If the climax was not worthy of the inception, yet the campaign as a whole must be pronounced a masterpiece.

Since the days of Hannibal no design so daring and original had startled the world.

A great Austrian army was stopped in its victorious career, was compelled to turn on its shattered communications, and to fight for its existence some 120 miles to the rear of the territory which it seemed to have conquered.

In fact, the allied victories of the past year were effaced by this march of Bonaparte's army, which, in less than a month after the ascent of the Alps, regained Nice, Piedmont, and Lombardy, and reduced the Imperialists to the direst straits.
Staggered by this terrific blow, Melas and his staff were ready to accept any terms that were not deeply humiliating; and Bonaparte on his side was not loth to end the campaign in a blaze of glory.

He consented that the Imperial troops should retire to the east of the Mincio, except at Peschiera and Mantua, which they were still to occupy.