time tells Joseph that he is attached to the
topographical bureau of the Comite de Saint Public, for the
direction of the armies in the place of Carnot. It is apparently
this significant appointment to which Madame Junot, wrongly dating
it, alludes as "no great thing" (Junot, vol. i, p. 143). Another
officer was therefore substituted for him as commander of Roches
artillery, a fact made use of in the Erreurs (p. 31) to deny his
having been dismissed--But a general re-classification of the
generals was being made. The artillery generals were in excess of
their establishment, and Bonaparte, as junior in age, was ordered on
13th June to join Hoche's army at Brest to command a brigade of
infantry. All his efforts to get the order cancelled failed, and as
he did not obey it he was struck off the list of employed general
officers on the 15th of September 1795, the order of the 'Comite de
Salut Public' being signed by Cambaceres, Berber, Merlin, and
Boissy. His application to go to Turkey still, however, remained;
and it is a curious thing that, on the very day he was struck off
the list, the commission which had replaced the Minister of War
recommended to the 'Comite de Saint Public' that he and his two
aides de camp, Junot and Livrat, with other officers, under him,
should be sent to Constantinople. So late as the 29th of September,
twelve days later, this matter was being considered, the only
question being as to any departmental objections to the other
officers selected by him, a point which was just being settled. But
on the 13th Vendemiaire (5th October 1795), or rather on the night
before, only nineteen days after his removal, he was appointed
second in command to Barras, a career in France was opened to him,
and Turkey was no longer thought of.

Thiers (vol. iv, p. 326) and most writers, contemporary and
otherwise, say that Aubry gave the order for his removal from the
list. Aubry, himself a brigadier-general of artillery, did not
belong to the 'Comite de Salut Public' at the time Bonaparte was
removed from the south; and he had left the Comite early is August,
that is, before the order striking Bonaparte off was given. Aubry
was, however, on the Comite in June 1795, and signed the order,
which probably may have originated from him, for the transfer of
Bonaparte to the infantry. It will be seen that, in the ordi