40 
Memoirs of Napoleon. [Aug. 1 ? 
examination preparatory to being ad¬ 
mitted into tile artillery ; there were 36 
vacant places, of which he obtained one, 
and was appointed second-lieutenant 
in the regiment of La Fere. One of the 
professors of the military, charged with 
the examination, is said to have writ¬ 
ten by the side of the name of Bona¬ 
parte this testimony :—A Corsican by 
character and by birth, and if favoured 
by circumstances , this young man will 
rise high. 
In 1789, he obtained the rank of cap¬ 
tain. At the siege of Toulon, in 1793, 
he commanded the artillery, and dis¬ 
tinguished himself by his skill. In the 
years 1794 and 1795, it was to his plans 
that the republicans were indebted for 
the successes which they obtained on 
the Italian frontier ; successes which he 
himself soon after eclipsed by others 
far superior. In May, 1795,he was ap¬ 
pointed to a command in the army of 
La Vendee, which he refused to accept. 
While he was at Paris, Kellerman 
being beaten in the Genoese territory, 
Bonaparte was called on to draw up 
instructions for the army of Italy.— 
Shortly afterwards he commanded the 
army of the metropolis, which defended 
the convention, and defeated the troops 
of the sections, on the 13th of Vende- 
miaire. At the desire of the officers and 
soldiers of the army of Italy, he was 
then appointed to the command of that 
army,and this event maybe considered 
as laying the ground-work of that dis¬ 
tinguished name which he afterwards 
erected for himself, not only in his 
own armies, but on other soils than 
France. On the recommendation of 
Barras, who was much attached to him, 
he married the widow of the Viscount 
de Beauharnois. Bonaparte, at that 
time, was not more than 26 years old; 
he had never commanded an army, been 
in a regular battle, nor even assisted at 
one; but he had youth, knowledge, 
ardour, science, judgment, and acti¬ 
vity ; added to which, a high opinion 
of ’his own talents, a confidence in 
which experience proved he was not 
mistaken. 
The army opposed to him was com¬ 
posed of Austrians, Sardinians, and Ne¬ 
apolitans ; it consisted of 60,000 men, 
commanded by General Beaulieu. Af¬ 
ter having defeated the enemy, at Mil- 
lesimo, Dego, Montenotte, and other 
places, he cont rived, in a masterly man¬ 
ner, to separate the Sardinian from the 
Austrian army; and the King of Sar¬ 
dinia. finding himself without support 
after he had lost the battle of Mondovi, 
signed a treaty in his own capital. The 
Austrian army having no other ally 
than the King of Naples, was not in a 
situation to defend the Po nor the Adda. 
The battle of Lodi was the first san¬ 
guinary battle which called forth into 
action the superior skill and determined 
courage of this great warrior; the bra¬ 
very with which he forced the passage 
of the bridge of Lodi, will never be for¬ 
gotten. It was successful, and put him 
in possession of Lombardy, though with 
a great loss of men. 
During this time the Austrians ob¬ 
tained reinforcements, and they made 
many attempts from the side of the 
Tyrol and the Venetian states, to com¬ 
pel the republicans to raise the siege of 
Mantua. Bonaparte did not fail to take 
advantage of the want of skill and the 
numerous errors of his enemy, and to 
profit by them ; his central position af¬ 
forded him an opportunity of engaging 
and beating one after the other the dif¬ 
ferent corps of the opposing army under 
Generals ^Vurmser and Alvinzi. The 
battles of Castiglione and Rivoli, 
among others, gave abundant proofs of 
the tact of Bonaparte, and Mantua at 
length capitulated. In the meantime, 
the Pope, the King of Naples, and the 
minor Italian princes, had been com¬ 
pelled to make peace at the expence of 
great sacrifices. The Austrians being 
still determined to try the fortune of 
war, Bonaparte penetrated through 
Friuli into Germany, and advanced 
within thirty leagues of Vienna. He 
was, however, not seconded in time by 
the French armies ou the Rhine ; and 
the Archduke Charles, his opponent, 
having collected a large force, which 
rendered victory doubtful to the repub¬ 
licans, and defeat highly dangerous, 
Bonaparte deemed it politic to resort to 
negociation. The Austrian cabinet 
readily consented, and the result was 
the signing of the preliminaries of Leo- 
ben, on the 16th of April, 1797, which 
left the French in possession of the 
Netherlands and other conopiests, and 
established a republic in Italy. 
The treatyliad hardly been conclud¬ 
ed before he declared war against, and 
overthrew the republic of Venice, and 
took possession of its fleet, arsenals, 
treasures, and dominions. He found 
means, in the midst of these achieve¬ 
ments, to bestow some attention on the 
Cisalpine republic, which he had esta¬ 
blished at Milan. He afterwards signed 
the definitive treaty with the Austrians, 
at 
