The feast of San Giuseppe is the only _festa_ day in Lent, when the
Romans eat fried fish in honour of the occasion,--St Joseph alone knows
why. Henceforth the day will have other and less pleasing associations.
The garland-wreathed stalls, with the open ovens and the frizzling
fritters, were reared as usual at every corner; the shops were closed;
the _osterias_ were full; the streets were crowded with holiday-people in
holiday-attire, and the day was warm and bright like an early summer-day
in England, though it was only the 19th of March. The news of the
Romagna elections, with their overwhelming majority in favour of
annexation to Sardinia, had been just received in Rome with general
exultation. No doubt the festive appearance which marked the city
throughout the day was not altogether accidental, but was meant for, and
regarded as, an expression of public sympathy with the revolted
provinces. St Joseph happens to be the patron saint of the two great
Italian popular heroes, Garibaldi and Mazzini, and a demonstration on
this day was therefore considered to be in honour of the Three Josephs,
the Saint and his two proteges. It was known generally that the
adherents of the Liberal party would muster, as usual, on the Porta Pia
road, and that the more courageous partizans of the popular cause would
be distinguished by wearing a violet in their button-holes.
The Government had, it seems, decided that even these tacit expressions
of disaffection must be suppressed at all costs. With a happy irony of
cruelty which appears to distinguish a priestly despotism above every
other, the holiday of St Joseph was chosen as the opportunity for
striking terror into the hearts of the disloyal Romans; and as the policy
which sent out the executioner to excite the populace had not been
crowned with its coveted success, it was resolved to create a collision
between the police and the people. In the morning, five Roman gentlemen
of position and fortune, suspected of sympathy with the liberal cause,
received notice that they were exiled from the Papal States, and must
leave the city within twenty-four hours. Amongst these gentlemen was St
Angeli, who, not long ago, was arrested and imprisoned without charge or
trial, and who was but lately released on the remonstrance of the French
authorities. There was also Count Silverstrelli, a brother of the
gentleman of that name so well known to English sportsmen at Rome. The
news of these arrests did not check the proposed demonstration. Towards
four o'clock a considerable number of carriages and persons on foot
assembled outside the gates on the Via Nomentana; some patrols, however,
of French soldiers were found to be stationed along the road; and as it
is the great object of the liberal leaders at Rome to avoid any
possibility even of collision between the people and the French troops,
it was resolved to adjourn the place of assemblage to the Corso. Whether
this was a thought suggested on the moment, or whether it was the result
of a preconcerted plan, is a mooted question not likely to be decided;
the resolution, however come to, was acted on at once. Neither here, nor
elsewhere, I may observe, was there anything of a tumultuous crowd, or
the slightest apparent approach to agitation on the part of the
multitude. All a spectator could observe was, that the carriages turned
homewards somewhat nearer to the gates than usual, and that the stream of
people who sauntered idly along the footpath, as on any other _festa_
day, set out earlier than they are wont to do on their return to the
city.
About six o'clock the crowd from the Porta Pia had reassembled in the
Corso. Six o'clock is always the fullest time in that street; private
carriages are coming back from the Pincio promenade, and strangers are
driving back to their hotels from the rounds of sight-seeing. The Corso,
without doubt, was unusually and densely crowded; the footpaths swarmed
with passengers, and, what was peculiarly galling to the Government,
after the failure of the Carnival, there was a double line of
aristocratic carriages passing up and down; still everything was
perfectly peaceable and orderly. At the hour of the _Ave Maria_ the
crowd was at its fullest, and this was the time selected for the outrage.
In a scene of general terror and confusion it is impossible to ascertain
exact details of the order in which events occurred, but I believe the
following account is fairly exact.
There were a great number of the Pontifical police, or _sbirri_, as the
Romans call them, scattered in knots of two or three about the Corso;
there were also several mounted patrols of the Papal gendarmes. The
police did everything in their power to excite the people, hustled the
crowd in every direction, used the most opprobrious epithets, and pushed
their way along with insulting gestures. There are various stories
afloat as to the immediate cause of the outbreak; one, that as a patrol
passed the crowd hissed; another, that a cry was heard of "Viva Vittorio
Emmanuele!" and a third, the Papal version, that on a young man of the
name of Barberi being asked by a gendarme why he wore a violet flower on
his coat, he answered rudely, and, on the officer trying to arrest him,
his comrades pulled him away. All stories agree, that the provocation to
the police was given in the Piazza Colonna; and the disturbance, if any,
was so trivial, that a friend of mine, who was on the spot at the time,
perceived nothing of it, and only fancies he heard a murmur as the police
rode by. The provocation, whatever it was, was sufficient as a pretext
for the premeditated outrage. The _sbirri_ drew their swords, and
slashing right and left, charged the dense crowds of men, women and
children. The word was given, and a band of some twenty Papal dragoons,
who had been drawn up hard by at the Monte Citorio, waiting under arms
for the signal, galloped down the Corso, clearing their way with drawn
swords. The _sbirri_ along the street pulled out their cutlass-knives;
the dragoons rode on the footway, and struck out at the carriages filled
with ladies as they passed by, while the police ran a-muck (I can use no
other word) amongst the terror-stricken crowd. The cries of the crushed
and wounded, the terror of the women, and the savage, brutal fury of the
police, added to the panic and confusion of the scene. Not the slightest
attempt at resistance was made by the unarmed crowd; in a few minutes the
Corso was cleared as if by magic, and order reigned in Rome.
Short as the time was, the havoc wrought was very considerable. Nearer
two than one hundred persons were injured in all. Of course the greater
number of these persons were not actually wounded, but crushed, or
stunned, or thrown down. There was no respect of persons in the use made
of their swords by the police. Three French officers of the 40th, who
were in plain clothes amongst the crowd, were cut down and severely
wounded. An Irish gentleman, the brother of the member for Fermanagh,
narrowly escaped a sabre-cut by dodging behind a pillar. The son of
Prince Piombino was pursued by a gendarme beneath the gateway of his own
palace, and only got off with his hat slit right in two. Persons were
hunted down by the soldiery even out of the Corso. One gentleman, an
Italian, was chased up the Via Condotti by a dragoon with his sword
drawn, and saved himself from a sabre-cut by taking refuge in a passage.
Some of the dragoons rode down the Via Ripetta, when they had come to the
top of the Corso, and cut down a woman who was passing by. As soon as
the Corso was cleared, the gendarmes went into the different cafes along
the street, and ordered all persons, who were found in them, to go home
at once. In one case an infirm old man, who could not make off fast
enough, had his face cut open by a sabre-blow; while the backs of the
gendarmes' swords were used plentifully to expedite the departure of the
cafe frequenters. The exact number of wounded it is of course impossible
to ascertain. Persons who received injuries were afraid to show
themselves, and still more to call attention to their injuries, for fear
of being arrested for disaffection and immured in prison. If I believed
the stories I heard on good authority and on most positive assurance, I
should put down the number of persons who died from wounds or injuries
received during the melee at from twelve to fifteen. Still, long
experience has led me to place very little reliance on any Roman story I
cannot test; and I am bound to say, I could not sift any one of these
stories to the bottom. On the other hand, this fact by no means causes
me to disbelieve that fatal injuries may have been received. The extreme
difficulty, if not impossibility, of obtaining true information on such a
point may be realized from the circumstance, that a government official
was, within my knowledge, dismissed from his post for merely visiting one
of the victims who had been wounded by the police. By all accounts, even
by that of the Papal partizans, the number of severe injuries inflicted
was very considerable; indeed it is impossible it should have been
otherwise, when one considers that along a street so crowded that the
carriages could only move at a foot's pace, the gendarmes on horse and
foot charged recklessly, cutting at every one they could reach. In my
statement, however, of the casualties, I have sought to assert, not what
I believe, but only what (as far as one can speak with certainty of what
one did not actually see) I know to be the truth.
The worst part of the whole story, in my opinion, was the subsequent
conduct of the Government. These outrages, which might have been excused
as the result of an unforeseen disturbance, obtained in cold blood the
deliberate sanction of the Vatican. The Papal gendarmes received the
personal acknowledgments of the Pope for their conduct. The six horsemen
who distinguished themselves by clearing the Piazza Colonna were promoted
for their services, and all the police on duty that day received extra
pay. With unusual promptitude, in fact not more than a week after the
event, the _Giornale di Roma_ contained an official statement of the
occurrence. After alleging that hitherto they had considered the
unpleasant event of too small importance to deserve notice, they proceed
to give the following narrative.
"On Monday, the 19th instant, in the course of the afternoon, the
revolutionary faction proposed to make a demonstration in the Corso
against the Pontifical Government, by an assemblage of persons hired
for the express purpose. On the discovery of these designs, fitting
arrangements were made in concert with the French police; and the
French troops, as well as the Papal gendarmes, were drawn up, so that
in case of need they might suppress any disturbance whatever.
"In fact, about five o'clock in the afternoon crowds were formed in
the streets, directed by leaders, and amongst these leaders were two
hide-tanners, whom the gendarmes arrested with promptitude. The
crowd, thus raked together, then began to hoot at and insult the
gendarmes, and at last attempted to rescue the prisoners. Not
succeeding in this attempt, the rioters, whose numbers had now been
swollen by a lot of idle fellows from the vilest rabble, crowded
together into the Piazza Colonna, and continued to outrage the
officers of public justice with every kind of insult. Thereupon a
handful of police advanced courageously against the rioters, and
proved quite sufficient to disperse and rout them.
"The friends of order applauded the gallant gendarmes in the execution
of their duty. In less than an hour the most perfect quiet reigned
around, and in the affray a very few persons were injured, whose
injuries have proved to be of slight consequence."
Throughout the whole of this document the _suppressio veri_ reigns
supreme. It is ludicrous describing the _emeute_ as an event unworthy of
special mention, when rewards and praises have been heaped by the
Government on the heroes who distinguished themselves in the suppression
of this contemptible fracas. In a city like Rome a crowd which filled
the whole Corso's length cannot be described as a faction, while the
occupants of the aristocratic carriages which lined both sides of the
street are not likely to have had two hide-tanners for their leaders. The
size of the crowd disposes at once of the idea that the persons who
composed it were bribed to be present; and the attempt to identify the
action of the French troops with that of the Papal gendarmes, is upset by
the plain and simple fact, that the French patrols were on the Porta Pia
road, and not in the Corso at all. Indeed, if the whole matter was not
too serious to laugh at, there would be something actually comical in the
notion of the friends of order, or any person in their senses, stopping
to applaud the gendarmes as they trampled their way through the helpless,
screaming, terror-stricken crowd, striking indiscriminately at friend or
foe. The statement has this value, and this value only, that it gives
the formal approval of the Government to the brutal outrages of the Papal
police.
For a time the Pro-Papal party were in a state of high exultation. A
popular demonstration had been suppressed by a score or so of Pontifical
troops. The stock stories about the cowardice of the Italians were
revived, and the more intemperate partizans of the Government asserted
that the support of the French army was no longer needed, and that the
Pope would shortly be able to rely for protection on his own troops
alone. There was in these exultations a certain sad amount of truth. I
am no blind admirer of the Romans, and I freely admit that no
high-spirited crowd would have submitted to be cut down by a mere handful
of gendarmes. I admit, too, that this blood-letting stopped for the time
the fashion of demonstrations. It is however at best a doubtful
compliment to a government that it has succeeded in crushing the spirit
and energy of a nation; but to this compliment, I fear, the Papal rule is
only too well entitled. "The lesson given on St Joseph's day," so wrote
the organ of the Papacy in Paris, "has profited;" how, and to whom, time
will show. Hardly, I think; at any rate, to the religion of love and
mercy, or to those who preach its doctrines, and enforce its teachings by
lessons such as this.