Baron Sonnino had to take into account not only the unsteadiness of the
ground on which the Government stood, owing to these parliamentary
regroupings, but the general effects that would ensue from the country's
financial position. When, in spite of the victory and the approach of
peace, the exchange price of the lira dropped 2 to 3 points towards the
end of November, this may have had, contrary to what was thought by
many, no connection with a revolutionary movement. The fact that in
Triest the authorities had been obliged to isolate Italian ex-prisoners
on their return from Russia, since they were imbued with revolutionary
principles, at any rate were uttering loud revolutionary cries, may have
been the mere temporary infection caught from their environment. But
that of which there was no doubt was the entire truth of Caroti's
statement when that deputy declared at Milan that while Italy had been
triumphant in the military sphere, she had been economically overthrown.
Bankruptcy had not been announced, though it existed. Sonnino may
therefore have been impelled not only by imperialism, by his inability
to adjust himself to the new international situation, but by the hope
that through his policy the new internal situation might be tided over.
If the thoughts of his fellow-countrymen could be directed elsewhere
than to bankruptcy and possible revolution, it might be that in the
meantime adroit measures and good luck would brush away these
disagreeable phenomena. And he would then be rightly looked upon as one
who had deserved well of his country. So he set about the task with such
a thoroughness that he turned not alone the thoughts of men, but their
heads. Professor Italo Giglioli addressed a letter to _The New Europe_
in which he said that he was claiming now not the territories given by
the Treaty of London, but considerably more. He wanted all Dalmatia,
down to Kotor. In foreign hands, he said, Dalmatia would be an eternal
danger, and besides: "What in Dalmatia is not Italian is barbaric!" It
was a melancholy spectacle to see a man of Giglioli's reputation saying
that Dubrovnik, the refuge of Slav culture in the age of darkness and
the place in which Slav literature so gloriously arose, was, forsooth,
throughout its history always Italian in culture and in literature.
"Among thinking people in Italy," proclaims the Professor, "there are
indeed but few who will abandon to the Balkan processes a region and a
people which have always been possessed by Italian culture and which
constitute the necessary wall of Italy and Western Europe against the
inroads of the half-barbaric East." He protests that it is ridiculous of
_The New Europe_ to assert that the secret Treaty of London is supported
by a tiny, discredited band of Italians; and indeed that Review has
regretfully to acknowledge that many of his countrymen have been swept
off their feet and carried onward in the gale of popular enthusiasm.
Giglioli ends by asking that his name be removed from the list of _The
New Europe's_ collaborators. In vain does the _The New Europe_ say that
the Professor's programme must involve a war between Italians and
Yugoslavs. "We must be prepared for a new war," said the _Secolo_ on
January 12. "The Italians who absolutely demand the conquest of Dalmatia
must have the courage to demand that the demobilization of our Army
should be suspended, and to say so very clearly." And the _Corriere
della Sera_ warned Orlando of the consequences if he took no steps to
silence the mad voices. "No one knows better," it wrote, "than the
Minister of the Interior, who is also Premier, that on the other coast
Italy claims that part of Dalmatia which was assigned to her by the
Treaty of London, but not more.... If the Government definitely claims
and demands the whole of Dalmatia, then the agitation is justified; but
if the Government does not demand it, then we repeat that to favour and
not to curb the movement is the worst kind of Defeatism, for it creates
among Italians a state of mind tending to transform the sense of a great
victory into the sense of a great defeat ... quite apart from the
intransigeance which this provokes in the Yugoslav camp." It was in
vain. And when Bissolati, having resigned from office on the issue of
Italo-Yugoslav relations, attempted to explain his attitude at the Scala
in Milan on January 11, his meeting was wrecked, for though the body of
the hall and the galleries were relatively quiet, if not very
sympathetic--it was a ticket meeting--the large number of subscription
boxes, which could not be closed to their ordinary tenants, had been
packed by Bissolati's adversaries, who succeeded in preventing him from
speaking. After a long delay he managed to read the opening passage, but
when he came to the first "renunciation"--the Brenner for the
Teutons--disturbance set in finally and he left the theatre. Afterwards
the rioters adjourned to the _Corriere_ and _Secolo_ offices, where they
broke the windows. And thus the first full statement of the war aims of
any Italian statesman could not be uttered. It was spread abroad by the
Press. Bissolati claimed to speak in the name of a multitude which had
hitherto been silent.... The masses, he said, demanded, that their
rulers should devote all their strength to "the divine blessing of
freeing mankind from the slavery of war." ... "To those," he said, "who
speak of the Society of Nations as an 'ideology' or 'Utopia' which has
no hold over our people, we would reply: Have you been in the trenches
among the soldiers waiting for the attack?" [Signor Bissolati had the
unique record, among Allied or enemy statesmen, of having volunteered
for active service, though past the fighting age, and of having served
in the trenches for many months before entering the Orlando Cabinet.]