25/32 257) takes the same view. 363) believes Napoleon was at last compelled by the Directory to start and he credits the story told by Desaix to Mathieu Dumas, or rather to the wife of that officer, that there was a plot to upset the Directory, but that when all was ready Napoleon judged that the time was not ripe. Lanfrey, however, rather enlarges what Dumas says; see Dumas, tome iii.p.167.See also the very remarkable conversation of Napoleon with Miot de Melito just before leaving Italy for Rastadt: "I cannot obey any longer. I have tasted the pleasures of command, and I cannot renounce it. |