CHAPTER VII

My father is exchanged for General Mack--Events during his captivity--He asks in vain for a share in the distribution of the 500,000 francs indemnity granted to the prisoners--The arrears of his pay also refused him--He is placed on the retired list, in spite of his energetic protests.

My father was exchanged for the famous general, Mack, whom the Austrian emperor had lent to the Neapolitans. This general was later captured at Ulm, for the third time, hence the following quatrain:--

"En loyauté comme en vaillance, Mack est un homme singulier; Retenu sur parole, il s'échappe de France; Libre dans Ulm, il se rend prisonnier."

My father's imprisonment had lasted from the 27th Ventôse, year VII (17th March 1799) to the 15th Germinal, year IX (5th April 1801), during which period great events had taken place.

Bonaparte saw his gigantic designs upon the East miscarry before the successful resistance of a paltry seaport town like St. Jean-d'Acre. He had heard no news from Europe for ten months, when suddenly he learnt, through the medium of a stray Gazette that came in his way, of our reverses in Italy, of the re-capture of Mantua, the battle of Novi and the death of Joubert. He immediately left Egypt, reached Fréjus after a forty days' crossing on board _la Muiron_, and arrived in Paris on the 16th October 1799; a month later he overthrew the Directory on the famous 18th of Brumaire, and had himself appointed First Consul. He then married his sister Caroline to Murat, set out for Italy on May 6th, 1800, crossed the Saint Bernard with his army on the 19th and 20th, and defeated the Austrians at Marengo on June 14th, 1800--the same day that Kléber was assassinated at Cairo by Soliman.

On January 12, 1801, Murat left Milan to invade Naples and to deliver Rome.

On the 18th February the armistice to which we have referred, and to which my father owed his liberty, was concluded between France and the King of Naples.

And finally, as we have seen, my father reached the headquarters at Florence on the 5th April, from whence he hastened to despatch to the First Consul the report we have just read, which I have copied from the manuscript written and signed in his own handwriting.

When he landed at Ancona, on the 23rd Germinal, year IX, my father at once wrote the following letter to the Consuls:--

"CITIZEN CONSULS,--I have the honour to inform you that we arrived at this town yesterday, with ninety-four prisoners, the officers and non-commissioned officers among whom about equal the soldiers and marines, and most of them are blind or maimed. We will confine ourselves for the present to informing you that the treatment we experienced at the hands of the Government of Naples disgraces that State in the eyes of humanity and of all nations, for the most frightful means were employed to get rid of us, even poisoning being resorted to.

"I have the honour to send to you at the headquarters at Florence a detailed report of all the scandalous deeds which the Neapolitan Government committed with regard to us.

"Accept, Citizen Consuls, our respectful greetings."

In the following July he wrote to Murat:--

"MY DEAR MURAT,--If I have not been able to correspond with you sooner, you must put it down entirely to my wretched state of health, which, always uncertain and shaky, now forcibly reminds me, acutely and constantly, of the terrible treatment the King of Naples meted out to me.

"I want to know something definite, my dear Murat, about the 500,000 francs indemnity you tell me the Neapolitan Government was made to pay to such of the prisoners of war as survived the sojourn in their prison. I have spoken to many people upon this subject, but no one seems able to tell me exactly what the facts are with respect to this indemnity. You alone, my dear Murat, were probably entrusted to treat with the King of Naples, in which case I have not the slightest doubt you will remember me, on two counts: first, from the interest you have apparently taken in my misfortunes, and secondly, on account of the lasting friendship we mutually vowed long ago. I beg you not to forget to reclaim the things the king stole from me, and to remind him of the promises made by his agents at the time of my departure from Brindisi: these are among the documents I deposited with you. Urge them to send back all those things, if they are not already in your hands, and especially my two horses. You know how attached I am to the mare you gave me; I saved her out of my eleven horses, when nine had to be thrown overboard.

"I am told the First Consul was very indignant at the conduct of the King of Naples towards me. He promised to have all my things restored to me, particularly the sword he gave me at Alexandria, which is in the hands of that wretched successor of the Cæsars.

"I hope with all my heart you may be able to get the better of him.--Ever yours," etc.

But although my father's appeal might seem to the First Consul at first sight quite fair, it had to be followed up by others, as this letter addressed to Bonaparte himself will show:--

"General Lannes informs me that you cannot grant me any indemnity before you know whether General Murat really did exact this same indemnity from the Neapolitan Government. Nobody, however, knows better than you what sufferings I underwent, and how completely I have been robbed of my goods.

"General Murat writes me that the minister for foreign affairs is charged with the distribution of the sum of 500,000 francs which the Neapolitan Government has been compelled to pay over to the French victims of its barbarity. I will therefore content myself, citizen, by begging you to have the goodness to give orders that I may be included in the distribution of that sum.

"I trust you will do your best in the matter of this just demand in the case of a man to whom you have given so many verbal tokens, so many written testimonies, of your esteem and your friendship."

It is evident that those clouds of Egypt which, according to Bonaparte's prophecy, were only to last six hours, had crossed the Mediterranean, and had thickened over my poor father's head. He had, moreover, himself declared that he had not long to live, and should soon cease to embarrass Napoleon with the presence of one of the old Republican generals who had crossed Bonaparte's path.

Hoche had died of poison; Joubert had been killed at Novi; Kléber had been assassinated at Cairo; and my father was feeling the first symptoms of cancer in the stomach--the natural consequence of the arsenic that had been given him. I need hardly say he was not included among those who shared the distribution of this 500,000 francs indemnity granted to the prisoners.

My father then thought he might at least count on receiving the arrears of his pay during the two years of captivity.

He addressed himself on this subject to Bonaparte, and Bonaparte replied favourably; then my father learnt that this request, however just it might seem at first sight, was surrounded by considerable difficulties. On hearing this, my father addressed the following letter to Bonaparte, the last, I believe, he ever wrote him; it was sent a few days after my birth:--

"_7 Vendémiaire, Year X._

"I believed, since you did me the honour to tell me that it would be so, that my arrears of salary from the 30th Pluviôse, year VII, would be made good. An examination of the accounts will show the deductions to be made from that which is due to me for this period. I was paid for the first three quarters of the year IX, but the minister of war tells me in his letter of the 29 Fructidor last, that I can only receive what is owing to me for a portion of the years VII and VIII in full, inasmuch as the order you have made in my favour says, in so many words, that I am only to receive what the law strictly grants me--that is to say, my salary for two months of active service.

"But, Consul-General, you know what misfortunes I have had, you know how small my fortune is! Remember how I gave up the treasure at Cairo!

"I hope I may rely sufficiently upon your friendship to believe that you will give orders that I may be paid for the remaining months of the years VII and VIII. It is the only thing I ask of you.

"The successive poisonings I underwent in the prisons of Naples have so much undermined my health, that already at the age of thirty-six I am the victim of infirmities which I should not naturally expect to feel until much later in life.

"I trust then, Consul-General, that you will not allow the man who shared your labours and your perils to languish in poverty when it lies in your power to place him above want. You will thus be the means of conveying to him evidence of the nation's generosity.

"I have another grievance, too, Consul-General, and one, I confess, that troubles me far more than those of which I have complained. The minister of war informed me in a letter of 29 Fructidor last, that during the year X I was put down on the list of generals no longer on active service. What! at my age and With my reputation! to be placed on the retired list! Surely my past services should have saved me from this....

"In 1793 I was chief commander of the Republican armies. I am the oldest general officer of my rank; feats of daring performed by me have greatly influenced the tide of affairs; I have always led the defenders of the country to victory. Tell me, then! who received more marks of your esteem? And yet I see officers of all grades, junior to me, unreservedly employed while I am left inactive!

"I appeal, Consul-General, to the goodness of your heart; allow me to lay bare my complaints and to place in your hands my vindication against my enemies."

A week previously my father had written to the minister of war:--

"I received your letter of the 29th of last month, which informed me that, as I was without fixed destination, I was placed upon the list of general officers on half pay; that I shall receive a salary of 7500 francs from the 1st Vendémiaire, year X.

"The services I have rendered to the nation readily lead me to believe that the Government will lose no time in employing me on the first opportunity that may offer, when you lay before them the details of those services.

"I will not speak of my recent misfortunes: I am a son of France, and bore them for my country's sake! But on that very ground, those afflictions should give me some claim upon the nation's gratitude.

"Furthermore, you are aware that I passed through every military grade, from ordinary soldier to general-in-chief; winning my promotion with my own sword, and not by private influence.

"Mont Cenis; Mont St. Bernard; the obstinate struggle before Mantua on the 27 Nivôse, year VII, where two horses were killed under me; the crossing of the Weiss, which was laid to the credit of Generals Baraguay-d'Hilliers and Delmas, but was really due to me; the act of Horatius Codes performed afresh in the Tyrol, which won me the honour of being introduced to the Executive Directory under that name by General Bonaparte, who thought of appointing me, at that time, commander-in-chief of the Army of the Tyrol; finally, the insurrection at Cairo, which I quelled in the absence of all; you are well aware, Citizen Minister, those are my inalienable claims in the eyes of my old comrades-in-arms, and deserving of the recognition of my country.

"From 1793, Citizen Minister, I was commander-in-chief of the Republican armies, and throughout these unfortunate and difficult times I was never beaten; on the contrary, my enterprises were invariably crowned with success.

"I am now the oldest general in my rank; I was the companion of the Consul-General in nearly all his Italian and Egyptian wars, and no one contributed more to his triumphs and to the glory of our arms than did I; his letters, which I have in my possession, testify no less to the respect in which he held me than to his friendship. You yourself lavished tokens of lively interest on me when I returned from the Neapolitan prisons, and now I am to be put aside on half pay!

"Citizen Minister, I cannot endure such an indignity; I beg you, therefore, to show this letter to the First Consul, and to tell him that I trust in his old friendship to obtain for me a place on the active list.

"Honour has always directed my conduct; sincerity and loyalty are the bases of my character; and injustice is the cruellest torture to me."

I have before me the register of all my father's correspondence; it stops short at this letter, and the rest of the pages are blank.

These two letters to the minister of war and to the First Consul were the last he wrote.

Doubtless they were never answered.

Despair beset him after this; he buried himself in the shadow of his enforced inactivity as those condemned to death await their doom in their cells before being taken to the scaffold: in a state of torpor, varied by fits of despair, he awaited that last supreme moment; most of his comrades-in-arms, more fortunate than he, had met it on the field of battle.