The Story of Mankind [133]
slaughter house. Everybody suspected everybody else.
No one felt safe. Out of sheer fear, a few members of the old
Convention, who knew that they were the next candidates for
the scaffold, finally turned against Robespierre, who had
already decapitated most of his former colleagues. Robespierre,
``the only true and pure Democrat,'' tried to kill himself
but failed His shattered jaw was hastily bandaged and
he was dragged to the guillotine. On the 27th of July, of the
year 1794 (the 9th Thermidor of the year II, according to the
strange chronology of the revolution), the reign of Terror came
to an end, and all Paris danced with joy.
The dangerous position of France, however, made it necessary
that the government remain in the hands of a few strong
men, until the many enemies of the revolution should have been
driven from the soil of the French fatherland. While the
half-clad and half-starved revolutionary armies fought their
desperate battles of the Rhine and Italy and Belgium and
Egypt, and defeated every one of the enemies of the Great
Revolution, five Directors were appointed, and they ruled
France for four years. Then the power was vested in the hands
of a successful general by the name of Napoleon Bonaparte,
who became ``First Consul'' of France in the year 1799. And
during the next fifteen years, the old European continent became
the laboratory of a number of political experiments, the
like of which the world had never seen before.
NAPOLEON
NAPOLEON
NAPOLEON was born in the year 1769, the third son
of Carlo Maria Buonaparte, an honest notary public of
the city of Ajaccio in the island of Corsica, and his good
wife, Letizia Ramolino. He therefore was not a Frenchman,
but an Italian whose native island (an old Greek, Carthaginian
and Roman colony in the Mediterranean Sea) had
for years been struggling to regain its independence,
first of all from the Genoese, and after the middle of the
eighteenth century from the French, who had kindly offered
to help the Corsicans in their struggle for freedom and had
then occupied the island for their own benefit.
During the first twenty years of his life, young Napoleon
was a professional Corsican patriot--a Corsican Sinn Feiner,
who hoped to deliver his beloved country from the yoke of the
bitterly hated French enemy. But the French revolution had
unexpectedly recognised the claims of the Corsicans and gradually
Napoleon, who had received a good training at the military
school of Brienne, drifted into the service of his adopted country.
Although he never learned to spell French correctly or
to speak it without a broad Italian accent, he became a Frenchman.
In due time he came to stand as the highest expression
of all French virtues. At present he is regarded as the symbol
of the Gallic genius.
Napoleon was what is called a fast worker. His career
does not cover more than twenty years. In that short span
of time he fought more wars and gained more victories and
marched more miles and conquered more square kilometers and
killed more people and brought about more reforms and generally
upset Europe to a greater extent than anybody (including
Alexander the Great and Jenghis Khan) had ever managed
to do.
He was a little fellow and during the first years of his life
his health was not very good. He never impressed anybody
by his good looks and he remained to the end of his days very
clumsy whenever he was obliged to appear at a social function.
He did not enjoy a single advantage of breeding or birth or
riches. For the greater part of his youth he was desperately
poor and often he had to go without a meal or was obliged
to make a few extra pennies in curious ways.
He gave little promise as a literary genius. When he competed
for a prize offered by the Academy of Lyons, his essay
was found to be next to the last and he was number 15 out of
16
No one felt safe. Out of sheer fear, a few members of the old
Convention, who knew that they were the next candidates for
the scaffold, finally turned against Robespierre, who had
already decapitated most of his former colleagues. Robespierre,
``the only true and pure Democrat,'' tried to kill himself
but failed His shattered jaw was hastily bandaged and
he was dragged to the guillotine. On the 27th of July, of the
year 1794 (the 9th Thermidor of the year II, according to the
strange chronology of the revolution), the reign of Terror came
to an end, and all Paris danced with joy.
The dangerous position of France, however, made it necessary
that the government remain in the hands of a few strong
men, until the many enemies of the revolution should have been
driven from the soil of the French fatherland. While the
half-clad and half-starved revolutionary armies fought their
desperate battles of the Rhine and Italy and Belgium and
Egypt, and defeated every one of the enemies of the Great
Revolution, five Directors were appointed, and they ruled
France for four years. Then the power was vested in the hands
of a successful general by the name of Napoleon Bonaparte,
who became ``First Consul'' of France in the year 1799. And
during the next fifteen years, the old European continent became
the laboratory of a number of political experiments, the
like of which the world had never seen before.
NAPOLEON
NAPOLEON
NAPOLEON was born in the year 1769, the third son
of Carlo Maria Buonaparte, an honest notary public of
the city of Ajaccio in the island of Corsica, and his good
wife, Letizia Ramolino. He therefore was not a Frenchman,
but an Italian whose native island (an old Greek, Carthaginian
and Roman colony in the Mediterranean Sea) had
for years been struggling to regain its independence,
first of all from the Genoese, and after the middle of the
eighteenth century from the French, who had kindly offered
to help the Corsicans in their struggle for freedom and had
then occupied the island for their own benefit.
During the first twenty years of his life, young Napoleon
was a professional Corsican patriot--a Corsican Sinn Feiner,
who hoped to deliver his beloved country from the yoke of the
bitterly hated French enemy. But the French revolution had
unexpectedly recognised the claims of the Corsicans and gradually
Napoleon, who had received a good training at the military
school of Brienne, drifted into the service of his adopted country.
Although he never learned to spell French correctly or
to speak it without a broad Italian accent, he became a Frenchman.
In due time he came to stand as the highest expression
of all French virtues. At present he is regarded as the symbol
of the Gallic genius.
Napoleon was what is called a fast worker. His career
does not cover more than twenty years. In that short span
of time he fought more wars and gained more victories and
marched more miles and conquered more square kilometers and
killed more people and brought about more reforms and generally
upset Europe to a greater extent than anybody (including
Alexander the Great and Jenghis Khan) had ever managed
to do.
He was a little fellow and during the first years of his life
his health was not very good. He never impressed anybody
by his good looks and he remained to the end of his days very
clumsy whenever he was obliged to appear at a social function.
He did not enjoy a single advantage of breeding or birth or
riches. For the greater part of his youth he was desperately
poor and often he had to go without a meal or was obliged
to make a few extra pennies in curious ways.
He gave little promise as a literary genius. When he competed
for a prize offered by the Academy of Lyons, his essay
was found to be next to the last and he was number 15 out of
16