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"How could you suppose," said he, "that a man of any talent and honour could resign himself to the part of fattening like a hog, on a few millions a year?" From that moment it was not again mentioned; Roger Ducos, and the greater part of the committee, declared in favour of Bonaparte; and Sieyes, who hated discussion, was either unwilling or unable to defend his ideas.
Just then the usher entered, and said: "General Moulins is at my heels; citizen Barras is in his bath, and will soon be here; citizens Sieyes and Ducos went out at five o'clock this morning, and have not yet returned." "They are the two traitors!" said Gohier; "Barras is only their dupe." Then kissing his wife, he added: "Now, go."
"'Paul Ducos, son of Eugène Ducos, formerly calling himself Count Ducos de la Brèche "'Down with the Royalists!
Well, they sent Mayer to the galleys at Toulon first; then, among the worst of the prisoners here he was too bold, too full of speech; he had not Laflamme's gift of silence, of pathos. Mayer works coarsely, severely here; Laflamme grows his vegetables, idles about Ducos, swings in his hammock, and appears at inspections the picture of docility.
The measures were found to be the deposition of the Directory, the expulsion of sixty-one members from the Councils, the nomination of Sieyès, Roger Ducos, and Bonaparte as provisional Consuls and the adjournment of the Councils for four months.
Accordingly, immediately after his installation at the Luxembourg he notified to all the foreign powers his accession to the Consulate, and, for the same purpose, addressed letters to all the diplomatic agents of the French Government abroad. The day after he got rid of his first two colleagues, Sieyes and Roger Ducos, he prepared to open negotiations with the Cabinet of London.
The new Directors were Gohier, Roger Ducos, and Moulin; the first, an elderly respectable advocate; the second, a Girondin by early associations, but a trimmer by instinct, and therefore easily gained over by Sieyès; while the recommendation of the third, Moulin, seem to have been his political nullity and some third-rate military services in the Vendéan war.
Ducos was the first to take his seat: scarcely twenty-eight years of age, his black and piercing eyes, the flexibility of his features, and the elegance of his figure revealed one of those ardent temperaments in whom everything is light, even heroism.
Then follow the names of sixty-one members expelled. By other articles of the same decree the Council instituted a provisional commission, similar to that which the Ancients had proposed to appoint, resolved that the said commission should consist of three members, who should assume the title of Consuls; and nominated as Consuls Sieyes, Roger Ducos, and Bonaparte.
In all this there is no intention to spare in Paris the chiefs of the insurrection or of the party, either deputies or ministers; on the contrary, the object is to complete the subjection of the Convention, to stifle the murmurs of the "Right," to impose silence on Ducos, Boyer-Fonfrede, Vernier, and Couhey, who still speak and protest.
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