Bologna was the most flourishing manufacturing town in the dominions of His Holiness, and Ancona the only port which could boast of a real trade. Probably it was because of their comparative prosperity that the people of Romagna were in a chronic state of unrest. The Pontifical troops, sent to suppress the insurrection, quickly proved their inability to carry out the task, and His Holiness appealed to Vienna for assistance. Sébastiani, so soon as he received intelligence that this request had been made, instructed Marshal Maison to warn Metternich that France could not consent to the entry of Austrian troops into the Papal States, and, on February 24, he informed Apponyi in Paris that, in accordance with its principle of non-intervention, the French government would regard the passage of the Piedmontese or Roman frontiers by an Imperial army as a declaration of war.[106] But Metternich had already sent off the Comte Athanase d'Otrante, a son of Fouché, the famous regicide and Minister of Police, to Paris, with documents to prove that the Italian insurrections were fomented by the Bonapartists. It was always in the power of Austria, he pointed out significantly, to put an end to the republican agitation in Italy, Spain, Germany or France, by simply allowing the Duc de Reichstadt, the heretofore King of Rome, to be proclaimed Emperor of the French.[107] It was perfectly true that the Bonapartes were concerned in the Italian revolutionary movement. Both Prince Charles and his brother Prince Louis Napoleon held commands in the rebel army at Civita Castellana. Without doubt this was a circumstance calculated to induce Louis Philippe to exercise the greatest caution. It was decided, accordingly, to despatch the Comte de Sainte-Aulaire to Rome to urge upon the Papal government the expediency of withdrawing from ecclesiastics the administration of the provincial affairs of Romagna, and of confiding the management of local business to the nobility and middle classes. Maison was to press the Cabinet of Vienna to join with France in persuading His Holiness to inaugurate these reforms, whilst in London Talleyrand was to seek to obtain the co-operation of the British government. Palmerston, who looked upon the condition of Italy as a perpetual menace to the peace of Europe, readily consented to instruct Sir Brooke Taylor, the British Minister at Florence, to proceed to Rome to take part in the conference.[108] Metternich agreed with equal alacrity to the French proposals. But it was not his policy to allow reforms of any kind to be introduced into Italy, and he was fully resolved that the deliberations should lead to no results of any consequence. "We risk nothing," he wrote to Apponyi. . . . "Count Lützow[109] is a man of character, he knows what is practicable."[110]