Читать книгу The Life, Exile and Conversations with Napoleon - Emmanuel-Auguste-Dieudonné Las Cases - Страница 41

Les Français sont lassés de chercher désormais

Des climats que pour eux le destin n’a point faits,

Ils n’abandonnent point leur fertile patrie,

Pour languir aux déserts de l’aride Arabie.

On one occasion, the General-in-chief, having a few moments’ leisure to look about the country, took advantage of the ebb-tide, and crossed on foot to the opposite coast of the Red Sea. Night surprised him on his return, and he lost his way in the midst of the rising tide. He was in the greatest danger, and very narrowly escaped perishing precisely in the same manner as Pharaoh. “This,” said Napoleon, “would have furnished all the preachers of Christianity with a splendid text against me.” On reaching the Arabian coast of the Red Sea, he received a deputation of the Cenobites of Mount Sinai, who came to implore his protection, and to request him to inscribe his name on the ancient register of their charters. Napoleon inscribed his name in the same list with those of Ali, Saladin, Ibrahim, and others! In allusion to this circumstance, or something of a similar kind, the Emperor observed that he had in the course of one year received letters from Rome and Mecca; the Pope addressing him as his dearest son, and the Sherif styling him the Protector of the holy Kaaba.

This singular coincidence, however, is scarcely surprising, with reference to him who has led armies both through the burning sands of the Tropic, and over the frozen Steppes of the North; who, when he narrowly escaped being swallowed up in the waves of the Red Sea, or might have perished in the flames of Moscow, was threatening the Indies from those two extreme points.

The General-in-chief shared the fatigues of the soldiers. The privations endured by every individual in the army were sometimes so great that they were compelled to dispute with each other for the smallest enjoyments, without the least distinction of rank. To such extremities were they reduced that, in the Desert, the soldiers would hardly relinquish their places to allow the General to dip his hands in a muddy stream. On one occasion, as they were passing by the ruins of Pelusium, and were almost suffocated with the heat, some one resigned to him a fragment of a door, beneath which he contrived to shade his head for a few minutes: “And this,” said Napoleon, “was no trifling concession.” It was on this very spot, while removing some stones at his feet, that chance rendered him the possessor of a superb antique, well known in the learned world.21

In proceeding to Asia, the French army had to cross the Desert which separates that continent from Africa. Kleber, who commanded the advanced guard, mistook his road, and lost his way in the Desert. Napoleon, who was following at the distance of half a day’s march, attended by a slender escort, found himself at night-fall in the midst of the Turkish camp: he was closely pursued, and escaped only because, it being night, the Turks suspected that an ambush was intended. The next source of uneasiness was the doubtful fate of Kleber and his detachment, and the greater part of the night was passed in the most cruel anxiety. At length they obtained information respecting them from some Arabs of the Desert, and the General-in-chief hastened, on his dromedary, in quest of his troops. He found them overwhelmed with despair, and ready to perish from thirst and fatigue; some of the young soldiers had, in a moment of frenzy, even broken their muskets. The sight of their General seemed to give them new life, by reviving their hopes. Napoleon informed them that a supply of provisions and water was coming up behind him. “But,” said he, to the troops, “if relief had been longer delayed, would that have excused your murmuring and loss of courage? No, soldiers; learn to die with honour.”

Napoleon travelled the greater part of the way through the Desert on a dromedary. The physical hardihood of this animal renders it unnecessary to pay the least attention to his sustenance; he scarcely eats or drinks; but his moral sensibility is extreme, harsh treatment provokes his resentment, and renders him furious. The Emperor observed that the roughness of his trot created nausea, like the motion of a ship. The animal will travel twenty leagues a day. The Emperor formed some dromedary regiments, and the use he made of them in the army soon proved the destruction of the Arabs. The rider squats himself on the back of the animal, through whose nostrils a ring is passed, which serves to guide him: he is very obedient, and on a certain signal, made by the voice of the rider, the animal kneels down to allow him to alight. The dromedary will carry very heavy burdens, and he is never unloaded during the whole of the journey. On his arrival at evening stations, his load is propped up, and the animal lies down and goes to sleep: at day-break he rises,—his burden is on his back, and he is ready to continue his journey. The dromedary is only a beast of burden, and not at all fit for draught. In Syria, however, they succeeded in yoking them to field-pieces, thus rendering them essentially serviceable.

Napoleon became very popular among the Egyptians, who gave him the name of Sultan Kebir (Father of Fire). He inspired particular respect: wherever he appeared the people rose in his presence; and this deference was paid to him alone. The uniform consideration with which he treated the Sheiks, and the adroitness by which he gained their confidence, rendered him truly the sovereign of Egypt, and more than once saved his life. But for their disclosures, he would have fallen a victim to fanaticism, like Kleber, who, on the contrary, rendered himself odious to the Sheiks, and perished in consequence of subjecting one of them to the punishment of the bastinado. Bertrand was one of the judges who condemned the assassin, and, on his telling us this fact one day at dinner, the Emperor observed:—“If the slanderers, who accuse me of having caused the death of Kleber, were acquainted with the fact you have mentioned, they would not hesitate to call you the assassin, or the accomplice, and would take it for granted that your title of Grand Marshal, and your residence at Saint Helena, are the reward and the punishment of the crime.”

Napoleon willingly conversed with the people of the country, and always displayed sentiments of justice which struck them with wonder. On his way back to Syria, an Arab tribe came to meet him, for the double purpose of shewing him respect and of selling their services as guides. “The chief of the tribe was unwell, and his place was filled by his son, a youth of the age and size of your boy here,” said the Emperor to me: “he was mounted on his dromedary, riding close beside me, and chatting to me with great familiarity. ’Sultan Kebir, said he, ‘I could give you good advice, now that you are returning to Cairo,’ ‘Well, speak, my friend, and if your advice is good, I will follow it.’—‘I’ll tell you what I would do, if I were in your place. As soon as I got to Cairo, I would order the richest slave-merchant into the market, and I would choose twenty of the prettiest women for myself; I would next send for the richest jewellers, and would make them give me up a good share of their stock; I would then do the same with all the other merchants; for what is the use of reigning, or being powerful, if not to acquire riches?’—‘But, my friend, suppose it were more noble to preserve them for others?’ This sentiment seemed to make him reflect a little, without convincing him. The young man was evidently very promising, for an Arab: he was lively and courageous, and led his troop with dignity and order. He is, perhaps, destined, one day or other, to carry his advice into execution for his own benefit in the market-place of Cairo.”

On another occasion, some Arabs who were on friendly terms with the army, penetrated into a village on the frontier, and an unfortunate Fellah (peasant) was killed. The Sultan Kebir flew into a great passion; and, vowing that he would have vengeance, gave orders that the tribe should be pursued into the Desert to extinction. This order was given in the presence of the principal Sheiks, one of whom could not refrain from laughing at his anger and his determination. “Sultan Kebir,” said he, “you are playing a bad game just now: do not quarrel with these people; they can do you ten times more harm than you can do them. And besides, what is it all about. Because they have killed a miserable peasant? Was he your cousin (a proverbial expression among them)?” “He was more than my cousin,” replied Napoleon; “all those whom I govern are my children: power is given to me only that I may ensure their safety.” On hearing these words all the Sheiks bowed their heads, and said, “O! that is very fine;—you have spoken like the Prophet.”

The decision of the Grand Mosque of Cairo in favour of the French army was a masterpiece of skill on the part of the General-in-chief, who induced the synod of the chief Sheiks to declare, by a public act, that the Mussulmans should obey, and pay tribute to, the French general. It is the first and only example of the sort, since the establishment of the Koran, which forbids submission to Infidels. The details of this transaction are invaluable: they will be found in the Campaigns of Egypt.

Saint-Jean d’Acre, doubtless, presented a singular spectacle, when two European armies met with hostile intentions in a little town of Asia, with the mutual purpose of securing the possession of a portion of Africa; but it is still more extraordinary that the persons who directed the efforts of each party were both of the same nation, of the same age, of the same rank, of the same corps, and of the same school.

Philippeaux, to whose talents the English and Turks owed the preservation of Saint Jean d’Acre, had been the companion of Napoleon at the military school of Paris: they had been there examined together, previous to their being sent to their respective corps. “His figure resembled yours,” said the Emperor to me, after having dictated his eulogium in the Memoirs, and mentioned all the mischief he had done him. “Sire,” I answered, “there were many other points of affinity between us; we had been intimate and inseparable companions at the Military School. When he passed through London with Sir Sydney Smith, who, by his assistance, had been enabled to escape from the Temple, he sought for me in every direction. I called at his lodgings only half an hour after his departure; had it not been for this accident, I should probably have accompanied him. I was at the time without occupation; the prospect of adventure might have tempted me; and how strangely might the course of my destinies have been turned in a new direction!”

“I am well aware,” said Napoleon, “of the influence which chance usurps over our political determinations; and it is the knowledge of that circumstance which has always kept me free from prejudice, and rendered me very indulgent with regard to the party adopted by individuals in our political convulsions. To be a good Frenchman, or to wish to become one, was all that I looked for in any one.”—The Emperor then went on to compare the confusion of our troubles to battles in the night-time, where each man attacks his neighbour, and friends are often confounded with foes; but when daylight returns, and order is restored, every one forgives the injury which he has sustained through mistake. “Even for myself,” said he, “how could I undertake to say that there might not have existed circumstances sufficiently powerful, notwithstanding my natural sentiments, to induce me to emigrate? The vicinity of the frontier, for instance, a friendly attachment, or the influence of a chief. In revolutions, we can only speak with certainty to what we have done: it is silly to affirm that we could not have acted otherwise.” The Emperor then related a singular example of the influence of chance over the destinies of men. Serrurier and the younger Hedouville, while travelling together on foot to emigrate into Spain, were met by a military patrol. Hedouville, being the younger and more active of the two, cleared the frontier, thought himself very lucky, and went to spend a life of mere vegetation in Spain. Serrurier, on the contrary, being obliged to return into the interior, bewailed his unhappy fate, and became a marshal: such is the uncertainty of human foresight and calculations!

At Saint-Jean d’Acre, the General-in-chief lost Caffarelli, of whom he was extremely fond. Caffarelli entertained a sort of reverential respect for the General-in-chief. The influence of this sentiment was so great that, though he was delirious for several days previous to his death, when Napoleon went to see him, the announcement of his name seemed to recal him to life: he became more collected, his spirits revived, and he conversed coherently; but he relapsed into his former state immediately after Napoleon’s departure. This singular phenomenon was renewed every time the General-in-chief paid him a visit.

Napoleon received, during the siege of Saint-Jean d’Acre, an affecting proof of heroic devotedness. While he was in the trenches, a shell fell at his feet; two grenadiers who observed it immediately rushed towards him, placed him between them, and raising their arms above his head, completely covered every part of his body. Happily the shell respected the whole group; nobody was injured.

One of these brave grenadiers afterwards became General Dumesnil, who lost a leg in the campaign of Moscow, and commanded the fortress of Vincennes at the time of the invasion in 1814. The capital had been for some weeks occupied by the Allies, and Dumesnil still held out. Nothing was then talked of in Paris but his obstinate defence, and his humorous reply when summoned by the Russians to surrender;—“Give me back my leg, and I will give up my fortress.”

The French soldiers acquired extraordinary reputation in Egypt, and not without cause; they had dispersed and dismayed the celebrated Mamelucks, the most formidable militia of the East. After the retreat from Syria, a Turkish army landed at Aboukir: Murat-Bey, the most powerful and brave of the Mamelucks, left Upper Egypt, whither he had fled for safety, and reached the Turkish camp by a circuitous route. On the landing of the Turks, the French detachments had fallen back in order to concentrate their forces. The Pacha who commanded the Turks was delighted at this movement, which he mistook for the effect of fear; and, on perceiving Murat-Bey, he exultingly exclaimed:—“So! these are the terrible French whom you could not face; see, the moment I make my appearance, how they fly before me.“ The indignant Murat-Bey furiously replied:—“Pacha, render thanks to the Prophet that it has pleased these Frenchmen to retire; if they should return, you will disappear before them like dust before the wind.”

His words were prophetical:—some days after, the French poured down upon the Turkish army and put it to flight. Murat-Bey, who had interviews with several of our generals, was extremely surprised at their diminutive stature and pitiful condition. The Oriental nations attach high importance to the bodily stature, and they were unable to conceive how so much genius could exist within such small dimensions. The appearance of Kleber alone came up to their ideas; he was an uncommonly fine-looking man, but his manners were rude. The discrimination of the Egyptians induced them to think that he was not a Frenchman; in fact, though a native of Alsace, he had spent the early part of his life in the Prussian army, and might very well have passed for a German. Some one said that Kleber had been a Janissary in his youth; the Emperor burst into a fit of laughter, and said somebody had been imposing on him.

The Grand-Marshal told the Emperor that at the battle of Aboukir he was for the first time placed in his army, and near his person. He was then so little accustomed to the boldness of his manœuvres, that he scarcely understood any of the orders he heard him give. “Particularly, Sire,” added he, “when I heard you call out to an officer, ‘Hercule, my dear fellow, take twenty-five men and charge that rabble:’ I really thought I had lost my senses; your Majesty pointed to a detachment of a thousand Turkish horse.”

After all, the losses sustained by the army in Egypt were far from being so considerable as might have been expected in a country to which the troops were unaccustomed; particularly when the insalubrity of the climate, the remoteness of the resources of the country, the ravages of the plague, and the numerous actions which have immortalized that army, are taken into account. The French force, at its landing in Egypt, amounted to 30,000 men; it was augmented by the wrecks of the battle of Aboukir, and probably also by some partial arrivals from France; and yet the total loss sustained by the army, from the commencement of the campaign to two months after the departure of the General-in-chief for Europe, (during the space of seven or eight-and-twenty months,) amounted only to 8,915, as is proved by the official report of the Muster-master-general.22

The life of a man must indeed be replete with prodigies, when one of his acts, which is without parallel in history scarcely arrests our attention. When Cæsar passed the Rubicon, he possessed an army, and was advancing in his own defence. When Alexander, urged by the ardour of youth and the fire of genius, landed in Asia, to make war on the great King, he, Alexander, was the son of a king, a king himself, and courted the chances of ambition and glory at the head of the forces of his kingdom. But that a private individual, whose name three years before was unknown to the world, who at that moment had nothing to aid him but the reputation of a few victories, his name, and the consciousness of his genius, should have dared to conceive the project of taking into his own hands the destinies of thirty millions of men, of protecting them from external defeats and internal dissensions;—that, roused by the recital of the troubles which were described to him, and by the idea of the disasters which he foresaw, he should have exclaimed, “France will be lost through these fine talkers, these babblers: now is the time to save her!”—that he should have abandoned his army, and crossed the seas, at the risk of his liberty and reputation, have reached the French soil and flown to the capital; that he should there have seized the helm, and stopped short a nation intoxicated with every excess; that he should have suddenly brought her back to the true course of reason and justice;—that he should from that moment have prepared for her a career of power and glory till then unknown;—and that all this should have been accomplished without the shedding of a single tear or a drop of blood;—such an undertaking may be regarded as one of the most gigantic and sublime that ever was heard of; it will fill calm and dispassionate posterity with astonishment and admiration; though at the time it was branded by some with the name of a desperate flight, and an infamous desertion. The army, however, which Napoleon left behind him, continued to occupy Egypt for the space of two years longer. It was the opinion of the Emperor that it ought never to have been forced to surrender; and the Grand Marshal, who accompanied the army to the last moment, concurred in that opinion.

After the departure of the General-in-chief, Kleber, who succeeded him, deceived and misled by intrigues, treated for the evacuation of Egypt; but when the enemy’s refusal compelled him to seek for new glory, and to form a more just estimate of his own force, he totally altered his opinions, and declared himself favourable to the occupation of Egypt; and this had even become the general sentiment of the army. He now thought only of maintaining himself in the country; he dismissed those who had influenced him in forming his first design, and collected around him only those who favoured the contrary measure. Had he lived, Egypt would have been secure; to his death her loss must be attributed. The command of the army was afterwards divided between Menou and Regnier. It then became a mere field of intrigue: the energy and courage of the French troops continued unabated; but they were no longer employed and directed as they had been by Kleber. Menou was totally inefficient; the English advanced to attack him with twenty thousand men; his force was much more considerable, and the general spirit of the two armies was not to be compared. By an inconceivable infatuation, Menou hastily dispersed his troops, as soon as he learned that the English were about to appear, the latter advanced in a mass, and were attacked only in detail. “How blind is fortune,” said the Emperor; “by the adoption of contrary measures, the English would infallibly have been destroyed; and how many new chances might not that event have brought about!”

Their landing was admirable, said the Grand Marshal: in less than five or six minutes five thousand five hundred men appeared in order of battle: it was a truly theatrical movement; and it was thrice repeated. Their landing was opposed by only twelve hundred men, who did them considerable damage. Shortly after, this mass, amounting to between thirteen and fourteen thousand, was intrepidly attacked by General Lanusse. The General had only three thousand troops; but fired with ambition, and not doubting that his force was adequate to fulfil the object he had in view, he would not wait for reinforcements; at first he overthrew every thing in his way, and, after causing immense slaughter to the enemy, he was at length defeated. Had his force been two or three thousand stronger, he would have attained his object.

The English were greatly astonished when they had an opportunity of judging for themselves of our real situation in Egypt; and they considered themselves extremely fortunate in the turn which affairs had taken.

General Hutchinson, who reaped the glory of the conquest, said, on his return to Europe, that had the English known the real state of things, they would certainly never have attempted to land; but in England it was believed that there were not six thousand French troops in Egypt. This mistake arose out of the intercepted letters, as well as the intelligence that was collected in Egypt. “So natural is it to Frenchmen,” said Napoleon, “to exaggerate, murmur, and misrepresent, whenever they are dissatisfied. These reports, however, were created merely by ill-humour or diseased imaginations: it was said that there was a famine in Egypt; that the French had all been destroyed, at every new battle; that the plague had swept away the whole army; that there was not a man left,” &c.

Through the repetition of these reports, Pitt was at length persuaded of their reality; and how could it be otherwise? The First Consul saw the despatches from his successor addressed to the Directory; and also letters from various persons in the French army. Who can explain the contradictions they contained? Who will henceforth trust to individual authority for the support of his opinion? Kleber, the General-in-chief, informed the Directory, that he had only six thousand men, while in the same packet the accounts of the inspector of reviews exhibited upwards of twenty thousand. Kleber declared that he was without money, and the treasury accounts display vast sums. The General-in-chief alleged that the artillery was merely an intrenched park, destitute of ammunition; while the estimates of that department made mention of stores for several campaigns. “Thus, if Kleber, by virtue of the treaty he commenced, had evacuated Egypt,” said the Emperor, “I should undoubtedly have brought him to trial on his return to France. All these contradictory documents had been submitted to the examination and opinion of the Council of State.”

From the letters of Kleber, the General-in-chief, an idea may be formed of the tone of those written by persons of inferior rank, and by the common soldiers. Such, however, were the communications daily intercepted by the English; which they printed and which guided them in their operations—a circumstance that must have cost them dear. The Emperor observed that in all his campaigns he had seen the same effect produced by intercepted letters, which sometimes had proved of great advantage to him.

Among the letters which at this period fell into his hands, he found odious attacks upon himself, which he felt the more sensibly because several of them were written by persons whom he had loaded with benefits, in whom he had reposed full confidence, and whom he believed to be strongly attached to him. One of these individuals, whose fortune he had made, and in whom he trusted with the utmost sincerity, alleged that the General-in-chief had decamped, after robbing the treasury of two millions. Fortunately, in these same despatches the accounts of the Paymaster proved that the General had not even received the whole amount of the pay due to him. “On reading this statement,” said the Emperor, “I felt really disgusted at mankind. This was the first moral disappointment I had ever experienced; and if it has not been the only one, it has, perhaps, at least, been the most severe. Many individuals in the army thought me ruined, and they were already eagerly seeking to pay their court in the proper quarter at my expense.” The author of the assertion above alluded to subsequently endeavoured to restore himself to favour. The Emperor signified that he should have no objection to his being employed in a subordinate situation; but that he would never see him again. To every application he constantly replied that he did not know him: this was the only vengeance he took.

The Emperor never ceased to repeat that Egypt ought to have remained in the possession of the French, which would infallibly have been the case had the country been defended by Kleber or Desaix. “These were my two most distinguished lieutenants,” said he; “both possessed great and rare merits, though their characters and dispositions were very different.”

Kleber’s was the talent of nature; Desaix’s was entirely the result of education and assiduity. The genius of Kleber only burst forth at particular moments, when roused by the importance of the occasion; and then it immediately slumbered again in the bosom of indolence and pleasure. The talent of Desaix was always in full activity; he lived only for noble ambition and true glory: his character was formed on the true ancient model. The Emperor said that his death was the greatest loss he could possibly have sustained. Their conformity of education and principles would always have preserved a good understanding between them. Desaix would have been satisfied with secondary rank, and would have remained ever devoted and faithful. Had he not been killed at the battle of Marengo, the First Consul would have given him the command of the army of Germany, instead of continuing it to Moreau. A very extraordinary circumstance in the destiny of these two lieutenants of Napoleon was that on the very day and at the very hour when Kleber was assassinated at Cairo, Desaix was killed by a cannon-ball at Marengo.