ents of the last twelve months in France had made Pichegru a
person of still higher importance than when he commenced his intrigues
with the Bourbons as general on the Rhine. Some obscure doubts of his
fidelity, or the usual policy of the Directory, which rendered them
averse (wherever they could help it) to continue any one general very
long at the head of one army, had induced them to displace Pichegru, and
appoint Hoche, a tried republican, in his room. Pichegru, on returning
to France, became a member of the Council of Five Hundred, and (the
royalist party having at this season recovered all but a preponderance)
was, on the meeting of the chambers, called to the chair of that in
which he had his place.

The Five Directors had in truth done everything to undermine their own
authority. They were known to be divided in opinion among themselves;
three only of their number adhered heartily to the existing
constitution: one was a royalist: another was a democrat of the
Robespierre school. One of these new and uncourtly men excited laughter
by affecting a princely state and splendour of demeanour and equipage.
Another disgusted one set of minds, and annoyed all the rest, by
procuring a law for the observation of the tenth day as the day of
repose, and declaring it a crime to shut up shops on the Sabbath. A
ridiculous ritual of an avowedly heathen worship followed, and was
received with partial horror, universal contempt. A tyrannical law about
the equalisation of weights and measures spread confusion through all
mercantile transactions, and was especially unpopular in the provinces.
A contemptible riot, set on foot by one who called himself Gracchus
Barboeuf, for the purpose of bringing back the reign of _terrorism_ was
indeed suppressed; but the mere occurrence of such an attempt recalled
too vividly the days of Robespierre, and by so doing tended to
strengthen the cause of the royalists in public opinion. The truth is,
that a vast number of the emigrants had found their way back again to
Paris after the downfall of Robespierre, and that the old sway of
elegant manners and enlightened saloons was once more re-establishing
itself where it had so long been supreme. The royalist club of Clichy
corresponded with the exiled princes, and with the imperial government,
and was gaining such influence as to fill Buonaparte himself with alarm.
Everything indicated that the Directory (the _five majesties_ of the
Luxembourg, as they w