Harper's New Monthly Magazine, No. XXVII, August 1852, Vol. V. Various

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СКАЧАТЬ him to be approached with emotions of awe. His words were listened to with intensest eagerness. He was the exclusive object of observation and attention. No earthly potentate had ever attained such a degree of homage, pure and sincere, as now circled around the First Consul.

      Napoleon was very desirous of having his court a model of decorum and of morals. Lucien owned a beautiful rural mansion near Neuilly. Upon one occasion he invited Napoleon, and all the inmates of Malmaison, to attend some private theatricals at his dwelling. Lucien and Eliza were the performers in a piece called Alzire. The ardor of their declamation, the freedom of their gestures, and above all the indelicacy of the costume which they assumed, displeased Napoleon exceedingly. As soon as the play was over he exclaimed, "It is a scandal. I ought not to suffer such indecencies. I will give Lucien to understand that I will have no more of it." As soon as Lucien entered the saloon, having resumed his usual dress, Napoleon addressed him before the whole company, and requested him in future to desist from all such representations. "What!" said he, "when I am endeavoring to restore purity of manners, my brother and sister must needs exhibit themselves upon a platform, almost in a state of nudity! It is an insult!"

      One day at this time Bourrienne, going from Malmaison to Ruel, lost a beautiful watch. He proclaimed his loss by means of the bellman at Ruel. An hour after, as he was sitting down to dinner, a peasant boy brought him the watch, which he had found on the road. Napoleon heard of the occurrence. Immediately he instituted inquiries respecting the young man and the family. Hearing a good report of them, he gave the three brothers employment, and amply rewarded the honest lad. "Kindness," says Bourrienne, "was a very prominent trait in the character of Napoleon."

      If we now take a brief review of what Napoleon had accomplished since his return from Egypt, it must be admitted that the records of the world are to be searched in vain for a similar recital. No mortal man before ever accomplished so much, or accomplished it so well, in so short a time.

      Let us for a moment return to his landing at Frejus on the 8th of October, 1799, until he was chosen First Consul for life, in August, 1802, a period of not quite three years. Proceeding to Paris, almost alone, he overthrew the Directory, and seized the supreme power; restored order into the administration of government, established a new and very efficient system for the collection of taxes, raised public credit, and supplied the wants of the suffering army. By great energy and humanity he immediately terminated the horrors of that unnatural war which had for years been desolating La Vendee. Condescending to the attitude of suppliant, he implored of Europe peace. Europe chose war. By a majestic conception of military combinations, he sent Moreau with a vast army to the Rhine; stimulated Massena to the most desperate strife at Genoa, and then, creating as by magic, an army, from materials which excited but the ridicule of his foes, he climbed, with artillery and horse, and all the munitions of war, the icy pinnacles of the Alps, and fell like an avalanche upon his foes upon the plain of Marengo. With far inferior numbers, he snatched the victory from the victors; and in the exultant hour of the most signal conquest, wrote again from the field of blood imploring peace. His foes, humbled, and at his mercy, gladly availed themselves of his clemency, and promised to treat. Perfidiously, they only sought time to regain their strength. He then sent Moreau to Hohenlinden, and beneath the walls of Vienna extorted peace with continental Europe. England still prosecuted the war. The First Consul, by his genius, won the heart of Paul of Russia, secured the affection of Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden, and formed a league of all Europe against the Mistress of the Seas. While engaged in this work, he paid the creditors of the State, established the Bank of France, overwhelmed the highway robbers with utter destruction, and restored security in all the provinces; cut magnificent communications over the Alps, founded hospitals on their summits, surrounded exposed cities with fortifications, opened canals, constructed bridges, created magnificent roads, and commenced the compilation of that civil code which will remain an ever-during monument of his labors and his genius. In opposition to the remonstrances of his best friends, he re-established Christianity, and with it proclaimed perfect liberty of conscience. Public works were every where established, to encourage industry. Schools and colleges were founded. Merit of every kind was stimulated by abundant rewards. Vast improvements were made in Paris, and the streets cleaned and irrigated. In the midst of all these cares, he was defending France against the assaults of the most powerful nation on the globe; and he was preparing, as his last resort, a vast army, to carry the war into the heart of England. Notwithstanding the most atrocious libels with which England was filled against him, his fame shone resplendent through them all, and he was popular with the English people. Many of the most illustrious of the English statesmen advocated his cause. His gigantic adversary, William Pitt, vanquished by the genius of Napoleon, was compelled to retire from the ministry – and the world was at peace.

      The difficulties, perplexities, embarrassments which were encountered in these enterprises were infinite. Says Napoleon, with that magnanimity which history should recognize and applaud, "We are told that all the First Consul had to look to, was to do justice. But to whom was he to do justice? To the proprietors whom the revolution had violently despoiled of their properties, for this only, that they had been faithful to their legitimate sovereign and to the principle of honor which they had inherited from their ancestors; or to those new proprietors, who had purchased these domains, adventuring their money on the faith of laws flowing from an illegitimate authority? Was he to do justice to those royalist soldiers, mutilated in the fields of Germany, La Vendee, and Quiberon, arrayed under the white standard of the Bourbons, in the firm belief that they were serving the cause of their king against a usurping tyranny; or to the million of citizens, who, forming around the frontiers a wall of brass, had so often saved their country from the inveterate hostility of its enemies, and had borne to so transcendent a height the glory of the French eagle? Was he to do justice to that clergy, the model and the example of every Christian virtue, stripped of its birthright, the reward of fifteen hundred years of benevolence; or to the recent acquirers, who had converted the convents into workshops, the churches into warehouses, and had turned to profane uses all that had been deemed most holy for ages?"

      "At this period," says Thiers, "Napoleon appeared so moderate, after having been so victorious, he showed himself so profound a legislator, after having proved himself so great a commander, he evinced so much love for the arts of peace, after having excelled in the arts of war, that well might he excite illusions in France and in the world. Only some few among the personages who were admitted to his councils, who were capable of judging futurity by the present, were filled with as much anxiety as admiration, on witnessing the indefatigable activity of his mind and body, and the energy of his will, and the impetuosity of his desires. They trembled even at seeing him do good, in the way he did – so impatient was he to accomplish it quickly, and upon an immense scale. The wise and sagacious Tronchet, who both admired and loved him, and looked upon him as the saviour of France, said, nevertheless, one day in a tone of deep feeling to Cambaceres, 'This young man begins like Cæsar; I fear that he will end like him.'"

      The elevation of Napoleon to the supreme power for life was regarded by most of the states of continental Europe with satisfaction, as tending to diminish the dreaded influences of republicanism, and to assimilate France with the surrounding monarchies. Even in England, the prime minister, Mr. Addington, assured the French embassador of the cordial approbation of the British government of an event, destined to consolidate order and power in France. The King of Prussia, the Emperor Alexander, and the Archduke Charles of Austria, sent him their friendly congratulations. Even Catharine, the haughty Queen of Naples, mother of the Empress of Austria, being then at Vienna, in ardent expression of her gratification to the French embassador said, "General Bonaparte is a great man. He has done me much injury, but that shall not prevent me from acknowledging his genius. By checking disorder in France, he has rendered a service to all of Europe. He has attained the government of his country because he is most worthy of it. I hold him out every day as a pattern to the young princes of the imperial family. I exhort them to study that extraordinary personage, to learn from him how to direct nations, how to make the yoke of authority endurable, by means of genius and glory."

      But difficulties were rapidly rising between England and France. The English were much disappointed in not finding that sale of their manufactures which they had anticipated. The cotton and СКАЧАТЬ