"On Linden, when the sun was low, All bloodless lay the untrodden snow, And dark as winter was the flow Of Iser rolling rapidly:
But Linden saw another sight When the drums beat at dead of night, Commanding fires of death to light The darkness of her scenery," &c.
CHAPTER XVI
Affairs of Naples and of the Pope--The Emperor Paul of Russia--Northern confederacy against England--Battle of Copenhagen--Nelson"s Victory--Death of Paul--Expedition to Egypt under Sir Ralph Abercrombie--Battle of Alexandria--Conquest of Egypt--The Flotilla of Boulogne--Negotiations with England--Peace of Amiens.
England alone remained steadfast in her hostility; and, as we shall presently see, the Chief Consul was even able to secure for himself the alliance against her of some of the princ.i.p.al powers in Europe; but before we proceed to the eventful year of 1801, there are some incidents of a minor order which must be briefly mentioned.
It has been already said that the half-crazy Emperor of Russia had taken up a violent personal admiration for Buonaparte, and, under the influence of that feeling, virtually abandoned Austria before the campaign of Marengo. Napoleon took every means to flatter the Autocrat and secure him in his interests. Paul had been pleased to appoint himself Grand Master of the ruined Order of the Knights of St. John. It was his not idle ambition to obtain, in this character, possession of the Island of Malta; and Buonaparte represented the refusal of the English government to give up that stronghold as a personal insult to Paul. Some 10,000 Russian prisoners of war were not only sent back in safety, but new clothed and equipped at the expense of France; and the Autocrat was led to contrast this favourably with some alleged neglect of these troops on the part of Austria, when arranging the treaty of Luneville. Lastly, the Queen of Naples, sister to the German Emperor, being satisfied that, after the battle of Marengo, nothing could save her husband"s Italian dominions from falling back into the hands of France (out of which they had been rescued, during Napoleon"s Egyptian campaign, by the English, under Lord Nelson), took up the resolution of travelling in person to St. Petersburg in the heart of the winter, and soliciting the intercession of Paul. The Czar, egregiously flattered with being invoked in this fashion, did not hesitate to apply in the Queen"s behalf to Buonaparte; and the Chief Consul, well calculating the gain and the loss, consented to spare Naples for the present, thereby completing the blind attachment of that weak-minded despot.
At the same time when Nelson delivered Naples from the French, a party of English seamen, under Commodore Trowbridge, had landed at the mouth of the Tiber, marched to Rome, and restored the Pope. The French army, after the great victory which gave them back Lombardy and Piedmont, doubted not that the re-establishment of "the Roman Republic" would be one of its next consequences. But Buonaparte, who had in the interim re-opened the churches of France, was now disposed to consider the affairs of the Pope with very different eyes. In a word, he had already resolved to make use of the Holy Father in the consolidation of his own power as a monarch; and, as the first step to this object, the government of the Pope was now suffered to continue--not a little to the astonishment of the French soldiery, and to the confusion, it may be added, and regret, of various powers of Europe.
The First Consul, meanwhile, proceeded to turn the friendship of the Russian Emperor to solid account. It has never, in truth, been difficult to excite angry and jealous feelings, among the minor maritime powers, with regard to the naval sovereignty of England. The claim of the right of searching neutral ships, and her doctrine on the subject of blockades, had indeed been recognised in many treaties by Russia, and by every maritime government in Europe. Nevertheless, the old grudge remained; and Buonaparte now artfully employed every engine of diplomacy to awaken a spirit of hostility against England, first, in the well-prepared mind of the Czar, and then in the cabinets of Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden. The result was, in effect, a coalition of these powers against the mistress of the seas; and, at the opening of the nineteenth century, England had to contemplate the necessity of encountering single-handed the colossal military force of France, and the combined fleets of Europe. To deepen the shadows of her prospects at that great crisis of her history, the people suffered severely under a scarcity of food, in consequence of bad harvests; and the efforts which England made, under such an acc.u.mulation of adverse circ.u.mstances, must ever be treasured among the proudest of her national recollections.
In January, 1801, the first imperial parliament of Great Britain and Ireland a.s.sembled; and, shortly afterwards, in consequence of a difference of opinion, touching the Roman Catholic Question, between George III. and Mr. Pitt, that great minister resigned his office, and a new cabinet was formed, with Mr. Addington (afterwards Viscount Sidmouth) at its head. These changes were a new source of embarra.s.sment; yet the prosecution of the war was urged with undiminished vigour.
Early in March, Admiral Sir Hyde Parker and Vice-Admiral Lord Nelson conducted a fleet into the Baltic, with the view of attacking the northern powers in their own harbours, ere they could effect their meditated junction with the fleets of France and Holland. The English pa.s.sed the Sound on the 13th of March, and reconnoitred the road of Copenhagen, where the Crown-Prince, Regent of Denmark, had made formidable preparations to receive them. It was on the 2nd of April that Nelson, who had volunteered to lead the a.s.sault, having at length obtained a favourable wind, advanced with twelve ships of the line, besides frigates and fire-ships, upon the Danish armament, which consisted of six sail of the line, eleven floating batteries, and an enormous array of small craft, all chained to each other and to the ground, and protected by the Crown-batteries, mounting eighty-eight guns, and the fortifications of the isle of Amack. The battle lasted for four hours, and ended in a signal victory. Some few schooners and bomb-vessels fled early, and escaped: the whole Danish fleet besides were sunk, burnt, or taken. The Prince Regent, to save the capital from destruction, was compelled to enter into a negotiation, which ended in the abandonment of the French alliance by Denmark. Lord Nelson then reconnoitred Stockholm; but, being unwilling to inflict unnecessary suffering, did not injure the city, on discovering that the Swedish fleet had already put to sea. Meantime, news arrived that Paul had been a.s.sa.s.sinated in his palace at St. Petersburg; and that the policy which he had adopted, to the displeasure of the Russian n.o.bility, was likely to find no favour with his successor. The moving spirit of the northern confederacy was, in effect, no more, and a brief negotiation ended in its total disrupture.[41]
In the same month of March the British arms were crowned with a more pleasing triumph in a more distant region. From the time when Buonaparte landed in Egypt, the occupation of that country by a French army, and its possible consequences to our empire in the East, had formed a subject of anxious solicitude in the cabinet of St. James"s; and the means for attacking the army which Napoleon had entrusted to Kleber, had, at length, been combined and set in motion, in opposition to the sentiments both of the King and Mr. Pitt, by the bold spirit of Lord Melville, then at the head of the Indian Board of Control. The fleet of Lord Keith, carrying Sir Ralph Abercrombie and his army, were already in possession of Malta; another army of 7000, composed partly of English troops and partly of sepoys, had been dispatched from India, and approached Egypt by the way of the Red Sea; and, lastly, the Ottoman Porte was prepared to co-operate with General Abercrombie, whenever he should effect a landing in the neighbourhood of Alexandria. That event occurred on the 13th of March, the British troops disembarking in the face of the French, who were very strongly posted; and, at length, driving them from the sh.o.r.e. On the 21st a general engagement took place in front of Alexandria; and Sir Ralph Abercrombie fell, mortally wounded, in the moment of victory. General Hutchinson (afterwards Earl of Donoughmore), on whom the command devolved, pursued the advantage.
Kleber, who by his excellent administration had earned the t.i.tle of the _Just Sultan_, had been a.s.sa.s.sinated by an obscure fanatic on the same day when Dessaix died gloriously at Marengo; and Menou, who succeeded to the command of the French army in Egypt, was found wholly incapable of conducting either the civil or the military business of the colony to advantage. He shut himself up in Alexandria with the relics of the army defeated on the 21st. The English, forthwith, let the sea into the lake Mareotis: the capital was thus made an island, and all communication with the country cut off. Hutchinson was now joined by the Turkish Capitan-pasha and 6000 men; and intelligence reached him that the Indian reinforcement, under General Baird, had landed at Cossire. Rosetta was soon captured; and, after various skirmishes, Cairo was invested. On the 28th of June General Belliard and a garrison of 13,000 surrendered, on condition that they should be transported in safety to France: and Menou, perceiving that defence was hopeless and famine at hand, followed, ere long, the same example. Thus, in one brief campaign, was Egypt entirely rescued from the arms of France. But even that great advantage was a trifle, when compared with the stimulus afforded to national confidence at home, by this timely re-a.s.sertion of the character of the English army. At sea we had never feared an enemy; but the victories of Abercrombie destroyed a fatal prejudice which had, of recent days, gained ground,--that the military of Great Britain were unfit to cope with those of revolutionary France. Nor should it be forgotten, that if Abercrombie had the glory of first leading English soldiers to victory over the self-styled _Invincibles_ of Buonaparte, he owed the means of his success to the admirable exertions of the Duke of York, in reforming the discipline of the service as commander-in-chief.
On learning the fate of Egypt, Buonaparte exclaimed, "Well, there remains only the descent on Britain;" and, in the course of a few weeks, not less than 100,000 troops were a.s.sembled on the coasts of France. An immense flotilla of flat-bottomed boats was prepared to carry them across the Channel, whenever, by any favourable accident, it should be clear of the English fleets; and both the soldiery and the seamen of the invading armament were trained and practised incessantly, in every exercise and manuvre likely to be of avail when that long-looked-for day should arrive. These preparations were met, as might have been expected, on the part of the English government and nation. Nelson was placed in command of the Channel fleet; and the regular army was reinforced on sh.o.r.e by a mult.i.tude of new and enthusiastic volunteers; men of all parties and ranks joining heart and hand in the great and sacred cause. Lord Nelson, more than once, reconnoitred the flotilla a.s.sembled at Boulogne, and, at length, attempted the daring movement of cutting out the vessels, in the teeth of all the batteries. The boats being chained to the sh.o.r.e, crowded with soldiery, and placed immediately under the fortifications, the attempt was unsuccessful; but the gallantry with which it was conducted struck new terror into the hearts of the French marine, and, Nelson continuing to watch the Channel with unsleeping vigilance, the hopes of the First Consul, ere long, sunk.
The successes of the English in the Baltic and in Egypt were well calculated to dispose Napoleon for negotiation: and the retirement of Mr. Pitt, who was considered throughout Europe as the author and very soul of the anti-revolutionary war, was not without its influence. On the other hand, Napoleon"s mighty successes against the German emperor had been followed up this same year by the march of a French and Spanish army into Portugal, in consequence of which that last ally of England had been compelled to submit to the general fate of the continent. On both sides there existed the strongest motives for accommodation; and, in effect, after a tedious negotiation, the preliminaries of peace were signed, on the 10th of October, at Amiens. By this treaty England surrendered all the conquests which she had made during the war, except Ceylon and Trinidad. France, on the other hand, restored what she had taken from Portugal, and guaranteed the independence of the Ionian Islands. Malta was to be restored to the Knights of St. John, and declared a free port: neither England nor France was to have any representatives in the order; and the garrison was to consist of the troops of a neutral power. This article was that which cost the greatest difficulty--and Malta was destined to form the pretext, at least, for the re-opening of the war at no distant date.
Meantime, except by a small party, who thought that England should never make peace unless the Bourbon family were restored to the throne of France, this news was received with universal satisfaction throughout Great Britain. "It was," as Mr. Sheridan summed up the matter, "a peace which all men were glad of, and of which no man could be proud." The definitive treaty was signed on the 25th of March, 1802: and nothing could surpa.s.s the demonstrations of joy on this occasion, both in London and in Paris--or the enthusiastic display of good-will with which the populace of either capital welcomed the plenipotentiaries.
[Footnote 41: For the details of the battle of Copenhagen see Southey"s _Life of Nelson_. That conflict has been celebrated, in a n.o.ble lyric, by Campbell--
"Of Nelson and the North Sing the glorious day"s renown, When to the battle fierce came forth All the might of Denmark"s crown," &c.
CHAPTER XVII
Peace of Amiens--The Concordat--The Legion of Honour--Buonaparte President of the Cisalpine Republic--First Consul for Life--Grand Mediator of the Helvetic Confederacy--St. Domingo--Toussaint L"Ouverture--Dissatisfaction of England--Trial of Peltier--Lord Whitworth--Rupture of the Peace of Amiens--Detention of English Travellers in France.
The peace of Amiens, like that of Campo-Formio, turned out a mere armistice. It was signed in the midst of mutual suspicion; and the audacious ambition of the French government, from the very day of its ratification, acc.u.mulated the elements of an inevitable rupture. The continent, however, had been virtually shut against the English for ten years; and now, in the first eagerness of curiosity, travellers of all ranks, ages, and s.e.xes poured across the Channel, to contemplate, with their own eyes, the scenes and effects of the many wonderful deeds and changes which had been wrought since the outbreaking of the French Revolution. The chief object of curiosity was Napoleon himself; and English statesmen, of the highest cla.s.s, were among those who now thronged the levees of the Tuileries. Mr. Fox, in particular, seems to have been courted and caressed by the Chief Consul; and these two great men parted with feelings of mutual admiration. Our countrymen, in general, were received in Paris with extraordinary attentions and civilities; and for a brief s.p.a.ce, the establishment of friendly feelings between the two nations was confidently expected.
The English were agreeably disappointed with the condition of Paris. To their great surprise they found the consular court already arranged, in many particulars, upon the old model of the monarchy, and daily approximating to that example, step by step. Josephine had restored, t.i.tles alone excepted, the old language of polite intercourse: _Citoyenne_ had been replaced by _Madame_; and _Citoyen_ was preparing to make way for _Monsieur_. The emigrant n.o.bility had flocked back in great numbers; and Buonaparte, dispensing with the awkward services of his aides-de-camp in the interior of the palace, was now attended by chamberlains and other officers of state--chosen for the most part, from the highest families of the monarchy; and who studiously conducted themselves towards the Chief Consul exactly as if the crown of Louis XVI. had descended to him by the ordinary laws of inheritance. Napoleon himself, if we may believe Madame de Stael, had the weakness to affect, in many trivial matters, a close imitation of what his new attendants reported to have been the personal demeanour of the Bourbon princes. His behaviour as the holder of a court was never graceful. He could not, or would not, control the natural vehemence of his temper, and ever and anon confounded the old race of courtiers, by ebullitions which were better suited to the camp than the saloons of the Tuileries. But whenever he thought fit to converse with a man capable of understanding him, the Consul failed not to create a very lively feeling in his own favour; and, meantime, Josephine was admirably adapted to supply his deficiencies in the management of circles and festivals.
The labour which Napoleon underwent at this period, when he was consolidating the administration throughout France (in every department of which intolerable confusion had arisen during the wars and tumults of the preceding years), excited the astonishment of all who had access to his privacy. He exhausted the energies of secretary after secretary; seemed hardly to feel the want of sleep; and yet sustained the unparalleled fatigue without having recourse to any stimulus stronger than lemonade. Of the many great measures adopted and perfected during this short-lived peace we may notice in particular the following:--
A decree of the senate, dated 26th April, 1802, allowed all emigrants to return to France, provided they chose to do so within a certain s.p.a.ce of time, and to pledge allegiance to the consular government; and offered to restore to such persons whatever property of theirs, having been confiscated during the Revolution, still remained at the disposal of the state. From this amnesty about 5000 persons, however, were excepted; these were arranged under five heads, viz.: those who had headed bodies of royalist insurgents; who had served in the armies of the allies; who had belonged to the household of the Bourbons during their exile; who had been agents in stirring up foreign or domestic war; and lastly, generals, admirals, Representatives of the People, who had been banished for treason to the Republic; together with bishops who were obstinate in refusing to accept of the conditions on which the exercise of ecclesiastical functions had been sanctioned by the consuls. The event, in a great measure, justified the prudence of this merciful edict. The far greater part of the emigrants returned, and became peaceful subjects of Napoleon--even although the restoration of forfeited property never took place to anything like the promised extent. He, having yielded back a few princely estates to their rightful lords, was, it is said, made aware, by sufficiently significant behaviour on their parts, that they had now obtained all they wished, and would not in future trouble themselves to merit his favour. Some instances of haughty ingrat.i.tude may, very probably, have occurred; but the Consul, in breaking his word with the despoiled emigrants as a body, was preparing for himself dangers greater than those he removed by permitting their return to France.
A still more important measure was that by which the Romish religion was finally re-established as the national faith. The sparing of the Papal dominion after Marengo, and the re-opening of the churches in France, were the preliminaries of the peace, which was, at length, signed on the 18th of September, 1802, between the Pope and the revolutionary government. This famous _concordat_ was the work of Napoleon himself, who seems to have met with more opposition, whenever he touched the matter of religion, than the men of the Revolution, with whom he consulted, thought fit to exhibit on any other occasions whatever. The question was argued one evening, at great length, on the terrace of the garden, at Buonaparte"s favourite villa of Malmaison. The Chief Consul avowed himself to be no believer in Christianity; "But religion," said he, "is a principle which cannot be eradicated from the heart of man."
"Who made all that?" he continued, looking up to the heaven, which was clear and starry. "But last Sunday evening I was walking here alone when the church bells of the village of Ruel rung at sunset. I was strongly moved, so vividly did the image of early days come back with that sound.
If it be thus with me, what must it be with others? In re-establishing the church, I consult the wishes of the great majority of my people."
Volney, the celebrated traveller, was present. "You speak of the majority of the people," said he: "if that is to be the rule, recall the Bourbons to-morrow." Napoleon never conversed with this bold infidel afterwards.
The _concordat_ gave no satisfaction to the high Catholic party, who considered it as comprehending arrangements wholly unworthy of the dignity of the Pope, and destructive of the authority of the church. The great majority of the nation, however, were wise enough to be contented with conditions which the Vatican had found it necessary to admit. The chief articles were these: I. The Roman Catholic religion is recognised as the national faith. II. The Pope, in concert with the French government, shall make a new division of dioceses, requiring, if necessary, the resignation of any existing prelate. III. Vacant sees now and henceforth shall be filled by the Pope _on nominations by the government_. IV. No bishops shall hold their sees unless they swear allegiance to the government, and adopt a ritual in which prayers are offered up for the Consuls. V. The church livings shall be, like the dioceses, rearranged; and the cures be appointed by the bishop, but not without the approbation of the government. VI. The French government shall make provision for the prelates and clergy, and the Pope renounces for ever all right to challenge the distribution of church property consequent on the events of the revolutionary period.
The Pope, in acceding to these terms, submitted to "the exigence of the time--which," said his Holiness in the deed itself, "lays its violence even upon us." The most bitter point of execution was that which regarded the bishops--the great majority of whom were yet in exile.
These prelates were summoned to send in, each separately, and within fifteen days, his acceptance of the terms of the concordat, or his resignation of his see. Thus taken by surprise, having no means of consultation, and considering the concordat as fatal to the rights of the church, and the Pope"s a.s.sent as extorted by mere necessity, almost all of them, to their honour be it said, declined complying with either of these demands. That these bishops should prefer poverty and exile to submission, was not likely to increase the popularity of the concordat with the more devout part of the nation. Meantime, the self-called philosophers looked on with scorn; and the republicans, of every sect, regarded with anger and indignation a course of policy which, as they justly apprehended, provided for the re-establishment of the church, solely because that was considered as the likeliest means of re-establishing the monarchy--in a new dynasty indeed, but with all, or more than all, the old powers.
In moments of spleen Napoleon is known to have sometimes expressed his regret that he should ever have had recourse to this concordat: but at St. Helena, when looking back calmly, he said that it was so needful a measure that had there been no Pope, one ought to have been created for the occasion.
The name of the First Consul was now introduced into the church service at least as often as that of the king had used to be. The cathedral of Notre Dame was prepared for the solemn reception of the concordat.
Napoleon appeared there with the state and retinue of a monarch; and in every part of the ceremonial the ancient rules were studiously attended to. The prelate who presided was the same Archbishop of Aix who had preached the coronation sermon of Louis XVI.
It was not easy, however, to procure the attendance of some of the revolutionary generals of the true republican race. Berthier had invited a large party of them long beforehand to breakfast: he carried them from thence to the levee of the Chief Consul, and they found it impossible not to join in the procession. Buonaparte asked one of these persons, after the ceremony was over, what he thought of it? "It was a true _Capucinade_" was the answer. To another of these, whom he thought less sincere, he said with a smile, "Things, you see, are returning to the old order." "Yes," the veteran replied, "all returns--all but the two millions of Frenchmen who have died for the sake of destroying the very system which you are now rebuilding." These officers are said to have paid dearly for their uncourtly language. Moreau was not to be tampered with by Berthier. The Chief Consul personally invited him to be present at the _Te Deum_ in Notre Dame, to attend afterwards at the consecration of some colours, and, lastly, to dine at the Tuileries. Moreau answered, "I accept the last part of your invitation."
A third great measure, adopted about the same period, was received with unqualified applause. This was the establishment of a national system of education, the necessity of which had been much felt, since the old universities and schools under the management of the clergy had been broken up amidst the first violence of the Revolution. The Polytechnic School, established under the direction of Monge, dates from this epoch; and furnished France, in the sequel, with a long train of eminent men for every department of the public service.
It was now also that the Chief Consul commenced the great task of providing France with an uniform code of laws. He himself took constantly an earnest share in the deliberations of the jurists, who were employed in this gigantic undertaking; and astonished them by the admirable observations which his native sagacity suggested, in relation to matters commonly considered as wholly out of the reach of unprofessional persons. But of the new code we shall have occasion to speak hereafter.
Buonaparte at this period devised, and began to put into execution, innumerable public works of the highest utility. The inland navigation of Languedoc was to be made complete: a great ca.n.a.l between the Yonne and the Saonne was begun, for the purpose of creating a perfect water communication quite across the republican dominion--from Ma.r.s.eilles to Amsterdam. Numberless bridges, roads, museums, were planned; and the vain were flattered with rising monuments of magnificence, while the wise recognised in every such display the depths and forecast of a genius made for empire.
Thus far the measures of the Consulate may be said to have carried with them the approbation of all but a few individuals. They were accompanied or followed by proceedings, some of which roused, or strengthened and confirmed, sentiments of a very different description among various important cla.s.ses of the French community; while others were well calculated to revive the suspicion of all the neighbouring nations.
It is said that the first idea of the Legion of Honour arose in the breast of Napoleon on witnessing one day, from a window at the Tuileries, the admiration with which the crowd before the palace regarded the stars and crosses worn by the Marquis Lucchesini, amba.s.sador of Prussia, as he descended from his carriage. The republican members of the senate could not be persuaded that the inst.i.tution of an order, with insignia, was anything but the first step to the creation of a new body of n.o.bility; and they resisted the proposed measure with considerable pertinacity. On this head, as on that of the concordat with the Pope, the Consul condescended to enter personally into discussion with the chief persons who differed from his opinion, or suspected his intentions; and if any, who heard his language on this occasion, doubted that both n.o.bility and monarchy were designed to follow hard behind the Legion of Honour, they must have been singularly slow of understanding. _Berthier_ had called ribbons and crosses "the playthings of monarchy," and cited the Romans of old as "having no system of honorary rewards." "They are always talking to us of the Romans," said Buonaparte. "The Romans had patricians, knights, citizens, and slaves:--for each cla.s.s different dresses and different manners--honorary recompenses for every species of merit--mural crowns--civic crowns--ovations--triumphs--t.i.tles. When the n.o.ble band of patricians lost its influence, Rome fell to pieces--the people were vile rabble. It was then that you saw the fury of Marius, the proscriptions of Sylla, and afterwards of the emperors. In like manner Brutus is talked of as the enemy of tyrants: he was an aristocrat, who stabbed Caesar, because Caesar wished to lower the authority of the n.o.ble senate.
You talk of _child"s rattles_--be it so: it is with such rattles that men are led. I would not say that to the mult.i.tude; but in a council of statesmen one may speak the truth. I do not believe that the French people love _liberty_ and _equality_. Their character has not been changed in ten years: they are still what their ancestors, the Gauls, were--vain and light. They are susceptible but of one sentiment--_honour_. It is right to afford nourishment to this sentiment: and to allow of distinctions. Observe how the people bow before the decorations of foreigners. Voltaire calls the common soldiers _Alexanders at five sous a day_. He was right: it is just so. Do you imagine that you can make men fight by reasoning? Never. You must bribe them with glory, distinctions, rewards. To come to the point: during ten years there has been a talk of inst.i.tutions. Where are they? All has been overturned: our business is to build up. There is a government with certain powers: as to all the rest of the nation what is it but grains of sand? Before the Republic can be definitely established, we must, as a foundation, cast some blocks of granite on the soil of France. In fine, it is agreed that we have need of some kind of inst.i.tutions. If this Legion of Honour is not approved, let some other be suggested. I do not pretend that it alone will save the state; but it will do its part." Such were the words of Napoleon when the scheme was in preparation. Many years afterwards, in his exile at St. Helena, he thus spoke of his Order. "It was the reversion of every one who was an honour to his country, stood at the head of his profession, and contributed to the national prosperity and glory. Some were dissatisfied because the decoration was alike for officers and soldiers; others because it was given to civil and military merit indiscriminately. But if ever it cease to be the recompense of the brave private, or be confined to soldiers alone, it will cease to be the Legion of Honour."
On the 15th of May, 1802, the Legion of Honour was formally inst.i.tuted; large national domains were set apart for its maintenance; and crosses (each of which ent.i.tled the bearer to certain precedence and a pension) widely distributed among the soldiery, and among citizens of almost all professions.
The personal authority of the future emperor, meantime, was daily widening and strengthening. After the Consulate was established in France, some corresponding change in the government of the Cisalpine Republic was judged necessary, and Napoleon took care that it should be so conducted as to give himself not only permanent, but wholly independent, power beyond the Alps. A convention of 450 Italian deputies was summoned to meet at _Lyons_; and there Talleyrand was ready to dictate the terms of a new const.i.tution, by which the executive functions were to be lodged in a president and vice-president, the legislative in a council chosen from three electoral colleges. It was next proposed that Buonaparte should be invited to take on him the office of president--Buonaparte, it was studiously explained, not as Chief Consul of France, but in his own individual capacity. He repaired to Lyons in person, and having harangued the convention in the Italian tongue, a.s.sumed the dignity thus conferred on him on the 2nd of January, 1802.
The next step was to prolong the period of his French Consulate. Chabot de L"Allier, his creature, moved in the Tribunate that the Conservative Senate should be requested to mark the national feelings of grat.i.tude by conferring some new honour on Napoleon. The Senate proposed accordingly that he should be declared Consul for a second period of ten years, to commence on the expiration of his present magistracy. He thanked them; but said he could not accept of any such prolongation of his power except from the suffrages of the people. To the people the matter was to be referred; but the Second and Third Consuls, in preparing the edict of the Senate for public inspection and ratification, were instructed by their master-colleague to introduce an important change in its terms.
The question which they sent down was, "Shall Buonaparte be Chief Consul for life?" No mention was made of _ten years_. Books were opened as on a former occasion: the officers of government in the departments well knew in what method to conduct the business, and the voice of the nation was declared to be in favour of the decree. Some few hundreds of st.u.r.dy republicans alone recorded their opposition; and Carnot, who headed them, said he well knew he was signing his own sentence of exile. But Napoleon was strong enough to dispense with any such severities; Carnot remained in safety, but out of office, until, many years afterwards, his services were tendered and accepted on the entrance of foreign invaders into France. Buonaparte was proclaimed Consul for life on the 2nd of August.
Shortly afterwards, in the committee occupied with the Code, Napoleon entered upon a long disquisition in favour of the Roman law of adoption; urging with intrepid logic, that an heir so chosen ought to be even dearer than a son. The object of this harangue was not difficult of detection. Napoleon had no longer any hope of having children by Josephine; and meditated the adoption of one of his brother"s sons as his heir. In the course of the autumn a simple edict of the Conservative Senate authorised him to appoint his successor in the consulate by a testamentary deed. By this act (Aug. 4, 1802) a new dynasty was called to the throne of France. The farce of opening books in the departments was dispensed with. Henceforth the words "_Liberty, Equality, Sovereignty of the People_," disappeared from the state papers and official doc.u.ments of the government--nor did the change attract much notice. The nation had a master, and sate by, indifferent spectators; while he, under whose sway life and property were considered safe, disposed of political rights and privileges according to his pleasure.[42]
This year was distinguished by events of another order, and not likely to be contemplated with indifference by the powers of Europe. After the peace of Amiens was ratified, certain treaties which the Chief Consul had concluded with Turkey, Spain, and Portugal, and hitherto kept profoundly secret, were made known. The Porte, it now appeared, had yielded to France all the privileges of commerce which that government had ever conceded to the most favoured nations. Spain had agreed that Parma, after the death of the reigning prince, should be added to the dominions of France: and Portugal had actually ceded her province in Guyana. In every quarter of the world the grasping ambition of Buonaparte seemed to have found some prey.
Nearer him, in the meantime, he had been preparing to strike a blow at the independence of Switzerland, and virtually unite that country also to his empire. The contracting parties in the treaty of Luneville had _guaranteed_ the independence of the Helvetic Republic, and the unquestionable right of the Swiss to settle their government in what form they pleased. There were two parties there as elsewhere--one who desired the full re-establishment of the old federative const.i.tution--another who preferred the model of the French Republic "one and indivisible." To the former party the small mountain cantons adhered--the wealthier and aristocratic cantons to the latter. Their disputes at last swelled into civil war--and the party who preferred the old const.i.tution, being headed by the gallant Aloys Reding, were generally successful. Napoleon, who had fomented their quarrel, now, unasked and unexpected, a.s.sumed to himself the character of arbiter between the contending parties. He addressed a letter to the eighteen cantons, in which these words occur:--"Your history shows that your intestine wars cannot be terminated, except through the intervention of France. I had, it is true, resolved not to intermeddle in your affairs--but I cannot remain insensible to the distress of which I see you the prey--I recall my resolution of neutrality--I _consent_ to be the mediator in your differences." Rapp, adjutant-general, was the bearer of this insolent manifesto. To cut short all discussion, Ney entered Switzerland at the head of 40,000 troops. Resistance was hopeless. Aloys Reding dismissed his brave followers, was arrested, and imprisoned in the castle of Aarburg. The government was arranged according to the good pleasure of Napoleon, who henceforth added to his other t.i.tles that of "Grand Mediator of the Helvetic Republic."
Switzerland was, in effect, degraded into a province of France; and became bound to maintain an army of 16,000 men, who were to be at the disposal, whenever it should please him to require their aid, of the Grand Mediator. England sent an envoy to remonstrate against this signal and unprovoked rapacity: but the other powers suffered it to pa.s.s without any formal opposition. The sufferings, however, of Aloys Reding and his brave a.s.sociates, and this audacious crushing-down of the old spirit of Swiss freedom and independence, were heard of throughout all Europe with deep indignation.
Feelings of the same kind were nourished everywhere by the results of an expedition which Buonaparte sent, before the close of 1801, to St.
Domingo, for the purpose of reconquering that island to France. The black and coloured population had risen, at the revolutionary period, upon their white masters, and, after scenes of terrible slaughter and devastation, emanc.i.p.ated themselves. The chief authority was, by degrees, vested in Toussaint L"Ouverture, a negro, who, during the war, displayed the ferocity of a barbarian, but after its conclusion, won the applause and admiration of all men by the wisdom and humanity of his administration. Conscious that, whenever peace should be restored in Europe, France would make efforts to recover her richest colony, Toussaint adopted measures likely to conciliate the exiled planters and the government of the mother country. A const.i.tution on the consular model was established, Toussaint being its Buonaparte: the supremacy of France was to be acknowledged to a certain extent; and the white proprietors were to receive half the produce of the lands of which the insurgents had taken possession. But Napoleon heard of all these arrangements with displeasure and contempt. He fitted out a numerous fleet, carrying an army full 20,000 strong, under the orders of General Leclerc, the husband of his own favourite sister Pauline. It has often been said, and without contradiction, that the soldiers sent on this errand were chiefly from the army of the Rhine, whose good-will to the Consul was to be doubted. Leclerc summoned Toussaint (Jan. 2, 1802) to surrender, in a letter which conveyed expressions of much personal respect from Buonaparte. The negro chief, justly apprehending insincerity, stood out and defended himself gallantly for a brief s.p.a.ce; but stronghold after stronghold yielded to numbers and discipline; and at length he too submitted, on condition that he should be permitted to retire in safety to his plantation. Some obscure rumours of insurrection were soon made the pretext for arresting him; and he, being put on board ship, and sent to France, was shut up in a dungeon, where either the midnight cord or dagger, or the wasting influence of confinement and hopeless misery, ere long put an end to his life. His mysterious fate, both before and after its consummation, excited great interest.[43] The atrocious cruelty of the French soldiery, in their subjugation of St.