THE KINGDOM OF ITALY
When Garibaldi entered Naples, Cavour had already decided on the
momentous step of sending the king's forces into Umbria and the
Marches of Ancona. At the end of August he wrote: "We are touching the
supreme moment; with God's help, Italy will be made in three months."
If constitutional monarchy was to triumph it could no longer stand
still; neither Austrian arms nor republican propaganda could so
jeopardise the scheme of an Italian kingdom under a prince of the
House of Savoy as the demonstration of facts that the Government of
Victor Emmanuel had lost the lead. Moreover, it became daily more
probable that, if the king did not invade the Roman States from the
north, Garibaldi would invade them from the south, and this Cavour was
determined to prevent. If a Garibaldian invasion succeeded, France
would come into the field; if it failed, all the great results
hitherto accomplished would be compromised. Garibaldi at most could
only have disposed of half his little army of volunteers, and in
Lamoricière, the conqueror of Abd-el-Kader, he would have met a
stouter antagonist than the Bourbon generals. But the party of action
urged him towards Rome, cost what it might, with the impracticability
of men who expect the walls of cities to fall at the blast of the
trumpet. Every reason, patriotic, political, geographical, justified
Cavour's resolution. It was only by force that Umbria and the Marches
had been retained under the papal sway in 1859; there was not an
Italian who did not look on their liberation as a patriotic duty. The
nominal pretext for the war, as has happened in most of the wars
of this century, only partially touched the point at issue; Cavour
professed to see a menace in the increase of the Pope's army, and
demanded its disbandment. In a literal sense, fifteen or twenty
thousand men could not be a menace to Italy. Still it must be doubted
if any state could have tolerated, in what was now its midst, even
this small force, commanded by a foreign general, composed largely
of foreign recruits, and proclaiming itself the advance guard of
reactionary Europe. Lamoricière said that wherever the revolution
appeared, it must be knocked on the head as if it were a mad dog. By
"the revolution" he meant Italian unity.
Cavour, the cabinet, and the king were already labouring under the
penalties of excommunication by the Bull issued in the spring against
all who had taken part in the annexation of Romagna. When Prince
Charles of Lorraine in 1690 advised the Emperor to withdraw his claims
to Spain and concentrate his energies on uniting Italy, he observed
that in order to join the kingdom of Naples with Lombardy, it would be
necessary to reduce the Pope to the sole city of Rome. This most able
statesman of the House of Hapsburg continued: "The services of very
learned doctors should be obtained to instruct the people, both
by word of mouth and by writing, on the inutility and illusion of
excommunications when it is a question of temporalities, which Jesus
Christ never destined to His Church, and which she cannot possess
without outraging His example and compromising His Gospel." Cavour did
not seek the learned doctors, because he knew that the religious side
of the matter, however vital it seemed to the young Breton noblemen
who enlisted under Lamoricière, left unmoved the Pope's subjects, who
had a mixture of scorn and hatred for the rule of priests, such as
was not felt for any government in Italy. For the rest, familiarity
lessens the effect of spiritual fulminations, and even of those not
spiritual. For three months Cavour had sustained the running fire of
all except one of the foreign representatives at Turin; as he wrote to
the Marquis E. d'Azeglio: "I have the whole _corps diplomatique_ on
my back, Hudson excepted; I let them have their say and I go on."
He deplored the sad fate of diplomacy, which always took the most
interest in bad causes, and was the more favourable to a government
the worse it was.[1] If _ces messieurs_ protested or departed, they
must; he could not arrest the current. If he tried, it would carry him
away with it, "which would not be a great evil," but it would carry
away the dynasty also. The Peace of Villafranca had caused the
Italians to conceive an irresistible desire for unity--events were
stronger than men, and he should only stop before fleets and armies.
[Footnote 1: We are reminded of a remark of Prince Bismarck:
"Personne, pas même le plus malveillant démocrate, ne se fait une
idée de ce qu'il y a de nullité et de charlatanisme dans cette
diplomatie."]
It appears that this time Cavour would have acted even without the
assent of Napoleon; it was, however, evidently of great moment to
secure it if possible. The Emperor was making a tour in the newly
acquired province of Savoy when General Cialdini and L.C. Farini were
despatched by Cavour to endeavour to win him over. The interview,
which was held at Chambéry, was kept so secret that its precise date
is not now known. Cavour tried, not for the first time, the effect
of entire frankness. He counted on persuading Napoleon that their
interests were identical: the White Reaction and the Red Republic were
the enemies of both. He did not neglect the item that Lamoricière was
disliked at the Tuileries. With regard to Garibaldi, he represented
that since the cession of Nice no one could manage him. The end of
it was that, if Napoleon did not say the words "Faites, mais faites
vite," which rumour attributed to him, he certainly expressed their
substance.
On September 11 the Sardinian army, more than double as strong as
Lamoricière's, crossed the papal frontier. With the exception of
England and Sweden, all the Powers recalled their representatives
from Turin. The French Ministry telegraphed to Napoleon, who was at
Marseilles, to ask what they were to do. They got no answer, and, left
to their own inspiration, they informed the Duke de Grammont, the
French Ambassador at Rome, that the Emperor's Government "would not
tolerate" the culpable aggression of Sardinia, and that orders were
given to embark troops for Ancona. These misleading assurances
encouraged Lamoricière, but in any case he would probably have thought
it incumbent on him to make what stand he could. He was defeated by
Cialdini on the heights of Castelfidardo--"yesterday unknown, to-day
immortal," as Mgr. Dupanloup eloquently exclaimed. Ancona fell to
a combined attack from land and sea. Meanwhile Fanti advanced on
Perugia, and was on the point of entering Viterbo when a detachment
from the French garrison in Rome suddenly occupied the town: one of
Napoleon's facing-both-ways evolutions by which he thought to save the
goat and cabbages of the Italian riddle, but the final result was to
lose both one and the other. Lamoricière went home, declaring that
he took his defeat less to heart than the cruel disillusions he had
undergone in Rome. Some one proposed that he should go to the rescue
of King Francis, but he answered that his wish had been to serve the
Pope, not the Neapolitan Bourbons.
On the 20th the King of Sardinia, at the head of his army, marched
into the kingdom of Naples. For the Continental Powers it was a new
act of aggression; for Lord Palmerston, a measure of the highest
expediency, to which he had been urging Cavour with an impatience
hardly exceeded by that of the most ardent Italian patriot. The goal
of Italian unity was now more than in sight--it was touched. The
Rubicon was crossed in more senses than one. But at this last stage
there arose a danger which Cavour had not seriously apprehended. He
thought that Austria would not attack, unless directly provoked by
some imprudence of the extreme party. She had allowed the Grand Duke
of Tuscany and the King of Naples to fall; why should she be more
concerned for the Pope? Austria's concern for the Pope was, in fact,
not very deep, but there were Austrian politicians who argued that, if
Venetia was to be saved for the empire, the right of Austria to hold
it must rest on something more solid than a treaty, every other
clause of which had been torn to shreds. Never could a time return so
favourable as the present for striking a blow at the nascent Italian
kingdom. With the king and the best part of the army in the south, who
was there to oppose them? It is true that there was a feeling, growing
and expanding silently, which tended all the other way: a feeling that
enough of German and Hungarian and Bohemian and Polish blood had been
poured out upon Italian plains; that there was a fate in the thing,
and the fate was contrary to Austria. This feeling grew and grew till
the day when Venice too was lost, and not a man in Austria could find
it in his heart to cast one sincere look of regret behind at all that
fabric of splendid but ill-fortune-bringing dominion. A few years were
still to pass, however, before that day came, and all the forces of
the old order combined to press the Emperor to oppose the invading
flood while there was time. Some say that he had actually signed the
order to cross the frontier, but that on second thoughts he decided
first to seek the co-operation of Russia, probably with a view to
keeping France quiet. When he went to Warsaw in October, he left
everything prepared for war on his return. But Alexander II., having
thrown overboard his old friends at Naples, did not want to help the
Pope. The Emperor of Austria was badly received by the people of
Warsaw, and this tended against the alliance. The Prince Regent of
Prussia, who travelled to Warsaw to meet him, definitely refused to
guarantee his Venetian possessions. Lord John Russell had lately met
the Prussian ruler and his minister, Schleinitz, at Coblentz, and had
used all his influence to persuade them to keep Germany out of Italian
concerns. Though the Berlin Government loudly protested against the
Sardinian attack on papal territory, there is no doubt that the voice
of Prussia at Warsaw was raised in favour of peace.
At this juncture Napoleon proposed the usual Congress. While he told
Cavour that he must not expect assistance from him, his private
language towards the Northern Powers did not exclude the possibility
of French intervention. A diversion was created by a note which Lord
John Russell addressed to Sir James Hudson, "the most unprincipled
document," as it was called at Rome, "that had ever been written by
the minister of any civilised court." Lord John defended every act of
Sardinia in the strongest and plainest terms, and people grew almost
more angry with him than with Cavour. The Italian statesman never
quailed through this last perilous crisis; "Nous sommes prêts," he
wrote, "à jouer le tout pour le tout." There are moments when the
problems of politics, as of life, cease to perplex. By degrees the
storm-clouds rolled away without breaking. In November Cavour felt
himself strong enough to affirm that the questions of Naples and the
Marches were purely Italian, and that the Powers of Europe had no
business to meddle with them. During the autumn, amidst other cares,
he was seriously preoccupied by a persistent rumour that his faithful
friend, Sir James Hudson, was to be removed to make room for the
ex-British Minister at Naples, whose occupation was gone through the
fall of the dynasty. It has been denied that the change was then
contemplated; at any rate it was not carried out till a later period,
and Cavour had the comfort of keeping his English fellow-worker near
him till he died.
The Garibaldian epic closed with the battle near the left bank of the
Volturno on October 1. Still Garibaldi showed no disposition to resign
the dictatorship, or to abandon the designs on Rome which he had
postponed, not renounced. On his side, Cavour was resolved that a
normal government should be established at Naples, and that Garibaldi
should not go to Rome, but he was no less resolved that, as far as
he could compass it, the giver of two crowns should be generously
treated. Unfortunately Fanti, the virtual head of the royal army,
represented the old military prejudice which classed volunteers with
banditti. A violent scene took place between this general and Cavour;
Fanti wished that the Garibaldians should be simply sent home with a
gratuity, alleging that "the exigencies of the army" were opposed to
the recognition of their grades. Cavour replied that they were not in
Spain,--in Italy the army obeyed. The ministerial emissaries in the
south received instructions (which they did not invariably execute) to
spare no pains to act in harmony with the dictator. Cavour, himself,
treated him always as a power and an equal. He took care that he
was the first to whom the secret of the invasion of the Marches was
confided. He assured him that in case of a war with Austria he would
be called upon to play an important part. When the king started on the
march for Naples, Cavour wrote to him advising that "infinite regard"
should be paid to the leader of the Thousand; "Garibaldi," he added,
"has become my most violent enemy, but I desire for the good of
Italy, and the honour of your Majesty, that he should retire entirely
satisfied." To L.C. Farini, who accompanied the king to Naples, he
wrote that the whole of Europe would condemn them if they sacrificed
to military pedantry men who had given their blood for Italy. He
would bury himself at Leri for the rest of his life rather than be
responsible for an act of such black ingratitude. In spite of all he
could do, however, a certain grudging spirit hung about the conduct of
Piedmontese officialdom towards the volunteers and their chief, but
great personal offers were made to Garibaldi--the highest military
rank, a castle, a ship, the dowry of a princess for his daughter. All
was refused. Garibaldi asked for the governorship of the Two Sicilies
for a year with unlimited power, and this, in the opinion of every
person of weight in Italy, it was impossible to grant.
In reviewing Cavour's conduct of affairs at this point, it is
important to dwell on his unwavering fidelity to constitutional
methods. We know now that he was strongly urged to take an opposite
course. Ricasoli telegraphed to him: "The master stroke would be to
proclaim the dictatorship of the king." The Iron Baron told Victor
Emmanuel to his face that it was humiliating for him to accept half
Italy as the gift even of a hero. It was no time for scruples; the
_coup d'état_ would be legitimised afterwards by universal suffrage;
Garibaldi himself would approve of the king's dictatorship if it were
accompanied by a thoroughly Italian policy. This was perfectly true;
as Cavour said, the conception was really the same as Garibaldi's own:
a great revolutionary dictatorship to be exercised in the name of the
king without the control of a free press, and with no individual or
parliamentary guarantees. But Cavour would have none of it. What, he
asked, would England say to a _coup d'état?_ His hope had always been
that Italy might make herself a nation without passing through
the hands of a Cromwell; that she might win independence without
sacrificing liberty, and abolish monarchical absolutism without
falling into revolutionary despotism. From parliament alone could be
drawn the moral force capable of subduing factions.
Not from his fellow-countrymen only, but from some who believed
themselves to be Italy's best friends abroad, came the prompting of
the tempter: more power! Few ministers in a predicament of such vast
difficulty would have resisted the evil fascination of those two
words. Cavour heard them unmoved. He told his various counsellors that
they counted too much on his influence, and were too distrustful of
liberty. He had no confidence in dictatorships, least of all in civil
dictatorships; with a parliament many things could be done which would
be impossible to absolute power. The experience of thirteen years
convinced him that an honest and energetic ministry, which had nothing
to fear from the revelations of the tribune, and which was not of a
humour to be intimidated by extreme parties, gained far more than it
lost by parliamentary struggles. He never felt so weak as when the
Chambers were closed. In a letter to Mme. de Circourt, he said that,
if people succeeded in persuading the Italians that they needed a
dictator, they would choose Garibaldi, not himself, and they would be
right. He summed up the matter thus: "I cannot betray my origin, deny
the principles of all my life. I am the son of liberty, and to it I
owe all that I am. If a veil is to be placed on its statue, it is not
for me to do it."
Meanwhile the edge of the precipice was reached. The king was marching
on, and still the dictator held the post which he owed to his sword
and the popular will. He openly begged the king to dismiss his
minister (in his idea kings could change their ministers as easily as
dictators). The public challenge could not be ignored. There was
no time to lose, and Cavour lost none; his answer was an appeal to
parliament. "A man," he said, "whom the country holds justly dear
has stated that he has no confidence in us. It behoves parliament to
declare whether we shall retire or continue our work." He invited the
deputies to pass a Bill authorising the king's Government to accept
the immediate annexation of such provinces of Central and Southern
Italy as manifested by universal suffrage their desire to become an
integral part of the constitutional monarchy of Victor Emmanuel.
This was voted on October 11. The majority of Cavour's party did not
believe that Garibaldi would give in to the national mandate; he knew
him better. On the 13th the dictator called together his advisers
of all shades of opinion. There was a heated discussion: a solution
seemed farther off than ever. Then, when they had all spoken, the
chief rose serenely and said that, if annexation were the will of the
people, he would have annexation; _si faccia l'Italia!_ He decreed
the plebiscite, but, having made up his mind, he did not wait for its
verdict. He issued one more ukase: "that the Two Sicilies form an
integral part of Italy, one and indivisible under the constitutional
king, Victor Emmanuel, and his successors." By a stroke of the pen he
handed over his conquests as a free gift. It was not constitutional,
still less democratic; puritan republicans averted their eyes, so did
rigid monarchists, but Cavour was perfectly content. He had forced
Garibaldi's hand without straining the royal prerogative or the
minister's authority. He had gained his end, and he had not betrayed
freedom. It could be argued now with more force than in 1860 that
Garibaldi and Ricasoli were right in contending that the best
government for the southern populations, only just released from a
demoralising yoke, would have been a wise, temporary despotism. But
despotisms have the habit of being neither wise nor temporary, and,
apart from this, the establishment of any partial or regional rule,
which placed the south under different institutions from the rest of
Italy, would have killed Italian Unity at its birth.
Cavour went on a brief visit to Naples, his name having been the
first to be drawn when the deputies were chosen who were to take the
congratulations of parliament to the king. Umbria, the Marches, and
the kingdoms of Sicily and Naples were joined to the common family.
Much had, indeed, been done, but there was trouble still at Gaeta,
where Napoleon placed his fleet in such a position as to render
an attack from the sea impossible. It was difficult to decide if
dust-throwing were the object, or if Napoleonic ideas had taken a new
turn. Italy was made, but it might be unmade. This was what French
politicians were constantly repeating. "L'Italie est une invention
de l'Empereur," said M. Rouher. "Rome l'engloutira!" predicted M. de
Girardin. Italy, declared M. Thiers, was an historical parasite which
lived on its past and could have no future. If all this were so, the
waters would be disturbed again soon, and there might be play for
anglers. The Murat scheme would have a new chance, were Victor
Emmanuel tried and found wanting. Young Prince Murat confided to his
friends that he expected to be wanted soon at Naples; "a great bore,"
but he would do his duty and go if required.
Whatever purpose Napoleon had in view, he was induced, at last, by the
British Government to desist from prolonging a struggle which could
only end in one way. The French fleet was withdrawn in January 1861,
and Gaeta capitulated on February 13. King Francis began the sad life
of exile, which closed a few years ago at Arco. The true Bourbon takes
misfortune easily; the pleasures of a mock court are dear to him, his
spirits never fail, nor does his appetite. But Francis II., the son of
a Savoyard mother, never consoled himself for the loss of country and
crown.
Cavour hoped that with the fall of Gaeta the state of the old
_Regno_ would rapidly improve, but another citadel remained to the
reaction--Rome, whence the campaign against unity continued to
be directed. A veritable _terreur blanche_, called by one side
brigandage, by the other a holy war, possessed the hills from Vesuvius
to the Sila forest. But though there were several foreign noblemen
who took part in it, not one Neapolitan of respectability or standing
joined the insurgents. The general elections showed in the south, as
over the whole country, a large majority pledged to support Cavour.
The first act of the new Chamber was to vote the assumption of the
title of King of Italy by Victor Emmanuel. The king might have assumed
the title a year before with more correctness than the Longobard kings
of Italy or the First Consul, but he did well to wait till none could
gainsay his right to it. Some faddists proposed to substitute "King of
the Italians." Cavour replied that the title of King of Italy was the
consecration of a great fact: the transformation of the country, whose
very existence as a nation was denied, into the kingdom of Italy.
It condensed into one word the history of the work achieved. On
the proclamation of the new kingdom Cavour resigned office; Victor
Emmanuel, who was never really at his ease with Cavour, thought of
accepting in earnest what was done as a matter of form, but Ricasoli
dissuaded him from the idea. The Cavour ministry therefore returned to
office, with a few modifications.
The new Chamber represented all Italy, except Rome and Venice. From
Villafranca to his death, Venice was never out of Cavour's mind. He
kept in touch with the revolutionary forces in Hungary, and Kossuth
believed to the last that, if Cavour had lived, he would have
compassed the liberation of both Hungary and Venetia within the year
1862. He would have supported Lord John Russell's plan, which was that
Italy should buy the Herzegovina and give it to Austria in exchange
for Venetia, but, on the whole, he thought that the most likely
solution was war, in which Prussia and Italy were ranged on the same
side. He, almost alone, rated at its true value the latent military
force of Prussia. He had a knack of calling Prussia "Germany," as he
used to call Piedmont "Italy." He turned off the furious remonstrances
which came like the burden of a song from Berlin, with the polite
remark that the Prussian Government would be soon very glad to follow
his example. When William I. ascended the throne, he ignored the
rupture of diplomatic relations, and sent La Marmora to whisper into
the ear of the new monarch words of artful flattery. He may have
doubted if a Prussianised Germany would exactly come as a boon and a
blessing to men. In 1848 he prophesied that Germanism would disturb
the European equilibrium, and that the future German Empire would aim
at becoming a naval power in order to combat and rival England on
the seas. But he saw that the rise of Prussia meant the decline of
Austria, and this was all that, as an Italian statesman, with Venetia
still in chains, he was bound to consider.