of the Valteline soon enabled
Bonaparte to intervene on behalf of the oppressed peasants, and to
merge this territory also in the Cisalpine Republic, which
consequently stretched from the high Alps southward to Rimini, and
from the Ticino on the west to the Mincio on the east.[81]

Already, during his sojourn at the Castle of Montebello, Bonaparte
figured as the all-powerful proconsul of the French Republic. Indeed,
all his surroundings--his retinue of complaisant generals, and the
numerous envoys and agents who thronged his ante-chambers to beg an
audience--befitted a Sulla or a Wallenstein, rather than a general of
the regicide Republic. Three hundred Polish soldiers guarded the
approaches to the castle; and semi-regal state was also observed in
its spacious corridors and saloons. There were to be seen Italian
nobles, literati, and artists, counting it the highest honour to visit
the liberator of their land; and to them Bonaparte behaved with that
mixture of affability and inner reserve, of seductive charm
alternating with incisive cross-examination which proclaimed at once
the versatility of his gifts, the keenness of his intellect, and his
determination to gain social, as well as military and political,
supremacy. And yet the occasional abruptness of his movements, and the
strident tones of command lurking beneath his silkiest speech, now and
again reminded beholders that he was of the camp rather than of the
court. To his generals he was distant; for any fault even his
favourite officers felt the full force of his anger; and aides-de-camp
were not often invited to dine at his table. Indeed, he frequently
dined before his retinue, almost in the custom of the old Kings of
France.

With him was his mother, also his brothers, Joseph and Louis, whom he
was rapidly advancing to fortune. There, too, were his sisters; Elise,
proud and self-contained, who at this period married a noble but
somewhat boorish Corsican, Bacciocchi; and Pauline, a charming girl of
sixteen, whose hand the all-powerful brother offered to Marmont, to be
by him unaccountably refused, owing, it would seem, to a prior
attachment. This lively and luxurious young creature was not long to
remain unwedded. The adjutant-general, Leclerc, became her suitor;
and, despite his obscure birth and meagre talents, speedily gained her
as his bride. Bonaparte granted her 40,000 francs as her dowry;
and--significant fact--the nuptials were privately blessed by a pr