ancient inhabitants and the settlement of French colonists in the fatherland of William Tell.[14] The imperial free town of Muhlhausen in the Suntgau, the ancient ally of Switzerland, fell, like her, into the hands of the French. Unable to preserve her independence, she committed a singular political suicide. The whole of the town property was divided among the citizens. A girl, attired in the ancient Swiss costume, delivered the town keys to the French commissioner; the city banner and arms were buried with great solemnity.[15] The French had also shown as little lenity in their treatment of Italy. Rome was entered and garrisoned with French troops; the handsome and now venerable puppet, Pope Pius VI., was seized, robbed, and personally maltreated (his ring was even torn from his hand), and dragged a prisoner to France, where he expired in the August of 1799. [Footnote 1: "The peasant, when summoned into the presence of a governor, lord of the council, head of a guild, or preacher, stood there, not as a free Swiss, but as a criminal trembling before his judge."--_Lehmann on the imaginary Freedom of the Swiss. 1799._] [Footnote 2: "The important office of provincial secretary was, in this manner, hereditary in the family of the Beroldingen of Uri."--_Lehmann_.] [Footnote 3: "In the Grisons, the constitution was extremely complicated. The lordships of Meyenfeld and Aspermont were, for instance, subject to the three confederated cantons and under the control of the provincial governors nominated by them; they were at the same time members of the whole free state, and, as such, had a right of lordship over the subject provinces, over which, they, in their turn, appointed a governor."--_Meyer von Knonau's Geography._] [Footnote 4: The best information concerning the authority held by the provincial governors, who enjoyed almost unlimited sway over their districts, is to be met with in the excellent biography of Solomon Landolt, the provincial governor of Zurich, by David Hesz. Landolt was the model of an able but extremely tyrannical governor (he ruled over Greisensee and Eglisau) and gained great note by his salomonic judgments and by his quaint humor. He founded the Swiss rifle clubs and introduced that national weapon into modern warfare. He was also a painter and had the whim, notwithstanding the constant triumph of the French, ever to represent them in his pictures as the vanquished party.]