It is difficult to take this quite seriously, considering that he had only 12,000 men available for these adventures; and with anyone but Bonaparte they might be dismissed as utterly Quixotic.  But in his case we must seek for some practical purpose; for he never divorced fancy from fact, and in his best days imagination was the hand-maid of politics and strategy rather than the mistress.  Probably these gorgeous visions were bodied forth so as to inspirit the soldiery and enthrall the imagination of France.  He had already proved the immense power of imagination over that susceptible people.  In one sense, his whole expedition was but a picturesque drama; and an imposing climax could now be found in the plan of an Eastern Empire, that opened up dazzling vistas of glory and veiled his figure in a grandiose mirage, beside which the civilian Directors were dwarfed into ridiculous puppets.

If these vast schemes are to be taken seriously, another explanation of them is possible, namely, that he relied on the example set by Alexander the Great, who with a small but highly-trained army had shattered the stately dominions of the East.  If Bonaparte trusted to this precedent, he erred.  True, Alexander began his enterprise with a comparatively small force:  but at least he had a sure base of operations, and his army in Thessaly was strong enough to prevent Athens from exchanging her sullen but passive hostility for an offensive that would endanger his communications by sea.  The Athenian fleet was therefore never the danger to the Macedonians that Nelson and Sir Sidney Smith were to Bonaparte.  Since the French armada weighed anchor at Toulon, Britain’s position had became vastly stronger.  Nelson was lord of the Mediterranean:  the revolt in Ireland had completely failed:  a coalition against France was being formed; and it was therefore certain that the force in Egypt could not be materially strengthened.  Bonaparte did not as yet know the full extent of his country’s danger; but the mere fact that he would have to bear the pressure of England’s naval supremacy along the Syrian coast should have dispelled any notion that he could rival the exploits of Alexander and become Emperor of the East.[112]

From conjectures about motives we turn to facts.  Setting forth early in February, the French captured most of the Turkish advanced guard at the fort of El Arisch, but sent their captives away on condition of not bearing arms against France for at least one year.  The victors then marched on Jaffa, and, in spite of a spirited defence, took it by storm (March 7th).  Flushed with their triumph over a cruel and detested foe, the soldiers were giving up the city to pillage and massacre, when two aides-de-camp promised quarter to a large body of the defenders, who had sought refuge in a large caravanserai; and their lives were grudgingly spared by the victors.  Bonaparte vehemently reproached his aides-de-camp for their ill-timed clemency.  What could he now