an; he made false movements; and as a result the
French armies at the close of the summer were no further than the Rhine.

{242} Preparations were made by the Directoire to retrieve this
comparative failure; the campaign of 1796 was to see a strong offensive
against the Austrians to the north and to the south of the Alps.
Jourdan and Moreau, the latter displacing Pichegru, were once more to
attempt to penetrate towards Vienna by the valley of the Danube. At
the same time a smaller army was to invade Italy and, from the valley
of the Po, perhaps lend a helping hand to the armies in Germany.
Buonaparte was selected for this last command.

Buonaparte owed his new appointment to a combination of reasons. He
had for some time past, knowing the ground, placed plans for the
invasion of Italy before the Government. These plans gave promise of
success, and Carnot was ready to give their author a chance of carrying
them into execution. Alongside of this was the strong personal
impression made by Buonaparte; his capacity was unmistakable. And last
of all came the element of romance,--he had fallen in love with Mme. de
Beauharnais, protegee of Barras,--and Barras worked for the
appointment. Early in March Napoleone Buonaparte and Josephine de
Beauharnais were married; before the end of the month {243} the young
general had reached his headquarters at Nice.

In the middle of April news reached Paris of a series of brilliant
engagements in which the army of Italy had defeated the Austrians and
Sardinians. But immediately afterwards the Directoire was faced by the
unpleasant fact that their new general, disregarding his instructions,
had concluded an armistice with Sardinia. Already in less than a
month, Bonaparte, as he now called himself, had shown that he was a
great general, and moreover a politician who might become a danger to
the Directoire itself. From that moment a veiled struggle began
between the two, the Directoire attempting to reduce the power and
influence of its general, Bonaparte constantly appealing from the
Directoire to the public by rhetorical accounts of his victories and
proceedings.

While Bonaparte was invading Lombardy and attacking the great Austrian
fortress of Mantua, the Directoire had to deal with conspiracy in
Paris. Conspiracy was a striking feature of the period that followed
the fall of Robespierre; in fact, for the ten years that follow it may
be said that all internal politics revolve