Page:Book of the Riviera.djvu/107

Rh Barrère, it was decreed that the name of Toulon should be blotted out, and a commission, consisting of Barras, Fréron, and the younger Robespierre, was ordered to continue the slaughter. Such as were able bought their lives. One old merchant of eighty-four offered all his wealth save eight hundred livres; but the revolutionary judge, coveting the whole, sent him under the guillotine, and confiscated his entire property. Whilst the butchery was in progress, a grand dinner was given in celebration of the taking of the town. Generals, representatives of the people, sans-culottes, galley-slaves, "the only respectable persons in the town," as the commissioners said, sat down together, the commissioners occupying a separate table.

Toulon again gradually refilled with people, and under the Directory it was constituted the first military port of France. From Toulon Bonaparte organised his expedition to Egypt.