h
Marescalchi, the Cisalpine envoy at Paris, Bonaparte had concerted a
constitution, or rather he had used these men as a convenient screen
to hide its purely personal origin. Having, for form's sake, consulted
the men whom he had himself appointed, he now suggested that the chief
citizens of that republic should confer with him respecting their new
institutions. His Minister at Milan thereupon proposed that they
should cross the Alps for that purpose, assembling, not at Paris,
where their dependence on the First Consul's will might provoke too
much comment, but at Lyons. To that city, accordingly, there repaired
some 450 of the chief men of Northern Italy, who braved the snows of a
most rigorous December, in the hope of consolidating the liberties of
their long-distracted country. And thus was seen the strange spectacle
of the organization of Lombardy, Modena, and the Legations being
effected in one provincial centre of France, while at another of her
cities the peace of Europe and the fortunes of two colonial empires
were likewise at stake. Such a conjunction of events might well
impress the imagination of men, bending the stubborn will of the
northern islanders, and moulding the Italian notables to complete
complaisance. And yet, such power was there in the nascent idea of
Italian nationality, that Bonaparte's proposals, which, in his
absence, were skilfully set forth by Talleyrand, met with more than
one rebuff from the Consulta at Lyons.

Bitterly it opposed the declaration that the Roman Catholic religion
was the religion of the Cisalpine Republic and must be maintained by a
State budget. Only the first part of this proposal could be carried:
so keen was the opposition to the second part that, as a preferable
plan, property was set apart for the support of the clergy; and
clerical discipline was subjected to the State, on terms somewhat
similar to those of the French Concordat.[191]

Secular affairs gave less trouble. The apparent success of the French
constitution furnished a strong motive for adopting one of a similar
character for the Italian State; and as the proposed institutions had
been approved at Milan, their acceptance by a large and miscellaneous
body was a foregone conclusion. Talleyrand also took the most
unscrupulous care that the affair of the Presidency should be
judiciously settled. On December 31st, 1801, he writes to Bonaparte
from Lyons:

"The opinion of the Cisalpines seems not at all