The History of Napoleon Buonaparte | Page 6

battle.]
[Footnote 3: Napoleon, with his stockings about his heels, makes love to Giacominetta.]
[Footnote 4: Corsica became by law a French department only two months before Napoleon was born.]
[Footnote 5: The report, in consequence of which Buonaparte received this distinction, is in these words: "M. de Buonaparte (Napoleon), born the 15th August, 1769, height four feet ten inches ten lines; good constitution; health excellent; character docile, upright, grateful; conduct very regular: has always distinguished himself by his application to the mathematics. He is passably acquainted with history and geography: is weak enough as to his Latin diction and other elegant accomplishments: would make an excellent sea-officer: deserves to be transferred to the Military School at Paris."]
CHAPTER II
Buonaparte commands the Artillery at Toulon--Fall of Toulon--The Representatives of the People--Junot.
Buonaparte's first military service occurred, as we have seen, in the summer of 1793. The king of France had been put to death on the 21st of January in that year; and in less than a month afterwards the convention had declared war against England. The murder of the king, alike imprudent as atrocious, had in fact united the princes of Europe against the revolutionary cause; and within France itself a strong reaction took place. The people of Toulon, the great port and arsenal of France on the Mediterranean, partook these sentiments, and invited the English and Spanish fleets off their coast to come to their assistance, and garrison their city. The allied admirals took possession accordingly of Toulon, and a motley force of English, Spaniards, and Neapolitans, prepared to defend the place. In the harbour and roads there were twenty-five ships of the line, and the city contained immense naval and military stores of every description, so that the defection of Toulon was regarded as a calamity of the first order by the revolutionary government.
This event occurred in the midst of that period which has received the name of the reign of terror. The streets of Paris were streaming with innocent blood; Robespierre was glutting himself with murder; fear and rage were the passions that divided mankind, and their struggles produced on either side the likeness of some epidemic frenzy. Whatever else the government wanted, vigour to repel aggressions from without was displayed in abundance. Two armies immediately marched upon Toulon; and after a series of actions, in which the passes in the hills behind the town were forced, the place was at last invested, and a memorable siege commenced.
It was conducted with little skill, first by Cartaux, a vain coxcomb who had been a painter, and then by Doppet, an ex-physician, and a coward. To watch and report on the proceedings of these chiefs, there were present in the camp several Representatives of the People, as they were called--persons holding no military character or rank, but acting as honourable spies for the government at Paris. The interference of these personages on this, as on many other occasions, was productive of delays, blunders, and misfortunes; but the terror which their ready access to the despotic government inspired was often, on the other hand, useful in stimulating the exertions of the military. The younger Robespierre was one of the deputies at Toulon, and his name was enough to make his presence formidable.
Cartaux had not yet been superseded, when Napoleon Buonaparte made his appearance at headquarters, with a commission to assume the command of the artillery. It has been said that he owed his appointment to the private regard of Salicetti; but the high testimonials he had received from the Military Academy were more likely to have served him; nor is it possible to suppose that he had been so long in the regiment of La Fere without being appreciated by some of his superiors. He had, besides, shortly before this time, excited attention by a pamphlet, called the Supper of Beaucaire, in which the politics of the Jacobin party were spiritedly supported; and of which he was afterwards so ashamed, that he took great pains to suppress it. However this may have been, he was received almost with insolence by Cartaux, who, strutting about in an uniform covered with gold lace, told him his assistance was not wanted, but he was welcome to partake in his glory.
The commandant of the artillery, on examining the state of affairs, found much to complain of. They were still disputing which extremity of the town should be the chief object of attack; though at the one there were two strong and regular fortifications, and at the other only a small and imperfect fort called Malbosquet. On inspecting their batteries, he found that the guns were placed about two gunshots from the walls; and that it was the custom to heat the shot at a distance from the place where they were to be discharged; in other words, to