Meanwhile Austria had resolved to make another effort for the recovery of Lom bardy. About the close of July marshal Wurmser advanced from Trent at the head of 00,000 men, forced Napoleon to raise the siege of Mantua, but was himself defeated. with the loss of all his cannon, near Castiglione (Aug. 5), and again at Bassano (Sept. 8t, in consequence of which he was driven to take refuge within the fortress of liintutt with some 13,000 troops—the shattered remains of his 00.000. Austria, however, was not disheartened. A third army was dispatched in two divisions; 30,000 from Carinthia, under marshal Alvinzi; and 20,000 from the Tyrol. under, gen. Davidowith. This was a terrible campaign for Napoleon; his veterans were exhausted, his new supports bad not arrived; he himself was desrondent, while the Austrians were fresh and hopeful. At first the latter were completely successful; but the great victory of Arcola, won by Napoleon (Nov. 17) after three days' fierce fighting, in which helost nearly all his gene rahoflicers, decided the fate of the campaign. Ills dispatches to the directory, penned about this period, show how thoroughly he apprehended the state of parties in Italy, and also how utterly indifferent he was to any considerations beyond those that advanced the interests of France. In Jan., 1797, a fourth campaign was commenced by Austria. At the head of 50,000 fresh troops, Alvinzi descended from the Tyrol, hut was completely routed by Napoleon nt Rivoli, on the 14th of the month; while, not long after, Wurmser was starved into surrender at Mantua. &fifth army was assembled on the Tagliamento, under the command of the archduke Charles; but his troops were mainly raw recruits, while those of Napoleon were inured to war and flushed with innumerable triumphs. JD consequence lie was forced to retreat, which, however, he did slowly and in goad order, hoping to surround his opponent in the interior of the country. Napoleon's design was to march on Vienna, and he actually penetrated as far as Judenburg, in upper Styria, only eight days' march from the capital. The Austrian government at length was seized with alarm, made overtures of peace, and finally on Oct. 17, 1797, the famous treaty of Campo Forrnio was signed, by which Austria ceded the Netherlands, Lombardy, and sonic other smaller territories to France; while she herself obtained in return, through disgraceful treachery on the part of the victor, possession 'of the prov ince of Venice. It is generally said that Napoleon's military genius was never more brilliantly displayed than in these early Italian campaigns. In ingenuity of plan, celerity of movement, audacity of assault, he far outshines all his adversaries; it is, moreover, but just to him to state, further, that he made desperate efforts to stop the excesses of the most scoundrelly commissariat in Europe; and that while in the main he showed no hesi tation in carrying out the brigand-like orders of the directory, he does not appear to have appropriated a single penny to himself. It was power, not gold, that he cared for.
In Dec., 1797, Napoleon returned to Paris, where lie was received with the utmost enthusiasm. At this time there was much talk, and probably some vrtte design, on the part of the directory, of invadide Eng,land, and Napoleon was appointed commander in-chief of the invading army. It has been thought, however, that this was mei ely feint to mask the real design of the directory; viz., the invasion of Egypt, as perhaps a preliminary step to the conquest of British India. Be that as it may, an expedition against l',gypt was resolved on hy the directory; and on May 19, 1798, Napoleon sailed from Toulon, with a fleet containing 30,000 soldiers and a body of savaus to investigate the antiquities of the country. De reached Alexandria on June 29. At this moment France was at peace with Turkey; the invasion of Egypt, a Turkish dependency, was therefore an net utterly unjustifiable. and retninds us not of European warfare, but rather of the irruption of a horde of barbaric Tartars. Napoleon, having landed his troops, captured and marched op Cairo. The Mamel ukes prepa red .resistance:- but on July 21, at the battle of the pyraMids, they were 'completely defeated, and the French became, In a masters of Egypt. Napoleon now entered the capital, and immediately commenced to reorganize the civil and military administration of the country; for he took a great, but also an ostentatious, pleasure in this sort of work. Meanwhile, on Aug.
2, Nelson had utterly destroyed the French fleet in Aboukir bay, and so cut off Napoleon from communication with Europe. A month later the sultan declared war against him. This was followed by disturbances in Cairo, which were only suppressed by horrible massacres. It was obviously necessary that Napoleon should go somewhere else. He resolved to meet the Turkish forces assembling in Syria; and in Feb., 179d, crossed the desert at the head of 10,000 men, stormed Jaffa on Mar. 7 after a heroic resistance on the part of the Turks, marched northwards by the coast, and reached Acre on the 17th. Here his career of victory was stopped. All his efforts to capture Acre were foiled through the desperate and obstinate valor of old Djezzar Pasha (q.v.), assisted by sir Sydney Smith with a small body of English sailors and marines. On 21 he commenced his retreat to Egypt, leaving the whole country on fire behind him. and re entered Cairo on June 14. It was during his absence that the savans made their valuable researches among the monuments of upper Egypt. About the middle of July the sultan landed a force of 18,000 men at Aboukir, who were attacked by Napoleon on the 25th, and routed with immense slaughter. But the 'position of the victor was fat from comfortable, and he therefore resolved to return to France—especially as news had come to him of disasters in Italy and confusions in Paris. On Aug. 23 he sailed front Alexandria, leaving his army behind him under the command of Kleber; and alto narrowly escaping capture by the English fleet, landed near Frejus on Oct. 9. Ile hastened to Paris, soon mastered the state of affairs, threw himself into the party of Sieyi;. and overthrew the directory (q.v.) on the famous 18th Brumaire. A new consti tution weis drawn up, chiefly by Sieges, under which Napoleon became first consul, with the power of appointing to all public offices, of proposing all public measures in peace or war, and the entire command of all administrative affairs civil and military. In a word, he was ruler of France: and though Jar from satisfied with the clumsy machinery of Sieys's plan, he could afford to wait the future. About the end of Jan., 1800, he took up his residence in the Tuileries. The country was tired of revolutions, discords, and con fusions; it was proud of its young leader, who seemed inspired but not enslaved by the ideas of his age, and who knew how to enforce obedience as well as to panegyrize prin. eiples. It therefore regarded his assumption of sovereign power with positive satisfac tion. Napoleon displayed extraordinary vigor as an administrator, recruited the national treasury by various sagacious expedients, repealed the more violent laws passed during the revolution, such as punishment for matters of opinion, reopened the churches, and terminated by policy the Vemlean struggle. But he knew well that his genius was essentially military, and that his most dazzling and influential triumphs were those won on the battle-field. France was still at war with Austria, and Ile resolved to renew the glories of his first Italian campaigns. Leaving Moreau in command of the army of the Rhine, he assembled, with wonderful rapidity and secrecy, army of 36,000 men on the shores of the lake of Ganeva, and on May 13 (1800) began his magnificent and dar ing march across the Alps. Almost before the Austrian general, Melas, was aware, Napoleon had entered l‘rlilan (June 2). Twelve days afterwards was fought the fiercely contested vet decisive battle of Marengo, which compelled the Austrians to resign Pierl mont, with all its fortresses, and (for the second time) Lombardy to the French. Later in the year hostilities were recommenced: but the Austrians, beaten •by Moreau in Germany (at Hohenlinden, etc.) and by Napoleon in Italy, were at last forced to make peace; and on Feb. 9, 1801, signed the treaty of Luneville, which was mainly based on that of Campo Formio. In the course of the same year France and England also made peace; but the treaty (known as that of Amiens) was not definitively signed till Mar. 27, 1802. Not less important for the consolidation of affairs in France was the concordat (q.v.) between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII., also concluded in 1801. In Jan., 1802, Napoleon became president of the Cisalpine republic; and on Aug. 2 following was declared consul for life by a decree of the French senate.