Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

XLII.

CHAP. conspiracy of the Anarchists, with the little sympathy shown by the people for them, evinced that the time of popular insurrection had passed. The people, as the French say, had given in their resignation. It was for professional politicians to continue the struggle. Could they have done so within the constitutional arena, and with merely such power and influence as civilians wield, liberty might still have survived; but unfortunately, from the commencement of the revolution to its close, party strife was decided not by opinion, violent as that might be, but by force. For five disastrous years the populace had formed that force. It was now to be sought elsewhere, and the army offered itself. It had during the revolutionary years deserved well of the country, kept its soil uninvaded, and even made conquests more important than those of Louis the Fourteenth. But it was not till the year 1796 that its exploits, and the fame of the general who achieved them, shone with a brilliancy that soon eclipsed and flung into the shade all civilian efforts, merits, and authority.

The year 1796 promised well for the Directory in its prosecution of the military struggle. The last months of the previous year had seen La Vendée finally succumb. The efforts of England and of the French princes, not dismayed by the disaster of Quiberon, had renewed the attempt of landing an English auxiliary force with a French prince upon the coast. The Count d'Artois embarked. Charette once more raised the standard of insurrection, but Hoche, who commanded the republican army, was too energetic and too able. He kept possession of the sea-coast, and rendered it a perilous task for the pretender or his auxiliaries to land. That personage had been landed on the Isle Dieu, off the coast of France, by the English fleet, which remained in the neighbourhood waiting an opportunity for disembarking. This, possible at first, became of course each day more hazardous, the republicans being more vigilant and

XLII.

better prepared. Neither Charette nor Stofflet were СНАР. able to raise anything like the old Vendean armies, and so open a passage from the sea to its foreign auxiliaries. The Vendeans expected everything from England and the prince. The prince and the English expected not merely the promise but the appearance of an army from them. Both were disappointed. The English thought that under such circumstances the prince should at least have flung himself upon his native soil, and have struck a blow for the throne and its partisans. But the Count d'Artois was not made to chouanner. He begged to be recalled, gave voluminous directions to the Vendeans for another rising, with a few thousand English pounds, and sailed away, leaving Charette and Stofflet to their fate. These could not even unite, so vigilant was the guard of Hoche. Stofflet could not number three hundred men. Soon tracked and seized, he was carried to Angers, and shot in February. Charette did his utmost to break through the toils with which Hoche surrounded him. But it was in vain; the spirit of the Vendeans was broken, and Hoche completed it by an adroit mode of disarmament. He seized all the eatables, corn, and principal inhabitants, and only delivered them up on the district surrendering its arms. This trial of life or death, the Vendeans, a year or two back would have answered at the point of the bayonet; not so now. Hoche prevailed, Charette became the daring leader of a band instead of the general of an army; and hunted by numerous detachments he at last fell into an ambuscade, laid for him by general Travot. He resisted capture with desperation; but it was effected, and the last Vendean chief died about a month after Stofflet, with his wonted fortitude, on the public place of Nantes.

The attempt to raise La Vendée was an abortive effort of England to take part in the continental war against France. This was by no means easy to accomplish,

XLII.

since the republic was mistress of the coast of Holland, since Spain had made peace, and Prussia in the treaty of Basle (1795) had acquiesed in the French conquest of the Low Countries and of Holland. Austria alone remained to reduce, and even she so far wavered as to render it necessary for England to encourage her resistance by a subsidy of six millions sterling. At the same time an aggressive war was indispensable to the Directory. In peace it could not hope to maintain its power, the national reaction of the time leading back to royalism. The old Conventionalists, who nominated and composed the Directory, must combat this; and the armies, which wanted to continue their careerthere was no other for any man-were of the same opinion. But war, to be carried on, must be bold and aggressive, for government had no money to feed the armies on its own soil.*

as well as acquire It was therefore Rhine should cross

They must advance to find food, glory, in the enemies' provinces. insisted on that the generals on the it and march into Austria, and that those on the Alps should force their way into Lombardy or Piedmont. It was hoped that they might "join hands" over the Tyrol, and then advance in concert. Bonaparte had long recommended the invasion of Piedmont, and Carnot was of the same opinion. Both were for driving the Austro-Piedmontese from the Riviera, or strip of coast between the mountains and the Mediterranean, and from thence crossing the low passes between the Alps and Apennines into the plains north of them. The AustroPiedmontese were quite strong enough to have defended the Riviera against the French, and they showed it by driving back Kellerman.

But the peace with Spain (July 1795) allowed the Directory to draft the army of Catalonia to Nice.

* Carnot to Scherer.

XLII.

Scherer and Augereau came with it, the former to take CHAP. the command. Finding himself at the head of 40,000 men and urged by Carnot, he advanced up the Riviera. Piedmontese and Austrians kept on different sides of the Alpine range. By taking possession of the crest of these the French might separate them. Scherer employed Augereau and Massena to do this, whilst he himself fell upon the Austrians at Loano in November. They expected no attack so late in the year, and were completely driven from their positions, leaving open those passes to the north through which the French had intended to penetrate. Scherer, however, contented with the defeat of the Austrians and with the opening communications with Genoa, shrunk from crossing the Alps into Piedmont at the commencement of winter. For this he was strongly censured by Buonaparte, who pointed out how easily he might have taken Ceva and conquered Piedmont, doing in November, what Buonaparte himself did in the following April. He insisted that it could best be done in winter.*

The Directory could only stop the mouth of such a critic by transferring to him the command, which he accordingly assumed in March, 1796, of the army of Italy, 45,000 strong. To engage him to set out, they promised that he should find 500,000 livres at Nice. They could only forward to him 24,000;† these were all he brought to the famished army, which had to look to victory for supplies. The Piedmontese army under Colli, of nearly equal force, had its head-quarters at Ceva. Beaulieu commanded an army of 34,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry, with which he imagined he had but to defend Genoa. To keep him in this opinion Buonaparte marched a division towards that city. The Austrians attacked it on the 10th at Voltri, beat it back, and

• To Napoleon's letter, included in his Correspondence, the date of October is wrongfully given. It

VOL. V.

с

must have been written after Loano.
† Mémoires du Duc de Gaeta.

XLII.

Beaulieu intending to annihilate his adversary, sent a strong corps to the mountains, from whence he hoped to fall upon their flank or rear. The greater part of the French had, however, already marched thither, and those driven from Voltri also took that direction. So that when Beaulieu occupied the heights of Montenotte with 13,000 men, he found himself beset on the 12th by far greater numbers of the French, whose divisions attacked him on all sides. The Austrians were overwhelmed and beaten, 2,000 of them made prisoners; the rest fell back upon Dego.

The Piedmontese were not in time to aid their allies at Montenotte, and not in force sufficient to aid them at Millesimo; Buonaparte was thus able on the 15th to send Augereau against the Piedmontese at Millesimo, whilst Massena drove the Austrians from Dego. On both points the French continued to be superior in numbers. A small Austrian division under Provera had advanced into the gorges of Millesimo to form a junction with the Piedmontese; but were driven back upon Ceva, after a smart action, and Provera compelled to surrender. The action of Dego was more fatal to the Austrians, who were expelled from the village with the loss of 3,000 killed and 9,000 prisoners. They lost all their artillery. The looseness of the Austrian tactics were proved, when on the following day, a strong corps of no less than 7,000 Austrian grenadiers stumbled upon Dego, drove the French from it, and placed the entire movement and victory of Buonaparte in jeopardy. To dislodge them was indispensable, yet, the troops worn with fatigue and fighting were scarcely equal to it. They were three times repulsed, from whence it is evident that had this corps arrived in time the former victory of Dego would not have been won. It was only on the fourth assault, led by General Lanusse with his hat held high on his sword, that the French succeeded in recapturing Dego.

« AnteriorContinuar »