nia, and of the Noric Alps, innumerable victims of the flames of war! fay who has been the most ardent inftigator of this deftructive conteft, in which have been facrificed more than a million of men, in which treasures immenfe have been diffipated, which even at this time of peace leaves to the eye, on the fields of victory, the view only of general mifery, univerfal melancholy, and extenfive defpair. It is in thefe circumftances that the cabinet of St. James's avows to afflicted Europe that it alone has felt nothing of thefe frightful difafters. Liften to the fpeech. delivered from the throne; " Our revenues," fays the King, "have continued highly productive, our national industry has been extended, and our commerce has furpaffed its former limits." If the King of England has told the truth, powers of Europe, to you is not this a terrible leffon? What then, is that government interested in your diforders, which alone collects the fruits of them, which is nourished by your calamities, profpers by your diftreffes, accumulates in its treafures the tears and the blood of the people, and fattens upon their plunder? It is evident that that cabinet fhould with for war, fince by war it is enriched. It is however that government which in its new manifeftoes, and in fimilar fpeeches, dares to accufe France of infatiable avarice! It is not faid, that the English, first devaftators of St. Domingo, have taken the colonies of Holland without ftriking a blow, have taken them from Holland their ally; and the King of England fpeaks to Europe of the ambition of France! But the principles of the French towards other nations are at this time too manifeft to be obfcured by vague allegations. If the French republic takes the limits the has received from nature, if the repairs in this refpect the faults of the monarchy, the difdains conquefts foreign to that great object; fhe neither oppreffes fecondary flates nor weak powers; the never thinks of defpoiling her allies; fhe is faithful to her friends; the punishes her enemies, but without hating them: naturally generous, the does not even hate the English nation. Never in France fhall any minifter be admired on account of his hatred of the Englith people; but every one in France is agreed in one point, in remembering what palled at Toulon, at Dunkirk, at Quiberon, at La Vendée; they deteft, they execrate the cruelty, the perfidy, the fanguinary machiavelifm of the British minifter; and they at the fame time deplore the unaccountable blindnefs of the English in fuffering themfelves to be made the horror of the world. The great nation will avenge the univerfe; and to enfure fuccefs, more than one means, Frenchmen, prefent themselves to You: the most important, and the moft fpeedy is, a defcent on England. Unexpected fuccefs has taught you to difregard all ob G 2 ftacles. ftacles. In fuch enterprises, the name alone of the armies promifes a triumph, and the juftice of the caufe guarantees it. We do not now boaft of plans of defcent, while we difcufs the means. In the fituation in which France now is, her will is victory. Thus the army of England proceeds to dictate a peace in London! and there, alfo, republicans, you will find auxilia ries. There alfo you will find many men whom reason has not fo much abandoned as to render them infenfible of the odium due to their government under the English name. There alfo you will find thousands of generous men who long ftruggled to obtain a parliamentary reform: there alfo you will find a multitude of manufacturers who figh for peace, whom the prolongation of the war has reduced to mifery, and who weigh in the balance against their real wants the gaudy deception of royal harangue, the illu fions of manifeftoes, and the chimera of conquefts. There alfo you will find the Irish nation, fo long oppreffed, and that bears reluctantly the chains of a court which is fupported by its produce, while it drinks its blood and infults its defpair. Proceed under thefe aufpices, brave republicans, to fecond the national and unanimous with: conducted by the hero who has fo ⚫ often shown you the way to victory, you will have with you the wishes of all the virtuous and the just who exift in the world. Proceed then, and re-establish the liberty of the feas; confine to its just limits the inordinate ambition of that government which disturbs its own country as it does the univerfe. Secure the repofe of the French republic and of the universe, Such is the great object which still remains for you to accomplish. Now that the British government, viewing coolly, and with a ferocious fmile, the difafters of the continent, boasts of its opulence, make it discharge agreeably to juftice its thare of the expenfes of the war, which it alone wishes to eternize, and which it knows it could terminate by fpeaking to the French republic in language that could be liftened to, and be believed fincere. Citizens, you will recognife your own fentiments in the expofition of thofe of the Executive Directory. The fame spirit animates your faithful reprefentatives. In vain the cabinet of London exhausts all its efforts to fow among them diftrust and discord. The 18th of Fructidor has deftroyed their influence, and fince that day the members of the Councils and the Directory prefent the pleafing fpectacle of the most intimate union. All patriots have only the fame interefts. There is in the republic but one opinion and one with, and war to the cabinet of St. James's is the cry of France. How much glory is promifed to the army of England! It is fufficient to point it out to it. To inflame our warriors with invincible enthusiasm, it is only neceffary to remind them of what they have already done. The walls of the ftrongeft fortreffes have been levelled before them; the greatest generals have not been able to refift them. They have taken prifoners Bender at Luxembourg, and Wurmfer at Mantua. They made the threecoloured ftandard wave on the banks of the Rhine, and on the hores of the Ægean fea. After fo many victories, what words. can add any thing to the ardour of French foldiers? It is fufficient for them to hear the voice of the country, and to remember their own exploits. The Executive Directory refolve that this proclamation shall be printed, pofted up, and folemnly read in all the communes of the republic, and to all the divifions of the armies, whether by fea or by land. It fhall be inferted in the bulletin of the laws. The minifters of the Interior, of war, and of the marine and the colonies, fhall render an account to the Executive Directory of its publication. L. M. REVEILLIERE LEPAUX, Prefident. Proclamation of Citizen Rudler. CITIZEN Rudler, commiffioner of the French government in the conquered countries between the Meufe and the Rhine, and the Rhine and the Mofelle, to the inhabitants of the conquered countries: The French republic fights and fubdues her enemies, but the does not make an unworthy ufe of her victories. The princes, coalefced against her liberty and conftitution, have been prefumptuous enough to conceive hopes of fubjugating her. She took up arms, fubdued them, and now contents herself in, fecuring her tranquillity by bounding her territory within those limits which have been traced by nature. She only wishes to make the people fhe has conquered forget the calamities infeparable from war, and indulge them gradually in a participation of all thofe rights which her own children enjoy. Such are the beneficent wishes of France with refpect to you, inhabitants of thofe countries furrounded by the waters of the Rhine, the Meufe, and the Mofelle; and fuch is the will of its government. The cellation of hoftilities affords it an opportunity of ameliorating your lot: and it charges me, in its tender anxiety for your welfare, to make you participate in the protection of thofe laws which govern the French, and which are to fecure your happiness. My heart tenderly fympathizes in this honourable miffion; and if I can form any judgment from the mildness of your manners, and the love of liberty, for which you are diftinguifhed, the fuccefs of my exertions will be fpeedy and fatisfactory.-A territorial divifion, favourable to the fubject, and indifpenfable in itfelf, will be my first operation.-The administrative and judiciary code established eftablished in the next place among you, will give birth to a harmony which would otherwife be incompatible with the variety of your fenates, councils, regencies, and your innumerable jurifdictions. Every thing appertaining to flavery is fuppreffed, and the effects of this fuppreflion will be directed by fucceffive and particular regulations. Thus you will enjoy, under this new fyftem, all the dignity of your existence. You will be accountable to God alone for your religious opinions, and your civit rights will be independent of them. Whatever they may be, they will be indifcriminately tolerated, equally protected, and he alone will be deemed guilty who fhall pervert them for the purpofe of deftroying the general harmony, and troubling the peace of fociety. The fixth year will be memorable for thefe countries, which have been freed from the oppreflive weight of all thofe privileges invented by the pride of thofe who called themfelves your lords and mafters. You will also be rescued, from the day on which it began, from thofe tithes which fwallowed up a great part of the fruit of your labours, and from thofe rights which the ufurping fpirit of the feudal fyftem had created. They are profcribed, and fhall no longer be exacted from you. A paternal administration, with powers diftinct from those of courts of judicature, will extend its benign influence to you. Juftices of peace will afford you the benefit of conciliatory measures, before you may be compelled to enter into the litigations of courts of law. The law, inflexible in its operation, will never moleft the innoThe prefent circumftances prevent me from electing your adminiftrators and judges, but be affured that I fhall make choice of the most upright and the most enlightened among you. I will affociate with them, Frenchmen, who, being their elders in the family of freemen, will prove to them fafe and neceffary guides, Should any perfons I may choofe, prove unfit for their offices, I fhall be ever ready to attend to complaints against them; but I fhall repel with indignation every fpecies of calumny, and every denunciation which may be directed to the degradation of the conftituted authorities. You may perceive, citizens, by this flight fketch, the great advantages which you are to derive from your new organization, for effecting which, I labour with all the zeal with which my duty, your wants, and your happy inclinations infpire me. Shut your ears againft the enemies of your profperity, who would feek to fow the feeds of divifion among you. Receive and follow with one common fentiment the regulations which I am commiffioned to eftablifh among you, and the dawn of your happinefs will thine with refplendent brilliancy. Bonn, December 11, in the fixth Year RUDLER. of the French Republic Buonaparte Buonaparte to the Prefident of the Executive Directory. Paris, 3 Nivofe (23 Dec.), 1797. HAVE the honour to fend you, Citizen Prefident, the copy of a letter which I have received from the Dey of Tunis, with the names of eighteen Frenchmen whom he has fet at liberty. While I was in Italy, I took every opportunity of testifying to our good friends the Turks, marks of the friendship which the French republic entertains for them. The provifional government of the Ligurian republic has given liberty to all the Turkish flaves, which were employed in the Genoefe gallies, and fent them to their country. Since we have been in poffeffion of the different iflands of the Ionian fea, we have received on the part of the Ali, the Pacha of Janina, the Pacha of Scutaria, the Turks of the Morea, and even on the part of the Divan, not only a kind welcome, but they have, upon every occafion, taken a pleasure in fhowing to us the particular efteem which they have for Frenchmen. Our ambaffador, Aubert-Dubayet, had no fooner informed the Sublime Porte that our troops were at Corfou, Zante, Cephalonia, &c. than that government fent large cargoes of corn for their fupport. Our Levant trade will now find a fecure protection from the new poffeffions which we have acquired, and our merchants will hereafter be received by the fubjects of the Ottoman Porte with a peculiar predilection. (Signed) BUONAPARTE. Hamuda, Pacha, Dey, Prince of Princes, and Lord of the wellguarded Town of Tunis, to General Buonaparte, the mighty Warrior of the French Republic, Health, and Length of Days! WITH the voice of friendfhip I inform you, that the eight Muffulmans who were on board a prize belonging to our odgiak (regency), which contrary winds drove on the coalt of Leghorn, where they were made flaves, and who were fent to us by your order, have arrived fafe, and filled our breasts with the moft lively joy. If fuch an accident fhould occur again, I have no doubt that your benevolent attention will be exercifed in the fame manner, for which I fhall always entertain the warmeft gratitude. Your conful who refides here has alfo informed me, that the agent of the French republic at Leghorn has received orders to provide for the fubfiftence of eighteen flaves, and to fend them to us. Το |