CHAPTER VI.
IN THE ORANGERY AT ST. CLOUD.
Promptly at noon of the 19th Brumaire the Council of Ancients assembled in the great gallery of the palace at St. Cloud, still under the presidency of Lemercier, one of the most active spirits in the conspiracy. An usher announced:
"General Bonaparte."
General Bonaparte entered the gallery with a lofty air; his aides trailed in his wake. Through the doors of the gallery, which remained open, were visible the guns and fur caps of a platoon of grenadiers.
"What! Soldiers here!" demanded several members of the minority, with indignation. "What right has General Bonaparte to announce himself in this guise? Would he play the role of a new Caesar?"
"I demand the floor!" cried Bonaparte imperiously.
"In what title, in what right do you thrust yourself into these precincts?" demanded Savary.
"General Bonaparte has the floor," Lemercier declared from his chair.
"Representatives of the people, you are in no ordinary circumstances," began Bonaparte, when at last he could speak. "You are sitting upon a volcano. Allow me to speak with the frankness of a soldier, the frankness of a citizen zealous for the welfare of his country; and suspend, I pray you, your judgment till you have heard me to the end. I was at ease and quiet in Paris when I received the decree of the Council of Ancients, which opened my eyes to the dangers that it and the Republic ran. At once I called to my brothers-in-arms, and we came to give you our support. We came to offer you the arm of the nation, for you are its head. Our intentions were pure and disinterested; and as the price of the devotion we yesterday and to-day displayed, lo, already we reap calumnies! There is speech of 'a new Caesar,' 'a new Cromwell'; they pretend that I aim to establish a new military government."