e. A congress was to
be held at Rastadt, at which the plenipotentiaries of France and of
the Germanic Empire were to regulate affairs between these two Powers.

Secret articles bound the Emperor to use his influence in the Empire
to secure for France the left bank of the Rhine; while France was to
use her good offices to procure for the Emperor the Archbishopric of
Salzburg and the Bavarian land between that State and the River Inn.
Other secret articles referred to the indemnities which were to be
found in Germany for some of the potentates who suffered by the
changes announced in the public treaty.

The bartering away of Venice awakened profound indignation. After more
than a thousand years of independence, that city was abandoned to the
Emperor by the very general who had promised to free Italy. It was in
vain that Bonaparte strove to soothe the provisional government of
that city through the influence of a Venetian Jew, who, after his
conversion, had taken the famous name of Dandolo. Summoning him to
Passeriano, he explained to him the hard necessity which now dictated
the transfer of Venice to Austria. France could not now shed any more
of her best blood for what was, after all, only "a moral cause": the
Venetians therefore must cultivate resignation for the present and
hope for the future.

[Illustration: CENTRAL EUROPE AFTER THE PEACE OF CAMPO FORMIO, 1797

The boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire are indicated by thick dots.
The Austrian Dominions are indicated by vertical lines. The Prussian
Dominions are indicated by horizontal lines. The Ecclesiastical
States are indicated by dotted areas.]

The advice was useless. The Venetian democrats determined on a last
desperate venture. They secretly sent three deputies, among them
Dandolo, with a large sum of money wherewith to bribe the Directors to
reject the treaty of Campo Formio. This would have been quite
practicable, had not their errand become known to Bonaparte. Alarmed
and enraged at this device, which, if successful, would have consigned
him to infamy, he sent Duroc in chase; and the envoys, caught before
they crossed the Maritime Alps, were brought before the general at
Milan. To his vehement reproaches and threats they opposed a dignified
silence, until Dandolo, appealing to his generosity, awakened those
nobler feelings which were never long dormant. Then he quietly
dismissed them--to witness the downfall of their beloved city.

_Acribus initiis, u