Napoleon's Marshals. Dunn-Pattison R. P.

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СКАЧАТЬ hill and set off to enjoy the good things prepared for the enemy. At daybreak the enemy attempted a surprise on the French position on the hill, and the troops, without their general and staff, were in great danger. Fortunately, Masséna had time to make his way through the Austrian skirmishers and resume his command. He was greeted by hoots and jeers, but with absolute imperturbability he reorganised his forces and checked the enemy. But one battalion was isolated on a spur, from which there seemed no way of escape save under a scorching flank fire. Masséna made his way alone to this detached post, scrambling up the steep slope on his hands and knees, and, when he at last reached the troops, remembering his old smuggling expedients, he showed them how to glissade down the steep part of the hill, and brought them all safely back without a single casualty. This escapade came to Bonaparte's ears, and it was only Masséna's great share in the victory of Montenotte which saved him from a court-martial.

      Bonaparte, at the commencement of the campaign, had ended a letter of instructions to his lieutenant with the words "Watchfulness and bluff, that is the card," and well Masséna learned his lesson. Montenotte, the bridge of Lodi, the long struggle at Castiglione, the two fights at Rivoli and the marshes of Arcola proved beyond doubt that of all the young conqueror of Italy's lieutenants, none had the insight, activity, and endurance of Masséna. But empty flattery did not satisfy him, for as early as Lonato, greedy for renown, he considered his success had not been fully recognised. In bitter anger he wrote to Bonaparte: "I complain of your reports of Lonato and Roveredo, in which you do not render me the justice that I merit. This forgetfulness tears my heart and throws discouragement on my soul. I will recall the fact under compulsion that the victory of Saintes Georges was due to my dispositions, to my activity, to my sangfroid, and to my prevision." This frank republican letter greatly displeased Bonaparte, who, since Lodi, had cherished visions of a crown, and to realise this desire had begun to issue his praise and rewards irrespective of merit, and to appeal to the private soldier while visiting his displeasure on the officers. But Masséna's brilliant conduct at the second battle of Rivoli, for the moment, blotted out all rancour, for it was Masséna who had saved the day, who had rushed up to the commander of the shaken regiment, bitterly upbraiding him and his officers, showering blows on them with the flat of his sword, and had then galloped off and brought up two tried regiments of his own invincible division and driven back the assailants; from that moment Bonaparte confirmed him in the title of "the spoilt child of victory." In 1797 Bonaparte gave his lieutenant a more substantial reward when he chose him to carry the despatches to Paris which reported the preliminary treaty of Leoben; thus it was as the right-hand man of the most distinguished general in Europe that the Italian saw for the first time the capital of his adopted country.

      In choosing Masséna to carry to Paris the tidings of peace, it was not only his prestige and renown which influenced Bonaparte. For Paris was in a state of half suppressed excitement, and signs were only too evident that the Directory was unstable; accordingly the wily Corsican, while despatching secret agents to advance his cause, was careful to send as the bearer of the good news a man who was well known to care for no political rewards, and who would be sure to turn a deaf ear to the insidious schemes of those who were plotting to restore the monarchy, or to set up a dictatorship, and were searching for a sovereign or a Cæsar as their political views suggested. It was for these reasons and because he was tired of Masséna's greed and avarice that Bonaparte refused to admit him among those chosen to accompany him to Egypt. Masséna saw clearly all the secret intrigue of the capital, and found little pleasure in his newly gained dignity of a seat among the Ancients, for he was extremely afraid of a royalist restoration, in which case he feared "our honourable wounds will become the titles for our proscription."

      Tired of Paris, in 1798, he was glad to accept the command of the French corps occupying Rome when its former commander, Berthier, was called away to join the Egyptian expedition. On his arrival at Rome, to take over his new command, he found himself face to face with a mutiny. The troops were in rags and badly fed, their pay was months in arrear, and meanwhile the civil servants of the Directory were amassing fortunes at the expense of the Pope, the Cardinals, and the Princes of Rome. Discontent was so widespread that the new general at once ordered all troops, save some three thousand, to leave the capital. Unfortunately Masséna's record was not such as to inspire confidence in the purity of his intentions. Instead of obeying, the officers and men held a mass meeting to draft their remonstrance to the Directory. In this document they accused, first of all, the agents who had disgraced the name of France, and ended by saying, "The final cause of all the discontent is the arrival of General Masséna. The soldiers have not forgotten the extortions and robberies he has committed wherever he has been invested with the command. The Venetian territory, and above all Padua, is a district teeming with proofs of his immorality." In the face of such public feeling Masséna found nothing for it but to demand a successor and throw up his command.

      But with Bonaparte in Egypt and a ring of enemies threatening France from all sides, the Directors, whose hands were as soiled as Masséna's, could ill spare the "spoilt child of victory." Accordingly, early in 1799 the general found himself invested with the important command of the Army of Switzerland. This was a task worthy of his genius and he eagerly accepted the post, but refused to abide by the stipulations the Directors desired to enforce on him, as, according to their plan, the Army of Switzerland was to form part of the Army of the Rhine commanded by Joubert. Masséna had obeyed Bonaparte, but he had no intention of playing second fiddle to any other commander, and, after some stormy interviews and letters, he at last had his way. As the year advanced it became more and more evident that on the Army of Switzerland would fall the full brunt of the attack of the coalition, for Joubert was defeated by the Archduke Charles at Stockach and thrown back on the Rhine, Schérer was defeated in Italy at Magnano, and by June the Russians and Austrians had begun to close in on Switzerland. It was clear that, if the French army were driven out of Switzerland, both the Rhine and the Maritime Alps would be turned, and the enemy would be in a strong position from which to invade France. On Masséna, therefore, hung all the hopes of the Directory. Fortunately for France, the general was admirably versed in mountain warfare. Well aware of the difficulty of keeping up communication between the different parts of his line of defence, Masséna skilfully withdrew his outposts, as the enemy pressed on, with the intention of concentrating his troops round Zurich, thereby covering all the possible lines of advance. But early in the summer his difficulties were further increased by the rising of the Swiss peasantry; luckily, however, the Archduke Charles advanced most cautiously, while the Aulic Council at Vienna, unable to grasp the vital point of the problem, stupidly sent its reserve army to Italy to reinforce the Russians under Suvaroff. By June 5th the Archduke had driven in all the outlying French columns, and was in a position to attack the lines of Zurich with his entire force. Thanks, however, to Masséna's courage and presence of mind, the attack was driven off, but so overwhelming were the numbers of the enemy that during the night the French army evacuated Zurich, though only to fall back on a strong position on Mount Albis, a rocky ridge at the north end of the lake, covered on one flank by the lake and on the other by the river Aar. The two armies for the time being lay opposite to each other, too exhausted after the struggle to recommence operations. The Archduke Charles awaited the arrival from Italy of Suvaroff, who was to debouch on the French right by the St. Gothard Pass. But fortune, or rather the Aulic Council at Vienna, once again intervened and saved France. The Archduke Charles was ordered to leave fifty-five thousand Russians under Korsakoff before Zurich and to march northwards and across the Rhine. Protests were useless; the Court of Vienna merely ordered the Archduke to "perform the immediate execution of its will without further objections." But even yet disaster threatened the French, for Suvaroff was commencing his advance by the St. Gothard. But Masséna at once grasped the opportunity fortune had placed in his power by opposing him to a commander like Korsakoff, who was so impressed by his own pride that he considered a Russian company equal to an Austrian battalion. On September 26th, by a masterly series of manœuvres, the main French force surprised Korsakoff and drove him in rout out of Zurich. Suvaroff arrived just in time to find Masséna in victorious array thrust in between himself and his countrymen, and was forced to save himself by a hurried retreat through the most difficult passes of the Alps.

      The campaign of Zurich will always be studied as a masterpiece in defensive warfare. The skilful use the French general made of the mountain passes, СКАЧАТЬ