ueror were to occupy the capital until tranquillity was established.
It will be seen in what that tranquillity was destined to consist.

Such was the humiliation of this once proud and energetic, but now
worn-out and enfeebled, oligarchy: so incapable was that hoary polity of
contending with the youthful vigour of Napoleon.

[Footnote 17: The armorial bearing of Venice.]

CHAPTER IX

Pichegru--The Directory appeal to Buonaparte--The 18th
Fructidor--The Court of Montebello--Josephine--The Treaty of
Campo-Formio--Buonaparte leaves Italy.

In their last agony the Venetian Senate made a vain effort to secure the
personal protection of the general, by offering him a purse of seven
millions of francs. He rejected this with scorn. He had already treated
in the same style a bribe of four millions, tendered on the part of the
Duke of Modena. The friend employed to conduct the business reminded him
of the proverbial ingratitude of all popular governments, and of the
little attention which the Directory had hitherto paid to his personal
interests. "That is all true enough," said Napoleon, "but for four
millions I will not place myself in the power of this duke." Austria
herself, it is said, did not hesitate to tamper in the same manner,
though far more magnificently, as became her resources, with his
republican virtue. He was offered, if the story be true, an independent
German principality for himself and his heirs. "I thank the emperor," he
answered, "but if greatness is to be mine, it shall come from France."

The Venetian Senate were guilty, in their mortal struggle, of another
and a more inexcusable piece of meanness. They seized the person of
Count D'Entraigues, a French emigrant, who had been living in their city
as agent for the exiled house of Bourbon; and surrendered him and all
his papers to the victorious general. Buonaparte discovered among these
documents ample evidence that Pichegru, the French general on the Rhine,
and universally honoured as the conqueror of Holland, had some time
before this hearkened to the proposals of the Bourbon princes, and,
among other efforts in favour of the royal cause, not hesitated even to
misconduct his military movements with a view to the downfall of the
government which had entrusted him with his command.

This was a secret, the importance of which Napoleon could well
appreciate;[18] and he forthwith communicated it to the Directory at
Paris.

The ev