Note 33 — No. IX.

[The above verses refer to the memorable events of the 18th Fructidor, Sept. 4, 1797 (the model of Prince Louis Napoléon’s coup d’état, Dec. 2, 1851), when Rewbell, Barras, and Laréveillère-Lepaux, on the plea that the Republic was in danger, got rid of their fellow-directors, Carnot (grandfather to the present President of the French Republic) and Barthélemy, who were replaced by Merlin and François de Neufchateau, dispersed by military force the members of the Five Hundred and the Ancients, fifty-three of whom were condemned to transportation—banished the editors, &c., of forty-two newspapers—annulled the elections of forty-eight departments—and effected other arbitrary measures without opposition. The springs of the movement were throughout directed by Buonaparte, seconded by Hoche and Augereau. This event was the true era of the commencement of military despotism in France. But Thiers considers “the Directory by these means prevented civil war, and substituted an arbitrary but necessary act of power, carried out with energy, but with all the mildness and moderation that revolutionary times would allow”.—Ed.]