Italy. A play based on his Italian exploits, Le Pont de Lodi, was a smash
hit at the theatre, and the street where he liv ed, rue Chantereine, was
renamed rue de la Victoire. Yet Napoleon proceeded cautiously: he knew
that the bubble of a reputation could burst overnight, as it had with
Hoche, and that a single unguarded aside could be the trigger for a
change in fickle public opinion.
He therefore burnished his performance as the Republican hero whose
active life is over and who wishes to devote himself to the disinterested
pursuit of science and knowledge. He sat through official receptions and
banquets taciturn and poker-faced, attended the theatre without cere
mony in a private box, refusing all offers by theatre managers of gala
performances, and held dignified and quiet dinner parties. He assumed
the vacant seat at the Institute left by Carnot's departure, and milked the
action for symbolism by taking up the seat on Christmas Day I797· His
entry into the First Class (Sciences) of the Institute was a clever piece of
Machiavellianism, winning the support of the 'ideologues' and the
intellegentsia. Thereafter he was frequently seen in the company of the
Institute crowd and assiduously attended its meetings, seated between
Laplace and the other great mathematician Joseph Lagrange.
Next he concentrated on behind-the-scenes domination of the five
Directors and the elimination of troublesome rivals. Irritated with
Augereau's independence, he had him removed from command of the
important Army of the Rhine and shunted into the backwater of the
Pyrenees command. Hearing that the Directors were about to appoint
Bernadotte to command of the Army of Italy, he intervened with the
objection that Bernadotte was 'too able a diplomat' to be used as a mere
commander and had him sent out to Vienna as the Directory's envoy to
Austria.
Meanwhile he attended the daily meetings of the Directory at the
Luxembourg, ostensibly working on the continuing negotiations at
Rastadt on the future of the Rhine and on the proposed descent on
England, but in reality bending the Directors to his iron will. Only Barras
held aloof, but the other four were soon reduced to the most craven
currying of favour. They showed him secret police reports on the popular
perception of Bonaparte, which were a melange of sycophantic nonsense
specially brewed for the occasion. When the Directors had their agents
assassinate two young aristocratic hotheads at the Garchi coffee house,
Napoleon dissociated himself from the act and called it murder. In alarm
the Directors sent him a deputation to justify their conduct as an act of
exemplary terror.
In January 1798 a fete had been arranged to commemorate the fifth
marcin
(Marcin)
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