The most unfortunate part of the story has now to be told. Instead of forcing France to restore the booty at her own cost and at once, the allies, in more merciful mood, simply demanded that she should send for the Italian representatives and permit them to take away their property. Only ten days were allowed in Paris for the booty to be secured, packed, and transmitted, and, as envoys arrived from all parts of Italy, and each was eager to obtain what he could as quickly as possible, very many pictures were left behind. The pictures sent to Paris in 1797 had been more in number than could be accommodated in the gallery, and, as it is so easy to give away other people's property, the government had distributed as marks of favour and bribes for tranquillity many of the best Italian pictures amongst the provincial museums in France. Many of these pictures Canova, who was sent by the Holy See, failed to trace; others it was impossible to obtain, as, although the allies were in possession of Paris, they were not equally masters of the distant provinces in France, and, consequently, in France these pictures remained. Even of those twenty-one pictures stolen from Perugia in 1812 but two were returned to Italy, and those only got as far as Rome. Englishmen may well feel proud of their part in this transaction. It was the firmness of the British Government[M] that enabled the Vatican Gallery to take its position as one of the great picture galleries of the world. They not only enforced the restitution by the French of the plunder accumulated in the Louvre by the rapacious arms of Napoleon, but even contributed some £30,000 to defray the expenses of the removal, which the finances of Pius VII. could ill afford, no other allied power contributing one farthing. Canova gathered up, in the short time at his disposal, and with the limited means that he possessed, all the fine pictures that he could obtain, and the treasures now in Rome are the proof of his zeal and exertions. Meantime the Priori of Perugia waited for two years, hoping against hope that their treasures might come back to them. At length, in September 1816, they wrote to Canova, and he replied to them on the 20th. His letter explained how encompassed with difficulty he had been in Paris, how short a time had been allowed him in which to remove the pictures, how small were the means at his disposal, how scattered were the pictures, and how impossible it was, without force of arms to travel from department to department and take possession of the property.