Pichegru might now be regarded as chief of the Royal party. He was an able and successful general, to whom France owed the conquest of Holland. Like La Fayette and Dumouriez, he had been disgusted with the conduct of the Revolution; and like the last of the two generals named, had opened a communication with the Bourbons. He was accused of having suffered his army to be betrayed in a defeat by Clairfait; and the government, in 1796, removed him from the command of the army of the Sambre and Meuse, offering him in exchange the situation of ambassador to Sweden. He declined this species of honourable exile, and, retiring to Franche Compté, continued his correspondence with the Imperial generals.[318] The Royalists expected much from the countenance of a military man of a name so imposing; but we have seen more than once in the course of these memoirs, that a general without an army is like a hilt without the blade which it should wield and direct. An opportunity, however, offered Pichegru the means of serving his party in a civil capacity, and that a most important one. The elections of May, 1797, made to replace that proportion of the councils which retired by rotation, terminated generally in favour of the Royalists, and served plainly to show on which side the balance of popular feeling now leaned. Pichegru, who had been returned as one of the deputies, was chosen by acclamation President of the Council of Five Hundred, and Barbé Marbois, another Royalist, was elected to the same office by the Council of Ancients, while, as we have already said, Barthelemy likewise friendly to monarchy, was introduced into the Directory. These elections were evil signs for the Directory, who did not fail soon to be attacked on every side, and upbraided with the continuance of the war and the financial distresses. Various journals were at the disposal of the party opposed to the majority of the directors, and hostilities were commenced between the parties, both in the assemblies, where the Royalists had the advantage, and in the public papers, where they were also favourably listened to. The French are of an impatient temper, and could not be long brought to carry on their warfare within the limits assigned by the constitution. Each party, without much regard to the state of the law, looked about for the means of physical force with which they might arm themselves. The Directory, (that is, the majority of that body,) sensible of their unpopularity, and the predominance of the opposite party, which seemed for a time to have succeeded to the boldness and audacity of the revolutionary class had, in their agony of extremity, recourse to the army, and threw themselves upon the succour of Hoche and of Buonaparte.