From Malta—­where he left a detachment of troops to guard an acquisition which he expected to find eminently useful in his future communications with France—­Buonaparte steered eastwards; but, after some days, ran upon the coast of Candia to take in water and fresh provisions, and, by thus casually diverging from his course, escaped imminent danger.  For Nelson, soon returning to Toulon, missed the shipping which had so lately crowded the harbour, and ascertaining that they had not sailed towards the Atlantic, divined on the instant that their mark must be Egypt.  His fleet was inferior in numbers, but he pursued without hesitation; and taking the straight line, arrived off the Nile before any of the French ships had appeared there.  Buonaparte, on hearing off Candia that the English fleet was already in the Levant, directed Admiral Brueyes to steer not for Alexandria, but for a more northerly point of the coast of Africa.  Nelson, on the other hand, not finding the enemy where he had expected, turned back and traversed the sea in quest of him, to Rhodes—­and thence to Syracuse.  It is supposed that on the 20th of June the fleets almost touched each other; but that the thickness of the haze, and Nelson’s want of frigates, prevented an encounter.  Napoleon, reconnoitring the coast, ascertained that there was no longer any fleet off Alexandria, and in effect reached his destination undisturbed on the 1st of July.  At that moment a strange sail appeared on the verge of the horizon.  “Fortune,” exclaimed he, “I ask but six hours more—­wilt thou refuse them?” The vessel proved not to be English; and the disembarkation immediately took place, in spite of a violent gale and a tremendous surf.  The Admiral Brueyes in vain endeavoured to persuade Buonaparte to remain on board until the weather should be more calm.  He sternly refused, and landed at Marabout, three leagues to the eastward of Alexandria, about one in the morning of the 2nd July—­having lost many by drowning.

Egypt, a province of the Ottoman empire, then at peace with France, was of course wholly unprepared for this invasion.  The Turks, however, mustered what force they could, and, shutting the gates of the city, held out—­until a division, headed by Napoleon in person, forced their way, at three in the morning, through the old crumbling walls, and it was no longer possible to resist at once superior numbers and European discipline.  Two hundred French died in the assault; the Turkish loss was much greater:  and, if we are to believe almost all who have written concerning this part of his history, Buonaparte, after taking possession, abandoned the place for three hours to the unbridled licence of military execution and rapine—­an atrocity for which, if it really occurred, there could have been only one pretext; namely, the urgent necessity of striking awe and terror into the hearts of the population, and so preventing them from obeying the call of their military chieftains, to take arms in defence of the soil.  De Bourienne and Berthier, however, wholly deny this story.