amongst many lies would probably detect the fact that the French never
entered the town. Whether the Roman Republic will stand I don’t know,
but it has under Mazzini’s inspiration shown a wonderful courage and a
glorious generosity, and at any rate has shaken to its foundations the
Odillon-Barrot Ministry, which I trust may yet go to its own place.
‘Peace be with all such!’
I live here, studying chiefly Michael Angelo, specially in the Sistine
Chapel. I believe the engraving of his ‘Creation of Eve’ there, more
than anything else, led me to Rome. I conceive myself to understand his
superiority and Leonardo da Vinci’s to Raphael, who is only natural,
while they are intellectual: he produces with, and they out of nature.
The idea of St. Peter’s has been wholly killed out of it, partly by the
horrid internal ornaments, but still more completely by the change of
the form from a Greek to a Latin cross; the latter belonging to Gothic,
which Michael Angelo rejects, because he asserts TOTALITY. There!
_To Rev. A. P. Stanley._
Rome: May 24, 1849.
Your historic soul shall be gratified--better late than never--with an
account of the fight of the 30th of April; fatto d’armi gloriosissimo.
‘Yes, we are fighting at last.’[12] ... ‘Meantime, the Æquians and
Volscians, quitting Algidus and concentrating their scattered forces on
Velitræ, ventured under the walls of this stronghold to give battle to
the detachment of Garibaldians which the bold temper of their leader
had brought up somewhat in advance of the main body of the Romans. The
enemy, driven after a severe conflict into the town, acknowledged his
discomfiture by a retreat during the following night in the direction
of Terracina.’
There---- to be translated into the style of Livy! However, I forbear
to proceed, for it is a fatiguing exercise, and ere this goes, our
history will have something newer to record than the fuga del Re Bomba
of Sunday, 3 A.M., 30th inst.
May 31.
If you are interested in our politics you should study the letters to
Lesseps by Mazzini. Only a vagrant artist or two represent with me our
country. Freeborn, British Consul, abides with his flag; but Lowe, the
British grocer, is at Florence. Piale, successor to Monaldini, is a
huge republican, and stands at corners in full civica uniform, shutting
up the reading-room. The Miss Pfyffers also love their country and
hate the priests; but their betrothed lovers being of the old Guardia
Nobile, take the other line. Papa Pfyffer (my landlord) follows these,
but protests against cardinalism loudly. Priests, by the way, walk
about in great comfort--arm-in-arm with a soldier, perhaps; in cafés
and legnos and all profane places they are seen circulating as freely
at least as government paper. Confession is still administered openly
with long sticks in St. Peter’s, and the Apostle’s toe multitudinously
kissed. The Bambino also drives about to see the sick in infinite
state, and is knelt to and capped universally.
Wandering about alone and with the map I have been twice hailed by the
civicas as a ‘spione,’ but after some prattle affectionately dismissed.
The barricades are very strong. A perfect _agger Servianus_ and _fossa
Quiritium_ crosses the road between the Palatine and Aventine; and
before the Porta del Popolo there is an immense work. In the line from
the Trinità del Monte to Sta. Maria Maggiore there are five or six,
besides laterals. The soldiers, so far as one sees, are well behaved;
but the government has been scolding a good deal. It is pleasant to my
pastoral soul to see them sitting by market-women and shelling peas.
I have only seen Mazzini once, but have been up to his rooms three or
four times. Anyone can go; he is sadly ἀδορύφορος for a τύραννος, and I
wonder no spirited Jesuit has yet looked in with a pistol.
June 1.
At this moment comes a rumour to say that the French are _combinati_
with us. But no; it proves that after getting certain conditions
accepted by the Romans, Lesseps had them refused by Oudinot, so he is
off to Paris to see about it there. Meantime, I take it, Oudinot will
only sulk without fighting.
June 3.
On the contrary, just the reverse. They are at it, at-at-at it, with
small arms frequent and occasional cannons, at the Porta San Pancrazio.
We began at four this morning. Oudinot had said distinctly he would not
attack before Monday, but his _Parisiaca fides_ brings him here this
present blessed Sunday.
11
After something like seventeen hours’ fighting, entirely outside in the
Villa Pamfili grounds, here we are _in statu quo_, barring a good many
morti e feriti.
_To T. Arnold, Esq._
Sunday, 10 A.M., June 3.
This is being written while guns are going off, there--, there--,
there! For the French are attacking us again. May the Lord scatter
and confound them! For a fortnight or more they have been negotiating
and talking, and inducing the government to send off men against the
Austrians at Ancona, and now here they are with their cannon. It is
a curious affair, truly; the French Envoy Plenipotentiary makes an
accommodamento; the General repudiates it, and, without waiting even
for advice from Paris, attacks.
_To J. C. Shairp, Esq._
Rome: June 2, 1849.
Concerning Roman politics, hath not God made great newspapers, and
appointed the ‘Times’ for certain seasons? Which even though it lie....
But briefly, for P----’s sake. Lesseps, the envoy, agreed yesterday to
four conditions with the Roman government: the French army to go into
cantonments in the healthy districts hereabouts, _but not in the city_:
guaranteeing these districts against foreign invasion, but exercising
no political power, till things should be settled. But Oudinot
repudiates. There--but for the awful lies which all the newspapers,
specially the ‘Débats,’ ‘Constitutionnel,’ and ‘Times,’ indulge in, I
would not have said a word thereupon. But they _do_ lie, indeed!
June 3.
No; your letter won’t go to-day: for the French are attacking
us--there! there! ‘But do Thou unto them as unto the Midianites. O my
God, make them like unto a wheel.’
10 P.M.
Seventeen blessed hours have they battled--3.30 A.M. to 8.30 P.M., and
the French, I am told, have been unable to plant their cannon against
the wall. The Villa Pamfili has been taken and retaken two or three
times. But to us only smoke and occasional flashes are visible.
June 4, Tuesday.
They can’t get in; they banged away by moonlight most of last night;
but, as I see a French officer at Toulon says, Oudinot is not the man.
June 5.
This is the third day, and they are still outside. The Pancrazio
untaken, and the Villa Pamfili in our hands still.
June 18, Monday.
Going, going, and to-morrow I shall be gone. We have had a fortnight
of gunnery, and what now, heaven knows: perhaps more gunnery; but
to-day I hear hardly anything. Yes--there is one. But we have
been bombarded, think of that! It is funny to see how like any
other city a besieged city looks. Unto this has come our grand
Liberty-Equality-and-Fraternity Revolution!
_To F. T. Palgrave, Esq._
Rome: June 21, 1849.
Shall I date one more letter from Rome? I hope to get off to-day, but
Frenchmen break down bridges. Here we are in the nineteenth day of our
siege, expecting immediate assault, of which, however, I hear as yet
no notice. In the way of cannonade or fusillade, all at this moment
is silent. But the breach is fully big enough, and the last breach
was being made, they say, two or even three days ago. Meantime all is
tranquil within. The soldiers, I think, will fight to the last, and
then retire upon the castle or into the mountains. And though I suspect
some plotting is at work, yet the whole basso popolo will fight, and
the middle classes mostly, and the ‘youth’ almost universally will
_at least_ offer a passive resistance. It is curious how much like any
other city a city under bombardment looks. One goes to the Ara Celi or
the Palatine to look at the firing; one hears places named where shells
have fallen; one sees perhaps a man carrying a bit of one.
The ‘Monitore’ this morning says that the Temple of Fortune has been
damaged, and that a ball has entered the roof exactly above the Aurora
of Guido.
The Romans have suffered heavy losses in their sorties; but they seem
to have obstructed the works a good deal. The French papers spoke of
ten days as the utmost space required for preparation; and on the 12th
Oudinot announced himself ready to enter.
Assure yourself that there is nothing to deserve the name of ‘the
Terror.’ There may be timidity in the passiveness of the Moderates, and
I will not say that if they tried resistance against the Government,
they would not be suppressed, force by force. But one sees no
intimidation. Since May 4 the worst thing I have witnessed has been a
paper in MS. put up in two places in the Corso, pointing out seven or
eight men for popular resentment. This had been done at night: before
the next evening a proclamation was posted in all the streets, from
(I am sure) Mazzini’s pen, severely and scornfully castigating such
proceedings. A young Frenchman in a café, hearing his country abused,
struck an Italian; he was of course surrounded, but escaped by the
interference of the national guard and of the British Consul. The
soldiers, so far as I see, are extremely well behaved, far more seemly
than our regulars; they are about of course in the streets and cafés,
but make no disorder. Ladies walk in the Corso till after 10 P.M.
Farewell; I must go and see about my place.
Alas! it is hopeless. I am doomed to see the burning of Rome, I
suppose. The world, perhaps in the same day, will lose the Vatican and
me! However, they won’t get in yet, I guess.
June 22.
It may have been merry in Dunfermline grey when all the bells were
ringing; but here at Rome it is by no means so. They are sounding the
storm-alarm. Venit summa dies. During the night the French made a
general attack from the Portese south to the Popolo north, and managed
to throw a body of 500 (?) men into a solitary house within the walls,
at the south-west corner.
_To the same._
Rome: June 28, 1849.
I wrote on the 22nd, just after the misfortune of the night of
the 21st. I was not then certain of the fact, that the passage
of the breach was effected without a shot being fired; the 600
men of the Roman line who were there were seized with a panic,
and their commanding officer is said to have told them to save
themselves--anyhow, save themselves they did, and only lost a
barricade, which these poor brutes had been working at for a month. A
very fatal go, indeed; but not so immediately fatal as was expected
when I wrote, and when all the bells were ringing. The batteries of the
new Roman line commanded the breach, and the French have had to dig a
trench to secure their advance.
In the following night (of Friday, 22nd) an immense number of bombs
were thrown; they fell chiefly in the Piazza di Venezia, Piazza Sant’
Apostoli, and Via del Gesù. I do not think much harm was done, and the
people took it coolly enough. I found a crowd assembled about 9 P.M.
in the north-east corner of the Piazza Colonna, watching these pretty
fireworks, ‘ecco un altro!’ One first saw the ‘lightning’ over the
Post-office; then came the missive itself, describing its tranquil
parabola; then the distant report of the mortar; and finally the near
explosion, which occasionally took place in the air. This went on all
night. But it has not been repeated in the same degree. The Consuls
have remonstrated with Oudinot, but he, I believe, pleads ‘orders.’
The operations meantime, till yesterday, were unimportant, _e.g._ four
cannon were got up on the breach, but the Roman batteries say that
they upset them. On Sunday night, however, the 26th, there was another
general attack, and under cover of this the French got their guns
planted on the breach, and were playing with these all yesterday upon
_our_ batteries of S. Pietro in Montorio, which I fear will not be long
tenable.
This morning I hear nothing I can rely on, and considering the bombs,
I forbore to visit my look out of the Ara Celi. As for the feelings of
the people, I can of course say little. I fancy the middle-class Romans
think it rather useless work, but they don’t feel strongly enough
on the matter to make them take steps against a government which I
believe has won their respect alike by its moderation and its energy;
perhaps, too, they are afraid of the troops, under which term however
do not understand foreigners, unless you choose to give that name to
the levies of the Papal States in general. Visiting the Monte Cavallo
hospital the other day, where there are I think 200 men, three Poles
and one Frenchman were especially pointed out to me, that I might say
some words of French to them. All the others I saw were Italians, from
Bologna, Ferrara, Ravenna, Perugia, and so forth. There was one Swiss.
Most of them had received their wounds on the 3rd. Nice fellows they
seemed, young, and mostly cheerful, spite of their hurts. One had lost
an arm and a leg; another had a ball in his hip, yet to be extracted;
‘and the like.’ On the whole I incline to think they will fight it out
to the last, but chi lo sa?
We have a General Archioni, a Milanese noble, a fine brave fellow, in
the lodgings here, with his secretary and capo del stato maggiore, and
a soldier or two. He was posted at the Villa Ludovisi, and thither two
days ago we all went--fourteen, ‘Mama’ and four daughters, and niece,
and their escort, a gay party of pleasure.
Festa di San Pietro: Friday, 29.
I have been this morning to the Colosseum, whence you see the position
very well and securely. The French batteries are too strong for the
Romans, I think; they respond but feebly. The Secretary of the General
here detected two nights ago some people making signals; he took some
‘civicas’ and went and arrested them; there were three monks and two
‘civicas’ in open communication with the French, while it was still
daylight. A good deal of this telegraphing goes on, they tell me.
The ‘panic’ of the 21st seems to have been a good deal felt as a
disgrace; these last few days they have been fighting very bravely, I
take it. The ‘Moniteur’ this morning states the number of _foreigners_
in the Roman service to be 1,650; 800 Lombards, 300 Tuscans, 250 Poles
and French, and 300 miscellaneous in Garibaldi’s corps. The national
guard is 14,000 strong; the army, I suppose, 20,000. A bomb, I am
thankful to say, has left its mark on the façade of the Gesù. I wish it
had stirred up old Ignatius. Farewell.
A. H. C.
Le Citoyen malgré lui.
_To M. Arnold, Esq._
Rome: June 23, 1849.
I advertise you that I hope to be in the Geneva country in August,
reposing in the bosom of nature from the fatigues of art and the
turmoil of war!!! _Quid Romæ faciam?_ What’s politics to he, or he to
politics? But it is impossible to get out, and if one did, Freeborn,
Vice-consul, who however is a _Caccone_, says the French avan-posti
shoot at one.
July 3.
Well, we are taken; the battery immediately to the left (as you go out)
of St. Pancrazio was carried by assault, on the night of the 29th or
morning of the 30th, while we in this corner got bombarded by way of
feint. The Roman line in several cases has behaved ill, and certainly
gave way here rather early; afterwards, however, under Garibaldi’s
command, it seems to have fought well, at least two regiments, who are
now off with him and his free corps to the Abruzzi.
On Saturday morning (30th June) the Assembly resolved to give in;
Mazzini & Co. resigned; and a deputation went off to Oudinot. Sunday
was perfectly tranquil; yesterday evening Garibaldi withdrew his troops
from the Trastevere, and went off by the S. Giovanni. To-day they
say the French will enter. Altogether, I incline to think the Roman
population _has_ shown a good deal of ‘apathy’; they did not care about
the bombs much, but they did not care to fight _very_ hard either. The
Lombards are fine fellows, and the Bolognese too; the only pity there
were not more of them. If you put the whole lot of them together,
Poles, Lombards, Tuscans, French, they would not exceed 3,000. On the
whole, the French were not _very_ barbarous, but if we had not yielded,
I believe they meant to bombard us really; and as it was, their shells
might have done irreparable harm.
At noon to-day the Assembly proclaims the Constitution! which it had
just completed.
_To F. T. Palgrave, Esq._
Rome: July 4, 1849.
If you should happen to read in the ‘Constitutionnel’ that ‘_on
Tuesday, July 3, our army entered Rome amidst the acclamations of the
people_,’ perhaps you will not be the worse for a commentary on the
text.
On Monday evening Garibaldi, with all the free corps except some
Lombards under Medici, and with a good many Roman troops in addition,
set off for the Abruzzi. On Tuesday at noon the Assembly proclaimed
the _Constitution_ on the Campidoglio. I went there and heard it.
There were present perhaps 800 or 900 people. This done, I presume
the deputies dispersed, the labours of the Constituent being clearly
completed. The French had already begun their entry, and occupied the
Ponte Sisto, and, I believe, the Trinità dei Monti. About half-past
four I went out, and presently saw a detachment coming up from the
Palazzo Borghese to the Condotti. I stood in the Corso with some thirty
of the people, and saw them pass. Fine working soldiers indeed, dogged
and business-like; but they looked a little awkward, while the people
screamed and hooted, and cried, ‘Viva la Reppublica Romana!’ When they
had got past some young simpleton sent a tin pail after them; four or
five faced round with bayonets presented, while my young friend cut
away up the Corso double quick. They went on. At this moment some Roman
bourgeois, as I fancy, but perhaps a foreigner, said something either
to express his sense of the folly of it, or his sympathy with the
invaders. He was surrounded, and I saw him buffeted a good deal, and
there was a sword lifted up, but I think not bare; I was told he got
off. But a priest who walked and talked publicly in the Piazza Colonna
with a Frenchman was undoubtedly killed I know his friends, and saw
one of them last night. Poor man! he was quite a liberal ecclesiastic,
they tell me, but certainly not a prudent one.
To return to my own experience. After this the column passed back by
another street into the Corso, and dispersed the crowd with the bayonet
point; they then went on and occupied, I take it, the Post-office,
which I afterwards found full of them. About six o’clock I walked
out again, and found the Monte Cavallo, the Palazzo Barberini, and
other places occupied. I thus missed the entry of Oudinot and his
staff. I got back only just to see the final dragoons; but an English
acquaintance informed me that in passing by the Café Nuovo, where an
Italian tricolor hung from the window, Oudinot plucked at it, and
bid it be removed. The French proceeded to do this, but the Romans
intervened; Cernuschi, the barricade commissioner, took it down,
kissed it, and, as I myself saw, carried it in triumph amidst cheers
to the Piazza Colonna. I did not follow, but on my bolder friend’s
authority I can state that here the French moved up with their bayonets
and took it from Cernuschi, stripping him moreover of his tricolor
scarf. One hears reports of as many as eight Romans being killed for
fraternising with the Gaul, and of some of the French themselves having
been assassinated. My friend told me two shots were fired from a café
in the Corso when the troops passed that way at half-past four. This
morning I have been to the field of battle and looked at the trenches.
I condescended to speak with two Frenchmen, consoling myself by an
occasional attempt at sarcasm. They said the Romans did nothing at all
when the batteries were assaulted; but the artillery had been well
directed. You see lots of villas, six or seven at least, in ruins. S.
Pietro in Montorio is in a sad state; balls have come in and knocked
great holes, and the east end is nearly in ruins, but the paintings are
most, if not all, quite safe--those of Sebastian del Piombo certainly;
and Bramante’s chapel is wholly untouched. My French officer said the
troops were about 25,000. Almost all are in the city. The Roman forces
are to withdraw immediately into cantonments assigned by Oudinot, and
guaranteed against the Austrians. The national guard will be disarmed,
and then all will be considered safe. On the whole, the French soldiers
seemed to me to show excellent temper. At the same time, some faces
I have seen are far more brutal than the worst Garibaldian; and we
have hitherto seen nothing so unpleasing in the female kind as the
vivandière. The Gaul is certainly the stronger animal, but assuredly
the greater beast.
The American banker tells me he was told that in the morning the
French were cheered. I rather doubt it; but I believe the bourgeoisie
in part are very glad it is over. Naturally, for there was to have
been a regular bombardment; so said my French friend. They had got a
large supply ready, just come from France. The priest is not dead,
and perhaps will survive; but another, I hear, was hewed in pieces
for shouting ‘Viva Pio Nono,’ ‘Abasso la Reppublica,’ &c. Oudinot’s
proclamation is expected every moment. They say it will declare a stage
of siege; name a military governor and commander of the garrison;
dissolve the national guard and the Assembly, and so forth.
_To the same._
Rome: July 6, 1849.
Medium of all desirable communication with my brethren at home! you
shall receive one more despatch. I think of going off to Albano, or
some of these places, which now one supposes will be attainable.
Tivoli, they say, is dubious. Garibaldi went off that way, and the
French have sent a detachment after him, with orders, one is told, to
give no quarter.
It is a sight to make one gnash one’s very wisdom teeth to go about
the fallen Jerusalem and behold the abomination of desolation standing
where it ought not; not that the French misbehave, so far as I see,
individually. They appear to me to display considerable temper. Still
one is told that they carried off a lot of lemons, &c., the first
night without paying for them. One soldier, they say, was stabbed by a
Trasteverine woman at the Ponte Sisto for insulting her. Any way, one
sees how ‘riling’ it is to be conquered.
I am greatly rejoiced meantime that they have been obliged to proclaim
the state of siege. They make much of the adhesion of the army. I don’t
exactly know how far it has been given. Two regiments went off with
Garibaldi and one heard divers stories. However, with the alternative
of dissolution and beggary, it is no marvel that the Roman line, not
a popular body, should consent to give its service to any de-facto
government.
Last night, for the first time, ‘by order,’ we were all driven in at
half-past nine. I found a bayonet point within a few inches of me as I
came along the Corso, while the battalion was clearing it.
Has the ‘Times’ correspondent told the funny way in which they have
shown their spite, by daubing out all the French sign-boards?
The natives do not universally quit the cafés when the French come in;
at the Bon Goût in the Piazza di Spagna they appear to be treated with
polite indifference; in the Café Nuovo, such unmistakable disgust was
evinced that, considering also its size and importance, for you know
it is a whole palace, and _the_ great place of resort, they have seen
fit to shut it up and fill it with soldiers. Elsewhere the enemies feed
together, but with a pale very distinctly marked between them.
Mazzini was still here yesterday. Galetti, president of the Assembly,
and commander of the Carbineers, was taken under American protection
(as I hear); otherwise he would have been arrested; but the political
arrests have been limited to some half-dozen agitators. Ciceruacchio
got off with an American passport. You know the Assembly sat on the day
after the French entrée; Mazzini was present. They passed some three or
four decrees, and put them up in the streets. Oudinot’s proclamation
dissolving the old government came out an hour or two after.