It is true, the infant Cispadane republic escaped the fate to which its patron and founder was about to resign it; for after this arrangement had been provisionally adjusted, news came of the insurrection of Venice, the attack upon the French through her whole territory, and the massacre at Verona. This aggression placed the ancient republic, so far as France was concerned, in the light of a hostile power, and entitled Buonaparte to deal with her as a conquered one, perhaps to divide, or altogether to annihilate her. But, on the other hand, he had received their submission, ratified the establishment of their new popular constitution, and possessed himself of the city, under pretence of assigning it a free government, according to the general hope which he had held out to Italy at large. The right of conquest was limited by the terms on which surrender had been accepted. Austria, on the other hand, was the more deeply bound to have protected the ancient republic, for it was in her cause that Venice so rashly assumed arms; but such is the gratitude of nations, such the faith of politicians, that she appears, from the beginning, to have had no scruple in profiting by the spoils of an ally, who had received a death-wound in her cause. By the time the negotiators met for finally discussing the preliminaries, the Directory of France, either to thwart Buonaparte, whose superiority became too visible, or because they actually entertained the fears they expressed, were determined that Mantua, which had been taken with such difficulty, should remain the bulwark of the Cisalpine republic, instead of returning to be once more that of the Austrian territories in Italy. The Imperial plenipotentiaries insisted, on the other hand, that Mantua was absolutely necessary to the safety of their Italian possessions, and became more so from the peculiar character of their new neighbour, the Cisalpine republic, whose example was likely to be so perilous to the adjacent dependencies of an ancient monarchy. To get over this difficulty, the French general proposed that the remaining dominions of Venice should be also divided betwixt Austria and France, the latter obtaining possession of the Albanian territories and the Ionian islands belonging to the republic, of which the high contracting powers signed the death-warrant; while Istria, Dalmatia, Venice herself, and all her other dominions, should be appropriated to Austria. The latter power, through her minister, consented to this arrangement with as little scruple, as to the former appropriation of her forlorn ally's possessions on the Terra Firma.