A Child's History of the WorldHillyer, V. M. (Virgil Mores)
History
A Child's History of the World
Hillyer, V. M. (Virgil Mores)
World history -- Juvenile literature
“Impossible,” Napoleon angrily replied, “is a word found only in the
dictionary of fools.” Then he shouted:
“There shall be no Alps!” and went ahead and crossed them. His army won
in Italy, and when he returned to France he was greeted by the people
as a conquering hero. But the men who were then governing France were
afraid of him. They feared he might try to make himself king because
he was so popular with the people. Napoleon, however, asked to be sent
to conquer Egypt because he had an idea he could get the better of the
English there. He thought he might then cut England off from India, the
new country that they had won in the reign of James I. England had lost
America, but she didn’t want to lose India.
The French Government was very glad to get rid of Napoleon, and so they
sent him off to Egypt as he asked. He quickly conquered Egypt as Julius
Cæsar had done, but there was no Cleopatra to upset his plans. While
he was conquering Egypt, his fleet, which was waiting for him at the
mouth of the Nile, was caught and destroyed by the English fleet under
a great admiral, if not the greatest that ever lived. His name was Lord
Nelson.
Napoleon had no way to take his army back to France. So he left his
army in Egypt under command of another. He himself, however, managed
to find a ship to take him back home. When he reached France he found
that the men who were supposed to be governing were quarreling among
themselves, and, seeing his chance, he had himself made one of three
men chosen to rule France. He was called first consul; and there were
supposed to be two assistant consuls, but the assistants were little
more than clerks to do Napoleon’s bidding. It was only a very short
time before he was next made first consul for life. Then, not long
after that, he became emperor of France and also king of Italy.
The other countries of Europe began to fear that Napoleon would conquer
them, too, and make them also a part of France. So all the other
countries joined together to beat him. Napoleon planned to conquer
England first, and he got ready a fleet to cross over to England. But
his fleet was caught off Spain near a point called Trafalgar by the
same English admiral, Lord Nelson, who had beaten him in Egypt. Before
this battle, Nelson said to his sailors, “England expects that every
man will do his duty,” and they did it. Napoleon’s fleet was utterly
destroyed, though Nelson himself was killed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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