... I am obliged to be indignant with the Provveditor, to exaggerate the number of assassinations, etc., in order that he, to calm my fury, may furnish me everything I [Sidenote: _Rom. ix. 351._] need; they will continue to give us what we want, willingly or by force, until Mantua is taken, after which I shall demand of them such contribution as you may order me, which will not be in the least difficult. If Bonaparte could find pretexts for accusing the Venetians of helping the Austrians, the latter had excellent reasons for complaining that Venice helped the French. Austria and France were the two stools between which half measures had led the Republic, and between which she fell. The position of the French army was not enviable at that time, and the alliance of Venice would really have been worth having, which was the reason why her obstinate efforts at neutrality exasperated Bonaparte to such a degree. At last his patience gave out and he ordered General Baraguay d’Hilliers, the father of the marshal of that name who died in 1878, [Sidenote: _Twenty-fifth of December 1796._] to occupy Bergamo, not as a guest, but as master. The Austrians at once replied by seizing Palma and Osopo. The peasants and the small communities were now driven to extremities; for the Government had left them to their fate, and they were plundered alike by the French and the Austrians. Discontent spread rapidly, and the rural population may be supposed to have been in the best possible disposition to receive the revolutionary doctrines by which Bonaparte had already called into existence the Cispadane Republic. That short-lived affair was made up of the cities and territories of Ferrara, Bologna, Modena, and Reggio d’Emilia, and was momentarily the headquarters of republicanism. In spite of all that the remnant of government in Venice could do against it, its influence was felt on Venetian territory. Behind all, the propaganda of Milan worked [Sidenote: _Rom. x. 12._] steadily to carry out Bonaparte’s plan under General Landrieux, whom he had deputed to take charge of that end of it. Bergamo was the first city to rise and drive out the Venetian governor, in order to join the Cispadane Republic; the city of Brescia followed, [Sidenote: _Molmenti, Nuovi Studi, 356._] naturally enough. But the country people of the two provinces still remained faithful to the Republic, and the peasants about Brescia were so indignant with the city for its defection that they would have marched upon it to burn it down if they had not been hindered by their Bishop, Dolfin. At Vallesabbia, certain emissaries of the republicans from the city were so ill received that they fled precipitately in fear of their lives. Two days after the latter incident, the inhabitants of the villages of the valley met in a field [Sidenote: _March 1797._] near Nozze, and drew up the following declaration, which was approved with absolute unanimity.