Eustace, John Cretwode: A classical tour through Italy An. MDCCCII (Vol. 3): 3. ed., rev. and enl (London: J. Mawman, 1815)

502

CLASSICAL TOUR

Ch. XV.

savage but appropriate ornament to this monu-
ment.
It is not my intention, as indeed it would be
foreign to my plan, to give an account of the
battle of Marengo, or to add one more to the
many contradictory relations of that event now
in circulation. But I may observe, that this
battle, whether the scale was turned by the skill
or by the fortune of Bonaparte, was in its result
one of the most important that has taken place
either in modern or in ancient times. Compared
to it, the bloody fields of Jemappe, Neerwinden,
and BJohenlinden, sink into insignificance; their
consequences were transitory, and no country
was permanently lost or won by the contesting
parties in consequence of the defeat or victory.
Even the carnage of Cannce loses its horrors
when put in competition with the disaster of
Marengo. Rome, in the wisdom of her senate,
in the courage of her people, and in the magna-
nimity of both, found adequate resources, and
rose from her defeat, more glorious and more tre-
mendous. At Marengo, Italy was laid prostrate
and bound at the feet of Bonaparte; her for-
tresses were abandoned: her ramparts levelled ;
or to use the phrase of the conqueror himself, the
Alps were annihilated. The whole of this7 de-
lightful country, the garden of Europe, the mis-
tress of the Mediterranean, teeming with popu-