GENERAL HISTORY. 



[173 



temporary possession of it. These 

 proceedings occasioned two pro- 

 clamations to be issued in Decem- 

 ber 12tli, addressed to the Tyrol- 

 ese, one from marshal count Bel- 

 legarde, commander of the Austrian 

 army destined against Italy, who 

 was taking his way through that 

 country; the other, from the Ba- 

 varian general-commissary, baron 

 von Lerchenfeld, in which the 

 insurgents were reminded of their 

 duty, and threatened with force of 

 arms should they delay to return 

 to their allegiance. Later advices 

 stated,that these addresses had pro- 

 duced the desired effect, and that 

 the insurgents were quietly going 

 back to their houses. 



The passage of the Rhine into 

 the French territory was the object 

 which principally occupied the al- 

 lied armies on its bank during the 

 last month of the year. It was 

 effected with little or no opposition 

 at various points,not asingleFrench 

 army appearing in the field to de- 

 fend the frontier. The strong fort 

 of Huningen in Alsace was invest- 

 ed, and the allied troops spread 

 over that province, and Franche 

 Comte. In these alarming circum- 

 stances, Napoleon issued a decree, 

 dated December 26th, the tenor 

 of which strongly marked his sense 

 of the impending dangers. He 

 announced by it the mission of se- 

 nators or counsellors of state into 

 the military divisions, in quality 

 of his commissioners extraordinary, 

 armed with powers relative to pro- 

 viding and organizing the means of 

 defence, which in effect suspend- 

 ed all the magistracies and other 

 authorities in the country, and ex- 

 tended the immediate agency of 

 military despotism to every part. 

 The commissioners nominated were 



30 in number, to be accompanied 

 by as many law officers. By a sub- 

 sequent decree an adjournment of 

 the legislative body was declared. 

 The last important event of the 

 year was the entrance into 

 Geneva of an advanced guard 

 of the allies, the French garrison 

 of which had retired upon its 

 appearance. At this momentous 

 period, when France, which had 

 for so many years, with her insa- 

 tiable avidity for conquest, been 

 extending her victorious arms 

 through every neighbouring state, 

 beheld herself in turn invaded from 

 her barrier of the Pyrenees, and the 

 river which she had once fixed as 

 her eastern boundary, we close our 

 account of the German and Spanish 

 campaigns. 



Few incidents worthy of record 

 have occurred during the present 

 year in the parts of Europe not 

 directly engaged in that war which 

 has been the common concern of 

 so large a portion of it. The island 

 of Sicily, though its future des- 

 tiny is probably deeply involved in 

 the final event of the war, is one 

 of those parts : its singular and 

 equivocal situation rendering it ra- 

 ther a passive spectator, than an 

 agent, in the scenes transacting on 

 the great theatre. In the history 

 of the last year, the formation of 

 a Sicilian constitution analogous to 

 the English, and supported by Bri- 

 tish influence, the attempts of the 

 queen to raise an opposition to it, 

 her removal from court, and the 

 temporary renunciation of the regal 

 authority by the king in favour of 

 his son, were briefly recorded. The 

 notorious incapacity of the king 

 was supposed to preclude any idea 

 of his return to power; but on 

 the 9th of March a roj/al despatch 



