Genoa at that time was encircled on the land side by a double line of fortifications, a considerable portion of which still remains. The outer one, with its associated detached forts, mounted up the inland slopes to an elevation of some hundreds of feet above the sea, and within this is an inner line of much greater antiquity. As it was for those days a place of exceptional strength, its capture became of the first importance, in the great struggle between France and Austria, as a preliminary to driving the Republican troops out of Italy. The city was defended by the French under the command of Massena; it was attacked on the land side by the Imperialist force, while it was blockaded from the sea by the British fleet. After fifteen days of hard fighting among the neighboring Apennines, Massena was finally shut up in the city. No less desperate fighting followed around the walls, until at last the defending force was so weakened by its losses that further aggressive operations became impossible on its part, and the siege was converted into a blockade. The results were famine and pestilence. A hundred thousand persons were cooped up within the walls. "From the commencement of the siege the price of provisions had been extravagantly high, and in its latter days grain of any sort could not be had at any cost.... The neighboring rocks within the walls were covered with a famished crowd, seeking, in the vilest animals and the smallest traces of vegetation, the means of assuaging their intolerable pangs.... In the general agony, not only leather and skins of every kind were consumed, but the horror at human flesh was so much abated that numbers were supported on the dead bodies of their fellow citizens. Pestilence, as usual, came in the rear of famine, and contagious fevers swept off multitudes, whom the strength of the survivors was unable to inter." Before the obstinate defense was ended, and Massena, at the end of all his resources, was compelled to capitulate on honorable terms, twenty thousand of the inhabitants had perished from hunger or disease. The end of this terrible struggle brought little profit to the conquerors, for before long the battle of Marengo, and the subsequent successes of Napoleon in Northern Italy, led to the city being again surrendered to the French. It had to endure another siege at the end of Napoleon's career, for in 1814 it was attacked by English troops under Lord William Bentinck. Fortunately for the inhabitants, the French commander decided to surrender after a few days' severe struggle around the outer defenses. On the settlement of European affairs which succeeded the final fall of Napoleon, Genoa was annexed to the kingdom of Sardinia, and now forms part of united Italy; though, it is said, the old instincts of the people give them a theoretic preference for a republican form of government.