- 
, 
. 
HISTORY OF EUROPE, 
material changes in the manage- 
ment of public affairs. ‘The power 
of the directory was, by numbers, 
deemied too great for the adminis- 
trators of the concerns of a com- 
‘monwealth, and a limitation of it 
was judged necessary, before cus- 
tom and length cf time should give 
ita rightofprescription. The coun- 
cil of five hundred had _ hitherto 
acted, in a remarkable degree, by 
the impulse of the directory. The 
necessity of preserving union be- 
tween the different branches of a 
constitution, newly established, and 
thereby securing it respect, pointed 
out the propriety of such a conduct. 
But the lapse of aconsiderable space 
of time, tilled up with continual 
triumphs, having conferred strength, 
and the prospect of stability upon the 
Dew system, its favourers, as well 
‘as criticisers, began to examine its 
flaws with the more severity, that 
the sooner these were remedied, 
the less of difficulty would occur in 
that necessary business. 
Both the councils. now contained 
a large proportion of members de- 
_ ’ termined. to retain as much autho- 
4 
P 
rity as they might be able to secure 
to their respective shares. They 
vigilantly waited an opportunity of 
enforcing, by actual exertion, their 
claim to some of those branches of 
power, that had been solely exer- 
cised by the directory, and either 
acquiesced in, or formally lodged 
in them by the councils. 
 The'sessions of the new legisla- 
e _ ture’ commenced towards the close 
w 
L' 
of May... In the beginning of June, 
the situation of the French islands, 
in the West Indies, was brought 
before the council of five hundred, 
The recall. of Santhonax,~ the 
_ French commissioner, in St, Do- 
_ mingo, was moved, 
and carried 
[ss 
but general Jourdan, apprehending 
that if this measure was not support- 
ed by a sufficient force, that com-. 
missioner might resist the orders of 
the legislature, and, sooner than sub- 
mit, give up theislandto the English, 
proposed, that a competent body of 
troops should be sent to enforce the 
decree of the council. This propo- 
sal was approved of, and passed ac- 
cordingly, to the great mortification 
of the directory, to whom the set- 
tlement of that affair had been com- 
mitted, by the late council. 
The public was not displeased at 
this assumption of authority, by the 
council. Profusions of an unsufter- 
able nature were imputed to the 
managers of the home departments, 
of which the expences, in the opi- 
nion of the committee appointed for 
their examination, ought to be redu« 
ced from seventeen to little more 
‘than six millions: The directory 
was accused of conniving at these 
excesses, if not of expressly autho~ 
‘rising them to indulge their vanity, 
and a contemptible fondness for im- 
proper magnificence, ‘The various 
‘palaces, inhabited by the late king, 
and the different branches of the 
royal] family, occasioned an expen- 
diture that ill accorded with the 
pretences of economy, so frequently 
in the mouth of the supporters of 
government. A far greater number 
of surveyors, architects, and work- 
men, were employed to keep them ~ 
in order and repair, than were want- 
ed for the purposes to which they 
were allotted. Several of those ma- 
nufactories, stiled royal, were still 
preserved on their former footing, 
without necessity. The expences 
arising from the printing of _ public 
papers, and the remunerations given 
to the writers in them, on the side 
of government, were no less exces- 
[LE 4] sive. 
