any plans for parties, or to be interested in the happiness of a man who
lives only for you ... I am not worth it ... When I beg you to equal a
love like mine, I am wrong... Why should I expect lace to weigh as
much as gold? ... 0 Josephine, Josephine!'
Josephine finally returned from Genoa on 7 December and three days
later gave a grand ball in the Palazzo Serbelloni. But by now Napoleon
had political problems to handle. The parting of the ways had finally
come with his old friend Saliceti, the Directory's political representative.
He and his colleague Garrau looted one church too many and went too
far in selling the proceeds openly on the street. When Napoleon clamped
down, Saliceti wrote a poisonous letter to Paris, stressing Bonaparte's
overweening ambition, his high-handed unilateral conclusion of peace
terms with Piedmont in May, the refusal to accept a joint command with
Kellermann, and much else. The Directory in some alarm sent General
Henri Clarke to Italy as its special representative, charged with making a
detailed report on the situation there.
The initial contacts between Napoleon and Clarke were scarcely
propitious. Clarke arrived in Milan on 29 November, the day after the
bombshell discovery that Josephine was in Genoa. Napoleon was in a foul
temper and Clarke reported that he looked emaciated and cadaverous,
having picked up fever, probably in the ditches of Arcole. Napoleon
remarked snappishly that he was opposed to an armistice with Austria.
Clarke snapped back: 'That is the intention of the Directory and there's
an end of it.' But three days later, after minute investigation, Clarke
changed tack and admitted that Napoleon was right. On 7 December,
when Josephine arrived, he was ready to pen the following highly
favourable report to Barras and Carnot:
Everyone here regards him as a man of genius .... He is feared, loved
and respected in Italy. I believe he is attached to the Republic and
without any ambition save to retain the reputation he has won ...
General Bonaparte is not without defects ... Sometimes he is hard,
impatient, abrupt or imperious. Often he demands difficult things in
too hasty a manner. He has not been respectful enough towards the
Government commissioners. When I reproved him for this, he replied
that he could not possibly treat otherwise men who were universally
scorned for their immorality and incapacity... Saliceti has the
reputation of being the most shameless rogue in the army and Garrau is
inefficient: neither is suitable for the Army of Italy.Whatever their misgivings, the Directors had to admit that their