several of the youths attempted to escape through Buonaparte's garden, when the ferocious boy was seen armed with a pickaxe, and driving such of his companions back into the fire as had trespassed, even in this terrible emergency, upon his territory; nor did he desist until he had severely wounded those who had broken down his fence.

Disgusted with the puerile amusements of his fellow-students, Buonaparte instituted Pyrrhic games, where, according to the custom of the ancients, he marshalled the boys in parties, representing alternately the Romans and the Carthaginians, the Greeks and the Persians. In these mimic contests, the embryo conqueror of Italy and Germany was beheld in the warmest parts of the encounter, directing, reproaching, exhorting, and kindling in the breasts of his associates, a spark of that martial enthusiasm which already burned in his own bosom.

4

The winter of 1784 happened to be extremely severe, and the fields of Champaigne were long covered with snow. Buonaparte availed himself of this circumstance, and directed his companions (whose awe of his bold originality of character was so great, that he could command them at pleasure) to raise, under his superintendance, an extensive and regular fortification; in which forts, redoubts, bastions, ravelines, &c. were constructed in snow, according to the nicest rules of military art. These works were alternately besieged and defended by our hero, who ordered all the operations. Whilst, however, Buonaparte exhibited so many striking proofs of the precocity and strength of his genius, his disposition still remained rugged, and his manners repulsive and unamiable to the last possible degree. If he was at this period a prodigy of military talent, he was careless of giving offence to his equals or superiors, and uniformly disdained either apology or reparation.

In October, 1784, Napoleon underwent an examination by the Chevalier de Renault, who found him well versed in the art of fortification; and, although some of his masters objected to certain points of his conduct, he was elected to the Military

6

School of Paris: a high distinction at that time, and in the present instance equally honourable to the discernment of the chevalier, and the abilities of the pupil.

On his arrival at Paris, the young Napoleon pursued, with unremitting assiduity, his military studies. It was here that he first contracted an intimacy with Lauriston and Dupont, which he remembered when seated on the throne of France, and invested with the dictatorship of Europe. Monge, his preceptor in the Military College of Paris, is said to have foretold his future greatness.

In 1785, being found properly qualified, Buonaparte was appointed a lieutenant in a regiment of artillery; and soon afterwards joined his corps. About this period, the death of the Count Marbœuf, who had hitherto supplied him with money, rendered the young warrior's financial operations far less satisfactory than his military plans. It was now that a clear indication of approaching revolution in France appeared; and Buonaparte, who had distinguished himself amongst his brother officers, as much by the tenacity and turbulence of his temper, as by the transcendant superiority of his genius, strenuously espoused the popular party; which he maintained with so much zeal and violence, that his companions were, on a particular occasion upon the point of drowning him, when he was fortunately rescued from their grasp. He soon afterwards deserted their society altogether, and in this state of ascetic seclusion, we must for the present leave him, in order to state, as briefly as possible, the origin and progress of that stupendous revolution, in the concluding scenes of which Buonaparte was destined to become so prominent an

actor.

Originally, France, as well as Spain and Portugal, enjoyed political freedom. We say political, because in these › states, and in France especially, the authority of the sovereign was held in check by a numerous martial and resolute aristocracy. Excepting, however, in the towns which obtained royal charters of emancipation from the yoke of the nobles, the peasants at large were hewers of wood and drawers of water to the

potent barons, whose fields they cultivated, whose battles they fought, whose behests they obeyed, at whose frowns they trembled, and at the shrine of whose lust and cupidity their wives and daughters, and their whole property were offered up in daily sacrifice.

. The first considerable augmentation of their power which the kings of France of the Capetian dynasty received, was from the annexation of the provinces held by the sovereigns of England: an event which was nearly accomplished in the reign of Philip Augustus. Before that era, the French monarch was only the first baron of his kingdom; exposed to the insults of his more powerful vassals; and depending for the maintenance of the splendour of his exalted rank, and the necessary charges of his civil administration, upon the produce of the crown lands, joined to an inconsiderable revenue imposed upon their merchandize. In process of time, the rich foreign inheritance of our Henry II. merged by successive conquests in the persons of the French kings, and they became more powerful themselves, and consequently better enabled to extend protection to their subjects.

The feudal system united at different extremities of one vast chain (of which the sovereign was the first, and the humble possessor of a solitary knight's fee, the last link,) all who aspired to the rank and character of gentry. But well adapted as this system was, from the peculiar circumstances of a conquering people, dispersed amongst a vanquished but more numerous nation, to rivet the chains of the latter, and establish the security of the former from external assaults, while the conquest itself was recent; it was proved in a short time, from its inherent vices, to be equally and necessarily a scourge to the peasants, and a perpetual grievance to the sovereign. A community of interests soon established the mutual cooperation of the monarch and the lower orders of his subjects in mitigating the rigours, and repressing the excesses resulting from a state of feudality. The humiliation of the nobles was a favourite object with Louis XI. The rack, the dungeon, and the axe, were unsparingly employed by that great poli

tician, and still greater tyrant. A mercenary standing army enforced his mandates; and the nobles, without union amongst themselves, or military experience, and destitute of popular support, were reduced to full and unqualified submission. But whilst the sovereign thus extended his authority over the nobles, and the inhabitants of towns and cities became, in consequence of their franchise, great and prosperous, the villager or serf remained still exposed to the tyranny of the seigneur. The religious wars which desolated France from the time of Francis I. to the apostacy of Henry IV., and the ascendancy acquired and maintained during a great part of that melancholy interval by the house of Guise, exalted once more the power of the principal nobility on the ruins of the just prerogative of the sovereign, and the dearest rights of the people.

The paternal government of Henry IV. cicatrized, but did not effectually heal the wounds of his country. The long minority which succeeded the assassination of that great and good prince, and the faction to which it gave rise, had plunged every part of the empire in the most frightful disorder; when the master spirit of the storm appeared, and wielding the sceptre of an all-pervading despotism, quelled the waves of popular commotion into that gloomy and awful calm which commonly succeeds the rage of the tempest. In the iron grasp of Richlieu, the power of the nobility and the remaining liberties of the people were crushed; and an uniformity of slavery succeeded to the caprices of wanton licentiousness. Louis XIV. was not only the most formidable, but in fact the most absolute monarch in Europe; and his internal administration, so far as the question of civil liberty is concerned, presents a revolting picture of lawless oppression. To enter into minute particulars would lead us too far from our main object. We must, therefore, now proceed to discuss the form of the French constitution, and the practical results of the system of administration.

The first and greatest tribunal was that of the States-Ge-.

neral of the kingdom, which consisted of the King and the representatives of the nobles, the clergy, and the enfranchised part of the population. This august court, in which all the powers of sovereignty were united in jure et in esse was very rarely assembled. The last convention of the States General took place in 1617. A more convenient instrument was found to interpose the mockery of an intermediate power between the sovereign and his subjects. Courts of justice, called parliaments, whose members were lawyers, and who were nominated for life by the king, were gradually established and dispersed throughout the provinces. It was a most important branch of their functions, to register the sovereign's edicts; after which enrolment they obtained the force of laws. In case of refusal on the part of the magistracy to register the edict proposed to them, the alternative adopted, was to hold what was called a Bed of Justice; when the king, in person, went to the parliament of Paris, and compelled the record of what he desired.

This was the only barrier opposed to the inroads of kingly tyranny. In the administration of justice the institution of juries was unknown. Torture was frequently inflicted; and lettres de cachet placed the personal liberty of every Frenchman at the disposal not only of the monarch, but even of the mistresses of the minister's valets.

The nobility and clergy were exempted from all taxation; which fell with insupportable weight upon the great bulk of the people. Myriads of monks and nuns covered the land, and devoured its richest fruits. The cultivators of the soil were burthened with the gratuitous performance of many oppressive duties for their advantage. To complete the picture, Protestantism was proscribed; and the dissenters from the Catholic faith were kindly disencumbered of all secular cares by the sequestration and destruction of their property; their understandings enlightened by the conflagration of their own dwellings; and their souls considerably mortified by the forced maceration and torture of their schismatical bodies. Such was the state of civil polity in the reign of Louis le Grand! Yet, in the course of