Worlds Best Histories - France, vol 7 | Page 5

in form, Austria had in reality replied like England.
War was inevitable, and in the internal disorder in which the Directory
had left affairs, in the financial embarrassment and in the deplorable
state of the armies, the First Consul felt the weight of a government that
had been so long disorganized and weak, pressing heavily on his
shoulders. His first care was to achieve the pacification of the west,
always agitated by royalist passions. For a moment the chiefs of the
party thought it possible to engage General Bonaparte in the service of
the monarchical restoration: they were speedily undeceived. But the
First Consul knew how to make use in Vendée of the influence of the
former curé of St. Laud, the Abbé Bernier; he made an appeal to the
priests, who returned from all parts to their provinces, "The ministers of
a God of Peace," said the proclamation of the 28th December, 1799,
"will be the first promoters of reconciliation and concord; let them
speak to all hearts the language which they learn in the temple of their
Master! Let them enter temples which will be reopened to them, and
offer for their fellow-citizens the sacrifice which shall expiate the crime
of war and the blood which has been made to flow!" Always in

intimate unison with the religious sentiment of the populace who
fought under their orders, the Vendean chiefs responded to this appeal,
laying down their arms. In Brittany and in Normandy, Georges
Cadoudal and Frotté continued hostilities; severe instructions were sent,
first to General Hédouville, and then to General Brune. "The Consuls
think that the generals ought to shoot on the spot the principal rebels
taken with arms in hand. However cunning the Chouans may be, they
are not so much so as Arabs of the desert. The First Consul believes
that a salutary example would be given by burning two or three large
communes, chosen from among those who have behaved themselves
most badly." Six weeks later the insurrection was everywhere subdued;
Frotté, and his young aide-de-camp Toustain, had been shot; Bourmont
had accepted the offers of the First Consul, and enrolled himself in his
service; Georges Cadoudal resisted all the advances of him whom he
was soon to pursue with his hatred even to attempting a crime. "What a
mistake I have made in not stifling him in my arms!" repeated the
hardy chief of the Chouans on quitting General Bonaparte. He retired
into England. The civil war was terminated; the troops which had
occupied the provinces of the west could now rejoin the armies which
were preparing on the frontiers. Carnot, who had just re-entered France,
replaced at the ministry of war General Berthier, called upon active
service. It was the grand association connected with his name, rather
than the hope of an active and effective co-operation, which decided
the First Consul to entrust this post to Carnot; possibly he wished to
remove it from the little group of obstinate liberals justly disquieted at
the dangers with which they saw freedom menaced. Already the
journals had been suppressed, with the exception of thirteen; the laws
were voted without dispute; and, "in a veritable whirlwind of urgency,"
the government claimed to regulate the duration of the discussions of
the Tribunate. Benjamin Constant, still young, and known for a short
time previously as a publicist, raised his voice eloquently against the
wrong done to freedom of discussion. "Without doubt," said he
"harmony is desirable amongst the authorities of the Republic; but the
independence of the Tribunate is no less necessary to that harmony than
the constitutional authority of the government; without the
independence of the Tribunate, there will be no longer either harmony
or constitution, there will be no longer anything but servitude and

silence, a silence that all Europe will understand."
The past violence of the assemblies, and their frequent inconsistencies,
had wearied feeble minds, and blinded short-sighted spirits. The speech
of Benjamin Constant secured for his friend Madame de Staël a forced
retirement from Paris. The law was voted by a large majority, and the
adulations of flatterers were heaped up around the feet of the First
Consul. He himself took a wiser view of his position, which he still
considered precarious. On taking up his residence at the Tuileries, in
great state, on February 19, 1800, he said to his secretary, "Well,
Bourienne, we have reached the Tuileries; the thing is now to stop
here."
Already, and by the sole effort of a sovereign will, which appeared to
improve by exercise, the power formerly distributed among obscure
hands was concentrated at Paris, under the direction of a central
administration suddenly organized; exactions borne with difficulty
resulted in abundant resources from the conquered or annexed countries,
at Genoa, in Holland, at Hamburg. The young King