All honor to the ruler who commences his reign by words and deeds
which suggest that he has somewhere heard and heeded the golden text,
“Blessed are the peacemakers!”
There had been riots in France and the clash of faction; there had
been massacre of Catholic by Protestant and of Protestant by Catholic;
there had been civil war in La Vendée. Napoleon had no sooner become
master than his orders went forth for peace, and a year had not passed
before quiet reigned from Paris to all the frontiers. Royally he
pardoned all who would accept his clemency, giving life and power to
many a secret foe who was to help pull him down in the years to come.
France tranquillized within, the First Consul turned to the enemies
without,--to the foreign powers which had combined against her.
On Christmas Day, December 25, 1799, Napoleon wrote to the King of
England and to the Emperor of Austria nobly worded letters praying
that the war might cease. Written with his own hand, and addressed
personally to these monarchs, the question of etiquette is raised
by royalist writers. They contend that letters, so addressed, were
improper. Think of the coldness of nature which would make the lives
of thousands of men turn on a pitiful point like that! These letters
were not sincere, according to Napoleon’s detractors. How they come to
know this, they cannot explain; but they know it. The average reader,
not gifted with the acumen of the professional detractor, can only be
certain of the plain facts of the case, and those are, that Napoleon
made the first overtures for peace; that his words have the ring of
sincerity, and the virtue of being positive; and that his conciliatory
advances were repelled, mildly by Austria, insolently by Great Britain.
So arrogant was the letter of reply which Grenville, the English
minister, sent to the French foreign office that even George III.
disapproved of it. With incredible superciliousness the French were
told by the English aristocrat that they had better restore the
Bourbons under whose rule France had enjoyed so much prosperity at
home and consideration abroad. Inasmuch as England had but recently
despoiled Bourbon France of nearly every scrap of territory she had in
the world,--Canada, India, etc.,--Grenville’s letter was as stupidly
scornful of fact as it was of good manners. The Bourbon “glory” which
had sunk so low that France had not even been invited to the feast when
Poland was devoured; so low that the French flag had been covered with
shameful defeat on land and sea, was a subject which might have made
even a British cabinet officer hesitate before he took the wrong side
of it.
The honors of the correspondence remained with Napoleon; and by way
of retort to Grenville’s plea, that the Bourbons were the legitimate
rulers of France, whom the people had no right to displace, the surly
Englishman was reminded that the logic of his argument would bring the
Stuarts back to the throne of England, from which a revolting people
had driven them. The truth is that Pitt’s ministry believed France
exhausted. Malta and Egypt were both coveted by Great Britain, and it
was believed that each would soon be lost by France. It was for reasons
like these that Napoleon’s overtures were rejected.
With the Emperor of Russia the First Consul was more fortunate. The
Czar had not liked the manner in which he had been used by his allies,
England and Austria. In fact, he had been shabbily treated by both.
Added to this was his dissatisfaction with England because of her
designs on Malta, in whose fate he took an interest as protector of the
Knights of St. John.
Napoleon cleverly played upon the passions of the Czar (who was more or
less of a lunatic), flattered him by releasing the Russian prisoners
held by France, and sending them home in new uniforms. Soon Napoleon
had no admirer more ardent than the mad autocrat Paul, who wrote him a
personal letter proposing a joint expedition against India.
Prussia had declared her neutrality. Napoleon sent Duroc and a letter
to the young King urging an alliance, Hamburg being the bait dangled
before the Prussian monarch’s eyes. He was gracious, and he was
tempted, but he did not yield: Prussia remained neutral.
Great Britain had good reasons for wishing for the restoration of the
Bourbons, from whose feeble hands so much of the colonial Empire of
France had dropped; she had good reason to believe that a continuation
of the war would increase her own colonial empire, but the manner in
which she repelled Napoleon’s advances gave to France just the insult
that was needed to arouse her in passionate support of the First Consul.
Forced to continue the war, his preparations were soon made.
* * * * *
It may be doubted whether any victory that he ever won held a higher
place in the memory of the great captain than that of Marengo. He never
ceased to recall it as one of the most glorious days of his life. We
see a proof of this in the Memoirs of General Marbot. The year was
1807, the battle of Eylau had been fought, the armies were in motion
again; and Lannes, hard-pressed by the Russian host at Friedland, had
sent his aide-de-camp speeding to the Emperor to hurry up support.
“Mounted on my swift Lisette, I met the Emperor leaving Eylau. His
face was beaming. He made me ride up by his side, and as we galloped
I had to give him an account of what had taken place on the field of
battle before I had left. The report finished, the Emperor smiled,
and asked, “Have you a good memory?”--“Pretty fair, sire.”--“Well,
what anniversary is it to-day, the 14th of June?”--“Marengo.”--“Yes,”
replied the Emperor, “and I am going to beat the Russians to-day as I
beat the Austrians at Marengo.” And as Napoleon reached the field, and
rode along the lines, he called out to his troops, “It is a lucky day,
the anniversary of Marengo!” The troops cheered him as he rode, and
they won for him the great battle of Friedland.”
The old uniform, sabre, spurs, hat, he had worn on that sunny day in
Italy, in 1800, he scrupulously kept. In the year he was crowned
Emperor he carried Josephine to see the plain he had immortalized,
fought again in sham fight the battle of Marengo, wearing the faded
uniform he had worn on that eventful day.
Even on his last journey to dismal St. Helena, it seems that these
relics of a glorious past were not forgotten. We read that when the
dead warrior lay stark and stiff in his coffin on that distant rock,
they spread over his feet “the cloak he had worn at Marengo.”
* * * * *
It was indeed a brilliant campaign, great in conception, execution,
results.
Moreau’s army lay upon the Rhine, more than one hundred thousand
strong. Masséna with the army of Italy guarded the Apennines, facing
overwhelming odds. From Paris the First Consul urged Masséna to hold
his ground, and Moreau to advance. Against the latter was a weak
Austrian commander, Kray, and forces about equal to the French. Much
time was lost, Napoleon proposing a plan which Moreau thought too
bold, and was not willing to risk. Finally the First Consul yielded,
gave Moreau a free hand, and the advance movement began. The Rhine was
crossed, and Moreau began a series of victories over Kray which brought
him to the Danube. But the Austrians, taking the offensive against the
army of Italy, cut it in two, and shut up Masséna in Genoa, where the
English fleet could coöperate against the French.
It was then that Napoleon, almost by stealth, got together another
army, composed partly of conscripts, partly of veterans from the armies
of La Vendée and Holland, and hurried it to the foot of the Alps. The
plan was to pass these mountains, fall upon the Austrian rear, and
redeem Italy at a blow. His enemies heard of the Army of the Reserve
which he was collecting at Dijon. Spies went there, saw a few thousand
raw recruits, and reported that Napoleon had no Army of Reserve--that
he was merely trying to bluff old Melas into loosening his grip on
Genoa. It suited Napoleon precisely to have his new army treated as a
joke. With consummate art he encouraged the jest while he collected,
drilled, and equipped at different points the various detachments with
which he intended to march.
Under the constitution the First Consul could not legally command the
army. He was not forbidden, however, to be present as an interested
spectator while some one else commanded. So he appointed Berthier,
General-in-chief.
Early in May, 1800, all was ready, and the First Consul left Paris to
become the interested spectator of the movements of the Army of the
Reserve. At the front, form and fiction gave way to actuality, and
Napoleon’s word was that of chief. At four different passes the troops
entered the mountains, the main army crossing by the Great St. Bernard.
Modern students, who sit in snug libraries and rectify the arduous
campaigns of the past, have discovered that Napoleon’s passage of the
Alps was no great thing after all. They say that his troops had plenty
to eat, drink, and wear; thousands of mules and peasants to aid in the
heavy work of the march; no foes to fight on the way; and that his
march was little more than a military parade. Indeed, it was one of
those things which looked a deal easier after it had been done than
before. And yet it must have been a notable feat to have scaled those
mighty barriers on which lay the snow, to have threaded those paths up
in the air over which the avalanche hung, and below which the precipice
yawned--all this having been done with such speed that the French were
in Italy before the Austrians knew they had left France. Much of the
route was along narrow ledges where the shepherd walked warily. To
take a fully equipped army over these rocky shelves,--horse, foot,
artillery, ammunition, supplies,--seems even at this admire-nothing
day to have been a triumph of organization, skill, foresight, and
hardihood. Only a few months previously a Russian army, led by Suwarow,
had ventured to cross the Alps--and had crossed; but only half of them
got out alive.
In less than a week the French made good the daring attempt, and were
in the valleys of Italy marching upon the Austrian rear. They had
brought cavalry and infantry almost without loss. Cannon had been laid
in hollowed logs and pulled up by ropes. The little fort of Bard, stuck
right in the road out of the mountains, had, for a moment, threatened
the whole enterprise with ruin. Napoleon had known of the fortress, but
had underrated its importance. For some hours a panic seemed imminent
in the vanguard, but a goat-path was found which led past the fort on
rocks higher up. The cannon were slipped by at night, over the road
covered with litter.
Remaining on the French side to despatch the troops forward as rapidly
as possible, Napoleon was one of the last to enter the mountains. He
rode a sure-footed mule, and by his side walked his guide, a young
peasant who unbosomed himself as they went forward. This peasant, also,
had his eyes on the future, and wished to rise in the world. His heart
yearned for a farm in the Alps, where he might pasture a small flock,
grow a few necessaries, marry a girl he loved, and live happily ever
afterward. The traveller on the mule seemed much absorbed in thought;
but, nevertheless, he heard all the mountaineer was saying.
He gave to the young peasant the funds wherewith to buy house and land;
and when Napoleon’s empire had fallen to pieces, the family of his
old-time guide yet dwelt contentedly in the home the First Consul had
given.
So completely had Napoleon hoodwinked the Austrians that the Army of
the Reserve was still considered a myth. Mountain passes where a few
battalions could have vanquished an army had been left unguarded; and
when the French, about sixty thousand strong, stood upon the Italian
plains, Melas could with difficulty be made to believe the news.
Now that he was in Italy, it would seem that Napoleon should have
relieved Genoa, as he had promised. Masséna and his heroic band were
there suffering all the tortures of war, of famine, and of pestilence.
But Napoleon had conceived a grander plan. To march upon Genoa,
fighting detachments of Austrians as he went, and going from one
hum-drum victory to another was too commonplace. Napoleon wished to
strike a blow which would annihilate the enemy and astound the world.
So he deliberately left Masséna’s army to starve while he himself
marched upon Milan. One after another, Lannes, leading the vanguard,
beat the Austrian detachments which opposed his progress, and Napoleon
entered Milan in triumph.
Here he spent several days in festivals and ceremonials, lapping
himself in the luxury of boundless adulation. In the meantime he threw
his forces upon the rear of Melas, spreading a vast net around that
brave but almost demoralized commander.
On June 4 Masséna consented to evacuate Genoa. His troops, after having
been fed by the Austrians, marched off to join the French in Italy.
Thus, also, a strong Austrian force was released, and it hastened to
join Melas.
When Bourrienne went into Napoleon’s room late at night, June 8, and
shook him out of a sound sleep to announce that Genoa had fallen, he
refused at first to believe it. But he immediately rose, and in a short
while orders were flying in all directions, changing the dispositions
of the army.
On June 9, Lannes, with the aid of Victor, who came up late in the day,
won a memorable victory at Montebello.
Napoleon, who had left Milan and taken up a strong position at
Stradella, was in a state of the utmost anxiety, fearing that Melas was
about to escape the net. The 10th and 11th of June passed without any
definite information of the Austrian movements. On the 12th of June his
impatience became so great that he abandoned his position at Stradella
and advanced to the heights of Tortona. On the next day he passed the
Scrivia and entered the plain of Marengo, and drove a small Austrian
force from the village. Napoleon was convinced that Melas had escaped,
and it is queer commentary upon the kind of scouting done at the time
that the whereabouts of the Austrian army was totally unknown to the
French, although the two were but a few miles apart. Leaving Victor in
possession of the village of Marengo, and placing Lannes on the plain,
Napoleon started back to headquarters at Voghera. By a lucky chance
the Scrivia had overflowed its banks, and he could not cross. Thus
he remained near enough to Marengo to repair his terrible mistake in
concluding that Melas meant to shut himself up in Genoa. Desaix, just
returned from Egypt, reached headquarters June 11, and was at once put
in command of the Boudet division. On June 13 Desaix was ordered to
march upon Novi, by which route Melas would have to pass to Genoa.
Thus on the eve of one of the most famous battles in history, the
soldier who won it was completely at fault as to the position and the
purpose of his foe. His own army was widely scattered, and it was only
by accident that he was within reach of the point where the blow fell.
The staff-officer whom he had sent to reconnoitre, had reported that
the Austrians were not in possession of the bridges over the Bormida.
In fact they were in possession of these bridges, and at daybreak, June
14, they began to pour across them with the intention of crushing the
weak French forces at Marengo and of breaking through Napoleon’s net.
About thirty-six thousand Austrians fell upon the sixteen thousand
French. Victor was driven out of the village, and by ten o’clock in
the morning his troops were in disorderly retreat. The superb courage
of Lannes stayed the rout. With the utmost firmness he held his troops
in hand, falling back slowly and fighting desperately as he retired.
At full speed Napoleon came upon the field, bringing the consular
guard and Monnier’s division. Couriers had already been sent to bring
Desaix back to the main army; but before these messengers reached him,
he had heard the cannonade, guessed that Melas had struck the French
at Marengo, and at once set his columns in motion toward the field of
battle.
Napoleon’s presence, his reënforcements, his skilful dispositions,
had put new life into the struggle; but as the morning wore away, and
the afternoon commenced, it was evident that the Austrians would win.
The French gave way at all points, and in parts of the field the rout
was complete. Napoleon sat by the roadside swishing his riding-whip
and calling to the fugitives who passed him to stop; but their flight
continued. A commercial traveller left the field and sped away to carry
the news to Paris that Napoleon had suffered a great defeat.
Melas, oppressed by age and worn out by the heat and fatigue of the
day, thought the battle won; went to his headquarters to send off
despatches to that effect, and left to his subordinate, Zach, the task
of the pursuit. But Desaix had come--“the battle is lost, but there is
time to gain another.”
Only twelve pieces of artillery were left to the French. Marmont massed
these, and opened on the dense Austrian column advancing _en échelon_
along the road. Desaix charged, and almost immediately got a ball in
the breast and died “a soldier’s beautiful death.” But his troops
pressed forward with fury, throwing back in confusion the head of the
Austrian column. At this moment, “in the very nick of time” as Napoleon
himself admitted to Bourrienne, Kellermann made his famous cavalry
charge on the flank of the Austrian column, cut it in two, and decided
the day. The French lines everywhere advanced, the Austrians broke.
They were bewildered at the sudden change: they had no chief, Zach
being a prisoner, and Melas absent. In wildest confusion they fled
toward the bridges over the Bormida, Austrian horse trampling Austrian
foot, and the French in hot pursuit.
Some sixteen thousand men were killed or wounded in this bloody battle,
and very nearly half of these were French. But the Austrians were
demoralized, and Melas so overcome that he hastened to treat. To save
the relics of his army, he was willing to abandon northern Italy, give
up Genoa, and all fortresses recently taken.
From the field of Marengo, surrounded by so many dead and mangled,
Napoleon wrote a long letter to the Emperor of Austria, urgently
pleading for a general peace.
Returning to Milan, he was welcomed with infinite enthusiasm. He spent
some days there reëstablishing the Cisalpine republic, reorganizing the
administration, and putting himself in accord with the Roman Catholic
Church. Just as earnestly as he had assured the Mahometans in Egypt
that his mission on earth was to crush the Pope and lower the Cross, he
now set himself up as the restorer of the Christian religion. He went
in state to the cathedral of Milan to appear in a clerical pageant; and
he took great pains to have it published abroad that the priests might
rely upon him for protection.
Leaving Masséna in command of the army of Italy, Napoleon returned
to Paris by way of Lyons. The ovations which greeted him were as
spontaneous as they were hearty. Never before, never afterward, did
his presence call forth such universal, sincere, and joyous applause.
He was still young, still the first magistrate of a republic, still
conciliatory and magnetic, still posing as a public servant who could
modestly write that “he hoped France would be satisfied with its
army.” He was not yet the all-absorbing egotist who must be everything.
Moreau was still at the head of an army, Carnot at the war office,
there was a tribunate which could debate governmental policies; there
was a public opinion which could not be openly braved.
Hence it was a national hero whom the French welcomed home, not a
master before whom flatterers fawned. All Paris was illuminated from
hut to palace. Thousands pressed forward but to see him; the Tuileries
were surrounded by the best people of Paris, all eager to catch a
glimpse of him at a window, and greeting him wherever he appeared with
rapturous shouts. He himself was deeply touched, and said afterward
that these were the happiest days of his life. The time was yet to come
when he would appear at these same windows to answer the shouts of a
few boys and loafers, on the dreary days before Waterloo.
With that talent for effect which was one of Napoleon’s most highly
developed traits, he had ordered the Consular Guard back to France
almost immediately after Marengo, timing its march so that it would
arrive in Paris on the day of the great national fête of July 14. On
that day when so many thousands of Frenchmen, dressed in gala attire,
thronged the Field of Mars and gave themselves up to rejoicings, the
column from Marengo, dust-covered, clad in their old uniform, and
bearing their smoke-begrimed, bullet-rent banners, suddenly entered the
vast amphitheatre. The effect was electrical. Shout upon shout greeted
the returning heroes; and with an uncontrollable impulse the people
rushed upon these veterans from Italy with every demonstration of joy,
affection, and wild enthusiasm. So great was the disorder that the
regular programme of the day was thrust aside; the men of Marengo had
dwarfed every other attraction.
About this time the Bourbons made efforts to persuade Napoleon to play
the part of Monk in restoring the monarchy. Suasive priests bearing
letters, and lovely women bearing secret offers, were employed, the
facile Josephine lending herself gracefully to the intrigue. The First
Consul was the last of men to rake chestnuts out of the fire for other
people, and the Bourbons were firmly advised to accept a situation
which left them in exile.
Failing in their efforts to bribe him, the monarchists determined to
kill him; and the more violent Jacobins, seeing his imperial trend,
were equally envenomed. It was the latter faction which made the
first attempt upon his life. The Conspiracy of Ceracchi, Arena, and
Topino-Lebrun was betrayed to the police. Ceracchi was an Italian
sculptor who had modelled a bust of Napoleon. Arena was a Corsican
whose brother had aimed a knife at Napoleon on the 19th of Brumaire.
Topino-Lebrun was the juryman who had doubted the guilt of Danton, and
who had been bullied into voting death by the painter David. They were
condemned and executed.
A yet more dangerous plot was that of the royalists. An infernal
machine was contrived by which Napoleon was to have been blown up while
on his way to the opera. The explosion occurred, but a trifle too
late. Napoleon had just passed. The man in charge of the machine did
not know Josephine’s carriage from Napoleon’s, and approached too near
in the effort to make certain. A guard kicked him away, and while he
was recovering himself Napoleon’s coachman drove furiously round the
corner. A sound like thunder was heard, many houses were shattered,
many people killed and wounded.
“Drive on!” shouted Napoleon; and when he entered his box at the opera,
he looked as if nothing had occurred. “The rascals tried to blow me
up,” he said coolly as he took his seat and called for an opera-book.
But when he returned to the Tuileries he was in a rage, and violently
accused the Jacobins of being the authors of the plot. Fouché in vain
insisted that the royalists were the guilty parties; the First Consul
refused to listen. Taking advantage of the feeling aroused in his
favor by the attempts to assassinate him, he caused a new tribunal
to be created, composed of eight judges, who were to try political
offenders without jury, and without appeal or revision. By another law
he was empowered to banish without trial such persons as he considered
“enemies of the State.” One hundred and thirty of the more violent
republicans were banished to the penal colonies.
For the purpose of feeling the public pulse, a pamphlet was put forward
by Fontanes and Lucien Bonaparte, called a “Parallel between Cæsar,
Cromwell, Monk, and Bonaparte.” It was hinted that supreme power should
be vested in Napoleon, that he should be made king. The pear was not
quite ripe, the pamphlet created a bad effect. Napoleon, who had
undoubtedly encouraged its publication, promptly repudiated it; and
Lucien, dismissed from his office as Secretary of the Interior, was
sent to Spain as ambassador.
* * * * *
However willing Austria might be for peace, she could not make it
without the consent of England, her ally. The British ministry viewed
with the spirit of philosophy the crushing blows which France had
dealt Austria, and, secure from attack themselves, encouraged Austria
to keep on fighting. Not able to send troops, England sent money.
With $10,000,000 she bought the further use of German soldiers to
keep France employed on the Continent, while Great Britain bent her
energies to the capture of Malta and of Egypt. Thus it happened that
the armistice expired without a treaty having been agreed on; and the
war between the Republic and the Empire recommenced (November, 1800).
Brune defeated the Austrians on the Mincio; Macdonald made the heroic
march through the Splügen Pass; Moreau won the magnificent victory of
Hohenlinden (December 4, 1800).
It seems that, with a little more dash, Moreau might have taken Vienna,
exposed as it was to the march of three victorious armies. But Austria
asked for a truce, gave pledges of good faith, and the French halted.
On February 9, 1801, the Peace of Lunéville put an end to the war.
France had won the boundary of the Rhine; and, in addition to the
territory made hers by the treaty of Campo Formio, gained Tuscany,
which Napoleon had promised to Spain, in exchange for Louisiana.
Napoleon’s position on the Continent was now very strong. Prussia was a
friendly neutral; Spain an ally; Italy and Switzerland little more than
French provinces; the Batavian republic and Genoa submissive subjects;
Portugal in his power by reason of his compact with Spain; and the
Czar of Russia an enthusiastic friend. England was shut out from the
Continent almost completely.
Her insolent exercise of the right of search of neutral vessels on the
high seas, a right which had no basis in law or justice, had provoked
the hatred of the world, and Napoleon took advantage of this feeling
and of Russia’s friendship to reorganize the armed neutrality of the
northern powers for the purpose of bringing England to reason. Her
reply was brutal and effective. She sent her fleet, under Parker and
Nelson, to bombard Copenhagen and to destroy the Danish navy. The work
was savagely done, and the northern league shattered. The English party
at St. Petersburg followed up this blow by the murder of the Czar Paul.
Hardly had the young Alexander been proclaimed before he announced
his adhesion to the English and his antagonism to the French. He may,
possibly, have been free from the guilt of conniving at his father’s
murder; but it is not to be denied that he continued to reward with the
highest offices the chief assassins--Bennigsen, for example.
* * * * *
Kléber, who had gloriously maintained himself in Egypt, was
assassinated on the day of Marengo. It is one of the mysteries of
Napoleon’s career that he allowed the incompetent Menou to succeed
to a command where so much executive and administrative ability was
required. One is tempted to think that even at this early date the
genius of Napoleon was overtaxed. In trying to do so many things,
he neglected some. Egypt he certainly tried to relieve by sending
reënforcements; but he slurred all, neglected all, and lost all, by
allowing so notorious an imbecile as Menou to remain in chief command.
Why he did not appoint Reynier or Lanusse, both of whom were already
in Egypt, or why he did not send some good officer from France, can
only be explained upon the theory that his mind was so much preoccupied
with other matters that he failed to attach due importance to the
situation of the Army of the East.
Menou’s administration was one dreary chapter of stupidities; and when
the English landed at Alexandria, they found an easy conquest. With
little effort and little bloodshed the French were beaten in detail,
and agreed to quit the country.
When the tidings reached Napoleon, his anger and chagrin were extreme.
He jumped upon his horse and dashed off into the forest of Bougival
as if the furies were after him. Hour after hour he rode frantically
in the wood, to the wonder of his staff, who could not guess what it
was all about. At last, when the storm had spent itself, he unbosomed
himself to the faithful Junot. That night Junot said to his wife,
“Ah, my General suffered cruelly to-day: Egypt has been taken by the
English!”
Malta having been captured also, Napoleon had the mortification of
realizing that his expedition to the East had had no other result than
to sow seed for an English harvest.
However, Great Britain was dismayed at the increase of her public debt,
oppressed by the load of taxation, and somewhat intimidated by the
energy which Napoleon began to show in building up the French navy. A
monster demonstration at Boulogne,--where he gathered an immense number
of armed sloops, apparently for the purpose of invading England,--and
the failure of an attack which Nelson made on this flotilla, had an
effect; and in March, 1802, to the joy of the world, the Peace of
Amiens was signed.
For the first time since 1792 universal peace prevailed in Europe.