A crisis therefore rapidly developed between the still Jacobinical Directory and the two legislative Councils, in each of which the royalists, or moderates, had the upper hand.

The aim of this majority was to strengthen the royalist elements in France by the repeal of many revolutionary laws.

Their man of action was Pichegru, the conqueror of Holland, who, abjuring Jacobinism, now schemed with a club of royalists, which met at Clichy, on the outskirts of Paris.

That their intrigues aimed at the restoration of the Bourbons had recently been proved.

The French agents in Venice seized the Comte d'Entraigues, the confidante of the _soi-disant_ Louis XVIII.; and his papers, when opened by Bonaparte, Clarke, and Berthier at Montebello, proved that there was a conspiracy in France for the recall of the Bourbons.