r attentions bestowed by the
other Directors, the curtain falls on the first, or Italian, act of
the young hero's career, soon to rise on oriental adventures that were
to recall the exploits of Alexander.

* * * * *

CHAPTER VIII

EGYPT

Among the many misconceptions of the French revolutionists none was
more insidious than the notion that the wealth and power of the
British people rested on an artificial basis. This mistaken belief in
England's weakness arose out of the doctrine taught by the
_Economistes_ or _Physiocrates_ in the latter half of last century,
that commerce was not of itself productive of wealth, since it only
promoted the distribution of the products of the earth; but that
agriculture was the sole source of true wealth and prosperity. They
therefore exalted agriculture at the expense of commerce and
manufactures, and the course of the Revolution, which turned largely
on agrarian questions, tended in the same direction. Robespierre and
St. Just were never weary of contrasting the virtues of a simple
pastoral life with the corruptions and weakness engendered by foreign
commerce; and when, early in 1793, Jacobinical zeal embroiled the
young Republic with England, the orators of the Convention confidently
prophesied the downfall of the modern Carthage. Kersaint declared that
"the credit of England rests upon fictitious wealth: ... bounded in
territory, the public future of England is found almost wholly in its
bank, and this edifice is entirely supported by naval commerce. It is
easy to cripple this commerce, and especially so for a power like
France, which stands alone on her own riches."[90]

Commercial interests played a foremost part all through the struggle.
The official correspondence of Talleyrand in 1797 proves that the
Directory intended to claim the Channel Islands, the north of
Newfoundland, and all our conquests in the East Indies made since
1754, besides the restitution of Gibraltar to Spain.[91] Nor did these
hopes seem extravagant. The financial crisis in London and the mutiny
at the Nore seemed to betoken the exhaustion of England, while the
victories of Bonaparte raised the power of France to heights never
known before. Before the victory of Duncan over the Dutch at
Camperdown (October 11th, 1797), Britain seemed to have lost her naval
supremacy.

The recent admission of State bankruptcy at Paris, when two-thirds of
the existing liabiliti