against the fort; stormed the forts Malbosquet and Ronge; a terrible struggle ensued, in which the English General O’Hara was taken prisoner by the French, and the English had to leave the fort and retreat into the city.
The first great advantage was won, but Little Gibraltar remained still in the hands of the English, and Napoleon desired, and felt it as an obligation, to subdue it at any price.
But already the Convention began to be discouraged, and to lose energy, and the deputies of the people, Barras and Freron, who until now had remained with the besieging army, hastened to Paris to implore the Convention to give up the siege, and to recall the army from Toulon.
But before they reached Paris the matter was to be decided before Toulon. The fate of the Little Gibraltar was to be fulfilled; it was to be taken, or in the storming of it the French army was to perish.
Thousands of shells were thrown into the fort, thirty cannon thundered against it. Napoleon Bonaparte mixed with the artillerymen, encouraged by his bold words their activity, their energy, and their bravery, and pointed to them the spots where to direct their balls. Whilst he was in conversation with one of the cannoneers near whom he stood, a cannon-ball from the English tore away the head of the artilleryman who had just lifted up the match to fire his cannon.
Napoleon quietly took up the burning match out of the hand of the dead man, and discharged the gun. Then, with all the zeal and tact of an experienced cannoneer, he began to load the piece, to send forth its balls against the enemy and for many hours he remained at this post, until another artilleryman was found to relieve the chief of division. [Footnote: This brave action of Napoleon was to have for him evil results. The cannoneer, from whose hand he took the match, was suffering from the most distressing skin-disease, generally breaking out with the greatest violence in the hand. The match which the cannoneer had for hours held in his hand was yet warm with its pressure, and imparted to Napoleon’s hand the poison of the contagious disease. For years he had to endure the eruption, which he could not conquer, as he had conquered nations and princes, but to its destructive and painful power he had to subdue his body. The nervous agitations to which he was subject, the shrugging of his right shoulder, the white-greenish complexion of his face, the leanness of his body, were all consequences of this disease. It was only when Napoleon had become emperor, that Corvisart succeeded, by his eloquence, in persuading him to follow a regular course of treatment. This treatment cured him; his white-greenish complexion and his leanness disappeared. The nervous movement of the shoulder remained, and became a habit.—See “Memoires de Constant,” vol. i.]
But whilst Napoleon made himself a cannoneer in the service of his country, he remained at the same time the chief of division, whose attention was everywhere, whose eagle glance nothing escaped, and who knew how to improve every advantage.
A body of troops was at a distant point, and Bonaparte wanted to send them an important order. Whilst loading his cannon, he called aloud to an under-officer to whom he might dictate the dispatch. A young man hastened to the call, and said he was ready to write. Upon a mound of sand he unfolded his pocket-book, drew out of it a piece of paper, and began to write what Napoleon, with a voice above the cannon’s roar, was dictating to him. At this very moment, as the order was written, a cannon-ball fell quite near the officer, burrowing the ground, and scattering some of the light sand over the written paper. The young man raised his hat and made a bow to the cannon-ball, that buried itself in the sand.
“I thank you,” said he, “you have saved me sand for my paper.”
Napoleon smiled, and looked with a joyous, sympathizing glance at the young officer, whose handsome pleasing countenance was radiant with bold daring and harmless merriment.
“Now, I need a brave messenger to carry this order to that exposed detachment,” said Napoleon.
“I will be the messenger,” cried out the officer, eagerly.
“Well, I accept you, but you must remove your uniform, and put on a blouse, so as not to be too much exposed.”
“That I will not do,” exclaimed the young man. “I am no spy.”
“What! you refuse to obey?” asked Napoleon, threateningly.
“No, I refuse to assume a disguise,” answered the officer “I am ready to obey, and even to carry the order into the very hands of the devil. But with my uniform I go, otherwise those cursed Englishmen might well imagine that I am afraid of them.”
“But you imperil your life if you go in your glittering uniform.”
“My life does not belong to me,” cried out gayly the young soldier. “Who cares if I risk it? You will not be sorry about it, for you know me not, citizen-officer, and it is all the same to me. Shall I not go in my uniform? I should be delighted to encounter those English gentlemen, for, with my sword and the sprightly grains in my patron’s pocket, the conversation will not sleep, I vow. Now, then, shall I go, citizen-officer?”
“Go,” said Napoleon, smiling. “But you are wrong if you think I will not be sorry in case you pay this duty with your life. You are a brave fellow, and I love the brave. Go; but first tell me your name, that when you return I may tell General Dugommier what name he has to inscribe in his papers of recommendation for officers; that will be the reward for your message.”
“My name is Junot, citizen-officer,” exclaimed the young man as, swinging the paper in his hand, he darted away eagerly.
The roar of the cannon was still heard, when Napoleon’s messenger returned, after a few hours, and reported to him. The chief of division received him with a friendly motion of his head.
“Welcome, Junot,” said he. “I am glad to see you back, and that you have successfully accomplished your task. I must now make a change of position in yonder battallion. To-morrow I will give you your commission of lieutenant, citizen-soldier.”
“And to-day grant me a nobler reward, citizen-officer,” said the young man, tenderly; “give me your hand, and allow me to press it in mine.”
Napoleon, smiling, gave him his hand. The eyes of both young men met in radiant looks, and with these looks was sealed the covenant which united them both in a friendship enduring to the tomb. For not one of his companions-in-arms remained attached to Napoleon with so warm, true, nearly impassioned tenderness as Junot, and none of them was by the general, the consul, the emperor, more implicitly trusted, more heartily beloved than his Junot, whom he exalted to the ranks of general, governor of Lisbon, Duke d’Abrantes, who was one of the few to whom in his days of glory he allowed to speak to him in all truth, in all freedom, and without reserve.
But whilst the two young men were sealing this covenant of friendship with this look of spiritual recognition, the cannon was thundering forth on all sides. The earth trembled from the reports of the pieces; all the elements seemed unloosed; the storm howled as if to mingle the noise of human strife with the uproar of Nature; the sea dashed its frothy, mound-like waves with terrible noise on the shore; the rain poured down from the skies in immense torrents, and everything around was veiled in mists of dampness and smoke. And amid all this, crackled, thundered, and hissed the shells which were directed against Little Gibraltar, or whizzed from Toulon, to bring death and destruction among the besiegers.
Night sank down, and yet Little Gibraltar was not taken. “I am lost,” sighed General Dugommier. “I shall have to pay with my head, if we are forced to retreat.”
“Then we must go forward,” cried Bonaparte; “we must have Little Gibraltar.”
An hour after, a loud cry of victory announced to General Dugommier that the chief of division had reached his aim, that Little Gibraltar was captured by the French.
As the day began to dawn, the French had already captured two other forts; and Bonaparte roused all his energies to fire from Little Gibraltar upon the enemy’s fleet. But the English admiral, Lord Hood, knew very well the terrible danger to which he was exposed if he did not at once weigh anchor.
The chief of division had prophesied correctly: in Little Gibraltar was the key of Toulon; and since the French had now seized the keys, the English ships could no longer close the city against them. Toulon was lost—it had to surrender to the conquerors. [Footnote: Toulon fell on the 18th of December, 1793.]
It is true, defensive operations were still carried on, but Napoleon’s balls scattered death and ruin into the city; the bursting of shells brought destruction and suffering everywhere, and in the city as well as in the harbor columns of flames arose from houses and ships.
Toulon was subdued; and the chief of division, Napoleon Bonaparte, had achieved his first brilliant pass of arms before jubilant France and astonished Europe; he had made his name shine out from the obscurity of the past, and placed it on the pages of history.
The Convention showed itself thankful to the daring soldier, who had won such a brilliant victory alike over the foreign as well as over the internal enemies of the republic; and Napoleon Bonaparte, the chief of division, was now promoted to the generalship of division.
He accepted the nomination with a quiet smile. The wondrous brilliancy of his eyes betrayed only to a few friends and confidants the important resolves and thoughts which moved the soul of the young general.
In virtue of the order of the Convention, the newly-appointed General Bonaparte was to go to the army of the republic which was now stationed in Italy; and he received secret instructions from the Directory concerning Genoa. Bonaparte left Paris, to gather, as he hoped, fresh laurels and new victories.
On the 25th day of March, 1794. General Bonaparte entered the headquarters of the French army in Nice. He was welcomed with joy and marks of distinction, for the fame of his heroic deeds before Toulon had preceded him; and on Bonaparte’s pale, proud face, with its dark, brilliant eyes, was written that he was now come into Italy to add fresh laurels to the victor’s crown won before Toulon.
The old commander-in-chief of the French army, General Dumerbion, confined oftentimes to his bed through sickness, was very willing to be represented by General Bonaparte, and to place every thing in his hands; and the two representatives of the people, Ricord and Robespierre (the younger brother of the all-powerful dictator)—these two representatives in the army corps of Italy bound themselves in intimate friendship with the young general, who seemed to share their glowing enthusiasm for the republic, and their hatred against the monarchy and the aristocrats. They cherished, moreover, an unreserved confidence in the military capacities of young Bonaparte, and always gave to his plans their unconditional assent and approbation. Upon Napoleon’s suggestion batteries were erected on the coast of Provence for the security of the fleet and of trading-vessels; and when this had been accomplished, the general began to carry out the plan which he had laid before the representatives of the republic, and according to which the republican army, with its right and left wings advancing simultaneously on the sea-coast, was to march through the neutral territory of Genoa into Italy.
This plan of Bonaparte was crowned with the most unexpected success. Without observing the neutrality of Genoa, Generals Massena and Arena marched through the territory of the proud Italian republic, and thus began the bloody war which was to desolate the Italian soil for so many years.
Ever faithful to Bonaparte’s war-schemes, which the general-in-chief, Dumerbion, and the two representatives of the people, Ricord and Robespierre, had sanctioned, the French columns moved from the valleys, within whose depths they had so long and so uselessly shed their blood, up to the heights and conquered the fortresses which the King of Sardinia had built on the mountains for the protection of his frontiers. Thus Fort Mirabocco, on the pass of the Cross, fell into the hands of General Dumas, who then conquered the intrenched Mount Cenis; thus the pass of Tenda, with the fortress Saorgio, was captured by the French; and there, in the general depot of the Piedmontese army, they found sixty cannon and war materials of all kinds.
The French had celebrated their first victories in Italy, and both commanding officers of the fortresses of Mirabocco and Saorgio had to pay for these triumphs in Turin with the loss of their lives; whilst General Bonaparte, “as the one to whose well-matured plans and arrangements these brilliant results were due,” received from the Convention brilliant encomiums.
But suddenly the state of affairs assumed another shape, and at one blow all the hopes and plans of the young, victorious general were destroyed.
Maximilian Robespierre had fallen; with him fell the whole party; then fell his brother, who a short time before had returned to Paris, and had there endeavored to obtain from Maximilian new and more ample powers for Bonaparte, and even the appointment to the chief command of the army—there fell also Ricord, who had given to General Bonaparte the letter of secret instructions for energetic negotiations with the government of Genoa, and to carry out which instructions Bonaparte had at this time gone to that city.
As he was returning to his headquarters in Saona, from Paris had arrived the new representatives, who came to the army of Italy as delegates of the Convention, and were armed with full powers.
These representatives were Salicetti, Albitte, and Laporte. The first of these, a countryman of Bonaparte, had been thus far his friend and his party associate. He was in Corsica at the same time as Napoleon, in the year 1793; he had been, like his young friend, a member of the Jacobin Club of Ajaccio, and Salicetti’s speeches had not been inferior to those of Napoleon, either in wildness or in exalted republicanism.
But now Salicetti had become the representative of the moderate party; and it was highly important for him to establish himself securely in his new position, and to give to the Convention a proof of the firmness of his sentiments by manifesting the hatred which he had sworn to the terrorists, and to all those who, under the fallen regime, had obtained recognition and distinction.
General Bonaparte had been a friend of the young Robespierre; loudly and openly he had expressed his republican and democratic sentiments; he had been advanced under the administration of Robespierre, from simple lieutenant to general; he had been sent to Genoa, with secret instructions by the representatives of the Committee of Safety, made up of terrorists—all this was sufficient to make him appear suspicious to the moderate party, and to furnish Salicetti an opportunity to show himself a faithful partisan of the new system of moderation.
General Bonaparte was, by order of the representatives of the people, Salicetti and Albitte, arrested at his headquarters in Saona, because, as the warrant for arrest, signed by both representatives, asserted: “General Bonaparte had completely lost their confidence through his suspicious demeanor, and especially through the journey which he had lately made to Genoa.” The warrant of arrest furthermore ordered that General Bonaparte, whose effects should be sealed and his papers examined, was to be sent to Paris, under sure escort, and be brought for examination before the Committee of Safety.
If this order were carried into execution, then Bonaparte was lost; for, though Robespierre had fallen, yet with his fall the system of blood and terror had not been overthrown in Paris; it had only changed its name.
The terrorists, who now called themselves the moderates, exercised the same system of intimidation as their predecessors; and to be brought before the Committee of Safety, signified the same thing as to receive a death-warrant.
Bonaparte was lost, if it truly came to this, that he must be led to Paris.
This was what Junot, the present adjutant of Napoleon, and his faithful friend and companion, feared. It was therefore necessary to anticipate this order, and to procure freedom to Bonaparte.
A thousand schemes for the rescue of his beloved chief, crossed the soul of the young man. But how make them known to the general? how induce him to flee, since all approaches to him were forbidden? His zeal, his inventive friendship, succeeded at last in finding a means. One of the soldiers, who was placed as sentry at the door of the arrested general, was bribed by Junot; through him a letter from Junot reached Bonaparte’s hands, which laid before him a scheme of flight that the next night could be accomplished with Junot’s help.
Not far from Bonaparte’s dwelling Junot awaited the answer, and soon a soldier passed by and brought it to him.
This answer ran thus: “In the propositions you make, I acknowledge your deep friendship, my dear Junot; you are also conscious of the friendship I have consecrated to you for a long time, and I trust you have confidence in it.
“Man may do wrong toward me, my dear Junot; it is enough for me to be innocent; my conscience is the tribunal which I recognize as sole judge of my conduct.
“This conscience is quiet when I question it; do, therefore, nothing, if you do not wish to compromise me. Adieu, dear Junot. Farewell, and friendship.” [Footnote: Abrantes, “Memoires,” vol. i., p. 241.]
Meanwhile, notwithstanding his quiet conscience, Bonaparte was not willing to meet his fate passively and silently, and, perchance, it seemed to him that it was “not enough to be innocent,” so as to be saved from the guillotine. He therefore addressed a protest to both representatives of the people who had ordered his arrest, and this protest, which he dictated to his friend Junot, who had finally succeeded in coming to Bonaparte, is so extraordinary and so peculiar in its terseness of style, in its expressions of political sentiment; it furnishes so important a testimony of the republican democratic opinions of the young twenty-six-year-old general, that we cannot but give here this document.
Bonaparte then dictated to his friend Junot as follows:
“To the representatives Salicetti and Albitte:
“You have deprived me of my functions, you have arrested me and declared me suspected.
“I am, then, ruined without being condemned; or else, which is much more correct, I am condemned without being heard.
“In a revolutionary state exist two classes: the suspected and the patriots.
“When those of the first class are accused, they are treated as the common law of safety provides.
“The oppression of those of the second class is the ruin of public liberty. The judge must condemn only after mature deliberation, and when a series of unimpeachable facts reaches the guilty.
“To denounce a patriot as guilty is a condemnation which deprives him of what is most dear—confidence and esteem.
“In which class am I to be ranked?
“Have I not been, since the beginning of the revolution, faithful to its principles?
“Have I not always been seen at war with enemies at home, or as a soldier against the foreign foe?
“I have sacrificed my residence in my country and my property to the republic; I have lost all for her.
“By serving my country with some distinction at Toulon and in the Italian army, I have had my share in the laurels which that army has won at Saorgio, Queille, and Tanaro.
“At the time of the discovery of Robespierre’s conspiracy, my conduct was that of a man who is accustomed to recognize principles only.
“It is therefore impossible to refuse me the title of patriot.
“Why, then, am I declared suspect without being heard? Why am I arrested eight days after the news of the death of the tyrant?
“I am declared suspect, and my papers are sealed!
“The reverse ought to have taken place: my papers ought to have been unsealed; I ought to have been tried; explanations ought to have been sought for, and then I might have been declared suspect if there were sufficient motives for it.
“It is decided that I must go to Paris under a warrant of arrest which declares me suspect. In Paris they will conclude that the representatives have acted thus only after sufficient examination, and I shall be condemned with the sympathy which a man of that class deserves.
“Innocent, patriotic, slandered, whatever may be the measures which the committee take, I cannot complain.
“If three men were to declare that I have committed a crime, I could not complain if the jury should declare me guilty.
“Salicetti, you know me. Have you, during the five years of our acquaintance, found in my conduct any thing which could be suspected as against the revolution?
“Albitte, you know me not. No one can have given you convincing evidence against me. You have not heard me; you know, however, with what smoothness calumny oftentimes whispers.
“Must I then be taken for an enemy of my country? Must the patriots ruin, without any regard, a general who has not been entirely useless to the republic? Must the representatives place the government under the necessity of acting unjustly and impolitically?
“Mark my words; destroy the oppression which binds me down, and re-establish me in the esteem of the patriots.
“If, then, at some future hour, the wicked shall still long for my life, well, then I consider it of so little importance—I have so often despised it—yes, the mere thought that it can be useful to the country, enables me to bear its burden with courage.” [Footnote: Bourienne, “Memoires sur Napoleon,” etc., vol. i., p. 63.]
Whether these energetic protestations of Bonaparte, or whether some other motives, conduced to the result, Salicetti thought that with Napoleon’s arrest he had furnished sufficient proof of his patriotic sentiments; it seemed to him enough to have obscured the growing fame of the young general, and to have plunged back into obscurity and forgetfulness him whose first steps in life’s career promised such a radiant and glorious course!
It matters not, however, what circumstances may have wrought out; the representatives Salicetti and Albitte issued a decree in virtue of which General Bonaparte was, after mature consideration and thorough examination of his papers, declared innocent and free from all suspicion. Consequently, Bonaparte was temporarily set at liberty; but he was suspended from his command in the Italian army, and was recalled to Paris, there to be made acquainted with his future destination.
This destination was pointed out to him in a commission as brigadier-general of infantry in the province of Vendee, there to lead on the fratricidal strife against the fanatical Chouans, the faithful adherents of the king.
Bonaparte refused this offer—first, because it seemed to him an insulting request to ask him to fight against his own countrymen; and secondly, because he did not wish to enter the infantry service, but to remain in the artillery.
The Committee of Safety responded to this refusal of Bonaparte by striking his name from the list of generals appointed for promotion, because he had declined to go to the post assigned him.
This decision fell upon the ambitious, heroic young man like a thunderbolt. He had dreamed of brilliant war deeds, of laurels, of fame, of a glorious future, won for him by his own sword; and now, all at once, he saw himself dragged away from this luminous track of fame upon which he had so brilliantly entered—he saw himself thrust back into obscurity, forgetfulness, and inactivity.
A gloomy, misanthropic sentiment took possession of him; and, though a prophetic voice within said that the future still belonged to him, with its fame, its laurels, its victories, yet inactivity, care, and the wants of the present, hung with oppressive weight upon his mind.
He withdrew from all social joys and recreations, he avoided his acquaintances, and only to a few friends did he open his foreboding heart; only with these did he associate, and to them alone he made his complaints of broken hopes, of life’s career destroyed.
To these few friends, whom Bonaparte in his misfortune found faithful and unchanged, belonged the Ferment family, and above all belonged Junot, who had come to Paris at the same time as Bonaparte, and who, though the latter was dismissed from the service, continued to call himself the adjutant of General Bonaparte.
In the Permont family Napoleon was received with the same friendship and attention as in former days; Madame de Permont retained ever for the son of the friend of her youth, Letitia, a kindly smile, a genial sympathy, an intelligent appreciation of his plans and wishes; her husband manifested toward him all the interest of a parental regard; her son Albert was full of tenderness and admiration for him; and her younger daughter Laura jested and conversed with him as with a beloved brother.
In this house every thing seemed pleasant and friendly to Bonaparte; thither he came every day, and mixed with the social circles, which gathered in the evening in the drawing-rooms of the beautiful, witty Madame de Permont; and where men even of diverging political sentiments, aristocrats and ci-devants of the first water, were to be found. But Madame de Permont had forbidden all political discussion in her saloon; and General Bonaparte, now compelled to inactivity, dared no more show his anger against the Committee of Safety, or against the Convention, than the Count de Montmorency or any of the proud ladies of the former quarter of St. Germain.
Not only the inactivity to which he was condemned, not only the destruction of all his ambitious hopes, burdened the mind of Bonaparte, but also the material pressure under which he now and then found himself, and which seemed to him a shame and a humiliation. With gloomy grudge he gazed at those young elegants whom he met on the Boulevards in splendid toilet, on superb horses—at these incroyables who, in the first rays of the sun of peace, from the soil of the republic, yet moist with blood, had sprung up as so many mushrooms of divers colors and varied hues.
“And such men enjoy their happiness!” exclaimed Bonaparte, contemptuously, as once in the Champs Elysees he sat before a coffee-house, near one of those incroyables, and with violent emotion starting up, he pushed his seat back and nearly broke the feet of his exquisitely dressed neighbor.
To be forgotten, to be set in the background, to be limited in means, was always to him a source of anger, which manifested itself now in impassioned vehemence, now in vague, gloomy dreaminess, from which he would rise up again with some violent sarcasm or some epigrammatic remark.
But whilst he thus suffered, was in want, and had so much to endure, his mind and heart were always busy. His mind was framing new plans to bring to an end these days of inactivity, to open a new path of fame and glory; his heart dreamed of a sweet bliss, of another new love!
The object of this love was the sister of his brother’s wife, the young Desiree Clary. Joseph Bonaparte, who was now in Marseilles as war-commissioner, had married there one of the daughters of the rich merchant Clary; and her younger sister Desiree was the one to whom Napoleon had devoted his heart. The whole Bonaparte family was now in Marseilles, and had decided to make their permanent residence in France, as their return to Corsica was still impossible; for General Paoli, no longer able to hold the island, had called the English to his help, and the assembled Consulta, over which Paoli presided, had invited the King of England to become sovereign of the island. The French party, at whose head had been the Bonaparte family, was overcome, and could no longer lift up head or voice.
Bonaparte came often to Marseilles to visit his family, which consisted of his mother Letitia, her three daughters, her two younger sons, and her brother, the Abbe Fesch. There, he had seen every day, in the house of his brother, Desiree Clary, and the beautiful, charming maid had not failed to leave in the heart of the young general a deep impression. Desiree seemed to return this inclination, and a union of the two young lovers might soon have taken place, if fate, in the shape of accident, had not prevented it.
Joseph was sent by the Committee of Safety to Genoa, with instructions; his young wife and her sister Desiree accompanied him. Perhaps the new, variable impressions of the journey, perhaps her separation from Bonaparte, and her association with other officers less gloomy than the saturnine Napoleon, all this seemed to cool the love of Desiree Clary; she no more answered Napoleon’s letters, and, in writing to his brother Joseph, he made bitter complaints: “It seems that to reach Genoa the River Lethe must first be crossed, and therefore Desiree writes no more.” [Footnote: See “Memoires du Roi Joseph,” vol. i.]
The only confidant to whom Bonaparte imparted these heart-complaints, was Junot. He had for him no secrecy of his innermost and deepest inclinations; to him he complained with grave and impassioned words of Desiree’s changeableness; and Junot, whose worshipful love for his friend could not understand that any maiden, were she the most beautiful and glorious on earth, could ever slight the inclination of General Bonaparte, Junot shared his wrath against Desiree, who had begun the rupture between them by leaving unanswered two of Napoleon’s letters.
After having been angry and having complained in concert with Bonaparte, Junot’s turn to be confidential had come. Bewildered, and blushing like a young maid, he avowed to his dear general that he also loved, and that he could hope for happiness and joy only if Napoleon’s younger sister, the beautiful little Pauline, would be his wife.
Bonaparte listened to him with a frowning countenance, and when Junot ended by asking his mediation with Pauline’s mother, Napoleon asked in a grave tone, “But, what have you to live upon? Can you support Pauline? Can you, with her, establish a household which will be safe against want?”
Junot, radiant with joy, told him how, anticipating this question of Napoleon, he had written to his father, and had asked for information in regard to his means; and that his father had just now answered his questions, and had replied that for the present he could not give him anything, but that after his death the inheritance of his son would amount to twenty thousand francs.
“I shall be one day rich,” exclaimed Junot, gayly, as he handed to Napoleon the letter of his father, “for with my pay I will have an income of twelve hundred livres. My general, I beseech you, write to the Citoyenne Bonaparte; tell her that you have read the letter of my father, and say a good word in my favor.”
Bonaparte did not at once reply. He attentively read the letter of Junot, senior, then returned it to his friend, and with head sunk down upon his breast he stared gloomily, with contracted eyebrows.
“You answer not, general,” exclaimed Junot, in extreme anguish. “You do not wish to be my mediator?”
Bonaparte raised his head; his cheeks were paler than before, and a gloomy expression was in his eyes.
“I cannot write to my mother to make her this proposition,” said he, in a rough, severe tone. “That is impossible, my friend. You say that one day you will have an income of twelve hundred livres. That is, indeed, very fair, but you have them not now. Besides, your father’s health is remarkably good, and he will make you wait a long time. For the present you have nothing; for your lieutenant’s epaulets can be reckoned as nothing. As regards Pauline, she has not even that much. Let us then sum up: you have nothing; she has nothing! What is the total amount? Nothing. You cannot, therefore, be married now: let us wait. We shall, perhaps, friend, outlive these evil days. Yes, we shall outlive them, even if I have to become an exile, to seek for them in another portion of the world! Let us, then, wait!” [Footnote: Bonaparte’s words.—See Abrantes, “Memoires,” vol. i., p. 284.]
And a wondrous, mysterious brilliancy and flash filled the eyes of General Bonaparte, as with a commanding voice he repeated, “Let us wait!”
Was this one of those few and pregnant moments in which the mind with prophetic power gazes into the future? Had a corner of the veil which hid the future been lifted up before the glowing eagle-eye of Napoleon, and did he see the splendor and the glory of that future which were to be his? However great his imagination, however ambitious his dreams, however wide his hopes, yet they all were to be one day surpassed by the reality. For would he not have considered a madman him, who, at this hour, would have told him: “Smooth the furrows on your brow, Bonaparte; be not downcast about the present. You are now in want, you are thrust aside; forgetfulness and obscurity are now your lot; but be of good cheer, you will be emperor, and all Europe will lie trembling at your feet. You love the young Desiree Clary, and her indifference troubles you; but be of good cheer, you will one day marry the daughter of a Caesar, and the little Desiree, the daughter of a merchant from Marseilles, will one day be Sweden’s queen! You refuse to Junot, your friend, the gratification of his wishes, because he possesses nothing but his officer’s epaulets: but be of good cheer, for you will one day convert the little Lieutenant Junot into a duke, and give him a kingdom for a dowry! You feel downhearted and ashamed, because your sister Pauline is not rich, because she possesses nothing but her beauty and her name: but be of good cheer, she will one day be the wife of the wealthiest prince of Italy; all the treasures of art will be gathered in her palace, and yet she will be the most precious ornament of that palace!”
Surely the General Bonaparte would have laughed at the madman, who, in the year 1795, should have thus spoken to him—and yet a mere decade of years was to suffice for the realization of all these prophecies, and to turn the incredible into a reality.
The days of terror, and of blood, under which France has sighed so long, were not to end with the fall of Robespierre. Another enemy of the rest and peace of France had now made its entrance into Paris—hunger began to exercise its dreary rale of horror, and to fill the hearts of men with rage and despair.
Everywhere throughout France the crops had failed, and the republic had too much to do with the guillotine, with the political struggles in the interior, with the enemies on the frontier, she had been so busy with the heads of her children, that she could have no care for the welfare of their stomachs.
The corn-magazines were empty, and in the treasury of the republican government there was no money to buy grain in foreign markets. Very soon the want of bread, the cry for food, made itself felt everywhere; soon hunger goaded into new struggles of despair the poor Parisian people, already so weary with political storms, longing for rest, and exhausted by conflicts. Hunger drove them again into politics, hunger converted the women into demons, and their husbands into fanatical Jacobins. Every day, tumults and seditious gatherings took place in Paris; the murmuring and howling crowd threatened to rise up. Every day appeared at the bar of the Convention the sections of Paris, entreating with wild cries for a remedy for their distress. At every step in the streets one was met by intoxicated women, who tried to find oblivion of their hunger in wine, and to whom, notwithstanding their drunkenness, the consciousness of their calamity remained. These drunken women, with the gestures of madness, shouted: “Bread! give us bread! We had bread at least in the year ‘93! Bread! Down with the republic! Down with the Convention, which leaves us to starve!”
To these shouts responded other masses of the people: “Down with the constitutionalists! Long live the Mountain! Long live the Convention!”
Civil war, which in its exhaustion had remained subdued for a moment, threatened to break out with renewed rage, for the parties stood face to face in determined hostility, and “Down with the constitutionalists!—down with the republicans!” was the watchword of these parties.
For a moment it seemed as if the Mountain, as if the revolution, would regain the ascendency, as if the terrorists would once more seize the rudder which had slipped from their blood-stained hands. But the Convention, which for a time had remained undecided, trembling and vacillating, rose at length from its lethargy to firm, energetic measures, and came to the determination to restore peace at any price.
The people, stirred up by the terrorists, the furious men of the Mountain, had to be reduced to silence, and the cry, “Long live the constitution of ‘93!—down with the Convention!”—this cry, which every day rolled on through the streets of Paris like the vague thunderings of the war-drum,—had to be put down by armed force. Barrere, Collot d’Herbois, Billaud Varennes, the remnant of the sanguinary administration of Robespierre, the terrorists who excited the people against the Convention, who pressed on the Thermidorists, and wanted to occupy their place, these were the ones who with their adherents and friends threatened the Convention and imperilled its existence. The Convention rose up in its might and punished these leaders of sedition, so as through fear and horror to disperse the masses of the people.
Barrere, Collot d’Herbois, and Billaud Varennes, were arrested and sent to Cayenne; six of their friends, six republicans and terrorists, were also seized, and as they were convicted of forging plots against the Convention and the actual administration, they were sentenced to death. A seventh had also been at the head of this conspiracy; and this seventh one, who with the others had been sentenced to death, and whom the Committee of Safety had watched for everywhere, to bring down upon him the chastisement due, this seventh one was Salicetti—the same Salicetti who after the fall of Robespierre had arrested General Bonaparte as suspect. Bonaparte had never forgiven him, and though he often met him in the house of Madame de Permont, and appeared to be reconciled with him, yet he could not forget that he was the one who had stopped him in the midst of his course of fame, that it was he who had debarred him from his whole career.
“Salicetti has done me much harm,” said Bonaparte to Madame de Permont, and a strange look from his eyes met her face—“Salicetti has destroyed my future in its dawn. He has blighted my plans of fame in their bud. I repeat, he has done me much harm. He has been my evil spirit. I can never forget it,” but added he, thoughtfully, “I will now try to forgive.” [Footnote: Abrantes, vol. i, p. 300.]
And again a peculiar, searching look of his eyes met the face of Madame de Permont.
She, however, turned aside, she avoided his look, for she dared not tell him that Salicetti, for whom the Convention searched throughout Paris so as to bring upon him the execution of his death-warrant—that Salicetti, whom Bonaparte so fiercely hated, was hid a few steps from him in the little cabinet near the drawing-room.
Like Bonaparte, Salicetti was the countryman of Madame de Permont; in the days of his power, he had saved the husband and the son of Panonia from the persecution of the terrorists, and lie had now come to ask safety from those whom he had once saved.
Madame de Permont had not had the courage to refuse an asylum to Salicetti; she kept him secreted in her house for weeks; and during all these weeks, Bonaparte came daily to visit Madame de Permont and her children, and every day he turned the conversation upon Salicetti, and asked if they knew not yet where he was secreted. And every time, when Madame de Permont answered him in the negative, he gazed at her with a piercing look, and with his light, sarcastic smile.
Meanwhile Salicetti’s danger for himself, and those who secreted him, increased every day, and Madame de Permont resolved to quit Paris. The sickness of her husband, who was in Toulon, furnished her with the welcomed opportunity of a journey. She made known to the friends and acquaintances who visited her house, and especially to Bonaparte, that she had received a letter from the physician in Toulon, requesting her presence at her husband’s bed of sickness. Bonaparte read the letter, and again the same strange look met the face of Madame de Permont.
“It is, indeed, important,” said he, “that you should travel, and I advise you to do so as soon as possible. Fatal consequences might ensue to M. de Permont, were you to delay any longer in going to Toulon.”
Madame de Permont made, therefore, all her arrangements for this journey. Salicetti, disguised as a servant, was to accompany her. Bonaparte still came as usual every day, and took great interest in the preparations for her journey, and conversed with her in the most friendly and pleasant manner. On the day of departure, he saluted her most cordially, assured her of his true, unswerving attachment, and, with a final, significant look, expressed a wish that her journey might be accomplished without danger.
When Madame de Permont had overcome all difficulties, and she and her daughter had left Paris and passed the barriere, as the carriage rolled on without interruption (Salicetti, disguised as a servant, sitting near the postilion on the driver’s seat), the housemaid handed to her a letter which General Bonaparte had given her, with positive orders to hand it to her mistress only when they should be beyond the outer gates of Paris.
The letter ran thus: “I have never been deceived: I would seem to be in your estimation, if I did not tell you that, for the last twenty days, I knew that Salicetti was secreted in your house. Remember what I told you on the first day, Prairial, Madame de Permont—I had then the mental conviction of this secrecy. Now it is a matter of fact.—Salicetti, you see I could have returned to you the wrong which you perpetrated against me, and by so doing I should have revenged myself, whilst you wronged me without any offence on my part. Who plays at this moment the nobler part, you or I? Yes, I could have revenged myself, and I have not done it. You will, perhaps, say that your benefactress acted as a protecting shield. That is true, and it also is taken into consideration. Yet, even without this consideration, such as you were—alone, disarmed, sentenced—your head would even then have been sacred to me. Go, seek in peace a refuge where you can rise to nobler sentiments for your country. My mouth remains closed in reference to your name, and will no more utter it. Repent, and, above all things, do justice to my intentions. I deserve it, for they are noble and generous.
“Madame de Permont, my best wishes accompany you and your daughter. You are two frail beings, without protection. Providence and prayers will accompany you. Be prudent, and during your journey never stop in large towns. Farewell, and receive the assurance of my friendship.” [Footnote: Abrantes, “Memoires,” vol. i., p. 351.]
The nobility of mind which Bonaparte displayed toward his enemy was soon to receive its reward; for, whilst Salicetti, a fugitive, sick, and sentenced to death, was compelled to remain hidden, Bonaparte was emerging from the oblivion to which the ambitious zeal of Salicetti would have consigned him.
When Napoleon, dismissed from his position, arrived in Paris, and appealed to Aubry, the chief of the war department, to be re-established in his command, he was told: “Bonaparte is too young to command an army as general-in-chief;” and Bonaparte answered: “One soon becomes old on the battle-field, and I come from it.” [Footnote: Norvins, “Histoire de Napoleon,” vol. i., p. 60.]
But Aubry, in his functions of chief of the war department, was soon superseded by the representative Douclet de Ponte-Coulant, and this event gave to the position of the young general a different aspect. Ponte-Coulant had for some time followed with attention the course of the young general, whose military talents and warlike reputation had filled him with astonishment. He had especially been surprised at the plan for the conduct of the war and the conquest of Italy which Bonaparte had laid before the war committee. Now that Ponte-Coulant had been promoted to be chief of the war department, he sent for General Bonaparte, and attached him to the topographic committee, where the plans of campaigns were decided and the movements of each separate corps delineated.
The forgotten one, doomed to inactivity, General Napoleon Bonaparte, now arose from his obscurity, and before him again opened life, the world, and fame’s pathway, which was to lead him up to a throne. But the envy and jealousy of the party-men of the Convention ever threw obstacles before him on his glorious course, and the war-scheme which he now unfolded to the committee for the campaign did not receive the approbation of the successor of Ponte-Coulant in the war department, and it was thrust aside. A new political crisis was needed to place in the hands of Napoleon the command of the army, the ruling authority over France, and this crisis was at hand.
Paris, diseased, still bleeding in its innermost life with a thousand wounds, was devoured by hunger. The unfortunate people, wretched from want and pain, during many past years, were now driven to despair. The political party leaders understood but too well how to take advantage of this, and to prey upon it. The royalists were busy instilling into the people’s minds the idea that the return of the Bourbons would restore to miserable France peace and happiness. The terrorists told the people that the Convention was the sole obstacle to their rest and to their peace, that it was necessary to scatter it to the winds, and to re-establish the Constitution of 1793. The whole population of Paris was divided and broken into factions, struggling one against the other with infuriated passions. The royalists, strengthened by daily accessions of emigrants, who, under fictitious names and with false passports, returned to Paris to claim the benefit of the milder laws passed in their favor, constituted a formidable power in that city. Whole sections were devoted to them, and were secretly supplied by them with arms and provisions, so as finally to be prepared to act against the Convention. An occasion soon presented itself.
The Convention had, through eleven of its committee members, prepared a new constitution, and had laid it before the people for adoption or rejection, according to the majority of votes. The whole country, with the exception of Paris, was in favor of this new constitution—she alone in her popular assemblies rejected it, declared the Convention dissolved, and the armed sections arose to make new elections. The Convection declared these assemblies to be illegal, and ordered their dissolution. The armed sections made resistance, congregated together, and by force opposed the troops of the Convention—the National Guards—commanded by General Menou. On the 12th Vendemiaire all Paris was under arms again; barricades were thrown up by the people, who swore to die in their defence sooner than to submit to the will of the Convention; the noise of drums and trumpets was heard in every street; all the horrors and cruelties of a civil war once more filled the capital of the revolution, and the city was drunk with blood!
The people fought with the courage of despair, pressed on victoriously, and won from General Menou a few streets; whole battalions of the National Guards abandoned the troops of the Convention and went over to the sections. General Menou found himself in so dangerous a position as to be forced to conclude an armistice until the next day with the Section Lepelletier, which was opposed to him, up to which time the troops on either side were to suspend operations.
The Section Lepelletier declared itself at once en permanence, sent her delegates to all the other sections, and called upon “the sovereign people, whose rights the Convention wished to usurp,” to make a last and decisive struggle.
The Convention found itself in the most alarming position; it trembled for its very existence, and already in fancy saw again the days of terror, the guillotine rising and claiming for its first victims the heads of the members of the Convention. A pallid fear overspread all faces as constantly fresh news of the advance of the sections reached them, when General Menou sent news of the concluded armistice.
At this moment a pale young man rushed into the hall of session, and with glowing eloquence and persuasive manner entreated the Convention not to accept the armistice, not to give time to the sections to increase their strength, nor to recognize them as a hostile power to war against the government.
This pale young man—whose impassioned language filled the minds of all his hearers with animosity against General Menou, and with fresh courage and desire to fight—was Napoleon Bonaparte.
After he had spoken, other representatives rushed to the tribune, to make propositions to the Assembly, all their motions converging to the same end—all desired to have General Menou placed under arrest, and Bonaparte appointed in his place, and intrusted with the defence of the Convention and of the legislative power against the people.
The Assembly accepted this motion, and appointed Bonaparte commanding officer of the troops of the Convention, and, for form’s sake, named Barras, president of the Convention, commander-in-chief.
Bonaparte accepted the commission; and now, at last, after so much waiting, so many painful months of inactivity, he found himself called to action; he stood again at the head of an army, however small it might be, and could again lift up the sword as the signal for the march to the fight.
It is true this fight had a sad, horrible purpose; it was directed against the people, against the sections which declared themselves to be the committee of the sovereign people, and that they were fighting the holy fight of freedom against those who usurped their rights.
General Bonaparte had refused to go to Vendee, because he wished not to fight against his own countrymen, and could not take part in a civil war; but now, at this hour of extreme peril, he placed himself in opposition to the people’s sovereignty, and assumed command over the troops of the Convention, whose mission it was to subdue the people.
Every thing now assumed a more earnest attitude; during the night the newly-appointed commanding officer sent three hundred chasseurs, under Murat, to bring to Paris forty cannon from the park of artillery in Sablons, and, when the morning of the 13th Vendemiaire began to dawn, the pieces were already in position in the court of the Tuileries and pointed against the people. Besides which, General Bonaparte had taken advantage of the night to occupy all the important points and places, and to arm them; even into the hall of session of the Convention he ordered arms and ammunition to be brought, that the representatives might defend themselves, in case they were pressed upon by the people.
As the sun of the 13th Vendemiaire rose over Paris, a terrible street-fight began—the fight of the sovereign people against the Convention. It was carried on by both sides with the utmost bitterness and fierceness, the sections rushing with fanatic courage, with all the energy of hatred, against these soldiers who dared slay their brothers and bind their liberty in chains; the soldiers of the Convention fought with all the bitterness which the consciousness of their hated position instilled into them.
The cannon thundered in every street and mingled their sounds with the cries of rage from the sectionnaires—the howlings of the women, the whiz of the howitzers, the loud clangs of the bells, which incessantly called the people to arms. Streams of blood flowed again through the streets; everywhere, near the scattered barricades, near the houses captured by storm, lay bloody corpses; everywhere resounded the cries of the dying, the shrieks and groans of the wounded, the wild shouts of the combatants. In the Church of St. Roche, and in the Theatre Francaise, the sectionnaires, driven from the neighboring streets by the troops of General Bonaparte, had gathered together and endeavored to defend these places with the courage of despair. But the howitzers of Bonaparte soon scattered them, and the contest was decided.
The sections were defeated; the people, conquered by the Convention, had to recognize its authority; they were no more the sovereigns of France; they had found a ruler before whom they must bow.
This ruler was yet called the Convention, but behind the Convention stood another ruler—General Bonaparte!
It was he who had defeated the people, who had secured the authority to the Convention, and it was therefore natural that it should be thankful and exhibit its gratitude. General Bonaparte, in acknowledgment for the great services done to his country, was by the Convention appointed commander-in-chief of the army of the interior, and thus suddenly he saw himself raised from degrading obscurity to pomp and influence, surrounded by a brilliant staff, installed in a handsome palace by virtue of his office as chief officer, entitled to and justified in maintaining an establishment wherein to represent worthily the dignity of his new position.
The 13th Vendemiaire, which dethroned the sovereign people, brought General Bonaparte a step nearer to the throne.