It will here satisfy the strongest love of contrasts to turn from
Dall' Ongaro the sentimental poet to Dall' Ongaro the politician, and
find him on his feet and making a speech at a public dinner given to
Richard Cobden at Trieste, in 1847. Cobden was then, as always, the
advocate of free trade, and Dall' Ongaro was then, as always, the
advocate of free government. He saw in the union of the Italians
under a customs-bond the hope of their political union, and in their
emancipation from oppressive imposts their final escape from yet
more galling oppression. He expressed something of this, and, though
repeatedly interrupted by the police, he succeeded in saying so much
as to secure his expulsion from Trieste.
Italy was already in a ferment, and insurrections were preparing in
Venice, Milan, Florence, and Rome; and Dall' Ongaro, consulting with
the Venetian leaders Manin and Tommaseo, retired to Tuscany, and took
part in the movements which wrung a constitution from the Grand Duke,
and preceded the flight of that prince. In December he went to Rome,
where he joined himself with the Venetian refugees and with other
Italian patriots, like D'Azeglio and Durando, who were striving to
direct the popular mind toward Italian unity. The following March he
was, as we have seen, one of the exiles who led the people against the
Palazzodi Venezia. In the mean time the insurrection of the glorious
Five Days had taken place at Milan, and the Lombard cities, rising one
after another, had driven out the Austrian garrisons. Dall' Ongaro
went from Rome to Milan, and thence, by advice of the revolutionary
leaders, to animate the defense against the Austrians in Friuli;
one of his brothers was killed at Palmanuova, and another severely
wounded. Treviso, whither he had retired, falling into the hands of
the Germans, he went to Venice, then a republic under the presidency
of Manin; and here he established a popular journal, which opposed the
union of the struggling republic with Piedmont under Carlo Alberto.
Dall' Ongaro was finally expelled and passed next to Ravenna, where he
found Garibaldi, who had been banished by the Roman government, and
was in doubt as to how he might employ his sword on behalf of his
country. In those days the Pope's moderately liberal minister, Rossi,
was stabbed, and Count Pompeo Campello, an old literary friend and
acquaintance of Dall' Ongaro, was appointed minister of war. With
Garibaldi's consent the poet went to Rome, and used his influence
to such effect that Garibaldi was authorized to raise a legion of
volunteers, and was appointed general of those forces which took so
glorious a part in the cause of Italian Independence. Soon after, when
the Pope fled to Gaeta, and the Republic was proclaimed, Dall' Ongaro
and Garibaldi were chosen representatives of the people. Then followed
events of which it is still a pang keen to read: the troops of the
French Republic marched upon Rome, and, after a defense more splendid
and heroic than any victory, the city fell. The Pope returned, and all
who loved Italy and freedom turned in exile from Rome. The cities of
the Romagna, Tuscany, Lombardy, and Venetia had fallen again under the
Pope, the Grand Duke, and the Austrians, and Dall' Ongaro took refuge
in Switzerland.
{Illustration: FRANCESCO DALL' ONGARA}
Without presuming to say whether Dall' Ongaro was mistaken in his
political ideas, we may safely admit that he was no wiser a politician
than Dante or Petrarch. He was an anti-Papist, as these were, and
like these he opposed an Italy of little principalities and little
republics. But his dream, unlike theirs, was of a great Italian
democracy, and in 1848-49 he opposed the union of the Italian patriots
under Carlo Alberto, because this would have tended to the monarchy.