ish and Spanish
fleets swept the seas, and were virtually blockading all the
Mediterranean ports of France. At Toulon, as has been told, they
actually entered, and departed only after losing control of the
promontory which forms the harbor. There is a similar conformation of
the ground at the entrance to the port of Marseilles, but Buonaparte
found that the fortress which occupied the commanding promontory had
been dismantled. With the instinct of a strategist and with no other
thought than that of his duties as inspector, he sat down, and on
January fourth, 1794, wrote a most impolitic recommendation that the
fortification should be restored in such a way as to "command the
town." These words almost certainly referred both to the possible
renewal by the conquered French royalists and other malcontents of
their efforts to secure Marseilles, and to a conceivable effort on the
part of the Allies to seize the harbor. Now it happened that the
liberals of the town had regarded this very stronghold as their
Bastille, and it had been dismantled by them in emulation of their
brethren of Paris. The language and motive of the report were
therefore capable of misinterpretation. A storm at once arose among
the Marseilles Jacobins against both Buonaparte and his superior,
General Lapoype; they were both denounced to the Convention, and in
due time, about the end of February, were both summoned before the bar
of that body. In the mean time Buonaparte's nomination as general of
brigade had been confirmed, his commission arriving at Marseilles on
February sixteenth. It availed nothing toward restoring him to
popularity; on the contrary, the masses grew more suspicious and more
menacing. He therefore returned to the protection of Salicetti and
Robespierre, then at Toulon, whence by their advice he despatched to
Paris by special messenger a poor-spirited exculpatory letter,
admitting that the only use of restoring the fort would be to "command
the town," that is, control it by military power in case of
revolution. Having by this language pusillanimously acknowledged a
fault which he had not committed, the writer, by the advice of
Salicetti and Robespierre, refused to obey the formal summons of the
Convention when it came. Those powerful protectors made vigorous
representations to their friends in Paris, and Buonaparte was saved.
Both they and he might well rely on the distinguished service rendered
by the culprit at Toulon; his military