The effusion of joy was the greater--because the tale of victory came on a people prepared for other tidings. About noontide on the 14th of June, when the French had been driven out of Marengo, and were apparently in full and disastrous retreat, a commercial traveller left the field, and arriving, after a rapid journey, in Paris, announced that Buonaparte had been utterly defeated by Melas. It is said that the ill-wishers of the First Consul immediately set on foot an intrigue for removing him from the government, and investing Carnot with the chief authority. It is not doubtful that many schemes of hostility had been agitated during Napoleon's absence; or that, amidst all the clamour and splendour of his triumphant reception in Paris, he wore a gloomy brow; nor has any one disputed that, from this time, he regarded the person of Carnot with jealousy and aversion.
The tidings of the great battle, meanwhile, kindled the emulation of the Rhenish army; and they burned with the earnest desire to do something worthy of being recorded in the same page with Marengo. But the Chief Consul, when he granted the armistice to Melas, had extended it to the armies on the German frontier likewise; and Moreau, consequently, could not at once avail himself of the eagerness of his troops. The negotiations which ensued, however, were unsuccessful. The emperor, subsidised as he had been, must have found it very difficult to resist the remonstrances of England against the ratification of any peace in which she should not be included; and it is natural to suppose, that the proud spirit of the Austrian cabinet revolted from setting the seal to an act of humiliation, not yet, as the English government insisted, absolutely necessary. News, meantime, were received, of the surrender of Malta to an English expedition under Lord Keith and Sir Ralph Abercrombie;[37] and this timely piece of good fortune breathed fresh spirit into the Antigallican league. In fine, insincerity and suspicion protracted, from day to day, a negotiation not destined to be concluded until more blood had been shed.
During this armistice, which lasted from the 15th of June to the 10th of November, the exiled princes of the House of Bourbon made some more ineffectual endeavours to induce the Chief Consul to be the Monk of France. The Abbé de Montesquiou, secret agent for the Count de Lille (afterwards Louis XVIII.), prevailed on the Third Consul, Le Brun, to lay before Buonaparte a letter addressed to him by that prince--in these terms: "You are very tardy about restoring my throne to me: it is to be feared that you may let the favourable moment slip. You cannot establish the happiness of France without me; and I, on the other hand, can do nothing for France without you. Make haste, then, and point out, yourself, the posts and dignities which will satisfy you and your friends." The First Consul answered thus: "I have received your Royal Highness's letter. I have always taken a lively interest in your misfortunes and those of your family. You must not think of appearing in France--you could not do so without marching over five hundred thousand corpses. For the rest, I shall always be zealous to do whatever lies within my power towards softening your Royal Highness's destinies, and making you forget, if possible, your misfortunes." The Comte D'Artois (Charles X. of France) took a more delicate method of negotiating. He sent a very beautiful and charming lady, the Duchesse de Guiche, to Paris; she without difficulty gained access to Josephine, and shone, for a time, the most brilliant ornament of the consular court. But the moment Napoleon discovered the fair lady's errand, she was ordered to quit the capital within a few hours. These intrigues, however, could not fail to transpire; and there is no doubt that, at this epoch, the hopes of the royalists were in a high state of excitement.