CHAPTER XV.
The Chief Consul writes to the King of England--Lord Grenville's Answer--Napoleon passes the Great St.Bernard--The taking of St.
Bard--The Siege of Genoa--The Battle of Montebello--The Battle of Marengo--Napoleon returns to Paris--The Infernal Machine--The Battle of Hohenlinden--The Treaty of Luneville.
Much had been already done towards the internal tranquillisation of France: but it was obvious that the result could not be perfect until the war, which had so long raged on two frontiers of the country, should have found a termination.

The fortune of the last two years had been far different from that of the glorious campaigns which ended in the treaty--or armistice, as it might more truly be named--of Campo-Formio.
The Austrians had recovered the north of Italy, and already menaced the Savoy frontier, designing to march into Provence, and there support a new insurrection of the royalists.

The force opposed to them in that quarter was much inferior in numbers, and composed of the relics of armies beaten over and over again by Suwarrow.

The Austrians and French were more nearly balanced on the Rhine frontier; but even there, there was ample room for anxiety.

On the whole, the grand attitude in which Buonaparte had left the Republic when he embarked for Egypt, was exchanged for one of a far humbler description; and, in fact, as has been intimated, the general disheartening of the nation, by reason of those reverses, had been of signal service to Napoleon's ambition.