youred to make a fland on the heights of Lambach; but Riche pante again defeated their rear guard, drove them into the defiles of Lambach with great lofs, and the imperial army retreated to Lintz, within ninety-two miles of Vienna. The French continued to advance, and, on the 20th, fixed their head-quarters at Wells. Moreau now formed his army into three columns, of which the right, under Lecourbe, made for the mountains fouth of Stever on the Ens; the centre, commaded by Moreau himself, fet out for Steyer; and the left, under Grenier, which had marched along the fouth banks of the Danube, and forced the Auftrians to retreat from Lintz across the river, proceeded on the high road from Lintz towards Vienna. On the 24th, Richepanfe, with the advanced guard of the centre column, entered Steyer, in which be found 17 pieces of cannon, and made 4000 prifoners. On the 25th, the French began to proceed onward to the next river, the Erlaph, and the Auftrians to retire behind the Trafen, the laft river of any, note within fifty miles of Vienna. This great city was ftruck with confternation and terror; the greater in loyal minds, that it was easily perceived by no means to be gene ral. As the French advanced, the countenances of the difaffected to government, who were neither few in number, nor yet altogether of the lower claffes, brightened up with joy. They held frequent converLuons with one another. They were at little pains to conceal their fentiments; and, in fhort, it was

fuppofed, that had the French come to Vienna, they would have been joined by numbers of the inhabitants: fuch was the general averfion to the war, and fuch the progress of French intrigues and principles. The imperial family prepared to fet out for Offen, elcorted by a party of the lifeguards. The gallery of paintings, with the imperial treafury, other valuable articles, and the city treafury, were placed in waggons, and ready to be removed from the capital, when the archduke Charles arrived at Vienna, at ten in the morning of the 27th of December, with the confolatory intelligence of his having concluded at Steyer an armiftice of thirty days with general Moreau.*

For the conclufion of this armiftice, there were not wanting very cogent inducements on both fides, as is very fairly ftated, in a letter from the general of divifion, Defolles, to the French minister at war, dated head-quarters, Steyer, the 26th of December, 1800. “The archduke Charles has propofed an armiftice to the general in chief, at the fame time announcing to him, that the emperor had fent a courier to Mr. Cobentzel, at Luneville, where a negotiation had been opened, in the end of September, with orders to fign a peace.

to

to fend a detachment, which, joining itself to the troops left in Tyrol, might fall upon our rear, and cut off our communication with France, has thought it his duty to confent to a convention, which, procuring us great advantages, left us the means, at the fame time, of waiting for the operations of the army of Italy, of which we have yet had no intelligence.

"The character of the archduke Charles, his well-known probity and honour, are fufficient pledges to us of the defire the emperor now feels to put an end to the war. To this he has, befides, been compelled by the deplorable flate of his army, which having loft, in twenty days, fixty-fix leagues of country, 25.000 prifoners, 12 or 15,000 in killed or wounded, 140 pieces of cannon, and immenfe magazines, is not, at prefent, and would not be for these three months, in a state to prevent our army from conquering all Auftria, and dictating laws to its capital; but, to do this without danger, it was neceflary that the army fhould have been mafter of the head of the defiles of Carinthia.

"The general in chief believed, befides, that to ftop, in the midft of the most brilliant victories, was conformable to that character of moderation, in which the chief conful withes to make himfelf known to the whole of Europe. I have the honour to addrefs to you a copy of the armiflice. The emperor has determined to treat of peace, whatever may be the determination of his allies; and our line, as it approaches to the Danube and to the mountains of the Tyrol, and puts into our hands the ftations of Ruff fteinfhoer, Nitz, Braunau, and other stations, will afford us the means of

renewing the war with the greatest advantages, but, above all, with the, greateft fecurity.”

This armistice affigned to the French army of the Rhine a triangular portion of territory, whose bafe refted on Chiavenna and Wurtzburg, and whofe point was between Leoben and Pachlarn_on the Danube, within fifty-two English miles from Vienna. It comprehended the Gallo-Batavian army, as well as that of the Rhine. It was not to be for a lefs duration than thirty days; at the expiration of which time, hoftilities were not to be refumed until a farther notice of fifteen days, to be dated from the hour in which the notification of the rupture fhould be made known; and the armistice was to be indefinitely prolonged until the notice of rupture. No corps or detachment, either of the French army of the Rhine, or of that of his imperial majefty in Germany, were to be fent to the refpective armies in Italy, fo long as there fhould be no armiftice between the French and the imperial armies in that country. The general in chief of the army of the Rhine engaged to tranfmit, with the utmoft difpatch, the prefent convention to the generals in chief of the Gallo-Batavian army, that of the Grifons, and that of Italy; with the most preffing invitation, particularly to the army of Italy, to conclude, on his part, a fufpen fion of hoftilities.

As foon as general Augerau was informed by Moreau of the new armiftice, he fent to the Auttrian generals Klenau and Simbfchen, to confer on the fettlement of the line of demarkation between the GalloBatavian army, and the Auftrian corps in the upper Palatinate and Franconia. It was agreed that the

river Rednitz and the Maine fhould feparate the two armies, as far as Lichtenfells on the line of neutrality. In this line was comprehended, Forkheim, Bamberg, Bannach, Haffalstein, and Lichtenfells. The Gallo-Batavian was likewife to occupy the city and district of Nuremberg. The general in chief was to take up his head-quarters at Wurtzburg, where, allo, he eftabiifhed his park of artillery. It now remains that we give fome account of the affairs of Italy.

By the armistice concluded after the battle of Maringo, as stated in our laft volume,* the French army was to occupy the country comprifed between the Chiefa, the Oglio, and the Po: and the Auftrians, befides certain territories which were specified on the left bank of the Po, were to occupy the city and citadel of Ferrara, on the right bank. They were alfo to occupy Tufcany and Ferrara. But the Auftrians continued to keep poffeffion not only of the town and citadel, but alfo of a large territory called the Polefino of Ferrara. At the fame time that a difpute arofe, on this point of the Polefino of Ferrara, a general infurrection of the people, or, according to what had become a technical phrafe in military tactics, a levy en maffe, was encouraged, and going on in Tufcany. Hoftilities were on the point of being renewed in Italy, when general Brune, informed of the preliminaries figned by count St. Julian, in which the emperor had engaged for difarming of the levy en masse, and of the arrival of count Cobentzel at Luneville, immediately took the earlieft opportu

nity of informing general Beellgarde, that until he fhould receive farther orders from his government, he would fufpend the motions of the military force under his command. A new convention was agreed to on the 20th of September, at Caftiglione, by which general Brune confented to wait for an anfwer from Vienna, relative to the evacuation of the Ferrarefe by the Auftrians. There was no mention in the treaty of Caftiglione, of the difarming the levy en maffe. But the French general alleged, that he confidered it as a matter of courfe, and, independently of the preliminaries juft mentioned, was no more than a natural return for the condefcenfion fhewn in that treaty to the Auftrians, refpecting the Polefing of Ferrara. The levy en maffe, the French believed, or pretended to believe, was paid by the English; and they obferved that it was re-enforced by a corps from Naples. The levy en malle was not in a state of great forwardness, nor, if it had been completely raised and equipped, could fuch a rabble of enervated Italians have been at all formidable to the troops of France. In truth, the French fought a pretext for an irruption into Tufcany; which they confidered as a meature of precaution, in order to prevent, in cafe of a renewal of the war, the landing of the English in that quarter, of which they were apprehenfive, and which was certainly intended. A general officer, with only a fmall efcort for fecurity against robbers, was fent by general Dupont, in the name of the commander-in-chief, to general Som mariva, who commanded the troops

in Tufcany, with a requeft that he would difarm the levy en malle, or as it was otherwife called, the national guard, and alfo difperfe the brigands, or parties of robbers. He fignified to Sommariva, that if the armed peasants did not return to their homes, by a certain day, he would enter Tulcany, in order to difarm, and punish them for the outrages which they daily committed on the territory occupied by the French army. The difarming, and the difperfion required, were, it has been said, we know not how truly, promiled: but this bufinels, if undertaken, was delayed and evaded. This being quickly perceived, lieutenant-general Dupont entered Florence on the 15th of October, with a great army, which he had concentrated on the left bank of the Po, and general Clement, on the 16th, entered Leghorn. The infurgents were early difperfed, and fent back to their feveral homes. General Sommariva, and the corps of Auftrians who were in Tuscany, to the number of 2500, were permitted to retire, through the midst of the French, to Ancona. The merchandise of the English found in Tufcany, particularly at Leghorn, though it had been permitted, by the armiftice of Maringo, to retain its neutrality, was, in open violation of public faith and the law of nations, confifcated for the benefit of the republic. But the English had taken care to avail themfelves of their naviga tion fo that the French treafury was not much emiched by the plunder of the English merchants of Leghorn. A few days after the

occupation of Leghorn by the French, the appearance of an Englifh fleet before that port, having on board 12,000 troops, fufficiently explained both the unwillingness of general Sommariva to difarm the levy en malle, and the motives of the French for making sudden irruption into Tufcany. About the fame

time alto a flip arrived at Ancona, from Triefte, laden with feveral thousands of mutkets for the use of the Tufcans.

The army of the Tufcan infurgents, according to the report of Dupont, amounted to 25,000. Among thefe, the brigands of Arezzo were particularly diftinguifhed for their audacity. Their town was taken by aflauit, and a great number of the inhabitants put to the fword. They were the fame, Dupont faid, who dared to infult the army of Naples in the laft campaign. "It was in that city," he fays, "that the famous miracle of the holy Virgin was fabricated, that gave the fignal of infurrection by the firing of a gun, which Mr. Windham, the British envoy to Tufcany, one of the principal artifts in that ridiculous miracle, made her difcharge upon the French. Thefe impoftures," he adds, " should not be fuffered to arm this multitude of pealants and increase their force." Dupont, in another report to the general in chief, Le Brune, dated at head-quarters, Florence, October 19, 1800, fays, "that the prefence of the French in Tuscany * had been thought neceflary by feve ral partizans of the grand doke themfelves, who felt that the safety and honour of the French army required

the

required the measures which he (general Brune) had ordered." He urged yet another argument for the irruption into Tulcany. It was juftified even by a concern for the welfare of the people. "Befides, fays he," the extraordinary levies infpired a very lively fear for the tranquillity of the interior of Tufcany, for their pay was an enormous weight, which that ftate could not fupport." In fhort, it was evident, from the variety of topics from which the French attempted to juftify the invafion of Tulcany, that there was not any one ground on which that violent ftep could be juftified; and that they were willing to derive advantage from it, without occafioning a rupture of the armiftice, fo long as there was any profpect of peace on the terms to be dictated by France through negotiation. Conformably to these views, general Dupont, to what has been quoted from his report, which the French government took care to have published in their demi-official Journal, adds, "That he had obferved the highest refpect towards the Auftrian troops: and that nothing had paffed that could, in the flightest degree, affect the armistice. All the officers had acknowledged, in that procedure, that the occupation of Tuscany was a particular measure which ought not to diminif the harmony that prevailed between the two armies." Whether the court of Vienna thought fo or no, there did not appear any difference of opinion, from the movements of their armies,

till the expiration of the truce of Hoinlinden. Skirmishes had taken place between advanced posts, but the campaign did not feriously begin till the 24th of December. The movements of Le Brune were directed by thofe of Moreau. He waited the arrival of Macdonald, with whom he was to co-operate.

It appears, at firft, to have been the plan of the French to fall on the Auftrians on the lake of Garda, and there to turn the lines of the Mincio. But general Le Brune, animated by the fucceffes of Moreau, and acquainted, perhaps, with fome encouraging circumftances refpecting the ftate of the Austrian army, determined to attack them in front. On the 24th of December, the right wing of the French army, under lieutenant-general Dupont, recalled from Tufcany, received orders to march up the courfe of the Mincio, leaving a corps of obfervation at Goito, in order to make a feint of paffing the river there. Orders were at the fame time given for the difpofition of the other divifions. Early on the 25th, a bridge was thrown over the Mincio, the paffage effected, and the poft occupied on the left bank, maintained by the French, against the moft vigorous and repeated attacks of the Auftrians, whofe main force was drawn more and more to that quarter. Dupont, who had been recalled, with his troops, from Tufcany, had received orders, if he fhould find it expedient, to make a retreat; but the ardour of the French rendered this unnecessary.

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VOL. XLIII.

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