In ordinary cases, the man who at thirty-five years of age has attained no higher rank than that of common soldier, would be accounted sanguine indeed if he looked for success in that profession. But Augereau, though not blessed with any great powers of penetration, could not but perceive that a great struggle between France and the old governments of Europe was at hand, and he resolved to act a conspicuous part in it. He had soon various opportunities of exhibiting that daring intrepidity which ever afterwards characterized his career. All that he wished to know was, where is the enemy? He cared not for superiority of numbers on the opposite side, or for disadvantage of position on his own; like a furious bull he rushed headlong on the danger. Hence he acquired what he so ardently sighed for -- distinction, and its unfailing rewards. His promotion was rapid beyond all precedent: in 1794 he was brigadier-general, and in two years more, general of division! To have risen, in the short space of four years, from the lowest to almost the highest rank, must have implied both extraordinary merit and unparalleled good fortune.

To enumerate all the valiant deeds of General Augereau, after his joining the army of Italy, in 1796, would be a mere catalogue of successes, the uniformity of which was broken by two or three trifling reverses only; we can, but briefly advert to the more striking.

After a forced march of two days, his first exploit was to attack the outposts of Millesimo, to seize on the gorge which defends it; and to cut off Rovera with two thousand from the main body of the Austrians. He soon stormed the fortified camp at Ceva, carried Alba and Casale, and encountered the enemy strongly entrenched at the bridge of Lodi, the passage of which was defended by a murderous fire. With some other officers he rushed forwards; the troops followed, and the retrenchments were carried. The officers who commanded his rear having sustained a repulse, he assailed the position of Castiglione with the desperation of one resolved to wipe out the disgrace or die. After a sanguinary struggle he succeeded; and in course of time the name of the place where this advantage was gained gave him his ducal title. He took Primolano, Cavelo, Porto Legagno, Fort St. George, and constrained a strong column of the Austrians to a ruinous retreat on Bassano. The last of his exploits in this short but memorable campaign was at the battle of Arcola. Perceiving that the French columns were giving way before the tremendous artillery of the enemy, he snatched an ensign from the bearer, raised it on high, advanced, constrained the men by his example, and thereby contributed essentially to the victory of Napoleon.

His bravery, great as it was, was eclipsed and sullied by his shameless avarice. He amassed immense riches in this campaign; not the least part at Lugo, a town he had mercilessly abandoned to a three hours' pillage. His insatiate thirst for gold was such, that it passed into a proverb even in an army of plunderers. If a soldier was poor, he was often told by his comrade, "Thou hast not the poker of Augereau!" an expression significantly denoting the diligence with which our general raked every comer for hidden treasure. In many respects, we fear, he must be held as one of the greatest ruffians of the revolution. He robbed churches with as much indifference as private houses; and has at least been reproached with the more serious charge of violating helpless innocence. That many excesses were committed at Lugo, during the sack of that unfortunate town, is certain; but for the sake of humanity we are unwilling to believe that "wives and daughters were violated" before the faces of their husbands and fathers, with the express sanction of this general."

1797.] At the commencement of this year, Augereau was dispatched by Buonaparte to Paris, under the pretext of laying before the government the numerous trophies won before the fall of Mantua, but in reality to assist the majority of the directors in their secret project of getting rid of their two colleagues. His fame as a soldier was deservedly high; he had been very honourably mentioned in the letters of the commander-in-chief; and the directors received him with marked distinction. They had need of a bold, devoted man, -- one more zealous than enlightened; such a one they found in this fearless, unscrupulous soldier, who was ready to serve "the powers that be in any way, or every way, provided he had any prospect of finding his own account in it; and they were the more willing to make him their instrument, from a persuasion that the obtusity of his understanding would prevent him from aspiring to an authority, the face of which he was so materially to change.

The situation of the general was one which required extreme caution, since the divulging of his design would have inevitably led to its frustration. An indefinite sort of suspicion already existed that some change was contemplated, -- and this acquired strength on his being appointed to the command of the troops in the capital. Every eye was now fixed on him, and every method used to extort some confession from him. One of the Council of Ancients took occasion to flatter him in presence of the assembly; -- hazarded some suppositions as to the intentions of the government; -- expressed something like apprehension for the capital, but was convinced that so patriotic an officer would attempt nothing to its injury. This was artful enough, but it elicited nothing from the cunning soldier beyond the blunt assurance, "Paris has nothing to fear from me; I am a Paris boy myself!" -- On the appointed day (the 18th Fructidor) at the head of an armed force he entered the hall of the legislative body, tore the epaulets from the shoulders of a distinguished but obnoxious officer, arrested Pichegru and about one hundred and fifty other deputies, and decimated the assembly! By the victor party he was proclaimed the saviour of his country, but he expected a more substantial recompense, -- the place of one of the directors thus forcibly expelled. His employers now found that, however deficient he might be in general talent, he had both address and ambition. They refused to admit him into their body: he remonstrated, and even threatened them. They were alarmed; but happily for them he was at length prevailed on to assume the command of the Army of the Rhine and Moselle.

In this honourable but inactive capacity, Augereau displayed great pomp in his style of living, and still more in his dress and equipage. The contrast between this splendour and the vulgarity of his manners and habits was striking, and bordering on the ludicrous. Even here the directors were afraid of him; they had heard an absurd report of his intention to revolutionize Suabia, and they were anxious to remove him quietly from a post in which he might seriously annoy them. They named him Commandant of the Tenth Division (at Perpignon), on the pretence that he was to head an expedition destined for Portugal. Thus the Fructidor-general--the name by which he was hereafter designated -- was duped by the very men whose odious instrument he had been.

1799.] The department of the Upper Garonne having returned him to the Council of Five Hundred, he abandoned his useless command, and hastened to Paris to exercise his new functions. Buonaparte soon arrived from Egypt; Jourdan proposed his famous resolution, -- "The country is in danger;" and Augereau seconded him; nor did he appear at the entertainment given to the hero of Italy and Egypt in the church of St. Sulpice. But Jourdan proved to be powerless; even Bernadotte was silent; Murat, Lannes, Berthier, Lefebre, Bessières, and nearly all the great generals of the army of Italy, rallied round their old chief; and Augereau began to think he had been somewhat indiscreet. Not a moment was to be lost; away he posted to Buonaparte, embraced him, and said, in a tone of tender reproach, "What! could you forget your own little Augereau?"

The general was rewarded for his seasonable conversion by several important commands, and after the establishment of the empire, by a marshal's truncheon and a ducal title. In 1805 he distinguished himself against Austria; in 1806, against Prussia. He added much to his reputation at the battle of Jena, where he exhibited not only the animal courage which had borne him triumphant over so many fields, but an ability in his movements for which no one was prepared. At the dreadful struggle at Eylau he performed an act of heroism which reminds us of the days of chivalry. When the battle commenced, he was seriously indisposed by a fever, and unable to sit in an upright posture. He called his servants, ordered them to place him on horseback, and bind him fast to the saddle ; he assembled his corps, and was soon engaged in the thickest of the fight! He was wounded in the arm, and compelled to fall back; his men were in consequence thrown into disorder, and suffered severely. No allowance was made for his enfeebled condition of body, no praise awarded for his unparalleled efforts, -- nay, he was censured by the emperor because his corps was defeated. The chief, whose banners conquest had hitherto favoured, was enraged at the indecisive result of the day, and wreaked his spleen on Augereau, who returned home in disgrace.

The Marshal Duke of Castiglione was long in fully recovering his master's favour. In 1809, however, he superseded St. Cyr in the siege of Gerona, which he took after an obstinate resistance. But near Barcelona he received a check, and was recalled. More than two years, of mortifying inactivity ensued. During the Russian expedition, he was stationed with the Eleventh Corps at Berlin; but throughout the Saxon campaign, and especially at Leipsic, he greatly distinguished himself. He was next entrusted with the defence of Lyons -- a post of the highest importance: "Remember your former victories, and forget that you are on the wrong side of fifty!" was Napoleon's injunction. For a time he did his duty: he forced the Austrian General Bubna to retreat on Geneva; but Augereau in his turn gave way before the superior forces of Bianchi and the Prince of Hesse Homburg; and forty-five thousand of the enemy pursued him to the gates of Lyons.

We have already seen one notable instance of the facility with which "the Fructidor general" could change sides. He now announced his resolution to defend Lyons to the last drop of his blood; and addressed a proclamation to the soldiers and inhabitants, exhorting them to resist to the uttermost, and professing the strongest devotion to Napoleon. But events hurried onwards with unexpected rapidity: the imperial fortunes grew darker every hour; and the marshal's part was taken He surrendered Lyons, which he might have defended for many months, if not years. He did more: he retired to Valence, where he addressed his troops in behalf of Louis XVIII. -- "the true heir of Henry IV., and the object of every Frenchman's affection!" As for the fallen emperor, he was "an odious despot, of whom all France was glad to be rid, -- a mean coward, who had feared to die as became a soldier!"

Soon after this, the Fructidor general and the exemperor accidentally met near Valence, as the latter was on his route to Elba. They embraced, the former with evident constraint, the latter with cold dignity. "Art thou going to court?" demanded Napoleon. "What a stupid proclamation is thine! Why abuse me? Couldst thou not have simply said, that, as the nation had pronounced in favour of the new sovereign, the duty of the army was to follow the example, and cry vive Louis XVIII.?" The marshal in reply accused his old master of tyranny, and of an ambition ruinous to France; he then turned his back on the fallen chief, and walked away. Such was the taste and feeling of "the Fructidor general."

Augereau hastened to Paris to receive his reward; and was presented with the cross of St. Louis. Impatient to reach higher favours, he surprised the faithful by presiding at the funeral service celebrated in memory of Louis XVI.; and was on this created a peer of France. In July, being present at an entertainment given by the troops of the garrison to the National Guard of Lyons, Augereau proposed the health of "Louis XVIII., our beloved king and father;" and he was speedily appointed commandant of the Fourteenth Division in Normandy.

This loyalist was with his division in Normandy when news arrived of the disembarkation of Cannes; and in two of Napoleon's proclamations he found himself openly designated as a traitor. The duke did not reply; he had once committed himself with respect to the Directory, and he resolved to watch the progress of events. When the arrival of Napoleon in Paris removed all doubt, he thought it high time to address his soldiers: "The emperor is in his capital! That name, so long the pledge of victory, has alone sufficed to disperse his enemies. For a moment fortune was faithless to him: influenced by the noblest of illusions, the happiness of his country, he believed the sacrifice of his glory and crown a duty to France. His rights are imprescriptible, and he comes to reclaim them: never were they more sacred. March once more under the victorious wings of those immortal eagles which have so often conducted you to glory." The emperor, however, would no longer trust one who, within a few short months, had betrayed two masters, and on both occasions with an effrontery that created a sensation, even at that period of unblushing apostacy. Obtaining neither a command in the army, nor a seat in the Chamber of Peers, Augereau was compelled to retire into the country; and there he remained until the second restoration of Louis, of whose cause he announced himself once more the fervent partisan. But the king had no ear for his protestations; and, equally the object of scorn and laughter, he again fled to his country-seat, where he remained until his death, June 12, 1816.

In the military career of this marshal we have found little to praise beyond fiery and indomitable courage; and his private character appears to have been, in every point of view, detestable.