CHAPTER NINENapoleon's interest in a specific adventure in Egypt, as opposed to his
general mania for the Orient, can be traced back to 1797. In July of that
year Talleyrand, newly arrived from the U.S.A. and soon to be the
Directory's Foreign Minister, lectured to the Institute of Sciences and
Arts in Paris on 'The Advantages of Acquiring New Colonies'.
Talleyrand argued that Egypt was an ideal colony, as it was closer to
France than her possessions in Haiti and the West Indies and not so
vulnerable, either to the Royal Navy or the rising power of the U.S.A. He
pointed out that the great eightenth-century French statesman the due de
Choiseul had wanted to buy Egypt from Turkey. The idea had been in
the air from other sources too: from Magallon, the onetime French consul
in Cairo who stressed that this was the obvious gateway to India; and
from Volney's Considerations sur Ia guerre actuelle des Turcs (1788). It was
perhaps no coincidence that Talleyrand was appointed Foreign Minister
fifteen days after making this speech.
Whether prompted by Talleyrand or not, on r6 August 1797 Napoleon
wrote from Mombello to the Directors as follows: 'The time is not far
distant when we shall feel that, in order to destroy England once and for
all we must occupy Egypt. The approaching death of the vast Ottoman
Empire forces us to think ahead about our trade in the Levant. ' Soon he
and Talleyrand were deeply involved in the project, at least at a
theoretical level. On 13 September Napoleon wrote to the Foreign
Minister to suggest that as a prelude to the conquest of Egypt France
should invade Malta: the island had a population of roo,ooo who were
disgusted with their hereditary rulers, the Knights of St John, while the
Knights were a shadow of their former military selves and could easily be
suborned from the Grand Master. Through his secret agents on the
island Napoleon had already learned that the Order was in a terminal
state of decline. When the French Revolution swept away feudal dues
and benefices and confiscated Church property it unwittingly signed a
death sentence on the Knights. Besides most of them were French, and