The form which the Confederation thus took in the sixteenth century remained untouched till the wars of the French Revolution. ♦Dismemberment of the Grey Leagues, 1797.♦ The beginning of change was when the Italian districts subject to the Grey Leagues were transferred to the newly formed _Cisalpine Republic_. In the next year the whole existing system was destroyed. ♦Abolition of the Federal system, 1798. | The Helvetic Republic.♦ The Federal system was abolished; instead of the Old League of High Germany, there arose, after the new fashion of nomenclature, a _Helvetic Republic_, in which the word _canton_ meant no more than _department_. Yet even by such a revolution as this some good was done. ♦Freedom of the subject districts.♦ The subject districts were freed from the yoke of their masters, whether those masters were the whole Confederation or one or more of its several cantons. ♦Freedom of Vaud.♦ Thus, above all, the Romance land of _Vaud_ was freed from subjection to its German masters at Bern. ♦Annexation of _Bischofbasel_ and Geneva to France.♦ Some of the allied districts, as the bishopric of Basel and the city of Geneva, were annexed to France. But the Leagues of Wallis and Graubünden were incorporated with the Helvetic Republic. ♦Act of Mediation, 1803.♦ In 1803 the Federal system was restored by Buonaparte’s _Act of Mediation_, which formed a Federal republic of nineteen cantons. ♦The nineteen cantons.♦ These were the original thirteen, with the addition of _Aargau_, _Graubünden_, _St. Gallen_, _Ticino_, _Thurgau_, and _Vaud_, which were formed out of the formerly allied and subject lands. ♦Wallis incorporated with France.♦ _Wallis_ was separated from the Confederation, and became, first a nominally distinct republic, and afterwards a French department. ♦Neufchâtel. | 1806.♦ _Neufchâtel_ was, in the course of Buonaparte’s wars with Prussia, detached from that power, to form a principality under his General Berthier. ♦The Swiss Confederation of twenty-two cantons. 1815.♦ At last, in 1815, the present _Swiss Confederation_ was established, consisting of twenty-two cantons, the number being made up by the addition of _Neufchâtel_, _Wallis_, and _Geneva_. ♦_Bischofbasel_ added to Bern.♦ The bishopric of Basel was also again detached from France, and added to the canton of Bern, a canton differing in language and religion, and cut off by a mountain range. ♦Neufchâtel separated from Prussia, 1848.♦ The great constitutional changes which have been made since that time have not affected geography, unless we count the division of the city and district of Basel, _Baselstadt_ and _Baselland_, into distinct half-cantons, and the surrender of all rights over Neufchâtel by the King of Prussia. But this last was not strictly a geographical change; it was rather a change from a _quasi_ monarchic to a purely republican government in that particular canton. § 7. _The State of Savoy._ ♦Position and growth of Savoy.♦