un
shone as it does in Floreal. The Consulta has named a committee of
thirty individuals, which has reported to it that, considering the
domestic and foreign affairs of the Cisalpine, it was indispensable
to let me discharge the first magistracy, until circumstances
permit and I judge it suitable to appoint a successor."

These extracts prove that the acts of the Consulta could be planned
beforehand no less precisely than the movements of the soldiery, and
that even so complex a matter as the voting of a constitution and the
choice of its chief had to fall in with the arrangements of this
methodizing genius. Certainly civilization had progressed since the
weary years when the French people groped through mists and waded in
blood in order to gain a perfect polity: that precious boon was now
conferred on a neighbouring people in so sure a way that the plans of
their benefactor could be infallibly fixed and his return to Paris
calculated to the hour.

The final address uttered by Bonaparte to the Italian notables is
remarkable for the short, sharp sentences, which recall the tones of
the parade ground. Passing recent events in rapid review, he said,
speaking in his mother tongue:

"...Every effort had been made to dismember you: the protection of
France won the day: you have been recognized at Luneville.
One-fifth larger than before, you are now more powerful, more
consolidated, and have wider hopes. Composed of six different
nations, you will be now united under a constitution the best
possible for your social and material condition. ... The selections
I have made for your chief offices have been made independently of
all idea of party or feeling of locality. As for that of President,
I have found no one among you with sufficient claims on public
opinion, sufficiently free from local feelings, and who had
rendered great enough services to his country, to intrust it to
him.... Your people has only local feelings: it must now rise to
national feelings."

In accordance with this last grand and prophetic remark, the name
Italian was substituted for that of Cisalpine: and thus, for the first
time since the Middle Ages, there reappeared on the map of Europe that
name, which was to evoke the sneers of diplomatists and the most
exalted patriotism of the century. If Bonaparte had done naught else,
he would deserve immortal glory for trai