neither the magic of his name, the troops that accompanied him,
nor the adverse representations of the council, which he brought with
him, could allay the discontent. He therefore remained for three days
in seclusion, and then departed in secret. On the other hand, the
populace was intimidated, permitting without resistance the rooms of
the club to be closed by the troops, and the town to be put under
martial law. Nothing remained for the agitators but to protest and
disperse. They held a final meeting, therefore, on October
thirty-first, 1789, in one of the churches, and signed an appeal to
the National Assembly, to be presented by Salicetti and Colonna. It
had been written, and was read aloud, by Buonaparte, as he now signed
himself.[19] Some share in its composition was later claimed for
Joseph, but the fiery style, the numerous blunders in grammar and
spelling, the terse thought, and the concise form, are all
characteristic of Napoleon. The right of petition, the recital of
unjust acts, the illegal action of the council, the use of force, the
hollowness of the pretexts under which their request had been
refused, the demand that the troops be withdrawn and redress
granted--all these are crudely but forcibly presented. The document
presages revolution. Under a well-constituted and regular authority,
its writer and signatories would of course have been punished for
insubordination. Even as things were, an officer of the King was
running serious risks by his prominence in connection with it.

[Footnote 19: Printed in Coston, II, 94.]

Discouraging as was the outcome of this movement in Ajaccio, similar
agitations elsewhere were more successful. The men of Isola Rossa,
under Arena, who had just returned from a consultation with Paoli in
England, were entirely successful in seizing the supreme authority; so
were those of Bastia, under Murati, a devoted friend of Paoli. One
untrustworthy authority, a personal enemy of Buonaparte, declares that
the latter, thwarted in his own town, at once went over to Bastia,
then the residence of General de Barrin, the French royalist governor,
and successfully directed the revolt in that place, but there is no
corroborative evidence to this doubtful story.

Simultaneously with these events the National Assembly had been
debating how the position of the King under the new constitution was
to be expressed by his title. Absolutism being ended, he could no
longer be king of