plotting that would result from his absence. Sure enough, for two months
Paris was once again in the grip of coup-fever, with Jacobins, royalists,
Thermidorians and Sieyes's partisans all prominent. Alternative consuls
proposed by one faction or another included Bernadotte, Carnot and
Lafayette. Fouche, who would have found a way to intrigue if he was
alone on a desert island, was well to the fore, sometimes as a simultaneous
participant in rival plots. All the conspiracies and bids for power were
swept away in a torrent of euphoria once the news of Marengo reached
Paris. The peace-thirsty population of Paris seemed to take collective
leave of its senses, with illuminated windows, fireworks, gunfire and huge
popular demonstrations in favour of the First Consul. Cambad:res
remembered it as 'the first spontaneous public rejoicing in nine years'.
The second Italian campaign was over in weeks, in contrast to the
protracted campaigns of the first in 1796-----9 7. There was another
difference. Napoleon still corresponded regularly with Josephine, even
though she, as usual, did not bother to reply, but there was no longer the
yearning and the sexual longing of four years before. One even suspects
irony in his order to army women and camp followers to leave the army
and return to France: 'Here is an example to be followed: Citoyenne
Bonaparte has remained in Paris.'
He reached Milan on 17 June and stayed there a week. Although he
wrote that he hoped in ten days to be in the arms of his Josephine, by
now such sentiments were purely formulaic. The reality was that in
Milan he found himself another mistress, in the shape of opera singer
Madame Grazzini. So taken with her was he that he insisted on bringing
her back to Paris, dallying with her on his return journey through Turin,
Mont-Cenis, Lyons, Dijon and Nemours. Arriving in Paris on 2 July, he
installed her in a house at 76 2 , rue Caumartin, where he visited her every
night, shrouded in a huge greatcoat. La Grazzini received an allowance of
2o,ooo francs and was admitted to all the best circles. The affair came to
an end when Grazzini met a young violinist named Pierre Rode and
began running him and Napoleon in tandem. Tipped off by Fouche,
Napoleon expelled her and Rode from Paris, giving them just one week to
leave the city.
Protracted peace negotiations with Austria occupied much of Napo
leon's attention for the rest of 18oo. Although beaten on both fronts, the
Austrians stalled and dragged out the peace talks, as they had in 1797. In
order to keep Austria in the war Pitt signed a new subsidy treaty, which
allowed the Austrian plenipotentiaries to plead that its treaty commit
ments to England precluded a separate peace before February 1801.
Exasperated, Napoleon reopened hostilities and presided over a string of
marcin
(Marcin)
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