with some security, that great career of | bivouacked without bread! The phalconquest which he already meditated anxes of the Republic--the soldiers of in the Imperial dominions. Neverthe-liberty-were alone capable of such less, a large proportion of his troops sacrifices. But, soldiers! you have done and officers openly condemned the con- nothing while anything remains to do. clusion of any treaty of peace with a Neither Turin nor Milan is in your monarchical government; and insisted hands; the ashes of the conqueror of that the opportunity should not have Tarquin are still trampled on by the been suffered to escape, of establishing assassins of Basseville! I am told that a revolutionary government in the fron- there are some among you whose courtier state of Italy. But Napoleon-age is giving way-who would rather whose head was too strong to be carried return to the summits of the Alps and away by the theories of democracy, and the Apennines. No-I cannot believe who already gave indications of that it. The conquerors of Montenotte, of resolution to detach himself from the Millesimo, of Dego, of Mondovi, burn cause of revolution by which he was to carry still farther the glories of the ever after so strongly distinguished- French name!" When these succesreplied, that the first duty of the army sive victories, these standards, these was to secure a firm base for future proclamations, arrived day after day at operations; that it was on the Adige Paris, the joy of the people knew no that the French standard must be estab- bounds. The first day the gates of the lished, to protect Italy from the Impe- Alps were opened; the next, the Ausrialists; that it was impossible to ad- trians were separated from the Piedvance thus far without being secured in montese; the third, the Sardinian army their rear; that a revolutionary govern- was destroyed and the fortresses surment in Piedmont would require con- rendered. The rapidity of the success, stant assistance, scatter alarm through the number of the prisoners, exceeded Italy, and prove a source of weakness all that had yet been witnessed. Every rather than strength; whereas the Sar-one asked, who was this young hero dinian fortresses at once put the Re-whose fame had burst forth so suddenly publicans in possession of the keys of the Peninsula.

who, like Cæsar, had at once come, seen, and conquered, and whose proclamations breathed the fervour of ancient glory? Three times the Councils decreed that the Army of Italy had deserved well of their country, and appointed a fête to Victory, in honour of the commencement of the campaign.

70. At the same time he despatched to Paris his aide-de-camp, Murat, with the standards taken, and addressed to his soldiers one of those exaggerated but eloquent proclamations which, by captivating the minds of men, contributed as much as his victories to his 71. Having secured his rear by this astonishing success. "Soldiers! you advantageous treaty, Napoleon lost no have gained in fifteen days six victories, time in pursuing the discomfited retaken one-and-twenty standards, fifty-mains of Beaulieu's army, which had five pieces of cannon, many strong places, and conquered the richest part of Piedmont; you have made fifteen thousand prisoners, killed or wounded ten thousand men. Hitherto you have fought on sterile rocks, rendered illustrious, indeed, by your courage, but of no avail to your country; now you rival, by your services, the armies of the Rhine and the North. Destitute at first, you have supplied everything. You have gained battles without cannons; passed rivers without bridges; made forced marches without shoes;

retired behind the Po, in the hope of covering the Milanese territory. The forces of the Austrians were plainly now unequal to the struggle; a coupde-main, which Beaulieu attempted on the fortresses of Alessandria, Tortona, and Valence, failed, and they were immediately after surrendered to the Republicans, while the corps of Kellermann was about to be united to the army of Napoleon, and the possession, by the conclusion of the armistice, of the Col de Tende, the principal passage in that quarter from France into Italy,

now rendered disposable a reinforce- at Pavia, busily engaged in erecting ment of above twenty thousand men. fortifications, when he received intelliNapoleon, on his side, indulged the gence of the passage at Placentia. He most brilliant anticipations; and con- immediately moved forward his adfidently announced to the Directory vanced guard, consisting of three thouthat he would cross the Po, expel the sand infantry, and two thousand horse, Austrians from the Milanese territory, under General Liptay, to Fombio, a traverse the mountains of the Tyrol, small town a short distance from the unite with the army of the Rhine, and Republican posts. Napoleon, who fearcarry the war, by the valley of the ed that he might be strengthened in Danube, into the heart of the Imperial this position, and was well aware of the dominions.* danger of fighting a general battle with a great river in his rear, lost no time in advancing his forces to disloage him. D'Allemagne, at the head of the grenadiers, attacked on the right, Lanusse by the chaussée on the centre, and Lannes on the left. After a vigorous resistance, the Austrians were expelled from the town, with the loss of above a thousand men. Liptay fell back to Pizzighitone. Meanwhile, Beaulieu was advancing with the bulk of his forces; and the leading division of his army surprised General La Harpe in the night, who was killed bravely fighting at the head of his division, but not until the Austrians had been compelled to retire.

72. By inserting a clause in the treaty with the King of Sardinia, that the French army was to be at liberty to cross the Po at Valence, he completely deceived the Austrians as to the place where the passage was to be effected. The whole attention of Beaulieu having been drawn to that point, the Republican forces were rapidly moved to Placentia, and began to cross the river in boats at the latter place. Lannes was the first who effected the passage, and the other columns soon passed with such rapidity that a firm footing was obtained on the opposite bank; and two days afterwards Napoleon arrived with the bulk of his forces, and established a bridge. By this skilful march, not only the Po was passed, but the Tessino turned, as Placentia is below its junction with the former river; so that one great obstacle to the conquest of Lombardy was already removed.

74. The French troops having now entered the territory of Parma, it was of importance to establish matters on a pacific footing in their rear before pressing forward to Milan. The Grandduke had no military resources whatever; the victor, therefore, resolved to 73. Beaulieu, however, was now con- grant him terms, upon the surrender siderably reinforced, and his forces of what he had to give. He was obliged amounted to thirty-six battalions and to pay two millions of francs in silver, forty-four squadrons, besides one hun- and to furnish sixteen hundred artildred and twenty pieces of cannon-in lery-horses, of which the army stood all, nearly forty thousand men. He was much in need, besides great supplies of * Buonaparte wrote to the Directory at this corn and provisions. But on this ocperiod-" "The King of Sardinia has surrend-casion Napoleon commenced another ered at discretion, given up three of his strong

est fortresses, and the half of his dominions. If you do not choose to accept his submission, but resolve to dethrone him, you must amusé him for a few weeks, and give me warning: I will get possession of Valence, and march upon Turin. On the other hand, I shall impose a contribution of some millions on the Duke of Parma, detach twelve thousand men to Rome, as soon as I have beaten Beaulieu and driven him across the Adige, and then I am assured that you will conclude peace with the King of Sardinia, and strengthen me by the army of Kellermann. As to Genoa, by all means oblige it to pay fifteen millions."Secret Despatch to the Directory, 29th April 1796. Corres. Secrète de Napoleon, i. 103.

species of military contribution, which he has himself confessed was unparalleled in modern warfare, that of exacting from the vanquished the surrender of their most precious works of art. Parma was compelled to give up twenty of its principal paintings, among which was the celebrated St Jerome by Correggio. The duke offered a million of francs as a ransom for that inestimable work of art, which many of his officers urged the French general to accept, as of much more service to the army than

the painting; but Napoleon, whose | the Hereditary States, and make them mind was fixed on greater things, re- prisoners; but as there was not a moplied "The million which he offers ment to be lost in achieving the moveus would soon be spent ; but the pos- ments requisite to attain this object, he session of such a chef-d'œuvre at Paris resolved to force the bridge, and thus will adorn that capital for ages, and give get into their rear. He himself arrived birth to similar exertions of genius." at Lodi, at the head of the grenadiers of d'Allemagne; upon which the Austrians withdrew from the town, and crossed the river, drawing up their infantry, with twenty pieces of cannon, at the further extremity of the bridge, to defend the passage. Napoleon immediately directed Beaumont, with all the cavalry of the army, to pass at a ford half a league farther up; while he himself directed all the artillery which had arrived against the Austrian battery, and formed six thousand grenadiers in close column, under cover of the houses at his own end of the bridge. No sooner did he perceive that the discharge of the Austrian artillery was beginning to slacken, from the effect of the French fire, and that the passage of the cavalry on their flank had commenced, than, addressing a few animating words to his soldiers, he gave the signal to advance. The grenadiers pushed on in double-quick time, through a cloud of smoke, over the long and narrow defile of the bridge. The terrible storm of grape-shot for a little arrested their progress; the front ranks were entirely swept away; but those in rear, finding themselves supported by a cloud of tirailleurs, who waded the stream below the arches, and led with heroic courage by their general, soon recovered, and, rushing forward with resistless fury, carried the Austrian guns, and drove back their infantry. Had the French cavalry been ready to profit by the confusion, the whole corps of the Imperialists would have been destroyed; but, as it had not yet come up, their numerous squadrons protected the retreat of the infantry, who retired with the loss of two thousand men, and twenty pieces of cannon. The loss of the victors was at least as great. The object of this bold measure was indeed lost, for the Austrians, whom it had been intended to cut off, had meanwhile gained the chaussée of Brescia, and made good their retreat; but it contributed greatly to

75. Thus commenced the system of seizing the great works of art in the conquered states, which the French generals afterwards carried to such a height, and which finally produced the noble gallery of the Louvre. The French have since had good reason to congratulate themselves that the Allies did not follow their bad example; and that, on occasion of the second capture of Paris, their victors had the generosity to content themselves with enforcing restitution of the abstracted spoils, without, like them, compelling the surrender of those that had been legitimately acquired. Certainly, it is impossible to condemn too strongly a use of the powers of conquest, which extends the ravages of war into the peaceful domain of the fine arts; which transplants the monuments of genius from the regions where they have arisen, and where their value is appreciated, to those where they are exotics, and their merit is probably little understood; which renders them, instead of being the proud legacy of genius to mankind, the mere trophy of a victor's glory; which exposes them to be tossed about by the tide of conquest, and subjected to irreparable injury in following the fleeting career of success; and converts works, destined to elevate and captivate the human race, into the subject of angry contention. and the badge of temporary subjugation. 76. On the 8th, Napoleon marched towards Milan; but, before proceeding to that city, he required to drive the Austrians from the line of the Adda, which they held, strongly guarded. The wooden bridge of LODI, over that river, was occupied by a powerful rearguard, consisting of twelve thousand Austrian infantry and four thousand horse; while the remainder of their forces had retired to Crema, the right wing still holding firm at Cassano, and the neighbourhood of Milan. By a rapid advance, he hoped to cut off the bulk of their troops from

of francs in money or stores for the army, and to submit to the exaction of twenty paintings from his gallery for the Republican museum. Liberated Italy was treated with more severity than is generally the lot of conquered states.

82. Thus commenced the system of "making war support war," which contributed so much to the early success of the Republican arms, which compensated for all the penury and exhaustion of the Republican territory, which raised to the clouds the glory of the Empire, and brought about inevitably its ultimate destruction. France, abounding with men, but destitute of

80. Great was the enthusiasm, unbounded the joy, which these unparalleled successes and eloquent words excited among all that ardent and generous part of the Italian people, who panted for civil liberty and national independence. To them Napoleon appeared as the destined regenerator of Italy, the hero who was to achieve their liberation from Transalpine oppression, and bring back the glorious days of Roman virtue. His burning words, his splendid actions, the antique character of his thoughts, diffused a universal en-money-incapable of supporting war chantment. Even the coolest heads by its own resources, from the entire began to turn at the brilliant career stoppage of domestic industry, but thus begun, by a general not yet eight- teeming with a restless and indigent and-twenty years of age, and the bound- population, let loose on the world from less anticipations of future triumph, of that very cause-found in this system which he spoke with prophetic cer- the means of advancement and oputainty. From every part of Italy the lence. While the other armies of the young and the ardent flocked to Milan; Republic were suffering under the horballs and festivities gave token of the rors of penury, and could hardly find universal joy; every word and look of food for their support, or clothes for the conqueror was watched; the patriots their covering, the Army of Italy was compared him to Scipio and Hannibal, rolling in opulence, and the spoils of and the ladies on the popular side knew vanquished states gave them every enno bounds in their adulation. joyment of life. From that time there was no want of soldiers to follow the career of the conqueror; the prospect of glory and plunder brought willing crowds to his standard. The passes of the Alps were covered with files of troops, pressing forward to the theatre of renown; and all the chasms occasioned by the relentless system of war which he followed, were filled up by the multitudes whom the illusion of victory brought to his ranks. But the Republican soldiers were far from anticipating the terrible reverses to which this system of spoliation was ultimately to lead, or that France was destined to groan under exactions as severe as those she now so liberally inflicted upon others. Clothed, fed, and lodged at the expense of the Milanese, the soldiers pursued with thoughtless eagerness the career of glory which had opened before them. The artillery, the cavalry, were soon in the finest condition; and hospitals were established for fifteen thou

81. But this illusion was of short duration, and Italy was soon destined to experience the bitter fate and cruel degradation of every people who look for their deliverance to foreign assistance. In the midst of the general joy, a contribution of twenty millions of francs, or £800,000 sterling, struck Milan with astonishment, and wounded the Italians in their tenderest part-their domestic and economical arrangements. So enormous a contribution upon a single city seemed scarcely possible to be realised; but the sword of the victor offered no alternative. Great requisitions were at the same time made of horses for the artillery and cavalry in all the Milanese territory; and provisions were amassed on all sides at the expense of the inhabitants, for which they received nothing, or Republican paper of no value. Nor did the Duke of Modena escape more easily. He was compelled to purchase peace by a contribution of ten millions