It must have been a sadly disappointed young man who rejoined his family, now at Marseilles, in the spring of 1795. Gone was the Toulon glory; gone the prestige of the confidential friend of commissioners who governed France. Barely escaping with his life from the Robespierre wreck, here he now was, stranded by the failure, the miserable collapse, of an expedition from which so much had been expected. Very gloomy must have been Napoleon’s “yellowish green” face, very sombre those piercing eyes, as he came back to his seat at the hearth of the humble home in Marseilles. Ten years had passed since he had donned his uniform; they had been years of unceasing effort, painful labor, and repeated failure. A demon of ill-luck had dogged his footsteps, foiled him at every turn, made null all his well-laid plans. Even success had come to him only to mock him and then drop him to a harder fall. Not only had he lost ground, but his brothers had been thrown out of the places he had obtained for them. In the midst of these discouragements came another: Lacombe St. Michel, a commissioner who bore him no good-will, urged the government to remove him from the army of Italy and to transfer him to the West. An order to that effect had been issued. This transfer would take him away from an army where he had made some reputation and some friends, and from a field of operations with which he was thoroughly familiar. It would put him in La VendÉe, where the war was the worst of all wars,—civil strife, brother against brother, Frenchman against Frenchman,—and it would put him under the command of a masterful young man named Hoche.

Absolutely determined not to go to this post, and yet desperately tenacious in his purpose of keeping his feet upon the ladder, Napoleon set out for Paris early in May, 1795, to exert himself with the authorities. In the capital he had some powerful friends, Barras and FrÉron among them. Other friends he could make. In a government where committees ruled, and where the committees were undergoing continual changes, everything was possible to one who could work, and wait, and intrigue. Therefore to Paris he hastened, taking with him his aides Junot and Marmont, and his brother Louis.

Lodged in a cheap hotel, he set himself to the task of getting the order of transfer cancelled. A general overhauling of the army list had been going on recently, and many changes were being made. Napoleon’s was not an isolated case. The mere transfer from one army to the other, his rank not being lowered, was, in itself, no disgrace; but Aubrey, who was now at the head of the war committee, decided upon a step which became a real grievance. The artillery service was overstocked with officers; it became necessary to cut down this surplus; and Napoleon, as a junior officer, was ordered to the army of the West as general of a brigade of infantry.

Napoleon regarded this as an insult, a serious injury, and he never forgave the minister who dealt him the blow. Aubrey had been a Girondin, and was at heart a royalist. He knew Napoleon to be a Jacobin, if not a Terrorist. Without supposing that there were any causes for personal ill-will, here were sufficient grounds for positive dislike in times so hot as those. In vain Napoleon applied in person, and brought to bear the powerful influence of Barras, FrÉron, and the Bishop of Marboz. Either his advocates were lukewarm, or his cause was considered weak. Neither from the full committee nor from Aubrey could any concession be wrung. Aubrey, himself a soldier of the perfunctory, non-combative sort, believed that Napoleon had been advanced too rapidly. “You are too young to be commander-in-chief of artillery,” he said to the little Corsican. “Men age fast on the field of battle,” was the retort which widened the breach;—for Aubrey had not come by any of his age on fields of battle.

Foiled in his attempt on the committees as then constituted, Napoleon’s only hope was to wait until these members should go out and others come in by the system of rotation.

In the meantime he stuck to Paris with supple tenacity. By producing certificates of ill-health, he procured and then lengthened leave of absence from this obnoxious post in the West. He clung to old friends, and made new ones. Brother Lucien having been cast into prison as a rabid Jacobin, Napoleon was able to secure his release. Peremptory orders were issued that Napoleon should go to his post of duty, but he succeeded, through his friends, in evading the blow. Louis, however, lost his place as lieutenant, and was sent back to school at ChÂlons.

In spite of all his courage and his resources, Napoleon became, at times, very despondent. He wrote his brother Joseph that “if this continues, I shall not care to get out of the way of the carriages as they pass.” The faithful Junot shared with his chief the money he received from home, and also his winnings at the gaming table;—for Junot was a reckless gambler, and, being young, sometimes had good luck. Bourrienne and Talma may also have made loans to Napoleon in these days of distress, but this is not so certain. There is a letter which purports to have been from Napoleon to Talma, asking the loan of a few crowns, and offering repayment “out of the first kingdom I win with my sword.” But Napoleon himself declared that he did not meet Talma before the time of the consulate.

Idle, unhappy, out of pocket, Napoleon became morose and unsocial. If he seemed gay, the merriment struck his friends as forced and hollow. At the theatre, while the audience might be convulsed with laughter, Napoleon was solemn and silent. If he was with a party of friends, their chatter seemed to fret him, and he would steal away, to be seen later sitting alone in some box of an upper tier, and “looking rather sulky.”

Pacing the streets from day to day, gloomy, empty of pocket, his career seemingly closed, his thoughts were bitter. He envied and hated the young men who dashed by him on their fine horses, and he railed out at them and at fate. He envied his brother Joseph, who had married the daughter of a man who had got rich in the business of soap-making and soap-selling. “Ah, that lucky rogue, Joseph!” But might not Napoleon marry DÉsirÉe, the other daughter of the soap man? It would appear that he wished it, and that she was not unwilling, but the soap-boiler objected. “One Bonaparte in the family is enough.” Napoleon traced his misfortunes back to the date of his arrest: “Salicetti has cast a cloud over the bright dawn of my youth. He has blighted my hopes of glory.” At another time he said mournfully, striking his forehead, “Yet I am only twenty-six.” Ruined by a fellow-Corsican! Yet to all outward appearance Salicetti and Napoleon continued to be good friends. They met at Madame Permon’s from time to time, and Salicetti was often in Napoleon’s room. Bourrienne states that the two men had much to say to each other in secret. It was as though they were concerned in some conspiracy.

On May 20, 1795 (1st of Prairial), there was a riot, formidable and ferocious, directed by the extreme democrats against the Convention and its moderates. The Tuileries was forced by the mob, and a deputy killed. Intending to kill FrÉron, the crowd slew Ferraud. The head of the deputy was cut off, stuck on a pike, and pushed into the face of Boissy d’Anglas, the president. Gravely the president took off his hat and bowed to the dead. The Convention troops arrived, cleared the hall, and put down the riot.

Napoleon was a witness to this frightful scene. After it was over, he dropped in at Madame Permon’s to get something to eat. The restaurants were all closed, and he had tasted nothing since morning. While eating, he related what had happened at the Tuileries. Suddenly he inquired, “Have you seen Salicetti?” He then went on to complain of the injury Salicetti had done him. “But I bear him no ill-will.” Salicetti was implicated in the revolt, and the conspiracy which preceded it may have been the subject of those private conversations he had been having at Napoleon’s room—conversations which, according to Bourrienne, left Napoleon “pensive, melancholy, and anxious.”

The conspiracy had ripened, had burst into riot, and the riot had been crushed. “Have you seen Salicetti?” A very pertinent inquiry was this, for Salicetti was being hunted, and in a few days would be proscribed. If caught, he would probably be executed. Madame Junot says that while Napoleon spoke of Salicetti he “appeared very abstracted.” Briefly to conclude this curious episode, Salicetti was proscribed, fled for refuge to Madame Permon’s house, was hidden by her, and was finally smuggled out of Paris disguised as her valet. Napoleon had known where Salicetti lay concealed, but did not betray him. Was his conduct dictated by prudence or by generosity? There was something generous in it, no doubt; but the conclusion is almost unavoidable that there was policy, too. If driven to the wall, Salicetti could have disclosed matters hurtful to Napoleon. Those private interviews, secret conferences, daily visits to Napoleon’s room on the days the conspiracy was being formed—would they not look bad for a young officer who was known to have a grievance, and who had been heard frequently and publicly to denounce the government? This may have been what was on Napoleon’s mind while he was so much buried in thought at Madame Permon’s.

It was fine proof of Napoleon’s judgment that he did not allow himself to be drawn into the conspiracy. Angered against the government, despising many of the men who composed it, restlessly ambitious, and intensely yearning for action, the wonder is that he came within the secrets of the leaders of the revolt and yet kept his skirts clear. Napoleon at this period was sallow and thin; his chestnut hair hung long and badly powdered. His speech was generally terse and abrupt. He had not yet developed grace of speech and manner. When he came to present Madame Permon a bunch of violets, he did it awkwardly—so much so that his ungainly manner provoked smiles. His dress was plain. A gray overcoat buttoned to the chin; a round hat pulled over his eyes, or stuck on the back of his head; no gloves, and a black cravat, badly tied; boots coarse, and generally unclean. When the weather was bad, these boots would be muddy and wet, and Napoleon would put them on the fender to dry, to the irritation of those who had exacting noses. Madame Permon’s being a nose of that class, her handkerchief rose to her nose whenever the Bonaparte boots rose to the fender. Napoleon, an observant man, took the hint, and got into the habit of stopping in the area for the chambermaid to clean his boots with her broom. His clothes had become threadbare, his hat dilapidated. The bootmaker who gave him credit in this dark hour was never forgotten. The Emperor Napoleon persisted in patronizing the clumsy cobbler whose heart had not hardened itself against the forlorn brigadier.

One night at St. Helena, when Napoleon, unable to sleep, was trying to rob time of its tedium by recalling the vicissitudes of his past, he related this incident: “I was at this period, on one occasion, suffering from that extreme depression of spirits which renders life a burden too great to be borne. I had just received a letter from my mother, revealing to me the utter destitution into which she was plunged. My own salary had been cut off, and I had but five francs in my pocket. I wandered along the banks of the river, tempted to commit suicide. In a few moments I should have thrown myself into the water, when I ran against a man dressed like a mechanic. ‘Is that you, Napoleon?’ and he threw himself upon my neck. It was my old friend, Des Mazis, who had emigrated, and who had now returned in disguise to visit his mother. ‘But what is the matter, Napoleon? You do not listen to me! You do not seem to hear me!’

“I confessed everything to him.

“‘Is that all?’ said he, and unbuttoning his coarse waistcoat and taking off a belt which he handed me, ‘Here are 30,000 francs which I can spare; take them and relieve your mother.’”

Napoleon told how he was so overjoyed that he rushed away to send the money to his mother, without having waited to thank his friend. Ashamed of his conduct, he soon went back to seek Des Mazis, but failed to find him anywhere. It was under the Empire that the two again met. Napoleon forced ten times the amount of the loan upon Des Mazis, and appointed him to a position which paid him 30,000 francs per year.

Low as he was in purse and spirit, Napoleon was too young, too strong, too self-reliant to yield to despair for any length of time. His active brain teemed with schemes for the future. His airy fancy soared all the way from plans which involved a book store, and a leasing and sub-letting of apartment houses, to service in Turkey and an empire in the East. Sometimes his friends thought him almost crazy. Going with Bourrienne, who was looking about for a suitable house, Napoleon took a fancy to the house opposite, and thought of hiring it for himself, Uncle Fesch, and his old Brienne teacher, Patrault: “With that house, my friends in it, and a horse and cabriolet, I should be the happiest fellow in the world.”

Junot relates that one evening when the two were walking in Jardin des Plantes, Napoleon appeared to be overcome by the beauties of his surroundings and the charms of the night. He made Junot his confidant—he was in love, and his affection was not returned. Junot listened, sympathized, condoled, and then made Napoleon his confidant. Junot was also in love—he loved Pauline Bonaparte, and wished to wed her. At once Napoleon recovered himself. Firmly he rejected the proposition: Junot had no fortune, Pauline had none—marriage was out of the question.

“You must wait. We shall see better days, my friend.—Yes! We shall have them even should I go to seek them in another quarter of the world!”

But where should he go? This question he put to himself and to the few friends who felt interest in his fate. One of his former teachers at Brienne, D’Harved, met him at this time in Paris, and was struck by his dejected appearance. “Chagrin and discontent were vividly painted on his face. He broke out into abuse of the government.” D’Harved was afraid that such talk would endanger listener as well as speaker, and at his instance they retired into the garden of the Palais Royal, accompanied by an Englishman named Blinkam or Blencowe. Napoleon continued to complain of the manner in which the authorities had treated him, and he declared his purpose of leaving the country. The Englishman proposed that they enter a restaurant. There the conversation was resumed. Napoleon did not favor D’Harved’s suggestion, that he offer his services to England. Nor did Germany attract him. Spain might do, for “there is not a single warrior in that country.”

Then the Englishman proposed Turkey, promising to write letters which would favorably dispose certain influential persons in Constantinople to the luckless adventurer. Napoleon jumped at the idea. “His countenance beamed with delight and hope.” He exclaimed, “I shall at once solicit permission to depart to Constantinople.” And he did so.

At the end of July, Aubrey went out of office, and was succeeded in the war committee by Doulcet de PontÉcoulant. One of the first matters which engaged his attention was the condition of the army of Italy. It had been losing ground. Doulcet needed the advice of some one who was familiar with the situation there; and Boissy d’Anglas recommended Napoleon. Summoned to the war office, Napoleon answered all questions promptly, and made suggestions as to what ought to be done, which so dazzled the minister that he said to Napoleon, “General, take time and write out what you propose, so that it may be laid before the Committee.”

“Time!” cried Napoleon, “give me a couple of sheets of paper and a pen. In half an hour I will have the plan of campaign ready.” He sat down and wrote, but who could read that awful writing? Taking it home with him, he made Junot copy it, and the plan was submitted to the full committee, which sent it on to the army. Doulcet, favorably impressed by Napoleon, retained him in the topographical bureau, where he and three others drew up plans and directions for all the armies.

On the 16th of August the order was issued peremptorily, that Napoleon should proceed to the post assigned him in the army of the West. He did not obey, and powerful friends screened him. On August 30 he applied to be sent to Turkey to increase the military resources of the Sultan. On September 15 or 25 (for authorities differ painfully on the date), a report signed by CambacÉrÈs and others decreed that his name be stricken from the list of generals in active service.

One reason given for the sudden harshness of the Committee in striking his name off the list is that he had pressed for payment of fraudulent accounts. He had claimed and received mileage from Nice to Paris, when he had come from Marseilles only. He had also claimed pay for horses sold by him according to orders, when he set forth on the Corsican expedition. The authorities had no faith in these horses, considered them purely imaginary; and, in consequence, Napoleon was spoken of very harshly by government officials. Letourneur, who had succeeded Doulcet on the Committee, was one of those who disliked and opposed him.

On September 15 a subcommittee reported to the full committee in favor of the proposition, that Napoleon be sent, with officers of his suite, to reorganize the military system of the Turks. Only in government by committee could such a contradictory series of orders and resolutions be possible. Napoleon had seriously canvassed the officers who were to compose his suite on the mission to Turkey, when symptoms of another revolutionary convulsion attracted his notice and halted his preparations.

The Convention, which had reeled and rocked along for three years, was now about to adjourn. It felt that it must, and yet it did not wish to do so. They therefore decreed that two-thirds of the next legislature should be composed of themselves. The other third, the people might elect. One reason for this strange law was that the royalist reaction had become extremely threatening. The Count of Artois was said to be hovering on the coast, ready to land an expedition from England, and to march on Paris. The army of CondÉ was expecting to coÖperate from the Rhine. Paris was to give the signal by a revolt which should upset the Convention.

Besides the royalists, there were other formidable malcontents. There were the poorer classes, who had been deprived of their votes by the property qualification of the new constitution. In the revolt which ensued, however, the royalists were the soul of the movement. The extreme democrats, though hotly opposed to the property qualification, hated royalism worse. Santerre was ready to sustain the Convention, and did so. The very prisoners who had been lying in chains since the democratic revolt of May (1st of Prairial) were now willing to fight for the Convention, and did fight for it.

The centre of the insurrection against the Convention, its new constitution, and its decrees was the Section Lepelletier, the home of the rich men of the middle class. The National Guards from this section, it will be remembered, had fought in defence of the King on the famous 10th of August. It was now ready to fight for royalty again.

On the 4th of October (12th of VendÉmiaire) the Section Lepelletier declared itself in insurrection, and it became the rallying-point for insurgents from all the sections of Paris. The National Guard, forty thousand strong, had been so reorganized that it was now with the insurgents. To the royalists the situation seemed full of promise, for the Convention had but seven or eight thousand troops upon which it could rely. General Dumas was selected by the Convention to take command of its forces, but he had left town three days before.

General Menou, in command of the Convention forces, was ordered to go and disarm and disperse the insurgents. For some reason, either because he failed to realize the gravity of the crisis, or because he was unnerved by it, he did the worst thing possible. He parleyed, and compromised. He agreed to withdraw his troops on the promise of the insurgents to withdraw theirs. He then retreated, and the insurgents held their ground and their arms, loudly proclaiming their triumph.

As the nerveless and witless Menou was drawing off his men, a young officer, on the steps of the Feydau Theatre, exclaimed to his companion, “Where can that fellow be going?” It was Napoleon speaking to Junot. And he continued: “Ah, if the sections would only let me lead them, I would guarantee to place them in the Tuileries in two hours, and have all those Convention rascals driven out!” Then he hurried to the Tuileries to see what the Convention would do next.

It was evident that on the morrow the insurgents would attack. They proclaimed their intention of doing so, and they were confident of success.

The Convention removed Menou from command, and placed him under arrest. They then chose Barras commander-in-chief, remembering his vigor and success in July, 1794, when Robespierre fell. Napoleon was made second in command.

Just how this appointment came to be made, will always be a matter of dispute. It is certain that Barras suggested Bonaparte’s name to the Committee in the words: “I have precisely the man we want. It is a little Corsican officer, who will not stand on ceremony.” Baron Fain states that Napoleon was at this time in the topographical office, that he was sent for, and sworn in by the Committee in the committee-room. Napoleon himself, in one of his different versions, relates that he was at the Feydau Theatre, was told what was happening at the Lepelletier section, left the theatre, witnessed Menou’s retreat, and then hurried to the Convention to see how the news would be received. Arrived at the Tuileries, he mixed with the crowd in the galleries, and heard his name called. Announcement was made that he had been appointed as aide to Barras.

Barras, in his turn, says that on this fateful evening Bonaparte could not be found at any of his usual haunts, that he came to the Tuileries late, looking confused, and that in answer to sharp questions he admitted that he had come from the section Lepelletier, where he had been reconnoitring the enemy. Barras charges that he had been dickering with the other side.

By whatever means it came about, Napoleon Bonaparte was acting chief in the famous 13th of VendÉmiaire (5th of October, 1795). It was he whose genius converted the Tuileries, which the Parisian mobs had time and again stormed, into a fortress an army could not have taken. Cannon were at Sablons, cannon he must have, and Murat at the head of three hundred horse went in a gallop to bring the guns. In the nick of time the order was given, for the insurgents had sent also. Murat’s mounted men reached Sablons in advance of the unmounted insurgents, and the cannon were whirled away to the Tuileries. Planted so as to command all avenues of approach, they made the position invulnerable, for the insurgents had no cannon.

General ThiÉbault says: “From the first, his activity was astonishing: he seemed to be everywhere at once, or rather he only vanished at one point to reappear instantly. He surprised people further by his laconic, clear, and prompt orders, imperative to the last degree. Everybody was struck also by the vigor of his arrangements, and passed from admiration to confidence, and from confidence to enthusiasm.”

Morning came, and with it the insurgents; but at sight of the formidable defences which had been the work of the night, they halted. Hour after hour passed away in hoots, yells, threats, negotiation. Toward evening it seemed that the Convention troops might be brought to fraternize with the insurgents. Suddenly a musket was fired, and the battle opened; or rather the cannonade commenced, for battle it could not be called. The insurgents showed courage, but had no chance of success whatever. It was cannon against muskets, an army intrenched against a packed mob in the streets. The firing commenced at about four in the evening. By six all was over.

A few attempts to rally the insurgents were made, but were easily frustrated. The Convention forces carried out the orders Menou had received by disarming the turbulent sections. A few of the ringleaders of the revolt were tried and punished, but only one, Lafond, was executed.

During this disarmament, which recent writers say never happened, but which Menou had been officially instructed to effect, and which both Napoleon and Barras say they did effect, the victorious conventionals made one of those mistakes incident to the prevailing darkness and confusion. The house of Madame de Beauharnais was entered, the sword of her late husband, the Viscount Beauharnais, was carried off. In a day or so the son of the widow Beauharnais went to Napoleon and asked for the return of his dead father’s sword. His request immediately granted, and the sacred relic being placed in his hands, the boy covered the handle of the weapon with kisses, and burst in tears. Napoleon’s interest was deeply aroused, and he treated the lad with that winning kindness which fascinated all who came within its influence. Such report did EugÈne Beauharnais carry home that his mother felt bound to call upon the General, and thank him in person; and it was thus, perhaps, that these two first met.

Later biographers scout this story as a romance fashioned by Napoleon himself, and they say that (1) no disarmament took place; and (2) that if such disarmament did take place, Madame Beauharnais, a friend of Barras, would not have been molested. To say nothing of further proof, the contemporaneous letter of Napoleon to Joseph shows that the sections were disarmed; and as to Madame Beauharnais being screened by her friendly relations with Barras, that presupposes every soldier in the Convention army to have known all about Barras’s private affairs. How could the thousands of Convention troops, fifteen hundred of whom were democrats just out of jail, know who was or was not a personal friend of Barras? The Convention was in the minority; it had less than eight thousand troops: would it have left arms in the hands of the majority and the forty thousand National Guards? Captious critics call attention to the fact that Napoleon elsewhere stated that he met his future wife at the house of Barras. This assertion does not necessarily conflict with the other. A call at the office of an official does not constitute a social meeting. When Napoleon said he met Madame Beauharnais at the house of Barras, his meaning probably was that he there first knew her socially. And why should a man like Napoleon, who could lie so superbly when he tried, invent so bungling a hoax as one which involved a disarmament of Paris which did not take place, and the return of a sword which had never been seized?

General ThiÉbault says: “A few days after the 13 of VendÉmiaire I happened to be at the office of the general staff when General Bonaparte came in. I can still see his little hat surmounted by a chance plume badly fastened on, his tricolor sash more than carelessly tied, his coat cut anyhow, and a sword which did not seem the kind of weapon to make his fortune. Flinging his hat on a large table in the middle of the room, he went up to an old general, named Krieg, a man of wonderful knowledge of military detail and author of a soldier’s manual. He made him take a seat beside him at the table, and began questioning him, pen in hand, about a host of facts connected with the service and discipline. Some of his questions showed such complete ignorance of some of the most ordinary things that several of my comrades smiled. I was myself struck by the number of his questions, their order, and their rapidity, no less than by the way in which the answers were caught up, and often found to resolve themselves into new questions, which he deduced as consequences from them. But what struck me still more was the sight of a commander-in-chief perfectly indifferent about showing his subordinates how completely ignorant he was of various points of the business which the junior of them was supposed to know perfectly, and this raised him a hundred cubits in my eyes.”

Here we see Napoleon drawn to the life. Instead of sitting down to gloat over his recent brilliant success, he had gone to work with the devouring zeal of a man who had done just enough to encourage him to do more. He did not idle away any time listening to congratulations. His cannon having opened one door in his advance, his eager eyes were already fixed far ahead on another, and his restless feet were in the path. In his garrison days he had not loved the details of his profession. Dull routine had been hateful, keeping him away from his books and his solitary musings. Now it was different. He saw the need of mastering everything which related to war, and, before he had even arrayed himself in new uniform, he had sought the old officer, Krieg, and was exhausting that source of information. In such direct, honest, practical way he came by that knowledge of war which justified him in saying in later years: “I know my profession thoroughly. Everything which enters into war I can do. If there is no powder, I can make it. If there are no cannon, I will cast them.” He knew better how to construct a road or a bridge than any engineer in the army. He had the best eye for ground, could best estimate distances, could best tell what men could do on the march or in the field. Down to the pettiest details, he studied it all. “Do you know how the shirts which come in from the wash should be placed in the drawer? No? Then I will tell you. Put them always at the bottom of the drawer, else the same shirts will be constantly in use.” This advice he volunteered to the astonished matron who had charge of the soldiers’ linen at the Invalides.

On October 12, 1795, Napoleon was restored to his grade in the artillery, and was named second commandant in the Army of the Interior. Ten days later, Barras having resigned his generalship, Napoleon became general of division and commander-in-chief of the Army of the Interior.

On October 26, 1795, the Convention finally adjourned; and on the next day it began to govern the country again with its two-thirds of the new legislatures (councils of Ancients and of Five Hundred) and its five regicide directors,—Barras, Carnot, Rewbell, Letourneur, and LarÉvelliÈre-LÉpaux.

Napoleon had become one of the dominant men of the State. In his every movement was the sense of his power. His position good, he lost no time in making it better. He took up suitable quarters in the Rue des Capuchines, surrounded himself with a brilliant staff, donned a handsome uniform, sported carriages and fine horses, and appeared in society.

He did not narrow himself to any clique or faction, but sought friends in all parties. He protected and conciliated royalists, called back to the service officers who had been retired, found good places for his friends, sent bread and wood to famishing families in the districts of the poor. At the same time he held down lawless outbreaks with a hand of iron, and went in person to close the great club of the PanthÉon, the hot-bed of political agitation. He thoroughly reorganized the Army of the Interior and the National Guard, formed guards for the legislative councils and for the Directory, acting almost always on his own responsibility, and consulting his superiors but little.

Uncle Fesch came to town to be nominally Napoleon’s secretary. Joseph received money and the promise of a consulship. Lucien was reinstalled in the fruitful commissary. Louis was once more lieutenant, and Jerome was placed in school in Paris. Of course Madame Letitia and the sisters basked in the sunshine also; for Napoleon could never do too much for his family. Nor did he overlook the Permons. According to Madame Junot, he had always liked them in the days of his poverty. Now that prosperity had come, he loved them better than ever: so much so indeed that he proposed that the Bonapartes should matrimonially absorb the entire Permon family. Jerome was to be married to Laura Permon, Pauline to Albert Permon, and Napoleon, himself, was to wed the widow Permon. According to Laura (afterward Madame Junot), this proposition was formally made by Napoleon, and laughed out of court by Madame Permon. The baffled matchmaker continued his visits, however, and frequently came to the house, accompanied by members of his staff.

One day as he stepped from his carriage, a poor woman held out toward him a dead child in her arms—the youngest of her six children. It had died of starvation, and the others would die if she could not get help. Napoleon was deeply moved, gave the woman kind words and money, and followed the matter up by getting her pensioned.

There was widespread squalor and misery in Paris during the winter of 1795, and Napoleon showed tact as well as kindness and firmness in preventing tumult. Consider that little picture which is usually passed over so lightly: an angry mob of the unemployed, hungry, desperate, threatening, and on the brink of violence. They suffer, their wives starve, their children die in the garrets. Of course they blame the government. How could such misery exist where there was so much wealth and food, if the government was treating all fairly? Furious women stir about in the crowd lashing the upper classes with bitter tongues, and goading the men on to the point of rioting. Napoleon and his escort arrive. One fat fisherwoman bustles and bawls: “Don’t mind these dandies in uniform with epaulettes on their shoulders! Don’t disperse! They care not if the poor people starve, if they can but eat well and grow fat.”

Think of Napoleon, the leanest of all lean men, “the thinnest and oddest object I ever laid eyes on,” sitting there on his horse representing the unpopular “they”! “Madame, pray look at me: tell us which of us two is the fatter.” The paunchy fisherwoman was stunned; the crowd laughed, and fell to pieces.