CHAPTER V

Revolt at Cairo--My father enters the Grand Mosque on horseback--His home-sickness--He leaves Egypt and lands at Naples--Ferdinand and Caroline of Naples--Emma Lyon and Nelson--Ferdinand's manifesto--Comments of his minister, Belmonte-Pignatelli.

The want of money, complained of by Bonaparte, was being felt increasingly. There seemed to be no means of paying the troops without having recourse to advances, a miserable method, sure to call to mind the thievish tricks of the famous Mamelukes which the French had ostensibly come to put down. So that remedy was not available. In this embarrassment, Poussielgue, Comptroller-General of Finances, suggested to the general-in-chief to establish the right of registration on all concessions of properties made since their arrival in Egypt, or upon all future concessions. All these concessions were of a temporary character, and could be withdrawn or renewed according to the wish of the commanding general, therefore the scheme was of inestimable value.

This fiscal method was hitherto unknown in the East, where it was looked upon as only another form of lending money; and as it was prejudicial to the interests of the great Turkish or Arabian concessionaires, most of whom lived in Cairo, it turned that capital into a hotbed of revolt.

One of the earliest orders on reaching Cairo had been to keep a watch on the mosque criers. It is the duty of these criers to call the faithful to prayer three times a day. For some time their cries were noted, but by degrees our people grew used to them, and neglected to notice what they said. Seeing this, the _Muezzins_ substituted appeals to revolt in place of their sacred formulas; and the French were too ignorant of the language to perceive the difference. This left the Turks every opportunity to conspire and to give orders for delaying or advancing the hour fixed for their insurrection. It was finally fixed to begin on the morning of the 21st October.

On the 21st October at eight o'clock, then, the revolt broke out simultaneously at every point from Syène as far as Alexandria.

My father was still ill and in bed when Dermoncourt rushed in, crying:

"General, the town is in full insurrection. General Dupuis has just been assassinated! To horse, to horse!"

My father did not wait a second bidding, he was too well aware of the value of every moment at such a crisis! He leapt half clad on his horse, not even waiting to saddle it, seized his sword, and rushed into the streets of Cairo at the head of several officers who had followed him.

The news was but too true. General Dupuis, the commander of Cairo, had been mortally wounded under the armpit by a lance-thrust, which had severed the main artery. A Turk who had concealed himself in a cellar had struck the blow. Bonaparte, it was rumoured, was on the isle of Rondah, and could not obtain entrance to the town. General Caffarelli's house had been taken by storm, and all inside put to death. The insurgents in a body were making for the quarters of Paymaster-General Estève.

My father urged his horse in that direction, collecting round him all the French he met on his way, amounting in all to about sixty men.

We know what admiration my father's herculean figure had raised among the Arabs. Mounted on a heavy dragoon horse, which he handled with consummate horsemanship, his head, breast, and arms bare to every blow, he hurled himself into the thickest of the fray with that utter fearlessness of death which always characterised him, this time intensified by the fit of melancholy that preyed on him. He appeared to the Arabs as the Destroying Angel of the flaming sword. In an instant the approaches to the Treasury were cleared, Estève saved and the Turks and Arabs cut to pieces.

Poor Estève! I remember that when I was quite a child he kissed me and said, "Remember what I tell you: if it had not been for your father, this head of mine would be lying to-day in the gutters of Cairo."

The rest of that day was spent in continual strife and fierce fighting. The members of the Egyptian Institute who inhabited the house of Kassim-Bey, in a remote quarter of the city, had barricaded themselves, and fired on the mob like ordinary soldiers. They were at it the whole day until evening, when my father and his brave dragoons came and rescued them.

News came at night that a convoy of sick men belonging to Régnier's division, on its way from Belbeys, had been butchered. Was Bonaparte really at Rondah, as all the official reports said? Or was he at his headquarters, as Bourrienne declared? Did he make fruitless attempts at the gates of Old Cairo, at the gate of the Institute? Could he only effect an entrance by the gate of Boulay towards six in the evening? Was he surrounded at his residence with no means of delivering himself? These questions still remain in obscurity; but it is a perfectly clear and patent fact that he took no part at all that first day, and I can call up living witnesses among the Egyptians[1] who will testify that they saw my father everywhere.

The first orders from Bonaparte were put into execution about five in the afternoon. The sound of cannon roared through the principal streets, the noise of a battery of howitzers, placed on the Mokkan, a noise as of thunder, rare in Cairo, that terrified the insurgents.

Resistance, which had been somewhat desultory and spasmodic in character until now, was increasing everywhere and taking more definite shape.

Nightfall interrupted the struggle, for it is a point of religion with the Turks not to fight in the dark. Bonaparte availed himself of the night to make his plans.

At sunrise the revolt was still alive, but the rebels were lost.

A great number of them had taken refuge with their principal leaders in the great mosque of El-Heazao. My father received orders to go and attack them there, thus striking at the very heart of what remained of the insurrection.

The doors were burst in with volleys of cannon; my father, urging his horse into a gallop, was the first to enter the mosque.

A danger arose at the very threshold, for his horse encountered an obstacle in the way, a tomb about three feet in height, at which he stopped dead, reared, then, dropping his forefeet in front of the tomb, stood for an instant motionless, with bloodshot eyes and smoking nostrils.

"The Angel! the Angel!" yelled the Arabs.

Their resistance was but the struggle of despair in the case of a few, but with the greater number it was continued out of a spirit of fatalistic resignation, and their leaders shrieked "_Amhan!_" and surrendered.

My father sought out Bonaparte to inform him of the fall of the mosque: he was already acquainted with the details of its capture, and, mollified by the treasure my father had sent him, he accorded him a gracious reception.

"Good-day to you, my Hercules," he said. "So you have crushed the dragon?" And he held out his hand.

"Gentlemen," he continued, turning towards his suite, "I shall order a picture to be painted of the taking of the Grand Mosque. Dumas, you have already posed as the principal figure."

The picture was, as a matter of fact, commissioned, but Girodet's principal figure, it will be remembered, was a tall fair hussar, of no name or practically no rank; he it was who took the place of my father, for, eight days after the insurrection of Cairo had been quelled, my father again fell out with Bonaparte, and insisted with renewed vehemence on being allowed to return to France.

He had been for a time distracted from his home-sick despondency by the insurrection at Cairo, but he soon relapsed into it again. A deep disgust with everything, life included, took possession of him, and, in spite of the advice of his friends, he obstinately persisted that Bonaparte should allow him furlough.

Bonaparte made one last attempt during their final interview to endeavour to make him stay, even going so far as to tell him that he meant himself to return to France before long, and promising to take my father back with him. But nothing could allay the desire to go; it had, in fact, become a mania.

Unluckily, Dermoncourt, who was the only man who could influence my father, had returned to his regiment, which was stationed at _Belbeys._ Directly he heard that the departure was settled, he hurried back to Cairo, and went to my father's house. He found the place dismantled and my father selling the things he did not want to take away.

With the proceeds of this sale my father bought 4000 lbs. of Mocha coffee, eleven Arabian horses (two stallions and nine mares), and chartered a small vessel called _la Belle Maltaise._

Want of news--all of which was intercepted by the English cruisers--cut them off completely from all that was passing in Europe, so we will very briefly recount what was happening in Rome and Naples, for the better understanding of what follows.

Ferdinand and Caroline reigned at Naples. Caroline, a second Marie-Antoinette, hated the French for having killed her sister. She was a woman of strong passions in hate and in love, and she indulged in luxuries both of pleasures and of blood.

Ferdinand was a _lazzarone_; he could scarcely read or write; he knew no other tongue than the Neapolitan dialect. In that patois he composed a slight variation upon the ancient _panem et circenses._ His version was: "The Neapolitans are ruled by three F's:--Forea--Festa--Farina" (gallows--games--grain).

It will be readily understood that a treaty wrung by fear from such sovereigns would only be enforced so long as they lived under the dominion of that fear. Now Bonaparte was to them himself the very embodiment of that terror, but he was away in Egypt, and they soon learnt the news of the destruction of the French fleet at Aboukir. They concluded from that that Bonaparte was lost and the French army annihilated.

Directly the English squadron made ready to stop our course towards the unknown destination of our expedition, the main body of the English fleet, in spite of our treaties with Ferdinand, made for the port of Naples, where it was received with demonstrations that were somewhat ambiguous in the matter of sympathy. It was quite another story after the battle of Aboukir.

Nelson's fleet had hardly been signalled off Naples, tugging the remains of our vessels in its wake, when the king, the queen, the English ambassador, Hamilton, with his beautiful wife, Emma Lyon, embarked on magnificently decorated vessels and advanced to meet the conqueror.

Oh, beautiful and ill-fated Emma Lyon! what historian shall dare to play the Tacitus and write your life? What poet shall presume to lay bare your secret passions? The favourite of Queen Caroline and the mistress of Nelson, who shall dare to be the judge and add up the list of your victims?

This splendid Court went forth in state to honour Nelson: the king offered him a sword, the queen a mistress. The town was illuminated in the evening, and there was a ball at the palace.

Nelson appeared on the royal balcony by the side of Ferdinand, and the people cried, "_Vive Ferdinand! vive_ _Nelson!_"

And all this took place under the eyes of our ambassador, Garat, who witnessed the decline of our influence and the growth of English popularity.

He made due complaints, but he was told in reply that the English fleet had only been received into the port of Naples because Nelson had threatened to bombard the town.

This excuse was, of course, a fallacious one, but our ambassador was obliged to accept it.

The next proceeding he witnessed was the mobilisation of an army of 60,000 men commanded by the Austrian general, Mack, who had won a certain notoriety by his repeated defeats.

From that moment war against France was resolved upon.

The Neapolitan army, under command of the Austrian general, was divided into three camps.

Twenty-two thousand soldiers were sent to St. Germain; 16,000 occupied the Abruzzi; 8000 camped on the plain of Sessa; and 6000 sheltered behind the walls of Gaëte.

Fifty-two thousand men were ready to invade the Roman States, to drive us out of Rome, which we then occupied.

Nevertheless, although war was decided upon, it had not yet been declared, and our ambassador again asked the Neapolitan Government for an explanation of what was passing.

The Government returned answer that they desired the continuation of amicable relations between themselves and the French Government more than ever, and that the soldiery noticed by M. Garat were only in their respective camps for training.

However, a few days later--on the 22nd of November--a manifesto was put forth, wherein King Ferdinand spoke of the "_state of revolutionary disorder in France; the political changes in Italy; the proximity of enemies of the monarchy and of public peace; the occupation of Malta, a fief of the kingdom of Sicily; the flight of the Pope, and the dangers which were threatening religion._" Then, after this list of troubles, he went on to declare that "_taking into consideration these many and powerful incentives, he was about to lead an army into the Roman States in order to restore to the people their rightful sovereign, the head of Holy Church, and to bring peace to the peoples of his kingdom._"

He added "_that as he was not declaring war against any monarch, he had persuaded the foreign armies not to oppose the march of the Neapolitan troops, which were intended solely to pacify Rome and the territory of the Holy See._"

At the same time private letters from ministers of the King of Naples to foreign ministers incited the latter to wage war against the French, not honest, open warfare, but a war of assassinations and poisonings.

It seems incredible, nay impossible, does it not? Read this letter from Prince Belmonte-Pignatelli, minister of the King of Naples, to Chevalier Riocca, minister of the King of Piedmont:--

"We know that in your king's council are several cautious, we might even say timid ministers, _who shudder at the idea of perjury and of murder_, as though the late treaty of alliance between France and Sardinia were to be considered a political act, which could be respected. Was it not dictated by the superior strength of the conqueror? Was it not accepted under the pressure of necessity? Such treaties weigh most unjustly on the oppressed, who in violating them but make amends on the very first opportunity afforded them by good fortune. What! with your king a prisoner in his own capital, surrounded by the enemy's bayonets, you would call it perjury to break promises wrung from you by force against your consciences? You would call the extermination of your tyrants assassination? No, the French battalions are scattered up and down Piedmont full of confidence in the security of peace. Stir up the patriotic feelings of the people to a pitch of enthusiasm and frenzy, until every Piedmontese will pant to tread his enemies beneath his feet. A few _individual murders_ will be more useful in Piedmont than victories won on the field of battle, and an impartial posterity will never give the name of treason to the spirited actions of a whole people, who pass over the dead bodies of their oppressors in regaining their liberty.... Our brave Neapolitans, under the leadership of worthy General Mack, will be the first to give the signal of death. They may be already on the track of the enemy of thrones and nations by the time this letter reaches you."

Now it was into the hands of a Government which could write such letters as the above, that my father, a Republican general, was to fall, when he left Egypt on account of his devotion to the Republic, which was threatened, as he thought, by Bonaparte's personal ambition.

And at what a moment, too! When the head of that Government had been defeated on all sides by a mere handful of French troops, chased from his kingdom on the mainland, and obliged to retire to Palermo; carrying in his train feelings of bitter hatred and anger and vows of vengeance, such as always accompany defeat, and fill the minds of the vanquished with desperate and deadly resolutions.

We shall now see how Prince Belmonte-Pignatelli put in practice upon my father and his unfortunate companions the precepts enjoined by him upon his colleague, the Chevalier Riocca, minister of the King of Piedmont.

I will leave my father himself to relate the story of this terrible captivity; his voice shall rise from a tomb closed for forty-five years, and, as did the voice of Hamlet's father, shall denounce the crime and the murderers to the whole world.

[Footnote 1: All those who took part in the Egyptian campaign are so called.]