Mr. Bonaparte of Corsica by John Kendrick Bangs (good non fiction books to read TXT) 📖

We've got the Austrians over the Adda, and that's just where we want them. I had a dream once about the Bridge of Lodi, and it's coming true now or never. We'll take a few of our long divisions, cross the Adda, and subtract a few fractions of the remainder now left the Austrians. This will destroy their enthusiasm, and Milan will be ours."

The words were prophetic, for on the 10th of May the French did precisely what their commander had said they would do, and on the fourteenth day of May the victorious French entered Milan, the wealthy capital of Lombardy.

"Curious fact," said Napoleon. "In times of peace if a man needs a tonic you give him iron, and it builds him up; but in war if you give the troops iron it bowls 'em down. Look at those Austrians; they've got nervous prostration of the worst sort."

"They got too much iron," said Lannes.

"Too much tonic is worse than none. A man can stand ten or twenty grains of iron, but forty pounds is rather upsetting."

"True," acquiesced Napoleon. "Well, it was a great fight, and I have only one regret. I do wish you'd had a Kodak to take a few snap- shots of me at that Bridge of Lodi. I'd like to send some home to the family. It would have reminded brother Joseph of old times to see me dashing over that bridge, prodding its planks with my heels until it fairly creaked with pain. It would have made a good frontispiece for Bourrienne's book too. And now, my dear Lannes, what shall we do with ourselves for the next five days? Get out your Baedecker and let us see this imperial city of the Lombards."

"There's one matter we must arrange first," said Augereau; "we haven't any stable accommodations to speak of."

"What's the matter with the stalls at the opera-house?" suggested Napoleon. "As I told the troops the other day, it's the biggest theatre in the world. You ought to be able to stable the horses there and lodge the men in the boxes."

"The horses would look well sitting in orchestra chairs, wouldn't they?" said Augereau. "It's not feasible. As for the boxes, they're mostly held by subscribers."

"Then stable them in the picture-galleries," said the general. "It will be good discipline."

"The people will call that sacrilege," returned Augereau.

"Not if we remove the pictures," said Bonaparte. "We'll send the pictures to Paris."

Accordingly this was done, and the galleries of France were thereby much enriched. We mention these details at length, because Napoleon has been severely criticised for thus impoverishing Italy, as well as for his so-called contempt of art--a criticism which, in the face of this accurate version, must fall to the ground. The pictures were sent by him to Paris merely to preserve them, and, as he himself said, a propos of the famous Da Vinci, beneath which horses and men alike were quartered: "I'd have sent that too, but to do it I'd have had to send the whole chapel or scrape the picture off the wall. These Italians should rather thank than condemn me for leaving it where it was. Mine was not an army of destruction, but a Salvation Army of the highest type."

"You made mighty few converts for a Salvation Army," said Talleyrand, to whom this remark was addressed.

"That's where you are wrong," said Napoleon. "I made angels of innumerable Austrians, and converted quite a deal of Italian into French territory."

It was hardly to be doubted that Napoleon's successes would arouse jealousies in Paris, and the Directory, fearing the hold the victorious general was acquiring upon the people, took steps to limit his powers. Bonaparte instantly resigned his command and threatened to return to Paris, which so frightened the government that they refused to accept his resignation.

From this time on for nearly a year Napoleon's career was a succession of victories. He invaded the Papal States, and acquired millions of francs and hundreds of pictures. He chastised all who opposed his sway, and, after pursuing the Austrians as far as Leoben, within sight of Vienna, he humbled the haughty Emperor Joseph.

"I'll recognize your Republic," said the Emperor at last, finding that there was nothing else to be done.

"Thanks," said Napoleon--"I thought you would; but I don't know whether the Republic will recognize you. She doesn't even know you by sight."

"Is that all you want?" asked the Emperor, anxiously.

"For the present, yes. Some day I may come back for something else," returned Napoleon, significantly. "And, by-the-way, when you are sending your card to the French people just enclose a small remittance of a few million francs, not necessarily for publication, but as a guarantee of good faith. Don't send all you've got, but just enough. You may want to marry off one of your daughters some day, and it will be well to save something for her dowry."

It was in little acts of this nature that Napoleon showed his wonderful foresight. One would almost incline to believe from this particular incident that Bonaparte foresaw the Marie-Louise episode in his future career.

The Austrians humbled, Napoleon turned his attention to Venice. Venice had been behaving in a most exasperating fashion, and the conqueror felt that the time had come to take the proud City of the Sea in hand.

"If the Venetians have any brains," said he to Bourrienne, who joined him about this time, secretly representing, it is said, a newspaper- syndicate service, "they'll put on all the sail they've got and take their old city out to sea. They're in for the worst ducking they ever got."

"I'm afraid you'll find them hard to get at," said Bourrienne. "That lagoon is a wet place."

"Oh, as for that," said Bonaparte, "a little water will do the army good. We've been fighting so hard it's been months since they've had a good tubbing, and a swim won't hurt them. Send Lannes here." In a few minutes Lannes entered Bonaparte's tent.

"Lannes, we're off for Venice. Provide the army with overshoes, and have our luggage checked through," said Bonaparte.

"Yes, General."

"Can Augereau swim?"

"I don't know, General."

"Well, find out, and if he can't we'll get him a balloon."

Thus, taking every precaution for the comfort of his men and the safety of his officers, Napoleon set out. Venice, hearing of his approach, was filled with consternation, and endeavored to temporize. The Doges offered millions if Bonaparte would turn his attention to others, to which Napoleon made this spirited reply: "Venetians, tell the Doges, with my compliments, that I am coming. The wealth of the Indies couldn't change my mind. They offer me stocks and bonds; well, I believe their stocks and bonds to be as badly watered as their haughty city, and I'll have none of them. I'll bring my stocks with me, and your Doges will sit in them. I'll bring my bonds, and your nobles shall put them on and make them clank. You've been drowning Frenchmen every chance you've had. It will now be my pleasing duty to make you do a little gurgling on your own account. You'll find out for the first time in your lives what it is to be in the swim. Put on your bathing-suits and prepare for the avenger. The lions of St. Marc must lick the dust."

"We have no dust, General," said one of the messengers.

"Then you'd better get some," retorted Napoleon, "for you will have to come down with it to the tune of millions."

True to his promise, Napoleon appeared at the lagoon on the 31st of May, and the hitherto haughty Venice fell with a splash that could be heard for miles, first having sent five ships of war, 3,000,000 francs, as many more in naval stores, twenty of her best pictures, the bronze horses of the famous church, five hundred manuscripts, and one apology to the French Republic as the terms of peace. The bronze horses were subsequently returned, but what became of the manuscripts we do not know. They probably would have been returned also--a large portion of them, at least--if postage-stamps had been enclosed. This is mere theory, of course; but it is rendered reasonable by the fact that this is the usual fate of most manuscripts; nor is there any record of their having been published in the Moniteur, the only periodical which the French government was printing at that time.

As for Bonaparte, it was as balm to his soul to humble the haughty Doges, whose attitude towards him had always been characterized by a superciliousness which filled him with resentment.

"It did me good," he said, many years after, with a laugh, "to see those Doges swimming up and down the Grand Canal in their state robes, trying to look dignified, while I stood on the sidewalk and asked them why they didn't come in out of the wet."



CHAPTER VI: MONTEBELLO--PARIS--EGYPT 1797-1799

Josephine now deemed it well to join her lord at Milan. There had been so many only women he had ever loved that she was not satisfied to remain at Paris while he was conducting garden-parties at the Castle of Montebello. Furthermore, Bonaparte himself wished her to be present.

"This Montebello life is, after all, little else than a dress rehearsal for what is to come," he said, confidentially, to Bourrienne, "and Josephine can't afford to be absent. It's a great business, this being a Dictator and having a court of your own, and I'm inclined to think I shall follow it up as my regular profession after I've conquered a little more of the earth."

Surrounded by every luxury, and in receipt for the first time in his life of a steady income, Bonaparte carried things with a high hand. He made treaties with various powers without consulting the Directory, for whom every day he felt a growing contempt.

"What is the use of my consulting the Directory, anyhow?" he asked. "If it were an Elite Directory it might be worth while, but it isn't. I shall, therefore, do as I please, and if they don't like what I do I'll ratify it myself."

Ambassadors waited upon him as though he were a king, and when one ventured to disagree with the future Emperor he wished he hadn't. Cobentzel, the envoy of the Austrian ruler, soon discovered this.

"I refuse to accept your ultimatum," said he one day to Napoleon, after a protracted conference.

"You do, eh?"--said Napoleon, picking up a vase of delicate workmanship. "Do you see this jug?"

"Yes," said Cobentzel.

"Well," continued Napoleon, dropping it to the floor, where it was shattered into a thousand pieces, "do you see it now?"

"I do," said Cobentzel; "what then?"

"It has a mate," said Napoleon, significantly; "and if you do not accept my ultimatum I'll smash the other one upon your plain but honest countenance."

Cobentzel accepted the ultimatum.

Bonaparte's contempt for the Directory was beginning to be shared by a great many of the French, and, to save themselves, the "Five Sires of the Luxembourg," as the Directory were called, resolved on a brilliant stroke, which involved no less a venture than the invasion of England.