Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/645

 KISE OP BONAPARTE.] FRANCE 009 seemed to revive. They also abolished the commune of Paris, created an army for the &quot; interior,&quot; and established guards for the public service. Stability seemed to return ; men were weary of the agitations of late years ; the famine also abated, so as to render Paris less difficult of management. It was felt that the Government was in a way provisional, that France had need of repose, and, as usually happens, indifference succeeded as a reaction from the heroic measures of the past. The councils of the Ancients and of the Five Hundred were one-third new ; and the elections had shown that the country was weary of the llevolution, and desired a return to a constitution, and perhaps even to a monarchy. The bourgeoisie of France were the strength of this movement. The republican party, which had offended Paris, and refused to ally itself with the doings of the Jacobins, seemed weak, and was obliged to stand on the defensive. The royalists, to whom had rallied many of the old Girondists, were able to pass more than ono decree in favour of their views. Had there been a prince of any re solution at their head, their chances would have been good ; as it was, the count of Provence, who in this year was recog nized by the crowned heads as Louis XVIII. on the death of his nephew the dauphin (the titular Louis XVII.), was fin intelligent and liberal person, but wanting in power, while his brother the count of Artois (afterwards Charles X.), whom he now named lieutenant-general of the realm, was a miserable and narrow creature, of good manners and bad morals, incapable of any worthy or heroic effort. When the Vendeans and Bretons were eager to revolt again, and Charette had prepared everything, the count of Artois could not even be persuaded to land ; he returned to England, discredited and despised. The fierce outbreak of despair with which Charette signalized his disappointment and nnger was soon mastered by the devotion and genius of Hoche, who circled round the revolted districts, gradually hemmed in the insurgents, and eventually took and shot the desperate chieftain himself. His comrade Stofflet had perished a month before. By April 1796 the west was completely pacified, and 80,000 of the best soldiers of France were free for foreign service. At the other extreme, the former &quot; Terrorists &quot; formed a great secret society called the Conspiracy of Babeuf ; their plans were betrayed to the Directory, and the movement easily crushed ; the Government used no vengeance ; only Babeuf and one com rade were executed. These things gave stability and confidence to the new administration ; it seemed to win the good-will of all except the extreme parties ; there was a distinct lull in political passion ; and as the Directory proved very enterprising and warlike in foreign affairs, it also secured the army. This was in large part due to the military genius and temper of Carnot, &quot; the organizer of victory,&quot; who was one of the Five. He now planned a grand attack on Austria, feeling that the hostility of England might for the moment bo neglected. Three armies, led by three young generals, wore to make their way in harmony towards Vienna, one under Jourdan, the army of the Sambre and Mouse, the second under Moreau, that of the Rhine and Moselle, the third under Bonaparte, the army of Italy. This army, hitherto commanded by Scherer, who had under him Serrurier, Massena, and Augereau, had not been inactive f.i 1794 and 1795. Scherer, however, had no enterprise in him, and was content with partial success ; his army lay scattered along the Alps, and he seemed powerless to draw it together so as to crush either Piedmontese or Austrians ; the army also was not powerful in numbers, though its quality was very good. Bonaparte, on his arrival to take the command, at once addressed them in the tone of a con fident adventurer speaking to hungry mercenaries : &quot; I am going to lead you into the richest plains on earth; there you will find honour, glory, and wealth/ Splendidly seconded 1796-97. by Massena, Laharpe, and Augereau, he at once took the Bona- ascendant, and placed his victorious army between the Piedmontese and the Austrians. . By a succession of rapid in C0 1 m .&quot; A. i f i ,1 m, , f *: mand m victories he forced the Turin court to sue for an armistice jtaly. (28th April 1796), securing the neutrality of the Sardinian and Savoyard troops, and the cession of Nice and Savoy to France at the end of the war. Then with the swiftness of an eagle he crossed the Po, won the hard-fought battle of Lodi (10th May 1796), and entered Milan in triumph. There he re-equipped and rested his army, made terms with the dukes of Parma and Modena, raised a contribution of twenty million francs on Lombardy, the half of which, with some of the masterpieces of Italian art, he sent at once to Paris to the Directory, which received his favours with a gratitude which trembled on the verge of jealousy. When they proposed to interfere with him, he threatened to throw up his command ; and so marked already was this young officer s popularity in France, that the Government shrank from accepting his resignation, and the great career was not checked. In spite of infinite difficulties, by un scrupulous assertion, audacity, genius in war, Bonaparte succeeded in humbling the Italian states : Venice, with her unarmed neutrality, was easily mastered; Beaulieu, who commanded the Austrian army now falling fast asunder, was driven back towards Tyrol ; Mantua was blockaded ; the pope, Pius VI., signed an armistice with the young conqueror; the English were dislodged from Leghorn and Corsica ; Genoa gave in ; Piedmont was quieted. When Wurmser came down into Italy with 40,000 Aus trians from the armies of the Rhine, these unwilling friends of France at once turned against her ; it might have well appalled a man of slighter nerve. But Bonaparte at once made head against his new foes. He was a man who never failed to see the critical point in a campaign or in a battle ; and at Lonato, Castiglione, Bassano, and Saint George he drove the old marshal, with his ancient ways of warfare, completely out of Italy with vast loss. The whole series of operations had taken but a week (July 30 to August 5). He hoped next to penetrate, according to Carnot s plan, through Tyrol into Bavaria, and there to unite with Moreau. He had, however, underrated the Austrian ob stinacy ; for Wurmser, gathering fresh forces, resumed the offensive, hoping to free Mantua, and to repulse the small French army. Bonaparte, who had won the battles of Roveredo and Galliano, and had reached Trent on his way for Innsbruck, at once hastened back, defeated Wurmser at Bassano and drove him towards Mantua, in which place he shut him up by the middle of September. In vain did whole German armies, released from the campaigns else where, pour from the mountains down into Italy ; the in credible swiftness, clearness of insight, vivacity of genius, ascendency over the soldierly mind, which mark the great commander, saved Bonaparte from being crushed. Seconded by his admirable captains, he won the fields of Arcola and Ilivoli, of La Favorita and Corona, in which he utterly para lysed the Austrians, secured the fall of Mantua, the prize for which the antagonists were striving, and led to the capitula tion of Marshal Wurmser himself. Bonaparte instantly set Bona- out to reduce the feeble pope, who, scared by his approach, r a rte signed (19th February 179 7) the treaty of Tolentino, under which he paid a heavy subsidy, and ceded Avignon and the Venaissin to France, and the Romagna, with Bologna and Ferrara, to the friends of France in the Milanese ; Bona parte also extorted from him a hundred of the chief works of art at Rome, which were sent as spoils of war to Paris. It was believed in France that the last hour of the papacy had struck. The young conqueror, in the midst of his most active movements, had found time to sketch out a future for Italy, and to frame his Cispadanc and Lombard IX. - 77