RETURN TO FRANCE. 75 
frail boat, and that Pichegru, being arrested by Auge- 
reau, was expecting to be taken back-to one of the pris- 
ons in Paris. Carnot was still at Nyon when Bonaparte, 
returning from Italy, passed through that little town on 
his way to Rastadt. Like all the other inhabitants, he 
illuminated his windows to do homage to the general. 
If the plan that I have proposed to myself were to 
allow me at present to speak of Carnot’s rare and sin- 
cere modesty, I hope his little illumination at Nyon 
would not be opposed to me. When he placed two 
candles in his window, in honour of victories to which 
he had contributed by his orders, or at least, by his 
counsels, Carnot proscribed, Carnot labouring under the 
menace of a forced journey back to Paris, and then of 
exile in the deserts of Guyana, must certainly have 
been agitated by far different sentiments; nor can we 
presume that pride showed itself in any of them. 
18TH BRUMAIRE.—RETURN OF CARNOT TO FRANCE.— 
HIS NOMINATION TO BE MINISTER OF WAR.—HIS 
DISMISSAL.—HIS APPOINTMENT TO THE TRIBUNATE. 
During upwards of two years, Carnot had disappeared 
from the arena of politics ; during upwards of two years 
he had lived at Augsbourg under a feigned name, ex- 
clusively occupied in the cultivation of the sciences and 
of literature, when General Bonaparte returned from 
Egypt, and with a breath reversed the 18th Brumaire, 
a government that had never been able to take root in 
the country. One of his first acts was his recalling the 
illustrious exile, and nominating him to be Minister of 
War. The enemy was then at our gates. Carnot did 
not hesitate to accept ; but a few months after, when the 
immortal victories of Marengo and of Hohenlinden had 
