German ecclesiastical lands and
the threatened collapse of the Ottoman power as a potent means of
busying the Continental States and leaving Great Britain isolated.
Moreover, the great island State was passing through ministerial and
financial difficulties which robbed her of all the fruits of her naval
triumphs and made her diplomacy at Amiens the laughing-stock of the
world. When monarchical ideas were thus discredited, it was idle to
expect peace. The struggling upwards towards a higher plane had indeed
begun; democracy had effected a lodgment in Western Europe; but the
old order in its bewildered gropings after some sure basis had not yet
touched bottom on that rock of nationality which was to yield a new
foundation for monarchy amidst the strifes of the nineteenth century.
Only when the monarchs received the support of their French-hating
subjects could an equilibrium of force and of enthusiasms yield the
long-sought opportunity for a durable peace.[218]

The negotiations at Amiens had amply shown the great difficulty of the
readjustment of European affairs. 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. That hope was now at an end. In vain did Lord
Whitworth, our ambassador at Paris, seek to help the Russian envoy to
gain a fit indemnity. Sienna and its