Buonaparte could not be neutral; his nature and his surroundings forbade it. His first step was to resume his command in the volunteers, and, under pretext of inspecting their posts, to make a journey through the island; his second was to go through the form of seeking a reconciliation with Paoli. Corsican historians, in their eagerness to appropriate the greatness of both Paoli and Napoleon, habitually misrepresent their relations. At this time each was playing for his own hand, the elder exclusively for Corsica's advantage as he saw it; the younger was more ambitious personally, although he was beginning to see that in the course of the Revolution Corsica would secure more complete autonomy as a French department than in any other way. It is not at all clear that as late as this time Paoli was eager for Napoleon's assistance nor the latter for Paoli's support. The complete breach came soon and lasted until, when their views no longer clashed, they both spoke generously one of the other. In the clubs, among his friends and subordinates at the various military stations, Napoleon's talk was loud and imperious, his manner haughty and assuming. A letter written by him at the time to Costa, then lieutenant in the militia and a thorough Corsican, explains that the writer is detained from going to Bonifacio by an order from the general (Paoli) to come to Corte; he will, however, hasten to his post at the head of the volunteers on the very next day, and there will be an end to all disorder and irregularity. "Greet our friends, and assure them of my desire to further their interests." The epistle was written in Italian, but that fact signifies little in comparison with the new tone used in speaking about France: "The enemy has abandoned Verdun and Longwy, and recrossed the river to return home, but our people are not asleep." Lucien added a postscript explaining that he had sent a pamphlet to his dear Costa, as to a friend, not as to a co-worker, for that he had been unwilling to be. Both the brothers seem already to have considered the possibility of abandoning Corsica.