If our Ministers had manifested their real feelings about Napoleon's presidency of the Italian Republic, war would certainly have broken forth.

But, as has been seen, they preferred to assume the attitude of the ostrich, the worst possible device both for the welfare of Europe and the interests of Great Britain; for it convinced Napoleon that he could safely venture on other interventions; and this he proceeded to do in the affairs of Italy, Holland, and Switzerland.
On September 21st, 1802, appeared a _senatus consultum_ ordering the incorporation of Piedmont in France.

This important territory, lessened by the annexation of its eastern parts to the Italian Republic, had for five months been provisionally administered by a French general as a military district of France.

Its definite incorporation in the great Republic now put an end to all hopes of restoration of the House of Savoy.

For the King of Sardinia, now an exile in his island, the British Ministry had made some efforts at Amiens; but, as it knew that the Czar and the First Consul had agreed on offering him some suitable indemnity, the hope was cherished that the new sovereign, Victor Emmanuel I., would be restored to his mainland possessions.