, which they could scarcely have carried out if the
French monarchy had been restored. If there was nothing to justify the
conduct of the two German Powers, there was much to warrant their
confidence in their own strength when they judged that the time had come
for them to exert it. They counted upon the known when they measured
their forces with those of revolutionary France; they could not count
upon the unknown quantity which was to disturb all their calculations.
The unknown quantity asserted itself just at the moment when France, in
spite of some successes, seemed to be deeply wounded by the loss of
Toulon.

With the great port of Toulon in their hands the adversaries of France
might well believe that a serious blow had been struck at her strength,
and that the spirit which so long had defied them might yet be broken.
But the success which had seemed to menace France so gravely proved to be
but the point of departure for a new era of French glory. The occupation
of Toulon is forever memorable, because it gave an opportunity to a young
lieutenant of artillery in the French service, quite obscure in that
service and wholly unknown outside of it. The quick intelligence of this
young soldier perceived that the seizure of a certain promontory left
unguarded by the invaders would place Toulon and those who had held it at
the mercy of the French cannon. The suggestion was acted upon; was
entirely successful; the English admiral was obliged to retire with all
his fleet, and Toulon was once again a French citadel garrisoned by
French soldiers. But the importance of the event, for France and the
world lay not in the capture but in the captor. Though Barras, confident
in his dominion over the Directory, might sneer at the young adventurer
from Corsica and minimize his share in a success that had suddenly made
him conspicuous, the name of Bonaparte then for the first time took its
{305} place in the history of Europe. The youth whose military genius
had enabled him to see and to seize upon the fatal weakness in a
well-defended city was destined to prove the greatest soldier France had
ever known, the greatest as well as the most implacable enemy England had
ever to reckon with, and one of the greatest conquerors that ever
followed the star of conquest across the war-convulsed earth.

[Sidenote: 1793--Napoleon Bonaparte]

This is the story of England, not the story of France, and Napoleon was
at his best and worst rat