tion.]

CHAPTER XV

The Chief Consul writes to the King of England--Lord Grenville's
Answer--Napoleon passes the Great St. Bernard--The taking of St.
Bard--The Siege of Genoa--The Battle of Montebello--The Battle of
Marengo--Napoleon returns to Paris--The Infernal Machine--The
Battle of Hohenlinden--The Treaty of Luneville.

Much had been already done towards the internal tranquillisation of
France: but it was obvious that the result could not be perfect until
the war, which had so long raged on two frontiers of the country, should
have found a termination. The fortune of the last two years had been far
different from that of the glorious campaigns which ended in the
treaty--or armistice, as it might more truly be named--of Campo-Formio.
The Austrians had recovered the north of Italy, and already menaced the
Savoy frontier, designing to march into Provence, and there support a
new insurrection of the royalists. The force opposed to them in that
quarter was much inferior in numbers, and composed of the relics of
armies beaten over and over again by Suwarrow. The Austrians and French
were more nearly balanced on the Rhine frontier; but even there, there
was ample room for anxiety. On the whole, the grand attitude in which
Buonaparte had left the Republic when he embarked for Egypt, was
exchanged for one of a far humbler description; and, in fact, as has
been intimated, the general disheartening of the nation, by reason of
those reverses, had been of signal service to Napoleon's ambition. If a
strong hand was wanted at home, the necessity of having a general who
could bring back victory to the tricolor banners in the field had been
not less deeply felt. And hence the decisive revolution of Brumaire.

Of the allies of Austria, meanwhile, one had virtually abandoned her.
The Emperor Paul, of Russia, resenting the style in which his army under
Suwarrow had been supported, withdrew it altogether from the field of
its victories; and that hare-brained autocrat, happening to take up an
enthusiastic personal admiration for Buonaparte, was not likely for the
present to be brought back into the Antigallican league. England
appeared steadfast to the cause; but it remained to be proved whether
the failure of her expedition to Holland under the Duke of York, or the
signal success of her naval arms in the Mediterranean under Lord Nelson,
had had the greater influence on the feelings of the government