judged necessary, and Napoleon took care that it should be
so conducted as to give himself not only permanent, but wholly
independent, power beyond the Alps. A convention of 450 Italian deputies
was summoned to meet at _Lyons_; and there Talleyrand was ready to
dictate the terms of a new constitution, by which the executive
functions were to be lodged in a president and vice-president, the
legislative in a council chosen from three electoral colleges. It was
next proposed that Buonaparte should be invited to take on him the
office of president--Buonaparte, it was studiously explained, not as
Chief Consul of France, but in his own individual capacity. He repaired
to Lyons in person, and having harangued the convention in the Italian
tongue, assumed the dignity thus conferred on him on the 2nd of
January, 1802.

The next step was to prolong the period of his French Consulate. Chabot
de L'Allier, his creature, moved in the Tribunate that the Conservative
Senate should be requested to mark the national feelings of gratitude by
conferring some new honour on Napoleon. The Senate proposed accordingly
that he should be declared Consul for a second period of ten years, to
commence on the expiration of his present magistracy. He thanked them;
but said he could not accept of any such prolongation of his power
except from the suffrages of the people. To the people the matter was to
be referred; but the Second and Third Consuls, in preparing the edict of
the Senate for public inspection and ratification, were instructed by
their master-colleague to introduce an important change in its terms.
The question which they sent down was, "Shall Buonaparte be Chief Consul
for life?" No mention was made of _ten years_. Books were opened as on a
former occasion: the officers of government in the departments well knew
in what method to conduct the business, and the voice of the nation was
declared to be in favour of the decree. Some few hundreds of sturdy
republicans alone recorded their opposition; and Carnot, who headed
them, said he well knew he was signing his own sentence of exile. But
Napoleon was strong enough to dispense with any such severities; Carnot
remained in safety, but out of office, until, many years afterwards, his
services were tendered and accepted on the entrance of foreign invaders
into France. Buonaparte was proclaimed Consul for life on the 2nd of
August.

Shortly afterwards, in the committee occupied with the Code, Na