The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte (Vol. 1-4). William Milligan Sloane
Corsican expedition was quite as ill-starred as the French. Paoli accepted Buonaparte's plan, but appointed his nephew, Colonna-Cesari, to lead, with instructions to see that, if possible, "this unfortunate expedition shall end in smoke."[31] The disappointed but stubborn young aspirant remained in his subordinate place as an officer of the second battalion of the Corsican national guard. It was a month before the volunteers could be equipped and a French corvette with her attendant feluccas could be made ready to sail. On February twentieth, 1793, the vessels were finally armed, manned, and provisioned. The destination of the flotilla was the Magdalena Islands, one of which is Caprera, since renowned as the home of Garibaldi. The troops embarked and put to sea. Almost at once the wind fell; there was a two days' calm, and the ships reached their destination with diminished supplies and dispirited crews. The first attack, made on St. Stephen, was successful. Buonaparte and his guns were then landed on that spot to bombard, across a narrow strait, Magdalena, the chief town on the main island. The enemy's fire was soon silenced, and nothing remained but for the corvette to work slowly round the intervening island of Caprera, and take possession. The vessel had suffered slightly from the enemy's fire, two of her crew having been killed. On the pretense that a mutiny was imminent, Colonna-Cesari declared that coöperation between the sloop and the shore batteries was no longer possible; the artillery and their commander were reëmbarked only with the utmost difficulty; the unlucky expedition returned on February twenty-seventh to Bonifacio.
Both Buonaparte and Quenza were enraged with Paoli's nephew, declaring him to have acted traitorously. It is significant of the utter anarchy then prevailing that nobody was punished for the disgraceful fiasco. Buonaparte, on landing, at once bade farewell to his volunteers. He reported to the war ministry in Paris—and a copy of the memorial was sent to Paoli as responsible for his nephew—that the Corsican volunteers had been destitute of food, clothing, and munitions; but that nevertheless their gallantry had overcome all difficulties, and that in the hour of victory they were abased by the shameful conduct of their comrades. He must have expressed himself freely, for he was mobbed by the sailors in the square of Bonifacio. The men from Bocagnano, partly from the Buonaparte estates at that place, rescued him from serious danger.[32] When he entered Ajaccio, on March third, he found that he was no longer, even by assumption, a lieutenant-colonel; for during his short absence the whole Corsican guard had been disbanded to make way for two battalions of light infantry whose officers were to be appointed by the directory of the island.
Strange news now greeted his ears. Much of what had occurred since his departure from Paris he already knew. France having destroyed root and branch the tyranny of feudal privileges, the whole social edifice was slack in every joint, and there was no strong hand to tighten the bolts; for the King, in dallying with foreign courts, had virtually deserted his people. The monarchy had therefore fallen, but not until its friends had resorted to the expedient of a foreign war as a prop to its fortunes. The early victories won by Austria and Prussia had stung the nation to madness. Robespierre and Danton having become dictators, all moderate policy was eclipsed. The executive council of the Convention, determined to appease the nation, gathered their strength in one vigorous effort, and put three great armies in the field. On November sixth, 1792, to the amazement of the world, Dumouriez won the battle of Jemmapes, thus conquering the Austrian Netherlands as far north as Liège.
The Scheldt, which had been closed since 1648 through the influence of England and Holland, was reopened, trade resumed its natural channel, and, in the exuberance of popular joy, measures were taken for the immediate establishment of a Belgian republic. The other two armies, under Custine and Kellermann, were less successful. The former, having occupied Frankfort, was driven back to the Rhine; the latter defeated the Allies at Valmy, but failed in the task of coming to Custine's support at the proper moment for combined action. Meantime the agitation in Paris had taken the form of personal animosity to "Louis Capet," as the leaders of the disordered populace called the King. In November he was summoned to the bar of the Convention and questioned. When it came to the consideration of an actual trial, the Girondists, willing to save the prisoner's life, claimed that the Convention had no jurisdiction, and must appeal to the sovereign people for authorization. The Jacobins insisted on the sovereign power of the Convention, Robespierre protesting in the name of the people against an appeal to the people. Supported by the noisy outcries not only of the Parisian populace, but of their followers elsewhere, the radicals prevailed. By a vote of three hundred and sixty-six to three hundred and fifty-five the verdict of death was pronounced on January seventeenth, 1793, and four days later the sentence was executed. This act was a defiance to all monarchs, or, in other words, to all Europe.
The younger Pitt was at this juncture prime minister of England. Like the majority of his countrymen, he had mildly approved the course of the French Revolution down to 1789; with them, in the same way, his opinions had since that time undergone a change. By the aid of Burke's biased but masterful eloquence the English people were gradually convinced that Jacobinism, violence, and crime were the essence of the movement, constitutional reform but a specious pretext. Between 1789 and 1792 there was a rising tide of adverse public sentiment so swift and strong that Pitt was unable to follow it. By the execution of Louis the English moderates were silenced; the news was received with a cry of horror, and the nation demanded war. Were kings' heads to fall, and republican ideas, supported by republican armies, to spread like a conflagration? The still monarchical liberals of England could give no answer to the case of Louis or to the instance of Belgium, and were stunned. The English anti-Jacobins became as fanatical as the French Jacobins. Pitt could not resist the torrent. Yet in his extreme necessity he saw his chance for a double stroke: to throw the blame for the war on France, and to consolidate once more his nearly vanished power in parliament. With masterly adroitness France was tempted into a declaration of war against England. Enthusiasm raged in Paris like fire among dry stubble. France, if so it must be, against the world! Liberty and equality her religion! The land a camp! The entire people an army! Three hundred thousand men to be selected, equipped, and drilled at once!
Nothing indicates that Buonaparte was in any way moved by the terrible massacres of September, or even by the news of the King's unmerited fate. But the declaration of war was a novelty which must have deeply interested him; for what was Paoli now to do? From gratitude to England he had repeatedly and earnestly declared that he could never take up arms against her. He was already a lieutenant-general in the service of her enemy, his division was assigned to the feeble and disorganized Army of Italy, which was nominally being equipped for active service, and the leadership, so ran the news received at Ajaccio, had been conferred on the Corsican director. The fact was that the radicals of the Convention had long been aware of the old patriot's devotion to constitutional monarchy, and now saw their way to be rid of so dangerous a foe. Three successive commanders of that army had already found disgrace in their attempts with inadequate means to dislodge the Sardinian troops from the mountain passes of the Maritime Alps. Mindful, therefore, of their fate, and of his obligations to England, Paoli firmly refused the proffered honor. Suspicion as to the existence of an English party in the island had early been awakened among the members of the Mountain; for half the Corsican delegation to the Convention had opposed the sentence passed on the King, and Salicetti was the only member who voted in the affirmative. When the ill-starred Sardinian expedition reached Toulon, the blame of failure was laid by the Jacobins on Paoli's shoulders.
Salicetti, who was now a real power among the leaders at Paris, felt that he must hasten to his department in order to forestall events, if possible, and keep together the remnants of sympathy with France; he was appointed one of a commission to enforce in the island the decrees of the Convention. The commission was well received and the feeling against France was being rapidly allayed when, most unexpectedly, fatal news arrived from Paris. In the preceding November Lucien Buonaparte had made the acquaintance in Ajaccio of Huguet de Sêmonville, who was on his way to Constantinople as a special envoy of the provisory council then in charge of the Paris administration. In all probability he was sent to test Paoli's attitude. Versatile and insinuating, he displayed great activity among the islanders. On one occasion he addressed the radical club of Ajaccio—but though eloquent, he was no linguist, and his French rhetoric would have fallen flat but for the fervid zeal of Lucien, who at the close stood in his place and rendered the ambassador's speech in Italian to an enthralled audience. This event among others showed the younger brother's mettle; the intimacy thus inaugurated ripened quickly and endured for