They had consulted Moreau, Hoche, and Bonaparte. Moreau showed little zeal: the army on the Rhine, which he commanded and whose fortunes he had retrieved by a signal victory, had not been paid; the men were destitute, and, like their leader, sullen on account of their enforced inaction. So unsympathetic and cold was the general's attitude toward the Directory that although, as appears certain, he had in his possession positive proof of Pichegru's desertion to the enemy, he kept silence, and allowed matters to take their course. The brilliant Hoche was willing to aid the directors. He had worked wonders in quelling rebellion throughout the Vendée, had won the favor of the soldiery, and in 1796 had made a gallant though futile expedition to stir up sedition in Ireland. Having then been transferred to the banks of the Rhine, he had gladly lent himself to execute a plan arranged by Barras for bringing troops to Paris under the pretext of a scheme for the complete transformation of the home and northern armies by a change of stations for the various divisions. To this end the general on July sixteenth had been nominated minister of war. It turned out, however, that, being not yet thirty, he was too young under the constitution, and could not be confirmed. Simultaneously the new dispositions in the army began to excite suspicion; the entire plan was discredited, and Hoche was so closely identified with it that he became an object of distrust to the masses, and therefore unavailable.
There remained only Bonaparte or one of his lieutenants. His very strength was a menace to the executive, and they felt the danger; but a general they must have. Accordingly, bitter as the decision was, they asked Bonaparte to send them such a commander as they needed—one of his own men. Bonaparte was ready for the emergency; he had already sent despatches to Paris promising a new remittance of six hundred thousand dollars, the strongest French army in the field had been used in a brilliant demonstration in favor of the Directory, and now most opportunely the ambitious, blustering, and fearless Augereau asked leave to depart for Paris on his private affairs. To him was entrusted an enthusiastic address to the Directory from the army, which had been prepared as part of the patriotic celebration. No better tool could have been selected. On his arrival in Paris,—"sent," as he boasted, "to kill the royalists,"—he was appointed to command the Army of the Interior; and the confession of d'Antraigues having been communicated to Barras a short time previously, through Bernadotte, the Directory felt ready for the coming crisis. Again they owed everything to Bonaparte; he was free to do as he chose in the further negotiations with Austria, and in the rearrangement of Italy.
With such weapons in hand, the Directory was for the moment invulnerable. But the royalist majority in the councils rushed madly on their fate. Infuriated by the presence so near to Paris of the soldiers brought in from the Army of the Sambre and the Meuse, they put their own guard under a royalist commander, closed the constitutional clubs which had been formed to offset that of Clichy, and in an irregular meeting of September third a proposition of General Willot to rise next day and destroy the government was received with applause. That night Augereau put himself at the head of about twelve thousand troops. With these he mounted guard throughout the city, seized the legislative chambers, and thus ended the first short constitutional régime of his country. The next morning, the eighteenth of Fructidor, the radical triumvirate of the Directory had entire control of the city and of the country. Of course all this was done in the name of public safety. Carnot, who had been kept in ignorance of Barras's dealings with Hoche, and had been reasoning with Bonaparte by letter as if his correspondent were an honest patriot, was rudely awakened from his illusion that others were as honest and sincere as he, and, seeing too late the snare which had been spread, took refuge in flight. Barthélemy was seized and imprisoned.
Two new radicals, Merlin and François de Neufchâteau, were appointed to the vacancies. Barbé-Marbois, the royalist president of the Ancients, with eleven members of that body; Pichegru with forty-two deputies from the Five Hundred, and one hundred and forty-eight other persons, mostly journalists, were proscribed. All these, with the exception of a few who escaped by flight, were sent to languish in the pestilential swamps of Cayenne, where there was already a colony of transported priests. Although the guillotine was not again erected, yet the eighteenth of Fructidor brought in a revolutionary government, an administration resting on force, though under the forms of the constitution. The Fructidorians claimed to be strict constitutionalists, and posed as such before the country. But facts were more convincing than their professions. Their rallying-point was the Directory, and the Directory having twice appealed to the army, the army was now its real support. The liberty of the press was abolished, and martial law was proclaimed wherever the executive thought best. Moreover, Bonaparte had shown the way and furnished the general; he had taken another step toward his eventual appearance as the ruler of the army, and through it of the country. Such a forced relation led to mutual distrust, and finally to hatred.
Augereau, who had fondly hoped to enter the Directory, was made commander, in Moreau's place, of an army whose campaigns were over. The premature death of Hoche about the same time quenched the only military genius in France comparable to that of Bonaparte, and removed a political rival as well. The Army of the Alps was then combined with that of Italy, and with this simplification of the military machine he who until peace was made would be virtually its mover could well say to his enemies: "I speak in the name of eighty thousand men. The time is past when scoundrelly lawyers and mere talkers can guillotine soldiers." Napoleon, in his intimate conversations with Mme. de Rémusat, said that at this time he "became a personage in Europe. On one side, by my orders of the day, I supported the revolutionary system; on the other, I secretly dealt with the emigrants, permitting them to cherish some hope. It is easy to deceive that party, for it always sets out not from what actually is, but from what it wishes there were. I received splendid offers in case I were willing to follow the example of General Monk. The pretender himself wrote to me in his halting, florid style. I conquered the Pope more completely by keeping away from Rome than if I had burned his capital. At last I became influential and strong."
With many men the success of the eighteenth of Fructidor would have been glory enough for a single season. But the indomitable and feverish energy of Bonaparte was not exhausted even by such minute prevision as was needed for this; in fact, the political campaign was only a considerable part of the summer's labor. While mastering France, he was preparing to master Italy, and, after Italy, Europe. Concurrently with the management of French politics went not only the negotiations with the Emperor, but the completion of his contemplated labors in Italy. Two constitutions were needed for new-born states, the republics known thus far as the Transpadane and the Cispadane. Neither was strong enough for their creator's purpose. By the preparation of almost identical charters, based upon the French constitution of the year III, the way for their union had already been prepared. These papers were now most carefully elaborated; and not only that, but an administrator for every post, from the highest to the lowest, was, after a minute scrutiny of his character, selected and then instructed according to his abilities. Most of these new officials were men of integrity and high purpose; but nevertheless they owed their appointment to the dictator, and were in consequence his tools, conscious or unconscious. The combination of the two temporary states into the Cisalpine Republic was thus made ready to be recognized in the final treaty with Austria.
Then there was Genoa. Bonaparte had told the Directory in May that her people were clamoring for liberty. She was destined by him for the same fate which had overtaken Venice. The identical machinery was set to work for a similar result. Faypoult, the diplomatic agent of France, began his agitations very much as Lallemant had done, although in comparison with his Venetian colleague he was but a bungler. The democratic club of Genoa first demanded from the senate that aristocracy should be abolished, and when their request was denied, seized the arsenal and the harbor. The populace rose to the support of the aristocracy, and temporarily triumphed. La Valette, Bonaparte's adjutant, appeared in due time on the floor of the Genoese senate with a peremptory message from his commander like that which in similar dramatic circumstances Junot read to the patricians of Venice. The intervention of the French, it said, was only to protect life and property, while assuring their own communications with France. But within twenty-four hours all political prisoners must be released, the people disarmed, and the enemies of France surrendered; otherwise the senators would answer with their lives. Thus menaced, the government obeyed every command. Then Faypoult repeated his demand for the substitution of a democratic constitution in place of the old one. The senate felt how futile further opposition would be, but sent an embassy to Montebello. The members were courteously received, and were probably not greatly amazed to find Bonaparte already occupied with the details of a constitution which was to reconstruct their commonwealth under the name of the Ligurian Republic. It was soon complete in all its parts, and with its adoption Genoa the Superb was no more.
As for Sardinia, the constant agitation carried on by her radicals kept the King in fear; and propositions from Bonaparte for an alliance, which would increase his army by the full effective force of the excellent Piedmontese troops, were favorably entertained. The health of the Pope had become so feeble that his death could not long be postponed. The opportunity was seized to display further respect for his ecclesiastical power by requesting, on August third, a reconciliation between the French government and the clergy for the common advantage of State and Church. A quarrel between the Valtellina and the Grisons gave the great man at Montebello his first chance to intervene in Switzerland as an arbiter whose word was law, and thus to begin the reconstruction of that country. In England, moreover, Leoben had made a profound impression, and Pitt became more anxious than ever for peace. In July Malmesbury reopened his negotiations, this time at Lille. The proffered terms were far more favorable than before. Belgium might be incorporated in France, and Holland made a dependency, if the French would renounce their claim to the most important among the Dutch colonies which England had conquered, including the Cape of Good Hope. There was no good will on the part of the French commissioners from the beginning, and the new ones who were appointed after the eighteenth of Fructidor proved to be utterly impracticable. The negotiations were marked by caviling over unimportant trifles and a suspicious indifference on both sides to really important concessions. Both parties, as later appeared, were fully aware of the impending revolution at Paris: the British plenipotentiary was confident in the restoration of royalty, the French commission was equally sure that the radical triumvirate would regain their mastery. Naturally it was a dispirited embassy which soon returned to England, when not merely the facts but the meaning and ultimate consequences of that revolution were known. Similar conditions attended the negotiation of Caillard at Berlin with Panine for a peace with Russia; only there, a treaty was signed. In it the French republic renounced its right or privilege of propagandism, and therefore the Directory after Fructidor rejected it. Throwing the responsibility for the coming war on England and Russia, the triumvirate without a moment's loss renewed its agitations in both Holland and Prussia to "fructidorize" both and secure them as allies. This insanity was merely the pendant of that with which they spurred Bonaparte to activity in forcing Austria's prompt surrender, withdrawing their agent from the negotiations and thus delivering themselves and France more and more completely into his hands. The process of "ripening the pear" for his enjoyment could not have been more auspiciously inaugurated.
The season was for Bonaparte, as may well be supposed, just as busy on the military as it had been on the political side. Day and night the soldiers in the conquered Venetian lands wrought with ceaseless labor until the whole territory was in perfect order as a base of military operations. Not a single strategic point there or elsewhere was overlooked. Even the little island of St. Peter in the Mediterranean was taken from Piedmont, and garrisoned with two hundred men. It was generally understood that war might break out at any moment. Every contribution under treaty obligations was exacted to the utmost farthing. As a single illustration of the French dealing, jewels and gems estimated by the Pope as worth ten millions of francs were accepted by the French experts at a valuation of five. Within the previous twelve months Bonaparte had sent to Paris one million four hundred thousand dollars, of which he destined four hundred thousand for the outfit of a fleet. It was but a moiety of what he had raised. During this summer, on the contrary, he kept everything: even the six hundred thousand dollars promised to Barras were not paid. It is therefore likely that he had in hand upward of six million dollars in cash, and commissary stores to the extent of possibly a million more.
The size of his army is difficult to estimate. By the records of the War Office he had in April one hundred and forty-one thousand two hundred and twenty-three effectives, of whom one hundred and twenty-one thousand four hundred and twenty were fit for service. On September third he wrote to Carnot that he had seventy-five thousand effective men, of whom fifteen thousand were in garrison; but a fortnight later he admitted a total of eighty-three thousand eight hundred, of whom he declared, however, that only forty-nine thousand were effective. He likewise admitted that he had one thousand Italians and two thousand Poles. No one can believe that these figures are of the slightest value. Conservative estimates put his fighting force at seventy thousand French soldiers ready for the field, and fifteen thousand Piedmontese, Cisalpines, and Poles in like condition. The French were by this time such veterans as Europe had seldom seen: the others were of medium quality only; excepting, of course, the Piedmontese, who were fine. Bonaparte's correspondence for the period was intended to convey the idea that he was preparing to enforce the terms of Leoben by another appeal to arms, if necessary. In fact, Austria was well-nigh as active as he was, and he had need to be ready. But subsequent events proved that all these preparations were really for another end. An advantageous peace was to be made with Austria, if possible, and Italy was to be properly garrisoned. But, on the old principle, one member of the coalition having been quieted, the other was to be humbled. The goal of his further ambition appears for a time to have been nothing less than the destruction somewhere and somehow of British power, and ultimately the conquest of Great Britain herself.