Marengo," says Napoleon, "I did not consider the whole of Italy
reconquered, until all the fortified places between me and the Mincio
should be occupied by my troops. I gave Melas permission to return to
Mantua, on condition of his surrendering all these fortresses."

He now directed Chasseloup de Laubat and his engineers to repair and
remodel the fortifications of Verona, Legnano, Pechiera, Mantua, the
line of the Adda, Milan, Alessandria,[5] Roco d'Aufo, Genoa, and several
smaller works; thus forming a quadruple line of defence against Austrian
aggression in Italy. These works were of great service to the French in
1805, enabling Massena with fifty thousand men to hold in check the
Archduke Charles with more than ninety thousand, while Napoleon's grand
army, starting from the solid base of the Rhine, traversed Germany and
seized upon the capital of Austria.

[Footnote 5: More than twenty millions of money were appropriated for
this place alone.]

The neglect of the Prussians to place their country in a state of
military defence, previous to declaring war against Napoleon in 1806,
had a most disastrous influence upon the campaign. Napoleon, on the
other hand, occupied and secured all the important military positions
which he had captured in the preceding campaign. "The Prussians," said
he, "made no preparations for putting into a state of defence the
fortifications on their first line, not even those within a few marches
of our cantonments. While I was piling up bastion upon bastion at Kehl,
Cassel, and Wesel, they did not plant a single palisade at Magdeburg,
nor put in battery a single cannon at Spandau." The works on the three
great lines of the Oder, the Elbe, and the Weser, had they been properly
repaired, garrisoned, and defended, were sufficient to have held in