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The Great Committee of Public Safety knew that its tenure of power rested on its successful conduct of the foreign war. Throughout the interior tranquillity prevailed except in La Vend?e, where the sanguinary measures adopted perpetuated a guerilla warfare. The French troops were, in 1794, in a very different condition from that in which they had been left at the commencement of 1793. The measures of terror which pacified France had been in the army the cause of the restoration of discipline. Constant fighting had converted the men into efficient soldiers. Excellent officers had come to the front during the campaign, and, owing to the rapidity of promotion, most of the generals were young and energetic men. All that was best in France had gone to the front. There, and there alone, men who might have fallen under the terrible Law of the Suspects at home, were not only safe themselves, but by their presence in the ranks of the Republic protected their relatives. All the resources of France were laid at the disposal of her armies. The country became one vast arsenal. The soldiers were well fed, clothed, and armed, and the ablest administrators were employed in rendering them efficient. The result of this concentration of France upon the foreign war was success in every quarter. In the spring of 1794 the various armies took the offensive, the Army of the North, under Pichegru, marched by the northern line into Belgium, while a new army, afterwards called the Army of the Sambre-and-Meuse, which was formed out of the Army of the Ardennes, and a wing of the Army of the Moselle penetrated Belgium from the south. Before these two armies the English and Austrians fell back. They were rapidly pursued, and on the 26th of June 1794 Jourdan won the battle of Fleurus. This victory, like the victory of Jemmappes the year before, laid Belgium open to the French armies. Brussels was reoccupied; the English and Dutch retired into Holland; the Austrians fell back behind the Meuse. Meanwhile, the Army of the Moselle, under Ren? Moreaux, stormed the Prussian position at Kaiserslautern, and with the Army of the Rhine drove the Austrians across that river. The Army of Italy, which had taken Toulon, also took the offensive, and defeated the Piedmontese at Saorgio. Dugommier, with the Army of the Eastern Pyrenees, turned the tables on the Spaniards, and crossing the mountains penetrated into Catalonia, while the Army of the Western Pyrenees invaded Spain in that quarter, and threatened San Sebastian.

The brilliant successes which followed the establishment of the power of the Great Committee of Public Safety justified its despotism in the eyes of France, but as soon as those successes had freed France from the invaders, it was generally felt that the weight of the Reign of Terror was intolerable, and that it had become unnecessary. It was at this period of most brilliant military triumphs that the Terror grew to its greatest height in Paris. On 22d Prairial a law was passed to accelerate the procedure of the Revolutionary Tribunal, and the number of deaths upon the guillotine increased to an average of 196 a week. Robespierre, who, as has been said, was more of a statesman than his colleagues upon the Committee of Public Safety, who were simply administrators, understood the tenor of feeling in France. He believed that the time was coming when the Reign of Terror should cease, and a new Reign of Virtue, carrying into effect the maxims of Rousseau, could be established. The working members of the Committee allowed Robespierre to theorise to his heart's content; as long as he did not interfere with them, he might advocate what principles he pleased. The first evidence of Robespierre's new tendency appeared in his establishment of the Worship of the Supreme Being. He was a profoundly religious and virtuous man, and the chief cause of his hatred of H?bert and Danton was his belief that they were immoral atheists. On 18th Flor?al Robespierre made his most famous speech in the Convention, by which he induced the Convention to officially acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul. The speech was followed on 20th Prairial by a great festival in honour of the Supreme Being, at which Robespierre presided. This was the day when his power seemed greatest, but many of his colleagues laughed at his assumption of virtue and at his posing as a high priest. He perceived clearly that he could not establish his chimerical Reign of Virtue without destroying the scoffers who refused to believe in him and his doctrines. He absented himself for six weeks from the meetings of the Committee, and prepared a speech by which he hoped to induce the Convention to proscribe his opponents.

On 8th Thermidor he read this speech to the Convention, and attacked covertly, and without mentioning many names, not only certain of his colleagues in the Committee of Public Safety, but also the majority of the Committee of General Security and of the Financial Committee. These men, who had been governing France while Robespierre was theorising, would not tamely submit to be ejected from power and guillotined. On the evening of the same day Robespierre read his speech to the Jacobin Club, which was the headquarters of the puritans who believed in the possibility of a Reign of Virtue. But on 9th Thermidor the accused deputies determined to act. It was not only the working members of the Committees, but also the friends of Danton, the independent deputies of the Mountain, and the members of the Centre, who felt threatened, and their attitude was speedily declared. Saint-Just began to read a report accusing Billaud-Varenne and Collot-d'Herbois by name, but he was interrupted, and Robespierre himself, with Couthon, Saint-Just, and two other deputies were, after a stormy scene, ordered under arrest. But the puritan party were not only strong in the Jacobin Club; they dominated the Commune of Paris ever since the overthrow of the H?bertists. Hanriot, the commandant of the National Guard of Paris, rescued Robespierre and the other imprisoned deputies, and took them to the H?tel-de-Ville, where a scheme of government was discussed. The Convention did not wait to be attacked. It declared Robespierre and all his adherents to be outlaws, and Barras, Fr?ron, and L?onard Bourdon collected columns of regular troops and national guards to attack the H?tel-de-Ville. The Convention was completely successful. The people of Paris, like the people of all France, persisted in considering Robespierre as the author of the Reign of Terror, while not only his enemies but his colleagues threw upon him the responsibility for all the atrocities included under the name of the Terror. Though personally he had very little influence in the Committee, he was represented and regarded as its master. Consequently no hand was raised to protect Robespierre and the puritans; the H?tel-de-Ville was easily occupied by Barras; Robespierre was wounded in the mouth by a gendarme, and on 10th Thermidor he was guillotined, and was accompanied or followed to the scaffold by the small group of colleagues who had been impeached with him, and by the majority of the Commune of Paris.

The conclusion of the Treaties of Basle in the spring and summer of 1795 brought France once more into a recognised position among the nations of Europe. The idea of a revolutionary propaganda had been entirely abandoned by the leading Thermidorians, who looked upon it as the first duty of the French Government to secure peace for France. All the great statesmen of the revolutionary period, from Mirabeau to Danton and Robespierre, had protested against the absurd notion that it was the mission of France to secure the pre-eminence of democratic ideas throughout the whole of Europe. Events had shown that it was a task of quite sufficient difficulty to secure the prevalence of such ideas in France. The abandonment of the revolutionary propaganda broke up the league of old Europe against new France. When the Prussian state, and still more the ancient monarchy of Spain, had consented to make peace with France, the rest of the powers of the Continent felt that they could no longer affect to treat the French republicans as beyond the pale of humanity, or the French Republic as having destroyed the title of France to be reckoned as a nation.

Under the new arrangement the executive was placed in the hands of five Directors. One was to retire every year and was not eligible for re-election; his successor was to be chosen by the Legislature. In order to secure an entire separation between the members of the Directory and of the Legislature, no member of the latter could be elected a Director until twelve months had elapsed after the resignation of his seat. The Directors were to appoint the Ministers, who were to have no connection whatever with the Legislature, and who were to act as the agents of the Directors. The individual Directors were to exercise no authority in their own names. They were to live under the same roof in the Palace of the Luxembourg at Paris. They were to meet daily, and the will of the majority was to be taken as the will of the whole. They were to elect a President every month, who was to act as their mouthpiece at the reception of foreign ambassadors and on all occasions of ceremony. The control of the internal administration, the management of the armies and fleets, and all questions of foreign policy were entirely left to the Directors. But treaties, declarations of war and similar acts had to be ratified by the Legislature. The Directors had nothing whatever to do with the work of legislation, and their assent was not needed to new laws. With regard to the revenue, the administration of the finances and of the treasury rested with the Directors, but they could not impose fresh taxes without the assent of the Legislature.

The first Directors elected and the new Legislature constituted, the Convention had to decree its own dissolution. The three years during which it had sat are perhaps the most important and most critical in the whole history of France. The Convention had not merely witnessed the rise and fall of many cliques and many parties; it had allowed the Reign of Terror to be established, and had punished its inventors with death or deportation. It had passed through nearly every variety of government, and had seen France in her greatest degradation and at the height of her success. Its last act, passed on the very day on which it dissolved itself, 4th Brumaire , was worthy of its best and greatest days, for it was an act declaring a complete amnesty for all political offences, or supposed offences, since the declaration of the Republic.

The campaign of 1795 on the Rhine frontier is chiefly important in regard to the treason of Pichegru. The Elector of Bavaria, who was at the same time the Elector Palatine, had, as has already been said, been uniformly friendly to the French. It was by his connivance that two of the most important fortresses upon the Rhine, Mannheim and D?sseldorf, were surrendered to Pichegru and Jourdan respectively. Meanwhile Marceau besieged the fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, and Kl?ber the city of Mayence. There can be little doubt, though it is not absolutely proved by documents, that it was because of the negotiations he had commenced with the Prince de Cond? that Pichegru did not advance into Germany. Jourdan, who did advance with the Army of the Sambre-and-Meuse, therefore found himself unprotected on his right, and was forced to retire with considerable loss. Marceau succeeded in taking Ehrenbreitstein, but the same treacherous inaction of Pichegru allowed the Austrian General Clerfayt to force Kl?ber to raise the siege of Mayence. It was on 20th October 1795 that Jourdan recrossed the Rhine; on the 29th Kl?ber was driven from before Mayence; and on the 30th Pichegru was defeated and driven behind the Queich. The first operations of the French armies under the Directory were, thus, owing to Pichegru's treachery, unsuccessful, and on the 21st December an armistice was made between the French and the Austrians on the Rhine. In the north, owing to the Treaties of Basle, there were no military operations of importance during the autumn of 1795, and the French army maintained its position on the frontier of Holland. In the south considerable alterations were made. The treaty of peace with Spain enabled the experienced and warlike soldiers of the two armies of the Pyrenees to be despatched to reinforce the Army of Italy, which was also joined by the bulk of the troops of the Army of the Alps. General Sch?rer, who commanded the Army of Italy, pushed forward, and by a victory at Loano on the 24th November 1795, opened up a direct communication with Genoa and cut off the Sardinians from the sea. In the four armies of the Directory which had thus taken the place of the thirteen armies of the Republic, there were under arms at the close of 1795 about 300,000 men under experienced generals, excluding what was known as the Army of the Interior, which guarded Paris and garrisoned the chief cities of France.

But Austria was not going to be driven out of Italy by a single campaign. The beaten army of Beaulieu was reorganised by General Melas, and reinforced by 30,000 picked men from the Rhine. This army, amounting in all to 70,000 men, was placed under the command of Marshal W?rmser, who, at the end of July, debouched from the Tyrol and invaded Italy by the two sides of Lake Garda. Bonaparte, whose army did not exceed 40,000 men, broke up the siege of Mantua which he had formed, and utterly defeated the Austrians in the great battle of Castiglione on 5th August 1796. W?rmser fell back, but in September, the following month, he invaded Italy by the valley of the Brenta, and threw himself into Mantua. Bonaparte, now considering himself for a time freed from the danger of another Austrian attack, made an effort to reconstitute Northern Italy. Several of the cities, notably Modena, Bologna, and Ferrara, had declared themselves republics, but Bonaparte could see no advantage in little republics, and summoned a general assembly of deputies from the whole of Lombardy to meet at Milan. This assembly was disposed to form a Lombard Republic, but before it could complete its deliberations Bonaparte had to fight another Austrian army.

The Austrians, disgusted and surprised by these successive defeats, prepared to make a great effort. For the first time, the Emperor appealed directly to the patriotism of the people, and more especially of the nobility. A new army was equipped, which, if not so numerous, was more enthusiastic than the former armies, and was placed under the command of General Alvinzi. Bonaparte had received few or no reinforcements, and felt himself unable to face an army of 60,000 men. He waited, therefore, patiently in his headquarters at Verona while Alvinzi advanced slowly down the Brenta. Having learnt experience from their former defeats, the Austrians were in no hurry to come to blows, even with the small French army in front of them. Alvinzi entrenched himself in a formidable position on the heights of Caldiero, and repulsed a French attack upon the 12th of November. Another such check meant the ruin of the French army. Bonaparte decided to turn the position. Advancing along the causeway through the marshes upon Alvinzi's left, he fought the celebrated battle of Arcola on the 16th of November, and Alvinzi, finding his position untenable, retreated into the Tyrol.

Though the history of Europe during the year 1796 is chiefly bound up in the policy and military achievements of France, the close of the year witnessed the disappearance of the greatest monarch of Eastern Europe. On the 17th November 1796, Catherine of Russia died. The importance of her reign belongs to the period prior to the French Revolution, and her attitude towards the series of events grouped under that title, was chiefly dictated by the course of events in Poland. She was succeeded on the throne of Russia by her son, the Emperor Paul. The new monarch soon gave evidence of the aberration of intellect which led him into the strange excesses that brought about his assassination. His first step in foreign politics was to decline to assist Austria with his armies, and he even withdrew a Russian fleet which his mother had recently sent to the assistance of England. In conversation he expressed his detestation of the French as Jacobins, but none the less he opened negotiations with the Directory by means of his ambassador at Berlin, Kolichev, who communicated freely with the French ambassador Caillard.

In the commencement of the year 1797 the interest of Europe was concentrated upon Bonaparte and his army. Being master of Italy he now determined to invade the home domains of the House of Austria. He begged the Directory to act with energy in Germany in order to prevent reinforcements being sent against him. The Emperor recalled his brother, the Archduke Charles, from the Rhine, and placed in him command of the Austrian army in the Tyrol. On the 16th of March 1797 Bonaparte forced the passage of Tagliamento. Joubert, who was acting independently in the district of Friuli, made his way by that route into the Tyrol, and joined his general-in-chief at Klagenfurt on the 13th of March. With the combined army Bonaparte pursued the Austrians. He defeated the Archduke Charles at Neumarkt and Unzmarkt, and on 7th April he entered Leoben. The Archduke Charles felt it impossible to oppose the French longer, and on the 17th of April 1797 preliminaries of peace were signed at Leoben.

Simultaneously with Bonaparte's advance the Armies of the Rhine-and-Moselle under Moreau, and of the Sambre-and-Meuse under Hoche, were set in motion. The latter advanced from D?sseldorf, defeated the Austrians in five engagements, took Wetzlar, and was already marching on Giessen in Hanover when his progress was stopped by the news of the signature of the Preliminaries of Leoben. Moreau, on his side, had not been able to cross the Rhine until 20th April, and had made no further offensive movement, when he was ordered to cease operations.

Elections of 1797 in France--Policy of the Clichians--Struggle between the Directors and the Clichians--Negotiations for Peace between England and the Directory--Changes in the French Ministry--Revolution of 18th Fructidor--Bonaparte in Italy--Occupation of Venice--The Ligurian and Cisalpine Republics formed--Annexation of the Ionian Islands by France--Treaty of Campo-Formio--Capture of Mayence--The Batavian Republic--Battle of Camperdown--Bonaparte's Expedition to the East--Capture of Malta--Conquest of Egypt--Battle of the Nile--Internal Policy of the Directory after 18th Fructidor--Foreign Policy--Attitude of England, Prussia, Austria, and Russia--The Helvetian Republic--Italian Affairs--The Roman and Parthenopean Republics formed--Occupation of Piedmont and Tuscany by France--The Law of Conscription--Outbreak of War between Austria and France--Murder of the French Plenipotentiaries at Rastadt--The Campaign of 1799--In Italy--Battles of Cassano, the Trebbia and Novi--Italy lost to France--In Switzerland--Battle of Zurich--In Holland--Battles of Bergen--Results of the Campaign of 1799--Policy and Character of the Emperor Paul of Russia--Bonaparte's Campaign of 1799 in Syria--Siege of Acre--Battle of Mount Tabor--Struggle between the Directors and the Legislature in France--Revolution of 22d Prairial--Changes in the Directory and Ministry--Bonaparte's return to France--Revolution of 18th Brumaire--End of the Government of the Directory in France.

The revolution of the 18th Fructidor was one which created but little interest among the people of France. It was the result of an intrinsic weakness in the Constitution, not of a popular movement. Two co-equal powers can never exist in the government of a State: when a collision takes place one must be overthrown. In their measures for overthrowing or muzzling the leaders of the opposition in the Legislature, the four senior Directors could not agree. Carnot, the greatest of them all, disliked any interference with the Constitution, and looked upon the employment of force as likely to lead to great disasters. The other original Directors, Barras, Reubell, and Revelli?re-L?peaux, were, however, perfectly agreed. They were determined to use the regular troops that formed the garrison of Paris; Hoche, from Holland, sent them a sum of money; and Bonaparte instructed one of his best generals, Augereau, to act according to their orders. Accordingly, on the morning of the 18th Fructidor fifty-five of the leaders of the Clichian party in the Legislature, including both Barb?-Marbois and Pichegru, were arrested, and were at once deported, with the ex-minister of Police, Cochon de Lapparent, and several other individuals, without trial, to Cayenne and Sinnamari. The same harsh measures were not taken with regard to the two dissentient Directors, Carnot and Barth?lemy, who were given every facility for escaping from France. This revolution was carried out without the shedding of a single drop of blood, and the success of the Directors was acquiesced in by the people of France.

Merlin of Douai, the great jurist and statesman, and Fran?ois de Neufch?teau, a dramatist and former member of the Legislative Assembly, were elected as the new Directors in the place of Carnot and Barth?lemy, and were succeeded in the ministries of Justice and the Interior by Lambrechts and Letourneur.

The Batavian Republic, which had been established in 1795 in Holland, was also considerably affected by the revolution of 18th Fructidor. The Dutch Legislature had been influenced by every current of feeling in France, and during the predominance of the Clichians had made no real effort to support their French allies. After the conclusion of the Convention of Leoben, and the consequent cessation of hostilities in Germany, the Directory despatched Hoche to Holland. He there busied himself with another effort for his favourite scheme for the invasion of England. For this purpose he relied upon the powerful Dutch fleet, which was being blockaded by an English squadron under Admiral Duncan in the Texel. During the mutiny at the Nore in the summer of 1797 the position of the blockading English fleet had been very critical, and on one occasion it is stated that two English ships were left to watch fifteen Dutch. Directly after the revolution of Fructidor, the Directors, who did not feel certain of the support of Moreau, removed Hoche from Holland and placed him in command of the united Armies of the Rhine-and-Moselle and the Sambre-and-Meuse under the title of the Army of Germany. Hardly had he taken up his command when the most distinguished rival of Bonaparte died on the 18th of September 1797. Though deprived of the active superintendence of Hoche, the government of the Batavian Republic, under the influence of the vigorous war policy of the new Directory, ordered the Dutch fleet to leave the Texel. It was met at sea by Admiral Duncan off the dunes or downs of Kampe , and entirely defeated after the most hotly contested naval battle of the war. The naval policy of the Directory had thus resulted in the destruction of the Spanish fleet in the battle of Cape St. Vincent and of the Dutch fleet in the battle of Camperdown.

On the 5th of December 1797 General Bonaparte arrived in Paris. The death of Hoche had left him without a rival, and the revolution of the 18th of Fructidor had been so entirely the result of the assistance of the army that its greatest general was practically the master of the political situation. The Directors received him with transports of enthusiasm and gave him a public reception, but, nevertheless, they were overawed by the extent of his reputation and afraid that he might attempt to take an active part in politics. He was appointed to the command of the Army of the Interior, which was intended for the invasion of England. Bonaparte, like Hoche, sincerely wished that such an invasion should be effected, but he understood the extraordinary difficulty inherent in any attempt to transport an army across the Channel in the presence of a powerful fleet. He therefore advised the Directory that it would be wiser not to attack England directly, but to make an effort to overthrow her power in Asia. It seemed to him more practicable to invade India than to invade England. His imagination was stirred by the conception of an expedition to the East, and the Directory was only too glad to remove from France for a time its most able and ambitious general.

On the 9th of May 1798 Bonaparte left Toulon at the head of a picked force of his veterans of Italy, and accompanied not only by his favourite generals, but also by some of the leading savants and men of letters of France. On the 9th of June the fleet reached Malta, and on the 12th the Knights of St. John of the Hospital, who had held the island ever since the Middle Ages, surrendered it to the French general. Leaving a garrison in Malta, Bonaparte then proceeded to Egypt. He disembarked in front of Alexandria on the 1st of July, and upon the 4th he occupied that city. He then advanced on Cairo, and on the 21st of July he defeated the Mamelukes at the Battle of the Pyramids, and on the 24th he occupied Cairo. The English fleet in the Mediterranean, under the command of Nelson, had been intended to stop the expedition to Egypt, but it had been misdirected, and was unable to prevent the disembarkation of the French forces. On the 1st of August, however, Nelson appeared before Alexandria, and in the battle of Aboukir Bay, generally known as the Battle of the Nile, he destroyed the French fleet. This victory entirely cut off Bonaparte and his army from France. The English held the Mediterranean, and for many months prevented the despatch of either news or reinforcements. In November they strengthened their position in the great south European sea by the occupation of Minorca by an army under the Hon. Sir Charles Stuart, and in 1800 the French garrison in Malta surrendered to General Pigot and Captain Sir Alexander Ball.

The French Directory, though recognising that it might have soon to contend again with the power of Austria, and for the first time with that of Russia, nevertheless roused without any reason fresh enemies upon the French frontiers. Its greatest mistake at this period was its interference with the affairs of Switzerland. For this interference there was no real cause, but the Directors could not resist the temptation of inflicting their special form of republic upon the Swiss. The organisation of most of the cantons of Switzerland was essentially feudal and oligarchical. The government of each canton and of each city was in the hands of a very few families, and the people were in much the same condition politically, socially, and economically as the people of France before the Revolution. The Swiss peasants had caught the contagion of revolution from France, and in the beginning of 1798 the people of the Pays de Vaud rose in insurrection against the authority of the Canton of Berne. This rising was followed by popular tumults in other cantons, and the peasants everywhere destroyed the signs of the feudal system and declared themselves in favour of 'Liberty--Equality--Fraternity.' The popular leaders appealed to France for help, and a powerful army under the command of General Brune invaded Switzerland. The militia of the cantons was speedily routed; Brune occupied Berne and sent the national treasury to Paris, and a freely-elected Constituent Assembly was summoned. This assembly proclaimed an Helvetian Republic, one and indivisible, with a Directory, two Councils, and Ministers, in imitation of the French, the Cisalpine, and the Batavian Republics, to take the place of the old Swiss federal constitution. Great reforms were speedily accomplished; on the 8th of May 1798 internal customs-houses were abolished, and on the 13th of May torture was forbidden in judicial processes; on the 3d of August marriages between persons of different religions were declared legal; and eventually all feudal rights were suppressed. Great as were these reforms, they were not entirely acceptable to the Swiss people. The mountaineers of Uri, Schweitz and Unterwalden, the descendants of the founders of the ancient Swiss liberties, objected to be freed under the influence of French bayonets, and the cry of national patriotism soon raised an army against the French liberators of the peasants. The French troops had to remain perpetually under arms, and the Helvetian Republic, in spite of the popular freedom which it secured, was hated even by the peasants whom it had relieved. The hatred for the French name was increased by the arbitrary conduct, and it was asserted by the corrupt behaviour, of Rapinat, the French commissioner, who was a near relative of Reubell, the Director. The intervention of the Directory had, therefore, in Switzerland, roused a people in arms, even though it had been dictated by the best of motives.

Mention has been made of the riot at Vienna which caused the departure of the French ambassador, Bernadotte. He was not replaced by the Directory, and long negotiations took place on the subject of the compensation due to the Republic for this insult. But neither party was in earnest. Both the French Directory and the Emperor Francis were preparing for the contest. The first overt act of war took place at the commencement of 1799, when the Austrian troops, under the command of the Archduke Charles, occupied the passes of the Grisons, and it was in this quarter that before war was actually declared the first engagements were fought. In Italy General Sch?rer was attacked at Verona by the Austrian General Kray, and in Germany General Jourdan fell back into the Black Forest. In both of these quarters many skirmishes took place, and eventually on the 25th of March 1799 the Archduke Charles defeated Jourdan in a pitched battle at Stockach. A few days later, on the 5th of April, Sch?rer was defeated at Magnano. Meanwhile the Congress of Rastadt was still sitting, and Austria was nominally at peace with France. The conclusion of a treaty between France and the Empire, which was the subject of the deliberations at Rastadt, was necessarily a difficult matter to negotiate, for it involved nothing less than the entire reconstitution of the Holy Roman Empire, a reconstitution which could only be carried out by the secularisation of the bishoprics. Eventually, in the month of April 1799, after the engagements of Stockach and Magnano, the French plenipotentiaries at Rastadt understood that it was hopeless to expect to conclude a treaty with the Empire. They therefore asked for their passports to France. These passports were refused. As they left Rastadt the French plenipotentiaries were attacked by some Austrian hussars; two of them, Roberjot and Bonnier-d'Alco, were killed, and the other, Jean Debry, left for dead. This odious violation of international law and the rights of ambassadors took the place of a formal declaration of war, and roused not only the Directory but the French people to the most strenuous exertions. Meanwhile the Emperor Paul of Russia declared war against France, and ordered three armies to be despatched to the scenes of action.

The campaign of 1799 was fought out in three localities, in all of which the Russians played a most prominent part. In Italy a Russian army, under the command of one of the most famous generals in Europe, Suv?rov, reinforced the Austrians after the battle of Magnano. Suv?rov forced the passage of the Adda at Cassano on the 27th of April, and rapidly drove Moreau, who had succeeded Sch?rer in command, across northern Italy. On the 28th of April Suv?rov entered Milan, and the Cisalpine Republic at once expired. On the 27th of May he entered Turin, and after leaving besieging armies before Mantua and Alessandria, shut up the remnants of Moreau's army in Genoa. But the army of Moreau was not the only French army in the Italian Peninsula. Several powerful divisions, under the name of the Army of Naples, were concentrated in Rome and Naples to support the newly-formed Roman and Parthenopean Republics. Macdonald, who had succeeded Championnet in the command of this army, rapidly concentrated and threatened to take the Austro-Russian army in flank. Suv?rov withdrew from Turin and turned to his left to meet his new assailant. On the banks of the Trebbia a three days' battle was fought from the 17th to the 19th of June. The issue of the battle itself was doubtful, but Macdonald, finding himself unsupported by Moreau from Genoa, was obliged to retreat into Tuscany. Fearing to be cut off, he then forced his way along the difficult passage between the mountains and the sea, and joined Moreau, after collecting every French soldier from the garrisons in the south of Italy. The retreat of the French was followed by an outburst against the Italian republicans.

While Suv?rov was conquering Italy and destroying the recollection of the victories of Bonaparte in that country, Mass?na, who was in command of the French army in Switzerland, was engaged in a most difficult task. The Archduke Charles, who also had under his command a Russian army under Korsakov, forced his way slowly into Switzerland, driving the French before him, and in August 1799 left Korsakov in command at Zurich. The Archduke was then ordered to take the bulk of his army to the Rhine in order to invade France. Korsakov, abandoned to his own resources, showed himself far inferior in military ability to Suv?rov. Mass?na, with singular boldness, refused to remain on the defensive, and on the 26th of September drove the Russians out of Zurich. His victory was won just in time, for Suv?rov, after defeating Joubert at Novi, had determined, in spite of the terrible weather, to cross the Alps. It was on the 24th of September, two days before Mass?na's victory at Zurich, that the main Russian army arrived at the summit of the St. Gothard Pass. General Lecourbe, one of the finest mountain generals of his day, occupied the St. Gothard, and with a few battalions kept the whole Russian army at bay. Suv?rov nevertheless persevered and hoped to turn Mass?na's flank. But it was several weeks before he could reach the village of Altdorf. Being unable to find boats to cross the lake, he had now to retreat, and when he reached the Grisons his army was practically destroyed by starvation and the stress of the weather. Mass?na, thus relieved of his most formidable enemies, took possession of Constance, and by threatening the flank of the Archduke Charles forced the main Austrian army to fall back to the Danube.

The third campaign of 1799 was fought in Holland. In this quarter it had been arranged that the English and Russians were to act in concert. On the 27th of August the English fleet had successfully reached the Dutch coast, and had captured the relics of the Dutch fleet, defeated at Camperdown, in the Texel. After this operation an English army, under the Duke of York, and a Russian army, under General Hermann, disembarked at the Helder. General Brune was hurriedly despatched to take command of the few French troops in Holland, and co-operated with the army of the Batavian Republic under General Janssens. The campaign consisted of a succession of fierce but indecisive battles in the neighbourhood of Bergen. The English and Russians did not act harmoniously together; the country was unsuited for field operations; and supplies were not adequately provided. As a result of the operations, though he had not been really defeated, the Duke of York signed the Convention of Alkmaar on the 18th October, by which he agreed to surrender all prisoners on being allowed to evacuate Holland.

The results of the campaigns of 1799 were decidedly favourable to France. Though Italy was lost, and more than one French army had been defeated, the victories of Mass?na and of Brune more than compensated for these disasters. Not only had France not been invaded, but she had been able to retain her position in Switzerland and in Holland, and to hold the whole of the right bank of the Rhine. England, in spite of the Convention of Alkmaar, could point to the victory of the Nile and the capture of the Dutch fleet in the Texel as real successes, and Pitt and Grenville did not despair of ultimate victory. The King of Prussia, who, when the affairs of France seemed to be desperate, had begun to assume an attitude of opposition, and demanded the evacuation of the Prussian provinces on the Rhine, speedily repented of his indiscretion, and made excuses for his behaviour. The Austrian ministers evinced no desire to continue the war; they resented the high-handed conduct of Suv?rov, and showed themselves more afraid of their powerful ally, Russia, than of their declared enemy, France. They implored the English government to bring about the withdrawal of the Russian troops, and the Emperor Paul was only too glad to comply. The retreat of the Russians left Italy practically in the hands of Austria. The Grand Duke Ferdinand of Tuscany was restored to his dominions, but the King of Sardinia was not recalled, and Piedmont remained in the occupation of the Austrian troops. Genoa alone was held by a French garrison, which was closely besieged by the Austrians on the land side, and blockaded by the English Mediterranean fleet. It was under the influence of Austria and under the protection of Austrian troops that the Conclave met at Venice in November 1799 to elect a new Pope.

While these important campaigns were being fought out in Europe, Bonaparte had not been idle in the East. The Battle of the Pyramids had made him master of Egypt, and though cut off by the English fleet from communication with France, he remained master of the country. His internal administration made him excessively popular among the Egyptians. He removed the Turks and Mamelukes from office, and called on the Egyptians to govern themselves. But the Turks did not intend to lose Egypt without striking another blow, and a powerful army was sent for its reconquest. Bonaparte determined to meet this army half way, and in February 1799 he advanced into Syria. He speedily reduced Palestine and took Jaffa, and then laid siege to the strong fortress of Acre. Assisted by the English sailors of Sir Sidney Smith, the garrison of Acre made a gallant defence. The Turkish army advancing to its relief was defeated by Bonaparte at Mount Tabor on the 16th of April. In spite of his victory, he had, nevertheless, to abandon the siege of Acre, and on the 20th of May he commenced his retreat to Egypt. He there found the position to be extremely critical. The Mamelukes had reorganised their army and reoccupied Cairo, and a Turkish army had been disembarked by the English fleet at Aboukir. Meanwhile Desaix, whom he had left in command in Egypt, had gone up the Nile for the conquest of the interior. Bonaparte soon re-established his power; he defeated the Mamelukes at Cairo, and drove the Turkish army into the sea. At this juncture he heard the news of the events of the campaigns in Europe, and, what affected him more, of the course of politics at Paris. He determined, therefore, to return to France, and leaving Kl?ber in command in Egypt, he set sail with a few personal friends. The ship on which he embarked escaped the English cruisers, and he landed at Fr?jus on the 9th of October 1799 after a perilous voyage of forty-seven days.

The varying issues of the campaigns of 1799 had profoundly affected the situation of the Directors, and the disasters in Italy had turned the hopes both of the army and of the French people towards Bonaparte. At the annual change in the composition of the Directory and the Councils which took place in 1799 a considerable alteration had been made. The new third of the Councils consisted almost entirely of men who, without being either Jacobins or Clichians, longed to see the establishment of a strong government in order to secure peace. The Directory, which had seemed so strong after the revolution of the 18th of Fructidor, had been considerably weakened by the behaviour of the Directors themselves. The election of none but civilians to the highest offices in the State was disliked by the army, and the characters of the Directors themselves had suffered. Reubell was the Director designed by lot to retire in May 1799; he was perhaps the ablest and most experienced of them all, but had been discredited by the bad conduct of his relative, Rapinat, in Switzerland. Siey?s was elected to succeed Reubell. This choice, and the acceptance of Siey?s, testified to a new condition of affairs. The former abb? might have been a Director on at least two former occasions, in 1795 and 1798, and his acceptance at this juncture was very significant. He had failed in his embassy to Berlin to induce the new King of Prussia to become the active ally of France, and had been convinced by his diplomatic experiences that the government of France must become frankly military, since the monarchical powers of Europe would not accept the possibility of a peaceable French Republic. From an internal point of view the acceptance of Siey?s indicated an increase of power for the Legislature, of which he was the idol.

The key-stone of the new Constitution was the Consulate. There were to be three Consuls nominated for ten years, but these officials were not to be equal in authority, as had been the case with the Directors. On the contrary, the First Consul was to be perpetual president and perpetual representative of the governing triumvirate. All administrative power was placed in his hands, and the Second and Third Consuls were little more than his chief assistants. The Consuls acting together nominated the Ministers, and also the Council of State, which was intended to be at the same time an administrative tribunal of appeal, and the originating source in matters of legislation.

In no respect was the administrative ability of the Consuls better manifested than in the selection they made of their ministers. It has already been noticed that Gaudin, the greatest financier of France, was appointed Minister of the Finances. Talleyrand and Fouch? once more took possession of the portfolios of Foreign Affairs and of Police, which they held for many years. Their first Minister of the Marine, Forfait, did not remain long in office, but his successor, Decr?s, held that post from 1801 till 1814. The same may be said with regard to the Ministry of Justice. Abrial, the first occupant of this post, gave way to Regnier in 1802, but he likewise remained in office till 1814. The Ministries of War and of the Interior were more difficult to fill; Carnot soon resented the tone of Bonaparte, and was succeeded by Berthier, afterwards Prince of Neufch?tel, who had been Chief of the Staff to Bonaparte in Italy. La Place, the great astronomer, had been appointed Minister of the Interior by the Provisional Government in November 1799. He did not show himself very efficient, and was succeeded by Lucien Bonaparte, the First Consul's ablest brother, in the following month. He too failed to carry out the wishes of the Consuls, and was succeeded in 1800 by one of the most distinguished administrators of the period, Chaptal.

With the two great enemies of France, Austria and England, the First Consul had no desire to treat. Though unable to strike at England, owing to the weakness of the French navy, he could yet attack the Austrians in two quarters. Two powerful armies were prepared, the one the Army of the Danube, which was placed under the command of Moreau, and the other the Army of the Interior, soon to become famous as the Second Army of Italy. Of all the conquests in Italy made by the French in 1796 and 1797, only Genoa remained in their possession. Mass?na, fresh from his victories in Switzerland, had taken command of the besieged army. His defence is one of the most famous in history, and does no less honour to the general than his victory at Zurich. Bonaparte desired to relieve Genoa; and he resolved not to advance along the coast, as he had done in 1796, but by crossing the Alps, and descending upon Piedmont, to cut off the Austrian army occupying that province.

While Bonaparte was winning the battle of Marengo, and reconquering Italy by a single blow, Moreau was again face to face with his old opponent, the Archduke Charles. The French advance was very slow. Fierce battles were fought at Engen, Moeskirchen, and Biberach in May 1800, and by the close of the summer Moreau had his headquarters at Augsburg, and his advanced guard at Munich. The slowness of Moreau's progress dissatisfied the First Consul, as did the want of success of the Archduke Charles dissatisfy the court of Vienna. Augereau was sent with 20,000 men to the assistance of Moreau, who was ordered, in spite of the severity of the winter, to continue his advance; and the Archduke John was appointed to succeed his brother, and ordered to take the offensive. The crowning event of this winter campaign was the great victory of Hohenlinden, which was won by Moreau on the 3d of December 1800. The Austrians lost the whole of their baggage and artillery and 12,000 prisoners.

The First Consul from Paris ordered Moreau and Macdonald to advance into the home districts of the House of Austria. Moreau accordingly pushed along the Inn, the Salz, the Traun, and the Ens, driving the disorganised and discouraged Austrians before him until he was within twenty leagues of Vienna. Macdonald, at the same time, crossed the Spl?gen Pass in spite of the avalanches, and penetrated into the Tyrol, thus turning the Austrian forces on the Mincio and the Adige. On arriving at Trent, Macdonald turned to the right and was joined by Brune, who had occupied the territory of Venice, and the united French army marched upon Vienna. Under these circumstances, with Italy lost, and Vienna threatened from two quarters, the Emperor Francis sued for peace, which was concluded at Lun?ville on the 9th of February 1801.

The admiration of the Emperor Paul for Bonaparte increased daily, and it was the Russian Czar, not the French First Consul, who proposed an invasion of India across Asia, in order to strike a blow at the English power in the East. Indeed, the English had taken the place of the French in the mind of Paul, who, not satisfied with forming once again the Neutral League of the North, determined to send his best troops against them. The Emperor's proposition was that one expedition should consist of 35,000 Frenchmen and 35,000 Russians, under the command of Mass?na. This column was to go down the Danube, and then up the Don to a point whence it would be but a short march to the Volga. It was then to proceed down the Volga to Astrakhan, thence across the Caspian Sea to Astrabad, and then to march by Herat and Kandahar to the Punjab. Another column was to move by Khiva and Bokhara, and to invade India by the north of Afghanistan. These grandiose plans were not entirely accepted by Bonaparte, and the death of the Emperor prevented an attempt being made to see if they were practicable. The madness of Paul had steadily increased during his short reign. His nobility disapproved heartily of his war policy, both against France and later against England; his adoption of the Neutral League and its policy had done much to ruin the wealthy nobles of Northern Russia by forbidding the exportation of Russian commodities on English ships. To the discontent of the nobility, of the politicians, and of the capitalists must be added the fears of the courtiers. Even the heir to the throne, his eldest son Alexander, perceived that the rule of the maniac could not be borne much longer. It is hardly necessary to particularise all the causes of his unpopularity; it is enough to say that his behaviour was that of a madman. Certain courtiers, of whom the leaders were Count Pahlen, a Livonian nobleman; Benningsen, a Hanoverian general; Plato Zubov, the last favourite of the Empress Catherine, and his brother Nicholas, and the Prince Jachvill, determined to put an end to the tyranny of the Czar. In the night of the 23d of March 1801 he was attacked by these conspirators and ordered to sign an act of abdication; he refused; the lamp went out, and the Emperor was struck down and strangled by an unknown hand among his assailants.

When Bonaparte first entered office he recognised that England was a more formidable, because a less approachable, enemy than Austria. Knowing that the French navy was unable to meet the English, he hoped to counterbalance the maritime preponderance of England by a league against her commerce. Owing to the long period of war, nothing was to be gained by solemn decrees forbidding the importation of goods into France, it was necessary to strike through the neutral nations. The three great commercial seats of English trade were the Levant, the Baltic, and Portugal. The failure of the expedition to Egypt proved that it was impossible to destroy the English trade in the Levant, and Bonaparte therefore resolved to strike in the other two directions. Acting mainly through the Emperor Paul, the Armed Neutrality of the North, or the Neutral League of 1780, was re-established between the Baltic powers of Russia, Prussia, Sweden, and Denmark. The real intention of Paul and of Bonaparte was to exclude English commerce entirely from the Baltic; but for the second time the Baltic powers nominally made themselves the guarantors of the rights of neutrals. They protested against the right assumed by England to search neutral ships, and to confiscate as contraband of war all the goods of belligerent powers found in them, and also against the prohibition against neutral ships trading between different enemies' ports. The Emperor Paul, like the Empress Catherine twenty years before, made himself the patron of the Neutral League.

The English government naturally refused to accede to the demands of the Neutral League, and when the Baltic was closed to them an English fleet was ordered to force the blockade. This fleet was placed under the command of Sir Hyde Parker, with Nelson as second in command. On the 30th of March 1801 the fleet sailed down the Sound, in spite of the Danish batteries at Elsinore, and on the 2d of April Copenhagen was bombarded and a large part of the Danish fleet destroyed. This victory, and still more the death of the Emperor Paul, caused the dissolution of the Neutral League of the North, and Bonaparte had to adjourn for some years his schemes for the annihilation of English commerce.

When Bonaparte left Egypt he was unable, owing to the stringency of the blockade maintained by the English fleet, to take more than a few companions with him. Kl?ber, who, as has been said, succeeded him in the command of the French army, soon found himself confronted by a powerful Turkish and Mameluke army. This army he defeated at the battle of Heliopolis on the 20th of March 1800, after which success Egypt again submitted to French rule. On the 14th of June 1800, the very day on which his former comrade Desaix met a soldier's death at the battle of Marengo, Kl?ber was assassinated by a Muhammadan fanatic in Cairo. Menou, the new French general in Egypt, was in every way Kl?ber's inferior, and concentrated the French troops in the two cities of Cairo and Alexandria. Isolated entirely from the mother country, and unable to receive reinforcements or ammunition, the English government regarded the French in Egypt as an easy prey. On the 19th of March 1801 a powerful English army disembarked at Aboukir, under the command of Sir Ralph Abercromby, and defeated the French before Alexandria two days later in a pitched battle, in which Abercromby was killed. Siege was then laid to Alexandria and Cairo, and both cities surrendered to the English general, Lord Hutchinson, before the arrival of a division from India, which, under the command of Sir David Baird, had sailed up the Red Sea, marched across the Soudan desert, and descended the Nile to Cairo in boats. As a result of these operations, a convention was signed between the French and English generals in Egypt on the 2d of September 1801, by which the French garrisons evacuated all remaining posts, and were conveyed to France in English ships.

The great war with France had shown the weakness of the Empire as an organisation, and had also proved the advantages to the inhabitants of the existence of large and powerful states. It was, therefore, the already existing kingdoms which received the greatest addition of territory under the new arrangements. Nominally, the secularised bishoprics were intended to compensate those German princes whose territories on the left bank of the Rhine had been ceded to France; practically, the powerful states only were increased. Austria, whose new possession of Venice in place of the Milanese had been reaffirmed by the Treaty of Lun?ville, only acquired in Germany the Bishoprics of Brixen and Trent, but two Austrian princes received independent states, namely, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand, who, as has been said, was given the Archbishopric of Salzburg, with the title of Elector, and the Duke of Modena, who received the Breisgau. Nevertheless, the power of Austria was greatly weakened, for under the old arrangement the ecclesiastical electors and the Catholic bishops had always been partisans of Austria. Prussia was the country which profited the most, though she had suffered the least in the war against France. In exchange for part of the Duchy of Cleves, the Duchy of Guelders, and the County of Moers, Prussia received the large and wealthy Bishoprics of Hildesheim, Paderborn, Erfurt, and part of M?nster, together with a number of abbeys, of which the largest were Herford, Quedlinburg, Elten, Essen, and Werden, and several free cities. Hanover received the Bishopric of Osnabr?ck, to which the King of England, as Elector of Hanover, had previously possessed the alternate nomination. Bavaria was made into a powerful and concentrated state. In exchange for the Palatinate, the Duchy of Deux-Ponts , the Principalities of Juliers, Simmern and Lautern, she received the Bishoprics of W?rtzburg, Bamberg, Augsburg, Freisingen, and part of Passau, together with a large number of abbeys and free cities. Baden received the portion of the Bishoprics of Spires, Strasbourg, and Basle, situated on the right bank of the Rhine, the Bishopric of Constance, the cities of Heidelberg and Mannheim, and many abbeys and free cities. Finally, the Duchy of W?rtemburg, in exchange for the Principality of Montb?liard, received abbeys and free towns, which increased its population by a hundred thousand inhabitants. It is not necessary to describe the various accessions granted to the Princes of Hesse-Cassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, and the rest; but, it may be noted that the Prince of Orange, the former Stadtholder of Holland, received the Bishopric of Fulda. These changes remodelled Germany, and in the result were most prejudicial to France; for instead of there existing a series of buffers in the shape of small and weak states, France was brought almost directly into contact with Prussia and Austria.

The recognition of the frontier of the Rhine by the Treaty of Lun?ville and the Diet of Ratisbon largely increased the territory of France. The First Consul proceeded to organise the additions on the bases laid down by the Constituent Assembly, Convention, and Directory. Belgium was divided into nine departments. The Rhenish territories, including the Palatinate, the Diocese of Tr?ves, etc., were divided into four departments, of which the headquarters were Aix-la-Chapelle, Coblentz, Mayence, and Tr?ves. Further south, the Department of the Mont-Terrible, which had been formed by the Convention out of the Republic of Mulhouse and the District of Porentruy, was merged into the Department of the Haut-Rhin, and the Principality of Montb?liard was united to the Department of the Doubs. The Republic of Geneva, as has been said, formed the Department of the Leman. Savoy was constituted as the Department of Mont-Blanc, and the County of Nice that of the Alpes-Maritimes. These were the recognised limits of France in 1801, and were defensible on geographical grounds; but, on the 11th of September 1802, Bonaparte went further, and declared the union of Piedmont with France. Instead of being amalgamated with the Cisalpine Republic, Piedmont was divided into six departments, and the island of Elba was detached from Tuscany and declared, like Corsica, to be a French island. At the head of each department a Pr?fet was appointed, to take the place of the national agents maintained by the Directory. At the head of each subdivision, now called an arrondissement instead of a district, was placed a Sous-Pr?fet, also nominated by the supreme executive, and at the head of each commune was the Maire, who was also nominated and not elected. Pr?fets, Sous-Pr?fets, and Maires were assisted by nominated councils in administrative matters, and appeals from their decisions lay to the Council of State.

Just as Bonaparte had built up the new Code of Law on the bases laid by the Legislative Committee of the Convention, so, too, he made use of the labours of its Committee of Public Instruction to establish a scheme of national education. In every commune which could afford the expense, he maintained the primary school established by the Convention; but he feared to burden the National Treasury with the expense of schools in the poorer communes, and preferred to leave their establishment to local endeavour. In secondary education, he suppressed the central schools of the Convention, and replaced them by twenty-nine lyc?es, specially intended for the education of the middle classes. For higher education, he founded ten schools of law and six of medicine; he improved the Polytechnic School, and started a school of mechanics, which became later the famous ?cole des Arts et M?tiers. The key-stone of the whole educational system, the foundation of the University, was, however, not laid till some years later.

The First Consul clearly understood that the Peace of Amiens was not likely to last, and that war would soon break out again with England. He knew that England derived much of her influence from her navy and her colonies; he therefore spared no efforts to restore the French navy, and to make France once more a colonial power. His first essays in this direction were to obtain Louisiana from Spain in exchange for the kingdom of Etruria, formed in Italy for Prince Louis of Parma, and the extension of the limits of French Guiana to the Amazon extorted from Portugal. But his main project was to restore the French power in the West Indies. Guadeloupe and Martinique and the French Antilles had been restored to France by the Treaty of Amiens, and the First Consul resolved to make them the starting-point for the reconquest of San Domingo. This island had, as a result of the policy of Sonthonax and Polverel, the proconsuls of the Convention, been entirely lost to France; the planters and other whites had fled; and the revolted slaves and mulattoes were masters of the island. Toussaint Louverture, the leader of the negroes, refused to hold any communications with Bonaparte, and the First Consul therefore, as soon as the Peace of Amiens had opened the sea, sent an expedition of 20,000 men against him, commanded by his brother-in-law, General Leclerc. The island was reconquered by May 1802; but the victorious army was practically destroyed by yellow fever. Toussaint Louverture was taken prisoner and sent to France: but nevertheless, as soon as war with England again broke out, and the arrival of reinforcements was prevented by English cruisers, the negroes rose afresh under new leaders and destroyed the remnant of the garrison. It may be added that the French Antilles were recaptured by the English in 1809 and 1810.

It has been said that the Treaty of Amiens was practically only a truce, and that many points of interest to the two nations were left undecided. Of these the most important regarded Malta. The English ministry positively refused to surrender this island to the Knights of Saint John, under the protectorate of the Emperor Alexander, which would leave it at the mercy of France. Bonaparte demanded the evacuation of Malta with much insistance as one of the conditions of the Treaty of Amiens; but the English government in reply pointed to the annexation of Elba, Parma and Piacenza, and Piedmont, and the interference in Switzerland, as also being breaches of the treaty. The First Consul was also very exasperated at the personal attacks made on him in the irresponsible English press. He failed to understand that by the English law the government could not prevent the publication of libels against him, and regarded their refusal to punish the libellers as personal insults to himself. The French ambassador in London prosecuted Peltier, the chief libeller, before the Court of King's Bench. He was brilliantly defended by Sir J. Mackintosh, and only ordered to pay a small fine. A public subscription was raised to pay his fine and costs, and the First Consul regarded this as adding a further insult to the injuries he had received. In truth, both governments felt that war was inevitable, and in May 1803 the rupture was complete. The English navy began to seize the French trading vessels, and the First Consul, as a reprisal, arrested all the English travellers he could find in France, and ordered Mortier to occupy Hanover.

The First Consul entered upon a fresh war with England with a light heart, for he believed that she would be unable to obtain any allies. Austria was exhausted by the terrible wars she had undergone, and the State Chancellor, Cobenzl, held that she needed time to recuperate. Prussia persisted in her attitude of strict neutrality; Haugwitz was dismissed from the Secretaryship of State for Foreign Affairs as being too French in his sympathies, after the occupation of Hanover, and was succeeded by Hardenberg, the maker of the Treaty of Basle. Spain was Bonaparte's faithful and hopeful ally; and Russia, the most formidable of the continental powers, inclined to his side. The attitude of the Emperor Alexander at this period was of the greatest importance. Educated by a Swiss publicist who sincerely loved France, La Harpe, the Emperor of Russia was inclined to admire the results of the French Revolution and the French people. His sentiments for the person of Bonaparte were nearly as full of enthusiastic admiration as those of his father, the Emperor Paul. He made the French ambassadors at St. Petersburg, Duroc and Caulaincourt, his personal friends, and wrote letters to Bonaparte expressing his feelings. But the Emperor's relatives, especially his mother, with his ministers and his courtiers, were opposed to France and in favour of a close alliance with England, or at the very least of the maintenance of strict neutrality. England practically commanded the Russian trade, and war with England meant the loss of the only market for Russian raw material, the consequent impoverishment of the Russian people, and the ruin of the Russian capitalists. Nevertheless the Emperor Alexander was an autocrat, and Bonaparte counted upon his friendship even though he could not secure his alliance.

On the outbreak of war the numerous French exiles in England offered their services to the English Government. It is significant of the change which had come over the state of affairs that, instead of endeavouring to raise a counter-revolution, they proposed to attack the person of the First Consul. The leaders of the new plot were Pichegru, now a declared royalist and partisan of the Bourbons, and Georges Cadoudal, the celebrated Chouan leader. Both had the audacity to go to Paris and to enter into relations with General Moreau. Moreau, though he resented the lofty position of Bonaparte and refused to serve him, would be no party to an assassination, more especially an assassination which would restore the Bourbons, and Cadoudal and Pichegru had to act with the assistance of certain French noblemen and some former Chouans. A plot was formed to murder the First Consul on the road from Malmaison to Paris, but it was discovered by the French police, and Bonaparte in terror ordered the gates of Paris to be closed as in the most terrible days of the Revolution, and proclaimed the pain of death against all who sheltered the conspirators. After some daring adventures the leaders were seized; Georges Cadoudal was executed; Pichegru was strangled in prison; and Moreau, who was condemned to two years' imprisonment, was allowed to go into exile in the United States. The French noblemen implicated were treated with more leniency, and the lives of their two chiefs, Armand de Polignac and Charles de Rivi?re, were spared.

Napoleon, Emperor of the French--His Coronation as Emperor and as King of Italy--The Imperial Court--The Grand Dignitaries, Marshals, and Imperial Household--Institutions of the Empire--Ministers and Government--The Camp at Boulogne--Pitt's last coalition--Campaign of 1805--Capitulation of Ulm--Battles of Austerlitz and Caldiero--Battle of Trafalgar--Treaty of Pressburg--Death of Pitt--Prussia declares War--Campaign of Jena--Campaign of Eylau--Campaign of Friedland--Interview and Peace of Tilsit--The Continental Blockade--Capture of the Danish Fleet by England--French Invasion and Conquest of Portugal--State of Sweden--The Rearrangement of Europe--Louis Bonaparte King of Holland--Italy--Joseph Bonaparte King of Naples--Battle of Maida--Rearrangement of Germany--Bavaria--W?rtemburg--Baden--Jerome Bonaparte King of Westphalia--Murat Grand Duke of Berg--Saxony--Smaller States of Germany--Mediatisation of Petty Princes--Confederation of the Rhine--Poland--The Grand Duchy of Warsaw--Conference of Erfurt.

It has been said that Napoleon created a new Court, which was intended to efface the recollection of the magnificence of the old Court of Versailles. At the head of this Court he created a hierarchy of Grand Dignitaries of the Empire, who were designed to form a Council of Regency in case of necessity. The chief of them was the Grand Elector, whose duty was to convoke the Senate, the Legislative Body, and the Electoral Colleges,--this post was conferred on the Emperor's elder brother, Joseph Bonaparte. Next ranked the Arch-Chancellor of the Empire, who was the chief of the judicial body,--this post was conferred on Cambac?r?s, the former Second Consul. Third came the Arch-Chancellor of State, whose business it was to receive foreign ambassadors and ratify treaties--this post was conferred upon Eug?ne de Beauharnais. Next came the Arch-Treasurer of the Empire, which post was first filled by Le Brun, the former Third Consul, and the remaining Grand Dignitaries were the Constable of the Empire, Louis Bonaparte, the Grand Admiral, Marshal Murat, and the Grand Judge, Regnier. In the same way as the Grand Dignitaries were at the head of the civil administration of the Empire, Napoleon created Marshals of France to be the representatives of the army. The first marshals were eighteen in number, and included all the most famous generals of the revolutionary period except Pichegru and Moreau, whose fate has been related. It was indispensable for the rank of Marshal of France to have commanded an army in the field, or at least a detached corps, and the office was surrounded with so many privileges as to make it the object of ambition to every colonel of a French regiment. The third hierarchy consisted of the great officers of the Emperor's household, who comprised a Grand Marshal, Duroc; a Grand Almoner, his uncle, Joseph Fesch, whom he had induced the Pope to make a cardinal; a Grand Chamberlain, Talleyrand; a Grand Huntsman, Marshal Berthier; and a Grand Equerry, Caulaincourt; and most of the first occupants of these offices were personal friends and former comrades in arms of the Emperor.

While threatened by the Boulogne flotilla, the English Government did all in its power to raise enemies on the Continent against Napoleon. Prussia, as usual, insisted on her neutrality; but Russia and Austria were not unwilling to try their strength once more with France. The Emperor Alexander of Russia was personally inclined to admire Napoleon, but he was induced by his Court, his family, and his ministry, who pointed out to him the importance of remaining on good terms with England, to sign an alliance with Pitt; he was further profoundly irritated by the violent scene which Napoleon, as First Consul, had had with his ambassador, Count Morkov, and was horrified at the execution of the Duc d'Enghien. The Emperor Francis of Austria was even more willing to fight Napoleon. He had spent the period of peace since the Treaty of Lun?ville in reorganising his army, and believed that he would be more successful now that he was freed from the incubus of his position as Holy Roman Emperor. The State Chancellor, Cobenzl, was also keenly in favour of war, for he was a sincere believer in the might of Russia, and had imbibed a desire to please the Court of St. Petersburg, at which he had long held the post of Austrian ambassador. To induce these powerful allies to attack in force, Pitt, who was once more Prime Minister, did not grudge the wealth of England. Large subsidies were offered both to Russia and Austria, which supplied the means for commencing the campaign; and strenuous efforts were made to win the assistance of Prussia.

Napoleon, despairing of success in his projected invasion of England, resolved to turn promptly upon England's principal ally, and directed the Grand Army to break up from Boulogne and enter Germany. Mack regarded it as certain that the French, as in the campaigns of Moreau, would advance through the Black Forest. Napoleon encouraged his illusion by showing him a few French troops in that quarter. Meanwhile, the Grand Army advanced in two portions through W?rtemburg and Franconia, and, on reaching the Danube, after violating the Prussian neutrality by marching through Anspach, cut off Mack's retreat on Vienna. The Austrian general made an effort to break through the French army, but he was defeated by Ney at Elchingen, and surrendered on the 20th of October 1805 with 33,000 men. The capitulation of Ulm did more than deprive Austria of a serviceable army,--it left open the road to Vienna. Napoleon rapidly followed up his success. He marched past a united Russian and Austrian army, which was quartered in Moravia, to influence Prussia, occupied Vienna, crossed the Danube, and eventually faced the army of the two emperors at Austerlitz. On the 2d of December 1805, the anniversary of his coronation, the Grand Army utterly defeated the Austrians and Russians. The allies lost 15,000 men killed and wounded, 20,000 prisoners, and 189 guns; and the Emperor Francis found himself defenceless, for his only other army, that in Italy, had been defeated at Caldiero by Eug?ne de Beauharnais and Mass?na on the 30th of October. While the rapid campaign of Austerlitz,--perhaps the most glorious of Napoleon's military career,--was taking place, he lost the navy which he had prepared with so much care, and which had been intended to cover his invasion of England. The French admiral, Villeneuve, left Cadiz at the head of the united French and Spanish fleet, consisting of thirty-three ships of the line and five frigates. He had not gone far when he was met by Nelson at the head of the English squadron of twenty-seven ships off Cape Trafalgar. The victory of Trafalgar, which was won on the 21st of October, was as complete as that of Austerlitz. The French and Spanish fleet was as entirely destroyed as the Austrian and Russian army. The allies at Trafalgar lost 7000 men in killed and wounded, and the English only 3000, among whom, however, was Nelson himself.

In this warlike attitude he was encouraged by Russia and England, and still more by his own army. The Prussian army, the creation of Frederick the Great, represented in more than an ordinary fashion the Prussian nation. Relying on the recollections of the Seven Years' War, and confident in the proverbial discipline of their soldiers, the Prussian generals believed that they would be able to defeat the conquerors of the rest of Europe. With the utmost ardour the young Prussian noblemen shouted for war; they resented the long peace, and applauded the new attitude of the king. He was stimulated likewise by the hatred for France, which was openly encouraged by his beautiful Queen Louisa, and he met with opposition only from a few of his more experienced ministers, and from the old Duke of Brunswick, who well knew the excellence of the French troops. Undecided and hesitating, Frederick William refused to join the coalition of Austria and Russia in 1805, when his assistance would have been of the greatest service. He signed, indeed, the Treaty of Potsdam on 3d November 1805, undertaking to mediate, and to join the coalition with 180,000 men if Napoleon refused the terms he offered. But the proposed intervention came to nothing. Haugwitz, the Prussian minister, awaited at Napoleon's headquarters the result of the battle of Austerlitz, and on December 15 he signed the Treaty of Sch?nbrunn, by which Prussia ceded Cleves to France and Anspach to Bavaria, and received provisional possession of Hanover. Two months later, on February 15, Prussia was compelled by a supplementary treaty to definitely accept Hanover from Napoleon, an arrangement which was tantamount to declaring war with England.

It was now necessary for the Grand Army to attack the Russians. Napoleon, after occupying nearly the whole of Prussia and laying siege to Dantzic, entered Poland. He was received with an enthusiastic welcome by the Poles, whose independence he hinted at restoring. Polish troops had long served in his armies, and the sympathy of the French people for the oppressed Poles was known throughout Poland. On the 15th of December 1806 Napoleon occupied Warsaw and sent his army into winter quarters upon the Russian frontier. The Russian general, Benningsen, one of the murderers of the Emperor Paul, conceived the idea of surprising part of the French army in its winter quarters. He drove back the division of Bernadotte; but when he reached the neighbourhood of K?nigsberg he found that Napoleon had received information of his movement and had collected the bulk of his army. It was now Napoleon's turn to pursue the Russians. At the head of 60,000 men he found 80,000 Russians entrenched in the village of Eylau, and attacked them during a snowstorm on the 8th of February 1807. The battle was long disputed. The Russians had to retire, but it was estimated that the loss of both armies was about the same, namely, 35,000 men. This loss was far more severe to the French than to the Russians, for the French soldiers slain at Eylau were veterans of the Grand Army, and their place could only be taken by raw conscripts.

The Peace of Tilsit left Napoleon face to face with only one enemy, and that was England. The destruction of the French fleet at Trafalgar and the diminution of the strength of the Grand Army from the losses suffered at Austerlitz, Jena, and Eylau, proved to the Emperor of the French that he had better abandon his project of invading England. But if he could not cross the Channel in force or meet the English fleets at sea, he believed he could ruin England by excluding her from the markets of the Continent. The English ministry, in pursuance of its reading of international law, had closed all neutral seaborne commerce from the mouth of the Elbe to the extremity of the French coast. Napoleon answered this measure by his Berlin Decree, which was issued in that city on the 21st of November 1806, and declared the British Islands to be in a state of blockade. All English merchandise was to be confiscated, as well as all ships which had touched either at a British port or at a port in the British Colonies. He followed up this measure by the Milan Decree of the 17th of December 1807, by which he declared that any ship of any country which had touched at a British port was liable to be seized and treated as prize. The entry of Russia into the scheme of the Continental Blockade would, Napoleon hoped, entirely ruin the English trade. But, in reality, it did nothing of the sort. English commerce was as active and enterprising as ever, and the risks it encountered in running the Continental Blockade only increased the profits of the English merchants. The real sufferers were the inhabitants of the Continent, who had to pay enhanced prices for such articles of prime necessity as sugar. Napoleon's expectation that the carrying trade of the world would desert England and fall into the hands of France and her allies was not fulfilled, because the English war fleets remained complete masters of the sea, and effectually prevented the rise of any other commercial power. The result of the Continental Blockade was therefore the impoverishment of the allies of France and their consequent hatred of Napoleon, while it increased rather than diminished the commercial prosperity of England.

In his rearrangement of the states of Germany and of the balance of power in Central Europe, Napoleon, like the Directory, followed out the traditional policy of Richelieu and Mazarin. He held it to be an advantage for France that there should be a number of small German states between the Rhine and the hereditary dominions of the House of Austria, but he considered that the very small size of the states maintained by the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 made them inadequate buffers. He, therefore, enlarged the Western German states and endeavoured to unite their interests with those of France. The reconstitution of Germany after the Peace of Lun?ville in 1803 destroyed the old Holy Roman Empire. Napoleon worked on the same lines, and his measures have had almost the same permanence as the arrangements of 1803. The changes took place gradually in accordance with the Treaties of Pressburg and of Tilsit, but their final results may be considered as a whole.

Napoleon endeavoured to concentrate the power of the German princes as a whole by the formation of the Confederation of the Rhine, of which he was officially recognised as Protector. The original Confederation of the Rhine established in July 1805, consisted of only fifteen princes, but after Tilsit it comprised thirty-two. The Arch-Chancellor of the new confederation was Charles de Dalberg, the Grand Duke of Frankfort, the only ecclesiastic who was acknowledged as a member. It comprised in all the four kingdoms of Bavaria, W?rtemberg, Westphalia, and Saxony, the five grand duchies and twenty-three principalities. Its policy was conducted by a Diet sitting at Frankfort composed of two colleges,--the College of Kings and the College of Princes. The Confederation of the Rhine, which was mainly situated between the Rhine and the Elbe, contained a population of twenty million Germans, and was bound by treaty to contribute a hundred and fifty thousand soldiers to the armies of Napoleon.

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