ed forces that France could bring, all
resistance was in vain. "Poor brave Paoli!" wrote Horace Walpole, "but
he is not disgraced. We, that have sat still and seen him overwhelmed,
must answer it to history. Nay, the Mediterranean will taunt us in the
very next war." Walpole wrote this letter but two months before the
birth of Buonaparte. Had England, who has joined in many a worthless
quarrel, struck in for the Corsicans, what a change might have been made
in the history of the world! If Buonaparte had never been a citizen of
France the name of Napoleon might be unknown. Paoli escaped in an
English ship, and settled in England. Walpole met him one day at Court.
"I could not believe it," he wrote, "when I was told who he was....
Nobody sure ever had an air so little foreign!... The simplicity of his
whole appearance had not given me the slightest suspicion of anything
remarkable in him."

Paoli remained in England, an honoured guest, for thirty years. In 1789
Mirabeau moved, in the National Assembly, the recall of all the Corsican
patriots. Paoli went to Paris, where "he was received with enthusiastic
veneration. The Assembly and the Royal Family contended which should
show him most distinction." The king made him lieutenant-general and
military commandant in Corsica. "He used the powers entrusted to him
with great wisdom and moderation." The rapid changes that swept over
France did not leave him untouched. He was denounced in the Convention
and "was summoned to attend for the purpose of standing on his defence.
He declined the journey on account of his age." A large part of his
countrymen stood by him, and in an assembly appointed him
general-in-chief, and president of the council of government. The
Convention sent an expedition to arrest him. Buonaparte happened at the
time to be in Corsica, on leave of absence from his regiment. He and
Paoli had been on friendly terms, indeed they were distantly related,
but Buonaparte did not hesitate for a moment which side to take. He
commanded the French troops in an attack on his native town. Paoli's
party proved the stronger, and Napoleon Buonaparte and his brother
Lucien were banished. The Corsicans sought the aid of the English who,
in the year 1794, landed, five regiments strong, in the island. A
deputation went to London to offer the Crown of Corsica to the King of
Great Britain. The offer was accepted, but contrary to the hopes and the
expectations of the islanders, not Pa