‘Another species of evil peculiar to a corrupt military government, prevails in a very great degree, and has become particularly offensive to the French, viz. the influence and insolence of generals.
‘All the generals attached to Buonaparte, those who supported him in his usurpation, and those who were with him in Egypt, bear an exact resemblance to the minions and favourites of the Roman Emperors. These men have the public treasure almost entirely at their disposal. General Lasnes, one of the Consul’s chief friends, spends the enormous sum of five hundred thousand livres (upwards of twenty thousand guineas!!!) a month, at Paris, where he and his aids de camp occupy one of the most magnificent hotels in that capital. Buonaparte, not being able to supply his favourites with sufficient specie for defraying their unbounded expences, grants them congées d’exportation, i.e. an exclusive permission to export various articles the exportation of which is prohibited by law; these congées are sold to mercantile men, who purchase them at a very high price.’
‘To the facts, which we stated on Monday, respecting the prodigality of Buonaparte and his creatures, we may add the instance of General Ney. This Republican Bashaw has fixed his head-quarters at Neubourg, at the expence of which place, his table is furnished at the rate of ninety pounds sterling a day! The French have a proverb, the truth of which they and their neighbours now experience to their sorrow: “Il vaut mieux qu’une cité soit brûlée, q’un parvenu la gouverne”—A city had better be burnt to ashes, than submit to the rule of an upstart vagabond.’[57]
CHAPTER XXI.
PLOTS AGAINST NAPOLEON’S LIFE—THAT OF OCTOBER 10, 1800—THAT OF DECEMBER 24, 1800—NUMBER OF PEOPLE KILLED AND INJURED—NAPOLEON’S PORTRAIT.
The two plots against Napoleon’s life which occurred in this year must not be forgotten. Let us have Combe’s version, which does not much exaggerate the facts of the cases:—
It seems the Jacobins against
Our hero greatly were incensed:
His levées, drawing-rooms, and so forth,
They look’d upon as deeds of no worth;
The pageantry he held so dear,
Did not Republican appear;
And, at such goings on distrest,
Their indignation they exprest;
Our hero consequently saw
The need of keeping them in awe;
So he contrived a plot, which seems
The masterpiece of all his schemes;
And in this plot, too, he resolved
His greatest foes should be involved.
Fouché pretended, on th’ occasion,
(For Nap allow’d of no evasion)
That some conspirators had got
Daggers and pistols, and what not,
To make the Conqueror their aim,
When from the Opera he came.
Nap to the Opera went indeed,
One gave the signal, as agreed;
Three men were instantly arrested
Three whom great Bonaparte detested.
They got it seems a dagger from one,
But carrying daggers now was common;
He was from Nap at a great distance,
This proof, tho’, was of no assistance;
When the supposed assassination
Had undergone examination,
They seiz’d on others, as directed,
For having such a scheme projected;
One prov’d at home that night he slept,
For being ill, his bed he kept;
All this, however, had no weight,
For Nap’s resentment was too great.
They suffered by the guillotine,
Which was his favourite machine;
Save one, th’ Italian too, I wot,
From whom the dagger had been got,
Nap banish’d him, and with him too,
Th’ Italian patriotic crew;
Four thousand, as historians say,
For no offence were swept away.