On the 5th of March Bonaparte communicated to the government a note containing the dispositions necessary for an expedition to seize Egypt and Malta. The same day the Directory issued a number of decrees, constituting a commission on the Coast Defences of the Mediterranean, under cover of which the needed preparations were to be carried on, and defining the various steps to be taken. The ships at Toulon were required to be ready for sea on the 4th of April. Admiral Brueys, who had been unable to sail for Brest on account of want of provisions, was on February 12 ordered to Toulon. He arrived there with, his squadron on the 2d of April, and was appointed to command the naval part of the expedition, to consist of thirteen ships-of-the-line with smaller vessels. All arrangements were pushed with the greatest activity possible, though much retarded by the extreme want of naval stores, of provisions, and of money. Still greater difficulty was experienced from scarcity of sailors; the inducements offered by privateers having drawn away almost all the seamen of the republic, and landed great numbers of them in British prisons,—a sad result of the much-vaunted commerce-destroying. Through all, the pretence of invading England was maintained; and Bonaparte himself, to mislead opinion, stayed till the last moment in Paris. The Spanish fleet at Cadiz was, by the urgent demands of the Directory, made to assume positions which threatened an approaching departure, in order to fasten St. Vincent's ships to the port and foster in British minds the easily aroused fear of an invasion of Ireland. But measures so extensive could not long escape comment and suspicion. The actual intentions of the Directory were kept so impenetrably secret that, after the expedition sailed, the senior naval officer at Toulon wrote to the Minister of Marine, "I know no more of the movements of the squadron than if it did not belong to the republic;"[171] but it was not possible to conceal the patent fact that Marseille, Toulon, Genoa, Civita Vecchia, and Corsica were alive with hurried preparations for a great naval undertaking, whatever its destination might be. It was evident, therefore, that France was about to expose herself for a time upon the sea to the blows of Great Britain, and the ministry determined not to let such an opportunity slip.