Other overtures made by Bonaparte were more effective. True to his plan of dividing his enemies, he appealed to the clergy to end the civil strife. The appeal struck home to the heart or the ambitions of a cleric named Bernier. This man was but a village priest of La Vendée: yet his natural abilities gained him an ascendancy in the councils of the insurgents, which the First Consul was now victoriously to exploit. Whatever may have been Bernier's motives, he certainly acted with some duplicity. Without forewarning Cadoudal, Bourmont, Frotté, and other royalist leaders, he secretly persuaded the less combative leaders to accept the First Consul's terms; and a pacification was arranged (January 18th), In vain did Cadoudal rage against this treachery: in vain did he strive to break the armistice. Frotté in Normandy was the last to capitulate and the first to feel Bonaparte's vengeance: on a trumped-up charge of treachery he was hurried before a court-martial and shot. An order was sent from Paris for his pardon; but a letter which Bonaparte wrote to Brune on the day of the execution contains the ominous phrase: _By this time Frotté ought to be shot_; and a recently published letter to Hédouville expresses the belief that _the punishment of that desperate leader will doubtless contribute to the complete pacification of the West_.[135] In the hope of gaining over the Chouans, Bonaparte required their chiefs to come to Paris, where they received the greatest consideration. In Bernier the priest, Bonaparte discerned diplomatic gifts of a high order, which were soon to be tested in a far more important negotiation. The nobles, too, received flattering attentions which touched their pride and assured their future insignificance. Among them was Count Bourmont, the Judas of the Waterloo campaign. In contrast with the priest and the nobles, Georges Cadoudal stood firm as a rock. That suave tongue spoke to him of glory, honour, and the fatherland: he heeded it not, for he knew it had ordered the death of Frotté. There stood these fighters alone, face to face, types of the north and south, of past and present, fiercest and toughest of living men, their stern wills racked in wrestle for two hours. But southern craft was foiled by Breton steadfastness, and Georges went his way unshamed. Once outside the palace, his only words to his friend, Hyde de Neuville, were: "What a mind I had to strangle him in these arms!" Shadowed by Bonaparte's spies, and hearing that he was to be arrested, he fled to England; and Normandy and Brittany enjoyed the semblance of peace.[136]