who remained secretly in Bretagne, was dreaming there, as formerly, of an insurrection in that province. In Normandy M. de Frotté was striving to excite a rising similar to that which had taken place in La Vendée, but neither of them would have any thing to do with the Paris agents. The Prince of Condé, duped in his intrigue with Pichegru upon the Rhine, wished still to carry it on by himself, without suffering the Austrians or the Pretender to have any hand in it, and he was sorry that he had let them into the secret. To give some unity to these incoherent projects, and more especially to obtain money, the Paris agents sent one of their number into the western provinces, England, Scotland, Germany, and Switzerland. Duverne de Presle was the person selected for this mission. Being unable to deprive Puisaye of his command, they strove, by the influence of the Count d'Artois, to force him to join the system of the Paris agents, and to come to an arrangement with them. They obtained from the English the most important thing, some assistance in money. They procured powers from the Pretender, which placed all the intrigues under the direction of the Paris agency. Their messenger saw the Prince of Condé, who was not to be rendered either intelligent or manageable. He saw M. de Précy, who was still the secret promoter of the disturbances at Lyons and in the South. At last a general plan was concerted, which had no harmony or unity but upon paper, and which did not prevent every one from acting in his own way, and agreeably to his personal interests and pretensions. It was agreed that all France should be divided into two agencies, one comprising the East and the South, the other the North and the West. M. de Précy was to be at the head of the former, the Paris agents were to direct the latter. These two agencies were to arrange together all their operations, and to correspond directly with the Pretender, who was to give them his orders. Secret associations were planned on the model of those formed by Babeuf. They were to have no connexion with one another, and to be kept ignorant of the names of the chiefs, that, if one of the parties were apprehended, this circumstance might not lead to the seizure of all the conspirators. These associations were to be adapted to the state of France. As it had been observed that the greater part of the population, without desiring the return of the Bourbons, wished for order and quiet, and imputed to the Directory the continuance of the revolutionary system, a sort of masonic society was formed, called the Philanthropists, who engaged to use their electoral rights, and to exercise them in favour of men opposed to the Directory. The Philanthropists were unacquainted with the secret aim of these proceedings, and nothing was to be avowed to them but the mere intention of strengthening the opposition. Another association, more secret, more concentrated, less nume rous, and entitled the Faithful, was to be composed of those more resolute and devoted men, to whom the secret of the faction might be divulged. The Faithful were to be secretly armed and ready for any coup-de-main. They were to enrol themselves in the national guard, which was not yet organized, and under cover of that uniform, to execute the more securely the orders that should be given them. It was to be their bounden duty, independently of every plan of insurrection, to watch the elections, and if the parties should come to blows, as had been the case in Vendémiaire, to fly to the assistance of the opposition party. The Faithful were to aid moreover in concealing emigrants and priests, in forging passports, in persecuting the revolutionists and the purchasers of the national domains. These associations were to be under the direction of military chiefs, who were to correspond with the two principal agencies and to receive orders from them. Such was the new plan of the faction, a chimerical plan, which history would disdain to record, did it not make us acquainted with the dreams with which parties feast themselves in their defeats. Notwithstanding this pretended unity, the association of the South did nothing more than produce some anonymous companies, acting without direction and without aim, and following only the inspiration of revenge and plunder. Puisaye, Frotté, and Rochecot, in Bretagne and Normandy, laboured apart to make a new rising like that of Vendée, and disavowed the mixed counter-revolution of the Paris agents. Puisaye even published a manifesto, declaring that Bretagne would never second any plans which did not tend to restore by open force absolute and entire royalty to the family of Bourbon. The Prince of Condé continued on his part to correspond directly with Pichegru, whose singular and absurd conduct nothing but the embarrassment of his situation can account for. This general, the only commander recorded in history to have voluntarily suffered himself to be beaten,* had himself demanded his dismissal. This conduct must appear surprising, for it was depriving himself of all means of influence, and consequently rendering it impossible for him to accomplish his pretended designs. We shall, nevertheless, have no difficulty to comprehend it, if we examine Pichegru's position. He could not continue general, without at length putting in execution the plans which he had engaged to accomplish, and for which he had received considerable sums. Pichegru had before his eyes three examples, each very different from the others, that of Bouillé, that of La Fayette, and that of Dumouriez, which proved to him * " Pichegru, having determined in one way or other to serve his new allies and betray his country, had allowed himself to be beaten at Heidelberg, had compromised the army of Jourdan, evacuated Mannheim, raised the siege of Mayence with considerable loss, and exposed the frontier."-Mignet. E. He that it was impossible to seduce a whole army. He wished, therefore, to put it out of his power to attempt any thing; and this accounts for the offer of his resignation which the Directory did not accept at first without regret, being wholly ignorant of his treason. The Prince of Condé and his agents were extremely surprised at the conduct of Pichegru, and conceived that he had swindled them out of their money, and that in reality he had never intended to serve them. But no sooner had he relinquished the command than he returned to the banks of the Rhine, upon pretext of selling his carriages, and then proceeded into the Jura, which was his native country. Thence he continued to correspond with the agents of the prince, to whom he represented his resignation as a profound combination. should be considered, he said, as a victim of the Directory; he was going to connect himself with all the royalists of the interior and to form an immense party; his army, in the command of which he was to be succeeded by Moreau, would deeply regret him, and, on the first reverse that it should sustain, it would not fail to call for its old general and to revolt in order to obtain his reinstatement. He should take advantage of this moment to throw off the mask, hasten to his army, assume the dictatorship, and proclaim royalty. This ridiculous plan, had it been sincere, would have been thwarted by the success of Moreau, who, even during his famous retreat, had never ceased to be victorious. The Prince of Condé, the Austrian generals, to whom he had been obliged to communicate the secret, and Wickham, the English minister in Switzerland, began to believe that Pichegru had cheated them. They would have dropped the correspondence; but, at the earnest desire of the intermediate agents, who never like to have made a vain attempt, the corre→ spondence was continued, to see whether any profit was to be derived from it. It was carried on through Strasburg, by means of some spies, who crossed the Rhine, and proceeded to the Austrian general Klinglin; and through Basle with Wickham, the English minister. Pichegru staid in the Jura without refusing or accepting the embassy to Sweden, which had been offered him, but striving to get himself elected deputy, paying the agents of the prince with the most wretched promises, and continually receiving considerable sums. He held out hopes of the most important results from his nomination to the Five Hundred; he boasted of an influence which he did not possess; he pretended to be giving the Directory perfidious advice and inducing it to adopt dangerous determinations; he attributed to himself the long resistance of Kehl, which, he said, he had recommended for the purpose of compromising the army. Very little faith was placed in these pretended services. The Count de Bellegarde wrote, "We are in the situation of the gambler, who wishes to regain his money, and who goes on risking more to |