Dennis Wheatley - The wanton princess

In order to reunite further the two factions that had torn France apart he was anxious to put an end to the insurrec­tions in La Vendee. In '94 he had himself been nominated for this task; but again, foreseeing that the shedding of French blood would harm his future popularity, he had skilfully evaded being sent to Brittany. In January, favouring the methods of Generals Hoch and D'Hedouville, both of whom had in the past used conciliation to bring about temporary cessations of hostilities, he had sent General Brune to open negotiations with the rebels. The Count d'Artois had promised to support them by landing from England with a " Royalist Army but, on his failing to do so. a village priest named Bernier had offered himself as a negotiator and, spite of the violent protests of the fiery insurgent leaders, had persuaded the others to agree a pacification.

But it was not only Brittany and Normandy that had long been in a state of anarchy. Every Province in France was infested with bands of marauders. Measures were being taken to put them down, others to make travel swifter by forcing Communes to have the roads put into sound repair, and others again to recreate a reliable service for posting along them by horse and diligence.

Closely associated with this policing of the Provinces was the restoration in them of regularly held Courts of Law, the dispensation of proper justice, and the collection of taws. At the date of Brumaire there had been the huge sum of eleven hundred million francs owing and less than one hundred thousand in the Treasury. To deal with this fantastic situation Bonaparte had appointed Gaudin Minister of Finance. He had worked in the Finance Department for thirty-seven years, was skilful, honest and industrious, and the sound measures he was taking had already led to a rise in the price of Government annuities from seven francs to forty-four, but a vast amount was still outstanding and, as a result of the Revolution, the collection of taxes had become nearly impos­sible.

In consequence Bonaparte resolved to revolutionize the entire administrative system of the country. His intention was to deprive the Communes of the right to elect their own officials, great numbers of whom were corrupt or inefficient, and replace the Mayors with men of his own choosing to be called Prefects. They would be accountable only to the Central Government, and in turn be given the power to appoint their own subordinates. This, in fact, would amount to a restoration of the old Monarchical system of Royal Intendants and would, at one stroke, abolish the freedom from rule by autocracy that the people had won in the Revolution.

The leading Jacobins saw at once that this concentration of power in Bonaparte's hands foreshadowed his intention to becomc a Dictator. His brother Lucien led the Opposition, upbraiding him fiercely for seeking to pass a law contrary to the oath he had taken to adhere to the Constitution and preserve the liberties of the people: then, as Minister of the Interior, he had refused to lend himself to such a measure.

Bonaparte, determined to have his way promptly dis­missed Lucien. His other critics he could afford to ignore as, owing to his tremendous popularity, the vast majority of the people did not care how he ran the country as long as he continued to clean it up and give them the security they had lacked for so long.

There remained one danger—that his enemies might bring the attention of the masses to his real intentions and cause them to rise against him. For long periods during the Revolu­tion, the Press had been suppressed: but recently it had regained its freedom, and editors of the Left were already making full use of it to criticize the Government. In order to prevent discussion of his projects he instructed Fouche to bring the Press to heel. Henceforth only journals favourable to him were allowed to continue publication and even they were subjected to a severe censorship, with the result that without fully realizing it the French people let him deprive them of their rights as citizens.

This replacement of democracy by a hierarchy entailing as it did the selection and instruction of a vast number of new officials meant an immense amount of work for Bonaparte and his personal staff; and on top of it there were the projects concerning education, the Church, finance, the posts, Emigres and many others; so throughout the Spring Roger was kept hard at it. But he felt that he was doing a tremen­dously worthwhile job and tackled with enthusiasm the scores of problems that came his way.

The only relaxation he got was when on Decedais —the 'tenth-day,' substituted during the Revolution for Sun­day—he accompanied Bourrienne to Malmaison. the charm­ing property outside Paris that Josephine had purchased and furnished at great cost while Bonaparte was in Egypt. There she was under no necessity to receive her enemies - the members of his family. Such parties usually consisted no more than a dozen people; her two children, a few close friends, Duroc and Bonaparte's personal assistants With the latter he would spend hours walking under the trees of the avenue, his hands clasped behind his back, discussing new projects. But in the evenings he cast all cares aside. Gathered in the big drawing room they amused themselvcs with amateur theatricals and charades into which he threw himself with zest, crawling about the floor making comical grimaces and laughing with the abandon of a school boy. Sometimes he would make up and tell stories and. as he had a taste for the horrific, have all but one candle put out, delighting to make the women give little exclamations of fright in the gloom as he described ghosts and vampires. It was on such evenings that he displayed all his best qualities as an affec­tionate husband and father, with a love of gaiety for which he had so little time, a charming host and generous friend.

But as the Spring advanced his thoughts turned to war. In Germany, Moreau had crossed the Rhine, inflicted a series of defeats on the Austrian General, Kray, and was pushing him back upon the stronghold of Ulm; but things were far from well with the Army of Italy. Greatly outnumbered by the Austrians, the French Army had been cut in two. The left wing under Suchet had been driven through Nice and now, only with difficulty, was holding the line of the Var; while the main force had been compelled to retire on Genoa. Massena and his other two divisional commanders, Soult and Oudinot, were putting up a stubborn resistance but they were now besieged in the city with only fifteen thousand troops, and a hundred and ten thousand civilians to feed. As a British Fleet under Admiral Lord Keith was blockading the port no reinforcements or supplies could be sent to them; so their situation must soon become desperate.

On April 20th an officer who had succeeded in passing through the enemy lines reached Paris and reported Massena's plight to Bonaparte. He had replied that he would cross the Alps himself and relieve Genoa. In the meantime Massena must somehow manage to hold out.

Had the public been informed of the situation they would have believed Bonaparte to have been caught napping as, to all appearances, he had no troops available to form another Army of any size. But that was far from being the case. On the rejection of his peace offers he had at once decided to take the field again in the early summer and had charged Berthier with creating an Army of Reserve. This had attracted no attention, as the units for its composition had been mustered and trained far from one another, scattered all over France. Now, they were already concentrating and on the way to Lausanne and Geneva, where large quantities of stores had been collected. To conceal his intentions for as long as possible from the enemy's spies Bonaparte selected Dijon as the Headquarters of the Army of Reserve, but in March Berthier left that city for Zurich. As First Consul, Bonaparte was debarred from taking command of an Army so, nominally, Berthier remained its Commander-in-Chief. But on May 6th Bonaparte set out for Geneva.