From a lithograph by Raffet.
His fertility in stratagem, his rapidity of action, his audacity in attack, bewildered and demoralized the enemy, but it raised the enthusiasm of his imaginative Southern troops to the highest pitch.
He insisted in this campaign on one other rule: “Unity of command is necessary to assure success.” After his defeat of the Piedmontese, the Directory ordered him, May 7, 1796, to divide his command with Kellermann. Napoleon answered:
“I believe it most impolitic to divide the army of Italy in two parts. It is quite as much against the interests of the republic to place two different generals over it....
“A single general is not only necessary, but also it is essential that nothing trouble him in his march and operations. I have conducted this campaign without consulting any one. I should have done nothing of value if I had been obliged to reconcile my plans with those of another. I have gained advantage over superior forces and when stripped of everything myself, because persuaded that your confidence was in me. My action has been as prompt as my thought.
“If you impose hindrances of all sorts upon me, if I must refer every step to government commissioners, if they have the right to change my movements, of taking from me or of sending me troops, expect no more of any value. If you enfeeble your means by dividing your forces, if you break the unity of military thought in Italy, I tell you sorrowfully you will lose the happiest opportunity of imposing laws on Italy.
“In the condition of the affairs of the republic in Italy, it is indispensable that you have a general that has your entire confidence. If it is not I, I am sorry for it, but I shall redouble my zeal to merit your esteem in the post you confide to me. Each one has his own way of carrying on war. General Kellermann has more experience and will do it better than I, but both together will do it very badly.
“I can only render the services essential to the country when invested entirely and absolutely with your confidence.”
He remained in charge, and throughout the rest of the campaign continued to act more and more independently of the Directory, even dictating terms of peace to please himself.
It was in this Italian campaign that the almost superstitious adoration which Napoleon’s soldiers and most of his generals felt for him began. Brilliant generalship was not the only reason for this. It was due largely to his personal courage, which they had discovered at Lodi. A charge had been ordered across a wooden bridge swept by thirty pieces of cannon, and beyond was the Austrian army. The men hesitated. Napoleon sprang to their head and led them into the thickest of the fire. From that day he was known among them as the “Little Corporal.” He had won them by the quality which appeals most deeply to a soldier in the ranks—contempt of death. Such was their devotion to him that they gladly exposed their lives if they saw him in danger. There were several such cases in the battle of Arcola. The first day, when Bonaparte was exposing himself in an advance, his aide-de-camp, Colonel Muiron, saw that he was in imminent danger. Throwing himself before Bonaparte, the colonel covered him with his body, receiving a wound which was destined for the general. The brave fellow’s blood spurted into Bonaparte’s face. He literally gave his life to save his commander’s. The same day, in a final effort to take Arcola, Bonaparte seized a flag, rushed on the bridge, and planted it there. His column reached the middle of the bridge, but there it was broken by the enemy’s flanking fire. The grenadiers at the head, finding themselves deserted by the rear, were compelled to retreat; but, critical as their position was, they refused to abandon their general. They seized him by his arms, by his clothes, and dragged him with them through shot and smoke. When one fell out wounded, another pressed to his place. Precipitated into the morass, Bonaparte sank. The enemy were surrounding him when the grenadiers perceived his danger. A cry was raised, “Forward, soldiers, to save the General!” and immediately they fell upon the Austrians with such fury that they drove them off, dragged out their hero, and bore him to a safe place.
His addresses never failed to stir them to action and enthusiasm. They were oratorical, prophetic, and abounded in phrases which the soldiers never forgot. Such was his address at Milan:
“Soldiers! you have precipitated yourselves like a torrent from the summit of the Apennines; you have driven back and dispersed all that opposed your march. Piedmont, liberated from Austrian tyranny, has yielded to her natural sentiments of peace and amity towards France. Milan is yours, and the Republican flag floats throughout Lombardy, while the Dukes of Modena and Parma owe their political existence solely to your generosity. The army which so haughtily menaced you, finds no barrier to secure it from your courage. The Po, the Ticino, and the Adda have been unable to arrest your courage for a single day. Those boasted ramparts of Italy proved insufficient. You have surmounted them as rapidly as you cleared the Apennines. So much success has diffused joy through the bosom of your country. Yes, soldiers, you have done well; but is there nothing more for you to accomplish? Shall it be said of us that we knew how to conquer, but knew not how to profit by victory? Shall posterity reproach us with having found a Capua in Lombardy? But I see you rush to arms; unmanly repose wearies you, and the days lost to glory are lost to happiness.
“Let us set forward. We have still forced marches to perform, enemies to conquer, laurels to gather, and injuries to avenge. Let those tremble who have whetted the poniards of civil war in France; who have, like dastards, assassinated our ministers, and burned our ships in Toulon. The hour of vengeance is arrived, but let the people be tranquil. We are the friends of all nations, particularly the descendants of the Brutuses, the Scipios, and those illustrious persons we have chosen for our models. To restore the Capitol, replace with honor the statues of the heroes who rendered it renowned, and rouse the Roman people, become torpid by so many ages of slavery—shall, will, be the fruit of your victories. You will then return to your homes, and your fellow-citizens when pointing to you will say, ‘He was of the army of Italy.’”
Such was his address in March, before the final campaign against the Austrians:
Engraved by Bartolozzi, R.A., an Italian engraver, resident of England, after the portrait of Appiani.
“You have been victorious in fourteen pitched battles and sixty-six combats; you have taken one hundred thousand prisoners, five hundred pieces of large cannon and two thousand pieces of smaller, four equipages for bridge pontoons. The country has nourished you, paid you during your campaign, and you have beside that sent thirty millions from the public treasury to Paris. You have enriched the Museum of Paris with three hundred chefs-d’oeuvre of ancient and modern Italy, which it has taken thirty ages to produce. You have conquered the most beautiful country of Europe. The French colors float for the first time upon the borders of the Adriatic. The kings of Sardinia and Naples, the Pope, the Duke of Parma have become allies. You have chased the English from Leghorn, Genoa, and Corsica. You have yet to march against the Emperor of Austria.”
His approval was their greatest joy. Let him speak a word of praise to a regiment, and they embroidered it on their banners. “I was at ease, the Thirty-second was there,” was on the flag of that regiment. Over the Fifty-seventh floated a name Napoleon had called them by, “The terrible Fifty-seventh.”
His displeasure was a greater spur than his approval. He said to a corps which had retreated in disorder: “Soldiers, you have displeased me. You have shown neither courage nor constancy, but have yielded positions where a handful of men might have defied an army. You are no longer French soldiers. Let it be written on their colors, ‘They no longer form part of the Army of Italy.’” A veteran pleaded that they be placed in the van, and during the rest of the campaign no regiment was more distinguished.
The effect of his genius was as great on his generals as on his troops. They were dazzled by his stratagems and manœuvres, inspired by his imagination. “There was so much of the future in him,” is Marmont’s expressive explanation. They could believe anything of him. A remarkable set of men they were to have as followers and friends—Augereau, Masséna, Berthier, Marmont, Junot.
The people and the government in Paris had begun to believe in him, as did the Army of Italy. He not only sent flags and reports of victory; he sent money and works of art. Impoverished as the Directory was, the sums which came from Italy were a reason for not interfering with the high hand the young general carried in his campaigns and treaties.
Never before had France received such letters from a general. Now he announces that he has sent “twenty first masters, from Correggio to Michael Angelo;” now, “a dozen millions of money;” now, two or three millions in jewels and diamonds to be sold in Paris. In return he asks only for men and officers “who have fire and a firm resolution not to make learned retreats.”
The entry into Paris of the first art acquisitions made a profound impression on the people:
“The procession of enormous cars, drawn by richly caparisoned horses, was divided into four sections. First came trunks filled with books, manuscripts, ... including the antiques of Josephus, on papyrus, with works in the handwriting of Galileo.... Then followed collections of mineral products.... For the occasion were added wagons laden with iron cages containing lions, tigers, panthers, over which waved enormous palm branches and all kinds of exotic shrubs. Afterwards rolled along chariots bearing pictures carefully packed, but with the names of the most important inscribed in large letters on the outside, as, The Transfiguration, by Raphael; The Christ, by Titian. The number was great, the value greater. When these trophies had passed, amid the applause of an excited crowd, a heavy rumbling announced the approach of massive carts bearing statues and marble groups: the Apollo Belvidere; the Nine Muses; the Laocoön.... The Venus de Medici was eventually added, decked with bouquets, crowns of flowers, flags taken from the enemy, and French, Italian, and Greek inscriptions. Detachments of cavalry and infantry, colors flying, drums beating, music playing, marched at intervals; the members of the newly established Institute fell into line; artists and savants; and the singers of the theatres made the air ring with national hymns. This procession marched through all Paris, and at the Champ de Mars defiled before the five members of the Directory, surrounded by their subordinate officers.”
The practice of sending home works of art, begun in the Italian campaign, Napoleon continued throughout his military career, and the art of France owes much to the education thus given the artists of the first part of this century. His agents ransacked Italy, Spain, Germany, and Flanders for chefs-d’oeuvre. When entering a country one of the first things he did was to collect information about its chief art objects, in order to demand them in case of victory, for it was by treaty that they were usually obtained. Among the works of art which Napoleon sent to Paris were twenty-five Raphaels, twenty-three Titians, fifty-three Rubenses, thirty-three Van Dykes, thirty-one Rembrandts.
In Italy rose Napoleon’s “star,” that mysterious guide which he followed from Lodi to Waterloo. Here was born that faith in him and his future, that belief that he “marched under the protection of the goddess of fortune and of war,” that confidence that he was endowed with a “good genius.”
He called Lodi the birthplace of his faith. “Vendémiaire and even Montenotte did not make me believe myself a superior man. It was only after Lodi that it came into my head that I could become a decisive actor on our political field. Then was born the first spark of high ambition.”
Trained in a religion full of mysticism, taught to believe in signs, guided by a “star,” there is a tinge of superstition throughout his active, practical, hardworking life. Marmont tells that one day while in Italy the glass over the portrait of his wife, which he always wore, was broken.
“He turned frightfully pale, and the impression upon him was most sorrowful. ‘Marmont,’ he said, ‘my wife is very ill or she is unfaithful.’” There are many similar anecdotes to show his dependence upon and confidence in omens.
In a campaign of such achievements as that in Italy there seems to be no time for love, and yet love was never more imperative, more absorbing, in Napoleon’s life than during this period.
“Engraved by Henry Richter from the celebrated bust by Ceracchi, lately brought from Paris and now in his possession. Published June 1, 1801, by H. Richter, No. 26 Newman Street, Oxford Street.” This bust was made in the Italian campaign by Ceracchi, a Corsican working in Rome. Ceracchi left Rome in 1799 to escape punishment for taking part in an insurrection in the city, and went to Paris, where he hoped to receive aid from the First Consul. He made the busts of several generals—Berthier, Masséna, and Bernadotte—but as orders did not multiply, and Napoleon did nothing for him, he became incensed against him, and took part in a plot to assassinate the First Consul at the opera, the 18th Brumaire, 1801. Arrested on his way to the loge in the opera, he was executed soon after.
“Oh, my adorable wife,” he wrote Josephine in April, “I do not know what fate awaits me, but if it keeps me longer from you, I shall not be able to endure it; my courage will not hold out to that point. There was a time when I was proud of my courage; and when I thought of the harm that men might do me, of the lot that my destiny might reserve for me, I looked at the most terrible misfortunes without a quiver, with no surprise. But now, the thought that my Josephine may be in trouble, that she may be ill, and, above all, the cruel, fatal thought that she may love me less, inflicts torture in my soul, stops the beating of my heart, makes me sad and dejected, robs me of even the courage of fury and despair. I often used to say, ‘Man can do no harm to one who is willing to die;’ but now, to die without being loved by you, to die without this certainty, is the torture of hell; it is the vivid and crushing image of total annihilation. It seems to me as if I were choking. My only companion, you who have been chosen by fate to make with me the painful journey of life, the day when I shall no longer possess your heart will be that when for me the world shall have lost all warmth and all its vegetation.... I will stop, my sweet pet; my soul is sad. I am very tired, my mind is worn out, I am sick of men. I have good reason for hating them. They separate me from my love.”
Josephine was indifferent to this strong passion. “How queer Bonaparte is!” she said coldly at the evidences of his affection which he poured upon her; and when, after a few weeks separation, he began to implore her to join him she hesitated, made excuses, tried in every possible way to evade his wish. It was not strange that a woman of her indolent nature, loving flattery, having no passion but for amusement, reckless expenditure, and her own ease, should prefer life in Paris. There she shared with Madame Tallien the adoration which the Parisian world is always bestowing on some fair woman. At opera and ball she was the centre of attraction; even in the street the people knew her. Notre Dame des Victoires was the name they gave her.
In desperation at her indifference, Napoleon finally wrote her, in June, from Tortona:
“My life is a perpetual nightmare. A black presentiment makes breathing difficult. I am no longer alive; I have lost more than life, more than happiness, more than peace; I am almost without hope. I am sending you a courier. He will stay only four hours in Paris, and then will bring me your answer. Write to me ten pages; that is the only thing that can console me in the least. You are ill; you love me; I have distressed you; you are with child; and I do not see you.... I have treated you so ill that I do not know how to set myself right in your eyes. I have been blaming you for staying in Paris, and you have been ill there. Forgive me, my dear; the love with which you have filled me has robbed me of my reason, and I shall never recover it. It is a malady from which there is no recovery. My forebodings are so gloomy that all I ask is to see you, to hold you in my arms for two hours, and that we may die together. Who is taking care of you? I suppose that you have sent for Hortense; I love the dear child a thousand times better since I think that she may console you a little. As for me, I am without consolation, rest, and hope until I see again the messenger whom I am sending to you, and until you explain to me in a long letter just what is the matter with you, and how serious it is. If there were any danger, I warn you that I should start at once for Paris.... You! you!—and the rest of the world will not exist for me any more than if it had been annihilated. I care for honor because you care for it; for victory, because it brings you pleasure; otherwise, I should abandon everything to throw myself at your feet.”
After this letter Josephine consented to go to Italy, but she left Paris weeping as if going to her execution. Once at Milan, where she held almost a court, she recovered her gaiety, and the two were very happy for a time. But it did not last. Napoleon, obliged to be on the march, would implore Josephine to come to him here and there, and once she narrowly escaped with her life when trying to get away from the army.
Wherever she was installed she had a circle of adorers about her, and as a result she neglected writing to her husband. Reproaches and entreaties filled his letters. He begged her for only a line, and he implored her that she be less cold.
“Your letters are as cold as fifty years of age; one would think they had been written after we had been married fifteen years. They are full of the friendliness and feelings of life’s winter,... What more can you do to distress me? Stop loving me? That you have already done. Hate me? Well, I wish you would; everything degrades me except hatred; but indifference, with a calm pulse, fixed eyes, monotonous walk!... A thousand kisses, tender, like my heart.”
It was not merely indolence and indifference that caused Josephine’s neglect. It was coquetry frequently, and Napoleon, informed by his couriers as to whom she received at Milan or Genoa, and of the pleasures she enjoyed, was jealous with all the force of his nature. More than one young officer who dared pay homage to Josephine in this campaign was banished “by order of the commander-in-chief.” Reaching Milan once, unexpectedly, he found her gone. His disappointment was bitter.
“I reached Milan, rushed to your rooms, having thrown up everything to see you, to press you to my heart—you were not there; you are traveling about from one town to another, amusing yourself with balls.... My unhappiness is inconceivable.... Don’t put yourself out; pursue your pleasure; happiness is made for you.”
It was between such extremes of triumphant love and black despair that Napoleon lived throughout the Italian campaign.
The title on the engraving reads: “Bonaparte, dédié à Madame Bonaparte.” Engraved in 1803 by Godefroy, after Isabey.
In December, 1797, he returned to Paris. His whole family were collected there, forming a “Bonaparte colony,” as the Parisians called it. There were Joseph and his wife; Lucien, now married to Christine Boyer, his old landlord’s daughter, a marriage Napoleon never forgave; Eliza, now Madame Bacciochi; Pauline, now Madame Leclerc. Madame Letitia was in the city, with Caroline; Louis and Jerome were still in school. Josephine had her daughter Hortense, a girl of thirteen, with her. Her son Eugène, though but fifteen years old, was away on a mission for Napoleon, who, in spite of the boy’s youth, had already taken him into his confidence. According to Napoleon’s express desire, all the family lived in great simplicity.
The return to Paris of the commander-in-chief of the Army of Italy was the signal for a popular ovation. The Directory gave him every honor, changing the name of the street in which he lived to rue de la Victoire, and making him a member of the Institute; but, conscious of its feebleness, and inspired by that suspicion which since the Revolution began had caused the ruin of so many men, it planned to get rid of him.
Of the coalition against France, formed in 1793, one member alone remained in arms—England. Napoleon was to be sent against her. An invasion of the island was first discussed, and he made an examination of the north coast. His report was adverse, and he substituted a plan for the invasion of Egypt—an old idea in the French government.
The Directory gladly accepted the change, and Napoleon was made commander-in-chief of the Army of Egypt. On the 4th of May he left Paris for Toulon.
To Napoleon this expedition was a merciful escape. He once said to Madame Rémusat:
“In Paris, and Paris is France, they never can take the smallest interest in things, if they do not take it in persons.... The great difficulty of the Directory was that no one cared about them, and that people began to care too much about me. This was why I conceived the happy idea of going to Egypt.”
He was under the influence, too, of his imagination; the Orient had always tempted him. It is certain that he went away with gigantic projects—nothing less than to conquer the whole of the East, and to become its ruler and lawgiver.
“I dreamed of all sorts of things, and I saw a way of carrying all my projects into practical execution. I would create a new religion. I saw myself in Asia, upon an elephant, wearing a turban, and holding in my hand a new Koran which I had myself composed. I would have united in my enterprise the experiences of two hemispheres, exploring for my benefit and instruction all history, attacking the power of England in the Indies, and renewing, by their conquest, my relations with old Europe. The time I passed in Egypt was the most delightful period of my life, for it was the most ideal.”
His friends, watching his irritation during the days before the campaign had been decided upon, said: “A free flight in space is what such wings demand. He will die here. He must go.” He himself said: “Paris weighs on me like a leaden mantle.”
Napoleon sailed from France on May 19, 1798; on June 9th he reached Malta, and won for France “the strongest place in Europe.” July 2d he entered Alexandria. On July 23d he entered Cairo, after the famous battle of the Pyramids.
The French fleet had remained in Aboukir Bay after landing the army, and on August 1st was attacked by Nelson. Napoleon had not realized, before this battle, the power of the English on the sea. He knew nothing of Nelson’s genius. The destruction of his fleet, and the consciousness that he and his army were prisoners in the Orient, opened his eyes to the greatest weakness of France.
The winter was spent in reorganizing the government of Egypt and in scientific work. Over one hundred scientists had been added to the Army of Egypt, including some of the most eminent men of the day: Monge, Geoffroy-St.-Hilaire, Berthollet, Fourier, and Denon. From their arrival every opportunity was given them to carry on their work. To stimulate them, Napoleon founded the Institute of Egypt, in which membership was granted as a reward for services.
These scientists went out in every direction, pushing their investigations up the Nile as far as Philoe, tracing the bed of the old canal from Suez to the Nile, unearthing ancient monuments, making collections of the flora and fauna, examining in detail the arts and industries of the people. Everything, from the inscription on the Rosetta Stone to the incubation of chickens, received their attention. On the return of the expedition, their researches were published in a magnificent work called “Description de l’Egypte.” The information gathered by the French at this time gave a great impetus to the study of Egyptology, and their investigations on the old Suez canal led directly to the modern work.
The peaceful work of science and law-giving which Napoleon was conducting in Egypt was interrupted by the news that the Porte had declared war against France, and that two Turkish armies were on their way to Egypt. In March he set off to Syria to meet the first.
Engraved by Vallot in 1838, after painting by Gros (1810). The moment chosen by the artist is that when Napoleon addressed to his soldiers that short and famous harangue, “Soldiers, from the summit of these Pyramids forty centuries look down upon you.” In the General’s escort are Murat, his head bare and his sword clasped tightly; and after him, in order, Duroc, Sulkowski, Berthier, Junot, and Eugène de Beauharnais, then sub-lieutenant, all on horseback. On the right are Rampon, Desaix, Bertrand, and Lasalle. This picture was ordered for the Tuileries, and was exhibited first in 1810. Napoleon gave it to one of his generals, and it did not reappear in Paris until 1832. It is now in the gallery at Versailles. Gros regarded this picture as his best work, and himself chose Vallot to engrave it.
This Syrian expedition was a failure, ending in a retreat made horrible not only by the enemy in the rear, but by pestilence and heat.
The disaster was a terrible disillusion for Napoleon. It ended his dream of an Oriental realm for himself, of a kingdom embracing the whole Mediterranean for France. “I missed my fortune at St. Jean d’Acre,” he told his brother Lucien afterward; and again, “I think my imagination died at St. Jean d’Acre.” The words are those of the man whose discouragement at a failure was as profound as his hope at success was high.
As Napoleon entered Egypt from Syria, he learned that the second Turkish army was near the Bay of Aboukir. He turned against it and defeated it completely. In the exchange of prisoners made after the battle, a bundle of French papers fell into his hands. It was the first news he had had for ten months from France, and sad news it was: Italy lost, an invasion of Austrians and Russians threatening, the Directory discredited and tottering.
If the Oriental empire of his imagination had fallen, might it not be that in Europe a kingdom awaited him? He decided to leave Egypt at once, and with the greatest secrecy prepared for his departure. The army was turned over to Kléber, and with four small vessels he sailed for France on the night of August 22, 1799. On October 16th he was in Paris.
For a long time nothing had been heard of Napoleon in France. The people said he had been exiled by the jealous Directory. His disappearance into the Orient had all the mystery and fascination of an Eastern tale. His sudden reappearance had something of the heroic in it. He came like a god from Olympus, unheralded, but at the critical moment.
The joy of the people, who at that day certainly preferred a hero to suffrage, was spontaneous and sincere. His journey from the coast to Paris was a triumphal march. Le retour du héros was the word in everybody’s mouth. On every side the people cried: “You alone can save the country. It is perishing without you. Take the reins of government.”
At Paris he found the government waiting to be overthrown. “A brain and a sword” was all that was needed to carry out a coup d’état organized while he was still in Africa. Everybody recognized him as the man for the hour. A large part of the military force in Paris was devoted to him. His two brothers, Lucien and Joseph, were in positions of influence, the former president of the Five Hundred, as one of the two chambers was called. All that was most distinguished in the political, military, legal, and artistic circles of Paris rallied to him. Among the men who supported him were Talleyrand, Sieyès, Chénier, Roederer, Monge, Cambacérès, Moreau, Berthier, Murat.
On the 18th Brumaire (the 9th of November), 1799, the plot culminated, and Napoleon was recognized as the temporary Dictator of France.
The private sorrow to which Napoleon returned, was as great as the public glory. During the campaign in Egypt he had learned beyond a doubt that Josephine’s coquetry had become open folly, and that a young officer, Hippolyte Charles, whom he had dismissed from the Army of Italy two years before, was installed at Malmaison. The liaison was so scandalous that Gohier, the president of the Directory, advised Josephine to get a divorce from Napoleon and marry Charles.
These rumors reached Egypt, and Napoleon, in despair, even talked them over with Eugène de Beauharnais. The boy defended his mother, and for a time succeeded in quieting Napoleon’s resentment. At last, however, he learned in a talk with Junot that the gossip was true. He lost all control of himself, and declared he would have a divorce. The idea was abandoned, but the love and reverence he had given Josephine were dead. From that time she had no empire over his heart, no power to inspire him to action or to enthusiasm.
When he landed in France from Egypt, Josephine, foreseeing a storm, started out to meet him at Lyons. Unfortunately she took one road and Napoleon another, and when he reached Paris at six o’clock in the morning he found no one at home. When Josephine arrived Napoleon refused to see her, and it was three days before he relented. Then his forgiveness was due to the intercession of Hortense and Eugène, to both of whom he was warmly attached.
But if he consented to pardon, he could never give again the passionate affection which he once had felt for her. He ceased to be a lover, and became a commonplace, tolerant, indulgent, bourgeois husband, upon whom his wife, in matters of importance, had no influence. Josephine was hereafter the suppliant, but she never regained the noble kingdom she had despised.
Napoleon’s domestic sorrow weakened in no way his activity and vigor in public affairs. He realized that, if he would keep his place in the hearts and confidence of the people, he must do something to show his strength, and peace was the gift he proposed to make to the nation. When he returned he found a civil war raging in La Vendée. Before February he had ended it. All over France brigandage had made life and property uncertain. It was stopped by his new régime.
Two foreign enemies only remained at war with France—Austria and England. He offered them peace. It was refused. Nothing remained but to compel it. The Austrians were first engaged. They had two armies in the field; one on the Rhine, against which Moreau was sent, the other in Italy—now lost to France—besieging the French shut up in Genoa.
By Auguste Conder. The Councillors of State having assembled in the hall which had been arranged for the occasion, the First Consul opened the séance and heard the oath taken by the sectional presidents—Boulay de la Meurthe (legislation), Brune (war), Defermont (finances), Ganteaume (marine), Roederer (interior). The first Consul drew up and signed two proclamations, to the French people and to the army. The Second Consul, Cambacérès, and the Third Consul, Lebrun, were present at the meeting. Locré, secrétaire-général du Conseil d’État, conducted the procès-verbal. This picture is at Versailles.
Moreau conducted the campaign in the Rhine countries with skill, fighting two successful battles, and driving his opponent from Ulm.
Napoleon decided that he would himself carry on the Italian campaign, but of that he said nothing in Paris. His army was quietly brought together as a reserve force; then suddenly, on May 6, 1800, he left Paris for Geneva. Immediately his plan became evident. It was nothing else than to cross the Alps and fall upon the rear of the Austrians, then besieging Genoa.
Such an undertaking was a veritable coup de théâtre. Its accomplishment was not less brilliant than its conception. Three principal passes lead from Switzerland into Italy: Mont Cenis, the Great Saint Bernard, and the Mount Saint Gothard. The last was already held by the Austrians. The first is the westernmost, and here Napoleon directed the attention of General Melas, the Austrian commander. The central, or Mount Saint Bernard, Pass was left almost defenceless, and here the French army was led across, a passage surrounded by enormous difficulties, particularly for the artillery, which had to be taken to pieces and carried or dragged by the men.
Save the delay which the enemy caused the French at Fort Bard, where five hundred men stopped the entire army, Napoleon met with no serious resistance in entering Italy. Indeed, the Austrians treated the force with contempt, declaring that it was not the First Consul who led it, but an adventurer, and that the army was not made up of French, but of refugee Italians.
This rumor was soon known to be false. On June 2d Napoleon entered Milan. It was evident that a conflict was imminent, and to prepare his soldiers Bonaparte addressed them:
“Soldiers, one of our departments was in the power of the enemy; consternation was in the south of France; the greatest part of the Ligurian territory, the most faithful friends of the Republic, had been invaded. The Cisalpine Republic had again become the grotesque plaything of the feudal régime. Soldiers, you march—and already the French territory is delivered! Joy and hope have succeeded in your country to consternation and fear.
“You give back liberty and independence to the people of Genoa. You have delivered them from their eternal enemies. You are in the capital of the Cisalpine. The enemy, terrified, no longer hopes for anything, except to regain its frontiers. You have taken possession of its hospitals, its magazines, its resources.
“The first act of the campaign is terminated. Every day you hear millions of men thanking you for your deeds.
“But shall it be said that French territory has been violated with impunity? Shall we allow an army which has carried fear into our families to return to its firesides? Will you run with your arms? Very well, march to the battle; forbid their retreat; tear from them the laurels of which they have taken possession; and so teach the world that the curse of destiny is on the rash who dare insult the territory of the Great People. The result of all our efforts will be spotless glory, solid peace.”
Melas, the Austrian commander, had lost much time; but finally convinced that it was really Bonaparte who had invaded Italy, and that he had actually reached Milan, he advanced into the plain of Marengo. He had with him an army of from fifty to sixty thousand men well supplied with artillery.
Bonaparte, ignorant that so large a force was at Marengo, advanced into the plain with only a portion of his army. On June 14th Melas attacked him. Before noon the French saw that they had to do with the entire Austrian army. For hours the battle was waged furiously, but with constant loss on the side of the French. In spite of the most intrepid fighting the army gave way. “At four o’clock in the afternoon,” says a soldier who was present, “there remained in a radius of two leagues not over six thousand infantry, a thousand horse, and six pieces of cannon. A third of our army was not in condition for battle. The lack of carriages to transport the sick made another third necessary for this painful task. Hunger, thirst, fatigue, had forced a great number to withdraw. The sharp shooters for the most part had lost the direction of their regiments.
“He who in these frightful circumstances would have said, ‘In two hours we shall have gained the battle, made ten thousand prisoners, taken several generals, fifteen flags, forty cannons; the enemy shall have delivered to us eleven fortified places and all the territory of beautiful Italy; they will soon defile shamefaced before our ranks; an armistice will suspend the plague of war and bring back peace into our country,’—he, I say, who would have said that, would have seemed to insult our desperate situation.”
The battle was won finally by the French through the fortunate arrival of Desaix with reënforcements and the imperturbable courage of the commander-in-chief. Bonaparte’s coolness was the marvel of those who surrounded him.
“At the moment when the dead and the dying covered the earth, the Consul was constantly braving death. He gave his orders with his accustomed coolness, and saw the storm approach without seeming to fear it. Those who saw him, forgetting the danger that menaced them, said: ‘What if he should be killed? Why does he not go back?’ It is said that General Berthier begged him to do so.
Engraved by Antonio Gilbert in 1809, under the direction of Longhi, after portrait painted by David in 1805. Dedicated to the Prince Eugène Napoleon of France, Viceroy of Italy. It was soon after his return from Marengo that Napoleon expressed a wish to be painted by David. The artist had long desired this work, and seized the opportunity eagerly. He asked the First Consul when he would pose for him.
“Pose!” said Bonaparte. “Do you suppose the great men of antiquity posed for their portraits?”
“But I paint you for your time, for men who have seen you. They would like to have it like you.”
“Like me! It is not the perfection of the features, a pimple on the nose, which makes resemblance. It is the character of the face that should be represented. No one cares whether the portraits of great men look like them or not. It is enough that their genius shines from the picture.”
“I have never considered it in that way. But you are right, Citizen Consul. You need not pose: I will paint you without that.” David went to breakfast daily after this with Napoleon, in order to study his face, and the Consul put at his service all the garments he had worn at Marengo. It is told that David mounted Napoleon on a mule for this picture, but that the General demurred. He sprang upon his horse, and, making him rear, said to the artist, “Paint me thus.”
“Once General Berthier came to him to tell him that the army was giving way and that the retreat had commenced. Bonaparte said to him: ‘General, you do not tell me that with sufficient coolness.’ This greatness of soul, this firmness, did not leave him in the greatest dangers. When the Fifty-ninth Brigade reached the battle-field the action was the hottest. The First Consul advanced toward them and cried: ‘Come, my brave soldiers, spread your banners; the moment has come to distinguish yourselves. I count on your courage to avenge your comrades.’ At the moment that he pronounced these words, five men were struck down near him. He turned with a tranquil air towards the enemy, and said: ‘Come, my friends, charge them.’
“I had curiosity enough to listen attentively to his voice, to examine his features. The most courageous man, the hero the most eager for glory, might have been overcome in his situation without any one blaming him. But he was not. In these frightful moments, when fortune seemed to desert him, he was still the Bonaparte of Arcola and Aboukir.”
When Desaix came up with his division, Bonaparte took an hour to arrange for the final charge. During this time the Austrian artillery was thundering upon the army, each volley carrying away whole lines. The men received death without moving from their places, and the ranks closed over the bodies of their comrades. This deadly artillery even reached the cavalry, drawn up behind, as well as a large number of infantry who, encouraged by Desaix’s arrival, had hastened back to the field of honor. In spite of the horror of this preparation Bonaparte did not falter. When he was ready he led his army in an impetuous charge which overwhelmed the Austrians completely, though it cost the French one of their bravest generals, Desaix. It was a frightful struggle, but the perfection with which the final attack was planned, won the battle of Marengo and drove the Austrians from Italy.
The Parisians were dazzled by the campaign. Of the passage of the Alps they said, “It is an achievement greater than Hannibal’s;” and they repeated how “the First Consul had pointed his finger at the frozen summits, and they had bowed their heads.” At the news of Marengo the streets were lit with “joy fires,” and from wall to wall rang the cries of Vive la république! Vive le premier consul! Vive l’armée!
Engraved by G. Fiesinger, after portrait by Guérin.
The campaign against the Austrians was finished December 3, 1800, by the battle of Hohenlinden, won by Moreau, and in February the treaty of Lunéville established peace. England was slower in coming to terms, it not being until March, 1802, that she signed the treaty of Amiens.
At last France was at peace with all the world. She hailed Napoleon as her savior, and ordered that the 18th Brumaire be celebrated throughout the republic as a solemn fête in his honor.
The country saw in him something greater than a peacemaker. She was discovering that he was to be her law giver, for, while ending the wars, he had begun to bring order into the interior chaos which had so long tormented the French people, to reëstablish the finances, the laws, the industries, to restore public works, to encourage the arts and sciences, even to harmonize the interests of rich and poor, of church and state.