emperor was displeasing to the French republicans. They were, however,
pacified by the delivery of Lafayette, who had been still detained a
prisoner in Austria after the treaty of Basel. Napoleon said in
vindication of his policy, "I have merely lent Venice to the emperor,
he will not keep her long." He, moreover, gratified Austria by the
extension of her western frontier, so long the object of her ambition,
by the possession of the archbishopric of Salzburg and of a part of
Bavaria with the town of Wasserburg.[5] The sole object of these
concessions was provisionally to dispose Austria in favor of
France,[6] and to render Prussia's ancient jealousy of Austria
implacable.[7] Hence the secret articles of peace by which France and
Austria bound themselves not to grant any compensation to Prussia.
Prussia was on her part, however, resolved not to be the loser, and,
in the summer of 1797, took forcible possession of the imperial free
town of Nuremberg, notwithstanding her declaration made just three
years previously through Count Soden to the Franconian circle, "that
the king had never harbored the design of seeking a compensation at
the expense of the empire, whose constitution had ever been sacred in
his eyes!" and to the empire, "He deemed it beneath his dignity to
refute the reports concerning Prussia's schemes of aggrandizement,
oppression, and secularization." Prussia also extended her possessions
in Franconia[8] and Westphalia, and Hesse-Cassel imitated her example
by the seizure of a part of Schaumburg-Lippe. The diet energetically
remonstrated, but in vain. Pamphlets spoke of the Prussian reunion-
chambers opened by Hardenberg in Franconia. An attempt was, however,
made to console the circle of Franconia by depicturing the far worse
sufferings of that of Swabia under the imperial contributions. The
petty Estates of the empire stumbled, under these circumstances, upon
the unfortunate idea "that the intercession of the Russian court
should be requested for the maintenance of the integrity of the German