374 Cavour at Paris.-Francis Joseph in Lombardy [1856-7

were the work of Austria, who thus secured a very dangerous preponderance in the Congress then about to assemble in Paris. Under these unfavourable conditions Cavour saw the moment approaching when he was to make good before a sceptical world the value for Italy's own safety, in a very broad interpretation of that term, of the patriotic crusade which she had gone out of her way to wage in the Crimea. For it was still doubtful whether the King of Sardinia would be admitted to the Congress on equal terms with other Powers, and still more doubtful whether, if the last difficulty were surmounted despite Austrian opposition, any mention of Italian affairs would be allowed. Thus Cavour started for the Congress more, as he said, to "sniff the air," than for any better. reason. He was at length able to bring up the Italian question (on April 8, 1856), and with outstretched finger he pointed at Austria as the author of all Italy's woes. He defended Italy with gallantry; "a viso aperto" said the Tuscans, applying to him Dante's phrase as the highest of compliments; but his own confession was that the results of his advocacy had been disheartening. Nor did the visit he paid to London, on the advice of Napoleon III, raise his spirits. Yet he had induced even the representatives of Prussia and Russia to condemn Austria, and perhaps had a vague consciousness that he had in fact won a moral victory of great value in the eyes of the world, and that he had given a gloriously new sensation to Italy, hitherto known in the diplomatic Olympus only by the wails of her exiles, the platitudes of her sentimental amateur politicians, and the incendiary proclamations of Mazzini. The universal feeling in Italy that Cavour had won his battle at the Congress of Paris, was needed in order to bring home to him his own success.

Austria had been the object of so many accusations at the Congress of Paris, that she determined, against the opinion of the experienced Radetzky, to make a final attempt at conciliation. She therefore relaxed the severities in Lombardo-Venetia, and removed the much-impugned sequestrations of the property of emigrants (December, 1856). The Emperor Francis Joseph visited the provinces in person in January, 1857, accompanied by his handsome wife; and he sent them Maximilian, the best-natured of his brothers, as Governor. Milan replied by erecting, at her own expense, a monument in Turin to the Piedmontese army; Venice declared through its illustrious exile, Daniele Manin, then a resident in Paris, "We do not want Austria to mend her ways in Italy; we want her to go"; and Cavour, who, in his alarm at the cajoleries of Maximilian towards Lombardo-Venetia, had bidden his friends "force Austria, if you can, to restore the state of siege in Milan," took the opportunity, supplied by the violent invectives of Count Buol, to break off all relations with her, even severing the last diplomatic threads which remained after 1853.

The attitude of Piedmont was becoming daily better defined after the Congress of Paris, in spite of the coldness of England, and the

1857-8] The Mazzinians at Genoa.- The Orsini Plot 375

advice, not to say the reproofs, of France. But however imprudently audacious Cavour's attitude may have appeared in some quarters, it was clearly impossible to effect any speedy solution of the questions at issue. Piedmont was incapable of provoking a crisis single-handed; and, besides the cost of her sacrifices old and new, had to face the expenses of the Crimean expedition and of the necessary renewal of her armaments. The Mazzinians and the Clericals took advantage of the distrust of Cavour; the former to repeat the rebellion of 1849 at Genoa in June, 1857; the latter to capture, by skilful manœuvres, a large number of seats in the Chamber at the general elections of November 15, 1857. The attempt at Genoa was undoubtedly the most criminal of Mazzini's enterprises; and his admirers have tried in vain to excuse him, on the absurd suggestion that he only wished to obtain arms for the support of Carlo Pisacane's revolutionary movement in Naples. The fact is that Mazzini, feeling that his revolutionary quasi-dictatorship was slipping from his hand, was now making a desperate attempt to recover it, by striking at the one hindrance in his path. The attempt in Genoa was put down; and the excess in the number of Clerical deputies was modified by the discreditable expedient of disqualifying many of them on scrutiny. But no sooner was one difficulty overcome than another arose, of far more serious character.

The sensation produced throughout Europe by the abominable crime of January 14, 1858, when the Italian, Felice Orsini, attempted the life of the Emperor Napoleon, was enormous. Orsini was executed on March 13, 1858. Soon afterwards the Emperor made public a letter from Orsini, dated March 11, 1858, in which he accepted the permission given to his counsel to submit a previous letter to the Court during his trial, as an indication not only of the Emperor's generosity, but of his goodwill towards Italy. He thanked him for the consolation thus afforded to him in his last moments, and, while offering his head as an expiation for his crime, which he declared to have been the result of temporary aberration, expressed his horror of all political murders.

The attack of Orsini, the conspiracies in Lombardo-Venetia, the attempts of Mazzini, the rising at Genoa, and the expedition of Pisacane were the last of the efforts, as varied as they had been unfortunate, of the Secret Societies to work on their traditional methods, before their final absorption into a wider policy. From this time public opinion tends towards the idea of the political unity of Italy - the one invaluable outcome of Mazzini's persistent preachings—but through, and by means of, Piedmont and the Savoy dynasty. This was the political testament of Daniele Manin, as delivered by Giorgio Pallavicino, Giuseppe La Farina, and Giuseppe Garibaldi. It was also the accepted programme of the "National Society" which these three men had started in August, 1857, and which became a powerful instrument for preaching and developing the perfect harmony that prevailed during the next three years.

376 Conference of Plombières.-Milan and Lombardy [1849–59

In Piedmont the attack of Orsini all but upset the friendly relations with France, at the very moment that Cavour was straining hard to improve them yet further, and when the advent of a Tory Ministry in England was threatening Piedmont with further isolation. This difficult situation, however, was overcome; and there can be no doubt that thenceforth Orsini's attempt and the rapprochement between England and Austria rather hastened than retarded the resolution of Napoleon. In June, 1858, he invited Cavour to a secret conference at Plombières. Three points were settled under the shade of the great trees of Plombières: war with Austria, the marriage of Prince Napoleon with the eldest daughter of Victor Emmanuel, and the cession of Savoy to France. The detailed steps were rather vaguely discussed; and the final events did not entirely correspond with the prognostications.

Before proceeding to describe the attack on Austria, designed and executed by France and Piedmont in co-operation, it is necessary to notice the condition of those other Italian States, which exercised so profound an influence on the course of the war. The disasters of the Revolution of 1849 had been followed by reaction in every State of Italy. "Reaction and the hegemony of Austria, whose mastery is felt even where her arms are absent" - these words summarise the condition of Italy everywhere, except in Piedmont, from 1849 to 1859. In Milan and all Lombardo-Venetia the vigorous rule of Radetzky prevailed, unrestrained even by the scruples which sometimes affected the Viennese politicians. Reform was in this case mere court-plaster to a gaping wound, and Radetzky knew it. Of the summary military executions, the imprisonments, the floggings, on mere suspicion, for imaginary crimes or for petty offences, no count is possible. The result was seen in the immediate revival of conspiracies, into which the more impetuous threw themselves with the determination of despair. Here, too, Mazzini made himself felt; he was now enjoying in London a short period of revived influence, which he was, however, soon gradually to fritter away by his adherence to the figment of universal revolution. In addition his dictatorial attitude, almost that of a Pretender in exile, was odious to many, and led him to multiply those demands for purposeless self-sacrifice which were as unsuccessful in their result as they proved detrimental to his reputation.

Thus the first conspiracies in Lombardo-Venetia after 1849 (since the claim of Monarchical Piedmont to the leadership had not yet been declared) were Republican, if not entirely Mazzinian. The most important of these was that started at Mantua, on the evening of November 2, 1850, by Enrico Tazzoli, a priest of blameless life, of distinguished intellect, and of heroic temperament, a sublime type of the inspired martyr of patriotism. During 1851 the conspiracy grew, its existence remaining unknown to the Austrian police. It had central committees in Milan and Venice, and branches everywhere. Part of its business was to raise money by

1850-7] Lombardo- Venetia. The "Mantuan Trials" 377

the sale of the National Loan Stock, started by Mazzini; but its principal object was to shake off the iron rule of Radetzky and the Austrians. The first suspicions of the Government, the first prosecutions, and the first condemnations appeared to deal with isolated cases. But the arrest of Enrico Tazzoli on January 27, 1852, and of many others, gave rise to the notorious "Mantuan Trials," the scandal and abomination of the entire world for the brutality of the tortures inflicted on the accused. It was a pitiful fact that, although one among the many dreams of these poor conspirators had been to seize the Emperor's person on his visit to Venice in 1852, of real revolutionary action there had been absolutely none. The legal proceedings lasted, one following upon another, from 1852 to 1855. Beginning the count with Enrico Tazzoli, who was hanged with four others on December 7, 1852, and closing it with Pier Fortunato Calvi, hanged on July 2, 1855, there were twelve of these "martyrs of Belfiore" (so called from the name of the terrace outside one of the gates of Mantua where executions were carried out), the heroes of a tragedy of patriotism and self-sacrifice which is the sublimest episode in the present story, and to which is due the impassable gulf then created between Austria and Italy.

The same can scarcely be said of the next attempt, one of purely Mazzinian origin, viz. that of February 6, 1853; though intended to be another Sicilian Vespers, it only afforded some excuse for the rigours of Radetzky, and finally made impassable the breach between Mazzini and the best of his supporters. But it was at any rate an additional testimony to the implacable hatred, against which the tardy repentance of Austria and the blandishments of the chivalrous Maximilian in 1857 were alike powerless. Throughout these ten years Milan and all Lombardo-Venetia maintained their inflexible resistance, their determination as to union with Piedmont, and their willingness to follow the direction given by Cavour to the Italian Revolution.

Slightly different was the state of affairs in Florence and Tuscany. Leopold II had been restored by a vote of the people; but he had returned a confirmed Austrian. The amnesty which had at first been proclaimed turned out to be a mere blind, and resulted in an increase of severities. The Constitution was certainly mentioned, but it was not put into force, being treated as in abeyance. The Moderates who had advocated the restoration became restive; but, with the Austrians installed, there was little to be done. On September 21, 1850, the Grand Duke, alleging (with some show of reason) that the Constitution had been wrecked, not by himself, but by the democrats, Montanelli, Guerrazzi, and their friends, adjourned the meeting of the Chambers indefinitely. Finally on May 6, 1852, he simply abolished the Consti

tution.

Such was the temper of one side and the other when the famous trial of Guerrazzi began. This was a review of the whole past, and in

378

Reaction in Tuscany and Rome

[1849-70

fact an indictment of all concerned: of the Grand Duke, for his fickleness and breach of faith; of the gloomy and violent Guerrazzi, for seeking only to gratify his own ambitions and dislikes; of the Democrats, for hounding their country into anarchy; of the Moderates, for giving the first impulse to reaction, a remedy worse than the disease.

On the close of the Austrian occupation (April, 1855), the Government, though still the creature of Austria, resumed on the whole its old attitude of kindliness and respect for law; prosperity returned; life in Florence and fertile Tuscany become once more easy and cheap. All might have settled down again comfortably, but for that national idealism which had been awakened in 1848, and which was now working in the minds of all. The principles of the "National Society" had spread everywhere; and the only opposition lay in some petty provincial vanity, and in the insignificant and self-interested protests of the adherents of the Grand Duke. The Moderates were working against the Government on a system of pin-pricks; the lower classes mainly by the methods of Mazzini, especially in turbulent Leghorn. The Government on its side had no strong feelings of dislike, except for Constitutionloving Piedmont and for Cavour. And it was towards Cavour, too, that the foremost of the Moderates were now looking, though still somewhat doubtfully, the most resolute among them being he whose iron will was to knit all the Liberal parties into one, and decide the fate of TuscanyBaron Bettino Ricasoli.

In Rome, after the restoration of the Papacy, it was evident that the Pope and Cardinal Antonelli, while thoroughly sympathising with the Grand Duke's dislike of Piedmont and of Cavour, were also specially incensed against Napoleon III. The personal views of that monarch the Pope and Antonelli never forgave. As for his expedition to Rome in 1849, its only result for France and for himself was that he was compelled to mount guard over the Vatican throughout nearly the whole of the Second Empire, without securing a single one of the reforms which he had laid down as absolutely indispensable. The Pope, suspicious of French intentions, delayed his return as long as possible. He had heralded his arrival by a motu proprio, dated Portici, September 12, 1849, which promised some trifling reforms (never carried out), and by an amnesty, from which some 7256 persons were excepted. Meanwhile there was a deluge of indictments, condemnations, and political persecutions of all sorts; and the reaction in the whole country was still more strongly accentuated after the return of the Pope on April 12, 1850. Political excesses were succeeded by disciplinary and dogmatic extravagances; the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy in England and in Holland (1851-2), and, lastly, the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception on December 8, 1854, to be soon followed by the Syllabus (1864), and later by the proclamation of the dogma of Papal Infallibility (1870).