The main task, that of hunting down Murad Bey, was given to the
brilliant Desaix, who had already settled in well in Egypt and gathered
around him a polyglot harem. On 25 August 1798 Desaix set out on an
expedition which, in terms of sheer military brilliance sustained month
month after month, equalled if not surpassed Napoleon's own great
achievements. Time and again, often hugely outnumbered and usually
with only 3,000 men at his disposal, Desaix defeated the Mamelukes:
principally at El Lakun (7 October 1798), Samhud (22 January 1799) and
Abnud (8 March 1799).
Meanwhile in Cairo Napoleon achieved his ambition of founding an
Egyptian Institute, with four sections: mathematics; physics; political
economy; literature and the arts. At last the scientists and savants were
coming into their own, for so far they had had a hard time of it,
constantly the butt of derision from generals and privates alike. A roar of
laughter invariably went up from the ranks just before an engagement
when the cry was heard: 'Donkeys and scientists to the centre of the
square.' Now, though, they proved their worth and achieved things of
permanent importance which echoed down the years long after the purely
military exploits of Napoleon's army were forgotten. Together with the
nine local administrators the scientists supervised the building of
hospitals (both civilian and military), sewage systems, street lighting,
irrigation schemes, windmills for grinding corn, a postal system, a
stagecoach service, quarantine stations to combat bubonic plague, and
many other projects.
Since most of the scholars' books and instruments had been lost in the
debacle at the Battle of the Nile, Conte, head of the balloon corps, built
workshops to manufacture what was needed. Napoleon and Monge,
president of the Egyptian Institute, supervised the construction of
libraries and laboratories, the installation of a printing press (which later
published two newspapers), the beginnings of a geographical survey of
Egypt, and complex mathematical studies of the Pyramids. A red-letter
day for the Institute came in July 1799 when they discussed the Rosetta
Stone, brought back from Upper Egypt by the academicians who had
accompanied Desaix's expedition. The paper read that day by Napoleon's
principal Egyptologist later inspired the brilliant French linguist Jean
Fran�ois Champollion to decipher the seemingly impenetrable hiero
glyphics. Napoleon in person took a party of savants to survey the ancient
Suez Canal and draw up plans for a new one. The amazing energy of the
Egyptian Institute membership covered so much ground that their work
needed several magisterial volumes to do it justice; these were published
over twenty years and the final volume did not appear until r828.
marcin
(Marcin)
#1