Bonaparte's retort was unanswerable, and nothing more was heard of the luckless proposal.
Meanwhile the peace with the House of Savoy had thrown open the Milanese to Bonaparte's attack.

Holding three Sardinian fortresses, he had an excellent base of operations; for the lands restored to the King of Sardinia were to remain subject to requisitions for the French army until the general peace.

The Austrians, on the other hand, were weakened by the hostility of their Italian subjects, and, worst of all, they depended ultimately on reinforcements drawn from beyond the Alps by way of Mantua.

In the rich plains of Lombardy they, however, had one advantage which was denied to them among the rocks of the Apennines.

Their generals could display the tactical skill on which they prided themselves, and their splendid cavalry had some chance of emulating the former exploits of the Hungarian and Croatian horse.
They therefore awaited the onset of the French, little dismayed by recent disasters, and animated by the belief that their antagonist, unversed in regular warfare, would at once lose in the plains the bubble reputation gained in ravines.