On November 30, 1789, the National Assembly of France decreed the incorporation of Corsica with France, and amnesty for all political offenders, including Paoli. Bonfires in Corsica and general joy greeted the news. The triumph of the patriots was complete. A democratic town government for Ajaccio was organized, a friend of Napoleon was chosen mayor, and Joseph was put in place as secretary to the mayor. A local guard was raised, and Napoleon served as private member of it. At the club and on the streets he was one of the loudest agitators.
Paoli, now a hero in France as well as in Corsica, was called home by these events, received a magnificent ovation from the French, and reached Corsica, July, 1790. When he landed, after an exile of twenty-one years, the old man knelt to the ground and kissed it.
Supported by the town government, Napoleon renewed his activity, the immediate object aimed at being the capture of the citadel. He made himself intensely disagreeable to the royalists. Upon one occasion, during a religious procession, he was attacked by the Catholics, as an enemy of the Church. His efforts to seize the citadel came to nothing. There was an uprising of the revolutionists in the town, but the French officials fled into the citadel and prepared to defend it. Napoleon advised an attack, but the town authorities lost heart. They decided not to fight, but to protest; and Napoleon drew up the paper.
The people of Corsica met in local district meetings and chose delegates to an assembly which was to elect departmental and district councils to govern the island. This general assembly met at Orezzo, September 9, 1790, and remained in session a month. Among the delegates were Joseph Bonaparte and Uncle Fesch. Napoleon attended and took an active part in the various meetings which were held in connection with the work of the assembly. He was a frequent speaker at these meetings, and, while timid and awkward at first, soon became one of the most popular orators.
It was while he was on his way to Orezzo, that Napoleon first met Paoli. The old hero gave the young man a distinguished reception. Attended by a large cavalcade, the two rode over the fatal field of Ponte Nuovo. Paoli pointed out the various positions the troops had occupied, and related the incidents of that lamentable day. Napoleon’s comments, his peculiar and original thought and speech, struck Paoli forcibly; and he is said to have remarked that Napoleon was not modern, but reminded him of Plutarch’s heroes. Napoleon himself, when at St. Helena, represents Paoli as often patting him on the head and making the remark above mentioned.
The assembly at Orezzo voted that Corsica should constitute one department, and that Paoli should be its president. He was also made commander-in-chief of the National Guard. The conduct of Buttafuoco and Peretti who had been representing Corsica in France, was condemned. Pozzo di Borgo and Gentili were chosen to declare to the National Assembly the loyalty of Corsica to the principles of the French Revolution.
Napoleon had endeavored to secure the election of Joseph Bonaparte to the general directory of the department. In this he failed, but Joseph was chosen as one of the district directory for Ajaccio.
During the sitting of the convention Napoleon wiled away many an hour in familiar intercourse with the peasantry. He visited them at their huts, made himself at home by their firesides, and interested himself in their affairs. He revived some of the old Corsican festivals, and the target practice which had long been forbidden. Out of his own purse he offered prizes for the best marksmen. In this manner he won the hearts of the mountaineers—a popularity which was of value to him soon afterward.
Returned to Ajaccio, Napoleon continued to take prominent part in the debates of the club, and he also continued his efforts at authorship. He threw off an impassioned “open letter” to Buttafuoco. This was his first successful writing. With imperial pride, it is dated “from my summer house of Milleli.” Stimulated perhaps by the applause with which young Corsican patriots hailed his bitter and powerful arraignment of a traitor, Napoleon ventured to compete for the prize which Raynal, through the Academy of Lyons, had offered for the best essay on the subject “What truths and ideas should be inculcated in order best to promote the happiness of mankind.” His essay was severely criticised by the learned professors, and its author, of course, failed of the prize.
It was on the plea that his health was shattered, and that the waters of Orezzo were good for his complaint, that Napoleon had been enabled to prolong his stay in Corsica. In February, 1791, he rejoined his regiment at Auxonne. His leave had expired long since, but his colonel kindly antedated his return. Napoleon had procured false certificates, to the effect that he had been kept in Corsica by storms. To ease his mother’s burden, he brought with him his little brother Louis, now twelve years old, whose support and schooling Napoleon proposed to take upon himself. To maintain the two upon his slender pay of lieutenant required the most rigorous economy. He avoided society, ate often nothing but bread, carried on his own studies, and taught Louis. The affectionate, fatherly, self-denying interest he took in the boy beautifully illustrates the better side of his complex character.