FIRST EFFORTS OF CONSTITUTIONALISM, 1820-1832.
Effect of Napoleonic Wars on Italian Feeling.--Austrian promises
and performances in Lombardy.--Vincenzo Monti.--Ugo
Foscolo.--Alessandro Manzoni.--Federigo Confalonieri.--Position of
Sardinia.--Relations of Sardinia with Austria.--Reaction under
Victor Emmanuel.--Ferdinand I. of Naples.--The Carbonari.--The
Spanish rising.--The Spanish Constitution.--The Neapolitan
rising.--Guglielmo Pepe.--The Conference at Troppau.--Palermo and
the Constitution of 1812.--Divisions in the Liberal
Camp.--Ferdinand's attitude.--The movement in Piedmont.--Santa
Rosa.--Charles Albert.--"Voleva e non voleva."--The Students'
rising.--The rising in Piedmont, and causes of its
failure.--Reaction in Italy.--The first martyr.--The Greek
rising.--Alexander of Russia.--George Canning.--Breaking of the
Holy Alliance.--The Movements of 1830-31.--The Frankfort
Decrees.--Metternich's second triumph.
Of all the countries of Europe, none had been more affected than
Italy, both for good and evil, by the Napoleonic wars; and in no part
of Italy were the traces of these wars so evident as in Lombardy.
Though settled liberty had been unknown there since the cities of the
Lombard League had fallen under their petty tyrants; though any sense,
even of national independence, must have ceased since the sixteenth
century; yet the real misery of the position of a conquered country,
the sense of an absolutely alien rule, seems hardly to have been fully
realised by the Lombards, until the Peace of Utrecht, in 1713, had
substituted the Austrian rule for that of the Spaniards. The Spanish
tyranny, however cruel, had been softened to the Italians by the sense
of community of race and similarity of language; and the readiness of
the conquerors to inter-marry with the conquered had given hopes of an
ultimate amalgamation between the races. But under the German rule
there were no such modifications of the evils of conquest. The new
rulers held aloof from the Italians; and the latter were reminded at
every moment that they were not merely slaves, but slaves to an alien
and unsympathetic master.
When, then, an Italian, at the head of a French army, offered the
Lombards deliverance from German rule; when he organized them into a
separate legion, and showed special trust in them throughout his wars;
when he established the Government of the Cis-Alpine Republic, and
held out before their astonished eyes the vision of an united Italy,
it was natural that such appeals should awaken hopes of a newer life,
and a prouder position in the councils of Europe.
It was true that their confidence had received terrible shocks. The
horrible treachery of the Treaty of Campo Formio, the manipulation of
the Constitution of the Cis-Alpine Republic, the gradual changes which
tended to absorb it into the French Empire; these had been tolerably
clear signs to the Lombards of what they might ultimately expect from
their so-called liberator.
Yet amid all these acts of violence and treachery, Napoleon had still
kept before them the idea of a separate kingdom of Italy, if not in
the present, then in the not distant future. If Napoleon failed them,
Eugene Beauharnais might realise the ideal with which his step-father
had mocked them; if Eugene Beauharnais proved false, King Joachim of
Naples might lead them to freedom.
And then, most wonderful of all! came the announcement that the
Austrian might become, in his turn, the liberator. In 1809, Archduke
John had promised to the Italians, in the name of the Emperor Francis,
"a Constitution founded on the nature of things, and a frontier
inaccessible to any foreign rule. Europe well knows," continued the
Archduke, "that the word of this Prince is sacred, and that it is as
unchangeable as it is pure. It is Heaven that speaks by his mouth."
General Nugent, the leader of the Austrian forces, followed up this
proclamation, at a later time, by equally strong promises of Italian
independence, and as late as April 26, 1814, Lord William Bentinck,
the founder of the Sicilian Constitution of 1812, had added his
guarantee for the liberty, prosperity, and independence of Italy.
The Italians, therefore, had some hopes of justice from the Powers of
Europe. These were shaken by the Congress of Vienna; and the Lombards
received a new shock when they found how unreal were even the seeming
concessions made by that Congress. A central Congregation of Lombardy,
which had no power of initiating reforms, and hardly leave to utter
complaints, was the sole embodiment of the principle of Italian
independence; and the "frontier guaranteed against the foreigner" was
unable to exclude, not only Austrian soldiers from the garrisons of
Lombardy, but even Austrian judges from her tribunals, and Austrian
professors from her universities; secret tribunals tried Lombards,
who were arrested for they knew not what cause; taxes out of all
proportion to the size of Lombardy drained the country for the benefit
of other parts of the empire; and police dogged the footsteps of the
most distinguished citizens.
Nor could Lombardy be even certain of her own sons. The wisest
Lombards might well have been confused by the rapid changes of
government which had taken place in the short space of eighteen years.
They had seen Austrian tyranny give place to a Cis-Alpine Republic;
they had passed from republican rule by somewhat confused stages under
the despotism of Napoleon, a despotism which had in its turn to give
way to the freer rule of Eugene Beauharnais; and lastly they had seen
Beauharnais overthrown, and Austrian rule restored in a more crushing
form than before.
Not merely their political judgment, but their sense of right and
wrong had been unsettled by such changes. When men of high genius,
like the poet Vincenzo Monti, could begin his literary career by a
fierce poem against France, continue it by songs in praise of the
French conquerors as promoters of liberty, then write eulogies on
Napoleon's empire, and finally join in the inauguration of a library,
which was to be the means of reconciling the Italians to their
Austrian conquerors, it can scarcely be wondered at if men of lower
intellect found themselves equally ready to worship each new ruler as
he rose into power, and to trample on the memory of fallen heroes.
A man of nobler type than Monti expressed, perhaps still more clearly,
the sense of despair which seemed likely to become the keynote of
Italian feeling. Ugo Foscolo was, from his very birth, an embodiment
of the confused state of Italy at that period. He was born in 1778, in
the Isle of Zante, then a colony of the Venetian Republic, and in a
condition of the utmost lawlessness. He was sent from thence to study
at Padua, and thus grew up to manhood during the period of those
continual changes in Lombardy which marked the period of the struggle
against France. At one time he thought of becoming a priest, but soon
devoted himself to literature.
The sole models for the Italian dramatists, at that period, were the
writings of Vittorio Alfieri, whose feelings and literary taste had
led him to adhere, as closely as he could, to the old classical
traditions. At the age of nineteen Foscolo chose, as his first subject
for a drama, the horrible story of Thyestes; but though this work was
received with great applause, his literary career was, for a time, cut
short by the Treaty of Campo Formio.
His political convictions seem already to have been strongly
developed, for he was forced to leave Venice to escape the persecution
of the new Government. Yet the creation of the Cis-Alpine Republic
revived his hopes, and he hastened to Milan to take a share in the new
life. There he became acquainted with the two leading poets of the
day, Vincenzo Monti and Giuseppe Parini. From the former he gained
several hints in style; from the latter he learnt the nobler lesson of
hatred of corruption and servility. But the growing tyranny of
Napoleon, the sense of the fickleness of his own countrymen, and the
loathing of the rule of the Austrians, produced in Foscolo a bitter
tone of cynicism and despair.
It was while in this state of mind that he fell in with Goethe's
romance of Werther; and on this he modelled the strange rhapsodical
story of Jacopo Ortis, in which the hero, disappointed in love and
politics, takes refuge, like Werther, in suicide. But while the German
romance was merely the expression of a passing feeling, which the
author took pleasure in throwing into an artistic form, the Italian
story was the deliberate expression of Foscolo's most permanent state
of mind, and was accepted as the embodiment of the feelings of many
other Lombard youths.
Foscolo, after fighting for the independence of Italy against the
Austrian invasion of 1815, withdrew in disgust to England; but some of
those who would gladly have welcomed him as a fellow-worker still
remained in Lombardy, and tried to form a nucleus of free Italian
thought.
Of these, the most remarkable was Alessandro Manzoni, best known to
foreigners as the author of "I Promessi Sposi." Manzoni's influence
was more widely felt in Italy at a later period; but the presence of
such a man among the Lombard patriots of 1816-20 is too remarkable a
fact to pass without notice. He, like so many other young nobles, had
gone through a phase of eighteenth-century scepticism. But in 1808 he
had been attracted by a beautiful Protestant lady, who, after her
marriage to Manzoni, drifted into Roman Catholicism, and eventually
led her husband to accept the same faith. Many of his old comrades
denounced his conversion, and some even attributed it to evil motives.
But they soon discovered that his new faith, far from weakening his
Italian feeling, had strengthened, while in some sense, it softened
it. The hard classicism of which Alfieri had set the fashion, and
which Foscolo could not shake off, was repugnant to Manzoni, who
desired to become the sacred poet of Italy, and who was recognized by
Goethe as being "Christian without fanaticism, Roman Catholic without
hypocrisy."
Manzoni disliked Eugene Beauharnais for wishing to derive his title to
the kingdom of Italy from Alexander of Russia; but he sympathized with
the attempt of Murat, and was ready to act with those Lombards who
wished to rouse Italian feeling in literature and politics.
But though men like Foscolo and Manzoni had a wider and deeper
influence in all parts of Italy, the person who most attracted the
hopes of the Lombards and the fear and hatred of Metternich, at this
period, was a man whose name is now little remembered outside his own
country. This was Count Federigo Confalonieri. He, like so many of the
better men of his country, had become equally disgusted with French
and Austrian rulers; and, when a proposal was made by the Italian
Senate in 1814 to secure from the allies an independent kingdom
of Italy, to be governed by Eugene Beauharnais, Confalonieri headed
a protest against the proposal. The Austrian spies seized the
opportunity to stir up a riot against the Senate; and in this
disturbance Prina, one of the ministers, was seized by the mob and
murdered, in spite of Confalonieri's indignant protest.
The Senate fled; and the new Provisional Government of Lombardy sent
Confalonieri to Paris, to plead for an independent kingdom of
Lombardy. His appeal, however, was in vain; and, when the Austrians
recovered their rule, Confalonieri was banished from Milan. He soon,
however, returned, and devoted himself to developing in all ways the
resources of his country. He had studied in London and Paris the
principle of mutual instruction; and he founded schools for that
purpose in Lombardy. He succeeded in getting the first steamboat
built in Milan, introduced gas light, and encouraged all kinds of
improvements, both artistic and industrial.
But his great work was the gathering round him, for literary and
political purposes, of the great writers of Lombardy; and he founded a
journal called "Il Conciliatore," to which contributions were sent by
the poet Silvio Pellico, by the historians Sismondi and Botta, by
Manzoni and Foscolo, and, amongst others, by a certain Lombard exile,
who was afterwards to earn a short and sad celebrity in Italian
history, Pellegrino Rossi. Thus, as a great noble encouraging the
material growth of his country, as the centre of a literary movement,
and above all as a known champion of freedom, Confalonieri riveted the
attention of all who knew him.
But, however zealous this small knot of Lombards might be for the
progress and freedom of their country, none of them supposed that
Lombardy could throw off the yoke of Austria without assistance from
other Powers. The question therefore was, to whom they should look for
help.
Their nearest neighbour, the King of Sardinia, had some special
grounds for grievance against the Emperor of Austria, besides the
tradition of dislike which he had inherited from Victor Amadeus. That
unfortunate king had had reason to regret the prominent part which he
had taken in defying the French Republic in 1796. For he found that
Francis of Austria was eager on every occasion to take advantage of
the weakness of his ally. When Savoy was hard pressed by the French,
the Austrians had demanded that, in return for any help that they
might give to the King of Sardinia, he should surrender to them part
of the territory in Lombardy which had been secured to him by recent
treaties. Victor Amadeus endeavoured to resist this proposal as
long as he could; but he was induced by the pressure of English
diplomatists to consent that, if in the war any lands were taken from
Austria, he would compensate the Austrians by part of the territory
which they demanded.
Victor Emmanuel found in 1815 that alliance with Austria cost him as
dear as it had cost his predecessor in 1796. For, even in the last
desperate struggle against Napoleon, the Austrians demanded that the
treaty of alliance between Austria and Sardinia should contain a
clause for the destruction of the fortifications of Alessandria; and
in the Congress of Vienna they tried to take from Victor Emmanuel the
district of Novara. By the help of Alexander of Russia these intrigues
were defeated; but the Austrians, in revenge, made all the delay that
they could devise in evacuating Piedmont; and, when they finally left
it in 1816, they destroyed the fortress outside Alessandria. Under
these circumstances it was natural enough that the King of Sardinia
should bear a bitter grudge against the House of Austria.
But, on the other hand, there was great reason to doubt whether Victor
Emmanuel could be persuaded to take the lead in any war that savoured
of revolution. For, hostile as he was to the claims of Austria, the
newly-restored king resented yet more strongly the changes which had
been introduced during the French occupation. On his restoration in
1814, he abolished by one sweeping Act all laws passed since 1800 in
Piedmont; primogeniture, aristocratic privileges, ecclesiastical
tribunals, tortures, secret inquisitions, were all restored. Even at
the universities learned men were deposed, as likely to be friendly to
the French, and were replaced by men who had no claim but their social
rank. A system of espionage was introduced, at least as inquisitorial
and degrading as that of Metternich, and it was soon found that to
maintain that system it was necessary to sacrifice national dignity,
and to have recourse to the great master in the art of tyranny. Thus
it came about that Austrian officers were chosen to control the police
in Turin.
In two important respects the government of Victor Emmanuel was even
worse than that of Austria. Clerical injustice and oppression were as
distasteful to Francis and Metternich as they had been to Joseph and
Leopold; while in Piedmont, on the contrary, friars and monks were
allowed a licence which speedily became a new source of evil. The
other point of difference was that, tyrannical and unjust as the
Austrian tribunals were in cases where political questions were
involved, they were perfectly pure in cases between man and man
unconnected with politics; whereas in Piedmont judicial decisions were
sold to the highest bidder.
Under these circumstances, the eyes of the champions of Italian
liberty naturally turned to that kingdom from which the last effort
had been made for the unity of Italy.
Naples had contributed a very large proportion of those who had died
for the cause of liberty in the earlier struggles, and even before
that time had produced at least one man who had left his mark on
sciences which tended to promote good government. Gaetano Filangieri
had been one of the most distinguished writers on law and political
economy, and had gained great influence at one period over Ferdinand
I. of Naples. Ferdinand himself, though intensely weak, and capable of
cruelty under certain circumstances, was not a man of habitually cruel
character, nor even of so despotic a temperament as Victor Emmanuel of
Sardinia.
But, like most of the sovereigns of Italy, he found himself compelled
to rely more and more on Austria for the re-establishment of his
power. He appointed Nugent, the Austrian general, as the head of his
army, and a central council interfered with the liberties which had
grown up in Naples. His refusal to carry out the promises of liberty
which he had made in his time of difficulty naturally irritated his
people against him, while the recollections of Murat stirred in them
the desire for new efforts for freedom.
But the great ally which Naples supplied at this time to the cause
of liberty was the Society of the Carbonari. Connected by vague
traditions with some societies of the past, Carbonarism had received
its first distinct political shape in the year 1811, when Murat was
reigning in Naples. In 1814, when Murat had shown signs of a despotic
spirit, it transferred its allegiance to King Ferdinand, then reigning
only in Sicily. When Ferdinand had been restored to the throne of
Naples, he found Carbonarism a dangerous element in his kingdom, and
he began to prosecute the members of the Society. This had not,
however, deprived the Carbonari of their monarchical sympathies; they
merely transferred them from Ferdinand to his son Francis, who, having
assisted at the establishment of the Constitution of 1812 in Sicily,
was supposed to be committed to the cause of liberty.
A vague talk about equality, and a more definite demand for the
independence of Italy, constituted the programme of the Carbonari. But
the Society was surrounded by various symbols of an impressive
character, and its rules were enforced by a secret and vigorous
discipline. It was evident that, in some way, it was suited to the
wants of the time; for it spread rapidly from Naples to other parts of
Italy, and took root both in Lombardy and Piedmont. In Lombardy it
speedily attracted the attention of the Austrian police, and in 1818
several arrests were made; but such attempts merely strengthened the
growth of the movement, and Carbonarism soon appeared in Spain.
In the latter country the betrayal of the Constitutional cause had
been, perhaps, baser than in any other part of Europe.
With the exception of Frederick William of Prussia, no sovereign had
owed more to the zeal of his people in the struggle against Napoleon
than Ferdinand of Spain. In 1812, before he had been restored to his
throne, he had been forced to grant a Constitution to his people,
which, on recovering full power, he had abolished; and anyone who
ventured to speak of liberty had been exiled or imprisoned. Among
those who had been forced to fly from the country was Rafael del
Riego, who had been one of the earliest to rise on behalf of Ferdinand
against Napoleon. He had succeeded, by the help of the Carbonari, in
establishing relations with many of the discontented soldiers in the
Spanish army; and in January, 1820, he suddenly appeared at Cadiz and
proclaimed the Constitution of 1812.
His success was rapid, and Ferdinand was compelled once more to swear
to maintain the Constitution.
This, the first Constitution proclaimed since the downfall of
Napoleon, was remarkable for its democratic character. Parliament was
to have the power of making laws in conjunction with the king, and if
they passed a law three times, the king was to lose the right of
vetoing it. Ministers were to be responsible to Parliament. Freedom of
the press was to be secured, and a Council of State was to advise the
king on questions of peace or war and the making of treaties. At the
same time, the nation was to prohibit the practice of any but the
Roman Catholic religion.
The news rapidly spread to Naples; for not only was there continual
communication between the Carbonari of Spain and those of Naples, but
even official duty would make speedy communication necessary, since
Ferdinand of Naples was the next heir to the Spanish throne, and it
was therefore held that this Constitution would be binding on him.
The Carbonari were ready for the emergency; and while some of
them, in the city of Naples, were demanding concessions, the more
revolutionary districts of Calabria and Salerno had already risen in
open insurrection. Ferdinand was able to arrest some of the leaders in
the city; but he soon found that the insurrectionary spirit had spread
even among the generals of his army. Officer after officer declared for
the Constitution; and even those who were not ready to take that step
were suspected by, and suspicious of, their fellows. Guglielmo Pepe,
known as a supporter of the previous movement of Murat, and at one time
sentenced to death for his opposition to the Bourbon rule, was marked
out by the Carbonari as their leader. He at first hesitated to join
them, and was even chosen by Nugent to lead the king's forces against
the insurgents; but Ferdinand distrusted him, and opposed his
appointment, and Pepe was finally driven to accept the leadership of the
revolution. On July 5th he gathered round him a great body of the
officers and soldiers, and led them to Naples; and Ferdinand, finding
that he had no one to rely upon, yielded to the insurgents and consented
to the appointment of a provisional Junta (composed to a great extent of
the previous supporters of Murat), and swore to accept the Spanish
Constitution.
Metternich was greatly startled at the completeness of this popular
victory. He had been convinced that, with a people like the Neapolitans,
blood would flow in streams; and he was alarmed to find that the leading
Carbonari were men of high character. He at once assumed that Alexander
of Russia was at the bottom of the conspiracy; and he set himself to
convert him once more to the side of order. But that fickle Prince seems
never to have seriously resumed the championship of liberalism in
Europe, after the death of Kotzebue; and though he may have wished
occasionally to play with the Carbonari, and may have been flattered by
their appealing to him, he was much more anxious to put in force those
principles which Mme de Kruedener had taught him, which forbade kings to
keep faith with those subjects to whom they had granted liberties. He
therefore readily consented to come to Troppau, to consider the best
means of checking the Neapolitan insurrection.
In the meantime, suspicions had arisen between the Carbonari and the
old followers of Murat, and the want of organization in their forces
seemed to doom the insurrection to failure.
But a still more fatal cause of division was the attitude of Sicily.
The news of the proclamation of the Spanish Constitution had, at
first, been welcomed there; but the nobles of Palermo cherished the
recollection of that short time of independence when Ferdinand, driven
out of Naples, had ruled Sicily as a separate kingdom; the Sicilian
Constitution of 1812, which was welcome to the nobles of Palermo, as
more aristocratic in its character than the Spanish Constitution,
was acceptable to all the Palermitans as the symbol of Sicilian
independence. The cry, therefore, of "the Constitution of 1812"
was raised in Palermo, in opposition to the cry of "the Spanish
Constitution."
A Neapolitan intriguer, named Naselli, did his best to fan the flame
of this division; riots arose; and the news spread to Naples that the
Sicilians were enemies of Naples, and were opposing the Spanish
Constitution. The Palermitans, on their part, appealed to the King by
the memory of the old fidelity which the Sicilians had shown him when
he was in exile. The King, and some others, might have responded to
this appeal; and General Florestano Pepe, who was sent to suppress the
rising, ended by conceding to the Sicilians the right of deciding by
popular vote between the two Constitutions. But the Neapolitan pride
was excited; a cry arose that the King was surrendering an important
part of the kingdom, and thereby violating the Constitution.
In the meantime, however, it had become clear that the preference of
the Palermitans for the Constitution of 1812 was not shared by the
whole body of the Sicilian people. Messina, followed by other towns,
rose on behalf of the Spanish Constitution; and, while the Neapolitans
were preparing new forces to suppress the rising in Palermo, the
Palermitans were sending their troops against Messina.
During this state of confusion the news arrived that the
representatives of the Powers at the Congress of Laybach had urged
pacific means of intervention, but at the same time had advised the
Neapolitans to modify their Constitution.
Under these circumstances, considerable alarm was caused by the news
that the King intended to go to Laybach. Ferdinand, to check this
alarm, declared to the Parliament that, whatever happened, he would
defend the fundamental principles of the Constitution, freedom of the
press, equality before the law, sole right of representatives to vote
taxes, independence of judicial power, and responsible ministry.
This speech, instead of calming the fears of the people, raised new
alarms; for it seemed as though the King were meditating already
_some_ changes in the Government; and the people declared that they
could only allow him to depart if he went to defend the Spanish
Constitution. But Ferdinand earnestly assured them that he had meant
nothing against the Constitution, and that, if he could not defend the
rights of the people and the crown by his words at Laybach, he would
return to defend them by his sword.
The Duke of Ascoli, an old friend and confidant of the King, asked him
privately for more specific directions; and Ferdinand urged him to
try to maintain peace; but, if it should be necessary, to prepare for
war. With such promises, Ferdinand left Naples for Laybach in January,
1821.
In the meantime, the work of the Carbonari had been spreading in
Piedmont; and other sects of a similar character, and with more
definite objects, had sprung up by their side. Unlike the Neapolitans,
the Piedmontese Liberals had no French political traditions, either to
encourage or to hamper them. Although the House of Savoy was French
in its origin, both rulers and people had been forward in their
resistance to the aggressions of the French Republic. Their ideas of
liberty were derived, not from France, but from their own poet,
Vittorio Alfieri; and these ideas had been strengthened by the love of
independence which they had developed in the struggle against France,
and which was now wholly directed against Austria.
The risings in Spain and Naples had attracted the sympathies of the
Piedmontese; and it was even rumoured that Victor Emmanuel I. himself
had said that if his people demanded a Constitution he would grant it.
His minister, Prospero Balbo, who had previously served under
Napoleon, was supposed to have Liberal leanings.
But while all these circumstances tended to connect the desire
for liberty in the minds of the Piedmontese with the support of
monarchical principles, and while the absence of any interest in
political affairs on the part of the peasantry, or the artizans,
prevented any strong democratic organization, it was yet necessary, if
the movement was to be successful, that there should be some leader
who was not afraid of revolutionary measures. Such a man was Santorre
di Santa Rosa, an officer who had fought in the royal guard against
the French, and who was now a major of infantry in Turin. His
sympathies were not only monarchical, but in some respects even
aristocratic; and when the Spanish Constitution was first proclaimed,
he was inclined to prefer some other Constitution like that of Sicily,
or even the charter which had been granted in France. But, with keen
insight, he quickly perceived that the Spanish Constitution had become
a watchword which was thoroughly understood by the people, and that
any new cry would only cause division.
Nor were the designs of Santa Rosa limited to his own State. He knew
that no struggle for Piedmontese liberty could be successful which did
not aim at throwing off the yoke of Austria; and that that could
only be done by combining with the other States, which were groaning
under the same oppression. The patriots of Lombardy were willing
enough to act with the Piedmontese, for Confalonieri was already in
communication with the Neapolitans and other Italian Liberals, and was
ready to provide arms for the rising.
But there was still needed a figure-head who must be placed in front
of the movement, if it was to retain any appearance of monarchical
Constitutionalism.
Whatever casual remarks Victor Emmanuel may have let fall, it soon
became evident that _he_ was disposed to resist the Constitutional
movement, and he even began to increase the guards about his palace.
Charles Felix, his brother, the next heir to the throne, was known to
be a yet sterner champion of despotism than the King himself; and it
was under these circumstances that the eyes of the Liberals of
Piedmont were for the first time turned to the head of the younger
branch of the House of Savoy, Charles Albert, Prince of Carignano.
He had been brought up as a simple citizen in a public school, and had
specially attracted attention by the favour which he had shown to
Alberto Nota, whom he had made his secretary. Nota was a writer who
had set himself to restore the national comic theatre in Piedmont, who
had excited the suspicion of the courtiers of Victor Emmanuel by his
Liberal principles, and who had at last been banished from Turin.
But, though the favour shown by Charles Albert to Nota was the fact in
the Prince's life which had most impressed the Piedmontese, other
influences had already been brought to bear on him; for he had also
studied at Paris under an Abbe, who had impressed on him a loathing
for the French Revolution. He was only twenty-three, and was still
hesitating between the lessons of these rival teachers.
But before Santa Rosa and his friends could carry out their schemes,
the first sign of protest against tyranny in Turin was given from a
different quarter. Although the desire for liberty had not yet
penetrated to the poorer classes of Italy, and though the leadership
of these movements naturally fell into the hands of men of noble
birth, like Confalonieri and Santa Rosa, yet there was another class
in the State which was already full of the new ideas, and which was
eventually to play an important part as a link between the more
intelligent members of the aristocracy and the still silent classes
of the community. The University students of Germany, Austria, and
Italy, from the time of the gathering at Jena in 1816 down to the fall
of Venice in August, 1849, were to hold a position in the great
movements of the time which affected considerably the character of
those movements, both for good and evil.
The share of the Turin students in the Piedmontese rising of 1821 was
touched with a certain character of boyish frolic. On January 11th,
some of the University students appeared at the theatre at Turin in
red caps. The police at once arrested them. But their companions rose
on their behalf and demanded that they should be tried by the
tribunals of the University. In this demand they hoped that the
professors would support them; but the rector of the college was
opposed to the movement, and the professors were unwilling to
interfere. Thereupon the students took matters into their own hands,
took away the keys of the University from the door-keeper, placed
guards at all the entrances, defended the two principal gates with
forms and tables, tore up the pavements, and barred the windows. Then
they despatched two delegates to Count Balbo, to entreat him to set
free their comrades, or to hand them over to the authorities of the
University.
The representatives of the provincial colleges flocked to the
assistance of the Turin students; and the sight of the soldiers, who
were called out to suppress their rising, only roused them to more
determined resistance.
The delegates returned speedily, followed by Count Balbo himself, who
promised to defend the cause of the students before Victor Emmanuel,
if they would in the meantime remain quiet. The students, therefore,
consented to wait for further news; but the soldiers remained encamped
outside the University. Suddenly the attention of the soldiers was
attracted by some boys coming out of school; and, irritated presumably
at some boyish mischief, they attacked the children with bayonets. The
students, indignant at the sight, threw stones at the soldiers, who
thereupon charged the barricades of the University, and a general
massacre followed.
The news of this massacre caused the most furious indignation in
Turin, and tended to swell the growing revolutionary feeling. Charles
Albert paid a special visit to the hospitals to console those who had
been wounded by the soldiers.
But in the meantime the proceedings at the Congress of Laybach were
alarming the lovers of liberty. The King of Naples, by all sorts of
pretences, had tried to lull to sleep the vigilance of the Junta at
home; but it soon became known that the Powers had resolved to
suppress the Neapolitan Constitution, and in February, 1822, their
forces were on the march to Naples. The Piedmontese Liberals were
eager to protest against this violation of national independence; and
their fears were further roused by a rumour that Austria was renewing
her demands for the surrender of the Piedmontese fortresses. These
rumours were specially rife in Alessandria, which had known the
degradation of an Austrian occupation; and Victor Emmanuel in vain
tried to convince the Alessandrians of the unreasonableness of this
panic.
On March 6th, Santa Rosa and his friends went to Charles Albert and
asked him to put himself at the head of the movement; and it was now
that Santa Rosa discovered the character of the man with whom he had
to deal, and left on record that saying which summed up the whole life
of that unhappy Prince--"Voleva e non voleva" (He would and would
not). On March 6th, says one writer, "I do not know if Charles Albert
_con_sented, but he certainly _as_sented" to the proposals of Santa
Rosa.
The rising was fixed for the 8th, but on the 7th Charles Albert had
changed his mind and wished to delay the movement. Again Santa Rosa
and his friends urged him to act with them, but without telling him on
which day the insurrection was to break out.
There was, indeed, no time to be lost; for suspicions had already
arisen of the designs of the Liberals, and arrests were being made.
On March 10th, therefore, Count Palma seized on the citadel of
Alessandria and proclaimed the Spanish Constitution. Almost at the
same time Captain Ferrero occupied the little town of San Salvario and
unfurled the Italian flag in the church. Students and soldiers readily
joined the insurgents, and both King and Ministers in Turin were
seized with panic. Orders came from the Powers at Laybach that Victor
Emmanuel should march to Alessandria, and Balbo called on all loyal
soldiers to return to Asti.
But Santa Rosa was as firm in his purposes as the Royalists were
undecided. The Spanish Constitution was proclaimed in the fortress of
Turin, and the soldiers, who were sent to attack the people, fled
after a few shots; Charles Albert represented to the King the wishes
of the people; and on the night of March 14th, Victor Emmanuel
abdicated in favour of his brother Charles Felix, appointing Charles
Albert Regent in Turin. On the following day Charles Albert, in his
capacity of Regent, swore to accept the Spanish Constitution.
But it was soon apparent that one vigorous man could not make a
revolution successful, when he had to depend on a nobility many of
whom were servile admirers of Austria, and on a Regent who "would and
would not." Men were appointed to posts in the new administration who
had no claim to their office except their rank. The leaders in
Alessandria suspected the leaders in Turin; while the hopes of
persuading Charles Albert to declare war on Austria grew fainter and
fainter.
In the meantime, the new King, Charles Felix, was residing in Modena,
under the protection of the Grand Duke. Francis IV. of Modena had
shown himself the most distinctly tyrannical of all the princes of
Italy; while his extravagance and indifference to the welfare of his
people had startled even Metternich. His relationship to the House of
Savoy had led him to sympathise at first with Victor Emmanuel in
his irritation at the arrogance of Austria; but that very same
relationship now led him to hope that he might succeed to the throne
instead of Charles Albert, if the latter offended the ruling Powers.
He therefore readily supported Charles Felix in his protest against
the proceedings of the new Regent.
Charles Felix, on his side, was a man of more rugged and narrow spirit
than Victor Emmanuel, and had none of the sense of national dignity
which occasionally interfered with the despotic inclinations of his
brother. When, therefore, he issued from Modena a denunciation of the
new Government, he did not scruple to add that, if order were not soon
restored, his august allies would come to his rescue. In the same
letter he ordered Charles Albert to go to Novara and place himself
under the orders of Della Torre. "I shall see by this," said Charles
Felix, "if you are still a Prince of the House of Savoy, or if you
have ceased to be so." Charles Albert concealed this letter from his
Ministers; and, after a few days of hesitation, fled secretly to
Novara.
The feeble officials of Turin would have at once deserted the cause;
but, in defiance of their opinion, Santa Rosa published a proclamation
declaring that the King was a prisoner in the hands of the enemy, and
that _he_, as Minister of Charles Albert, called on them to stand by
the Constitution and declare war on Austria. One or two of the
generals fled to Della Torre, at Novara; but at the same time the
Genoese rose on behalf of the Spanish Constitution. Della Torre
sent orders to Santa Rosa, in the name of the King, to resign his
authority. Santa Rosa refused to recognize the King while he remained
in a foreign country, and despatched a force against Novara.
But, in the meantime, the news came that General Pepe had in vain tried
to rally his forces in defence of the Neapolitan Constitution; that his
bands had been dispersed at the first attack of the Austrians; and that
the Austrians, having crushed out the freedom of Naples, were marching
northwards. The Russian Ambassador thereupon entreated the Junta to
modify the Spanish Constitution. Some of the Ministers were inclined to
consent; but Santa Rosa knew that to lose the Spanish Constitution was
to lose the watchword of the Revolution; and no doubt he felt the
indignity of yielding to a foreign ambassador. He therefore refused this
proposal, and once more despatched forces against Della Torre, who was
now preparing to march on Turin.
Colonel Regis, the leader of the Constitutional forces, succeeded in
reaching Novara before Della Torre had begun his advance. The armies
met outside the town; but in the middle of the battle the news arrived
that the Austrians had crossed the Ticino and were marching into the
country. Regis and Ferrero fought gallantly; but the double forces
against them were too strong; and though they once or twice repelled
the Austrian attack, the want of discipline of the Piedmontese
soldiers, combined with the superior force of the enemy, led to a
crushing defeat. Santa Rosa, finding it impossible to defend Turin,
retreated first to Alessandria and then to Genoa; but the men on whom
he relied had lost courage and hope; and he and such of his friends as
were fortunate enough to reach Genoa were soon obliged to leave it
again and to fly from Italy, most of them to fight in foreign
countries for the liberty which they had lost at home.
The reaction set in with the greatest fury. In Piedmont the system of
espionage was resumed with double force. The University was closed.
Under the influence of favouritism, and in the absence of any free
expression of public opinion, corruption of tribunals revived, and the
Jesuits, who had lost power during the Liberal interregnum, speedily
recovered it. In Naples, the Austrians, after recommending mildness
to Ferdinand, yielded to his demands for the right to punish; and the
sense of his dishonourable position seems to have called out in him a
savagery which he had not previously shown; while the presence of the
Austrian troops irritated the country into a state of intermittent
insurrection.
Lord William Bentinck attempted a protest in the English House of
Commons against a second destruction of Sicilian independence; but
Castlereagh defeated the motion, and Sicily fell back under Neapolitan
rule.
Metternich specially devoted himself to restoring order in Lombardy. He
established an Aulic Council at Vienna to superintend the affairs in
that province, so as to crush out still further any local independence.
At the same time a special committee was formed at Milan to enquire into
the conspiracy. Several leading conspirators were arrested. One tried to
save his friends by confessing his own fault; but the confession was
used as a new clue by the police. Confalonieri was urged to save himself
by flight; but he answered, "I will not retire in face of the storm
which I wish to confront. Let what God will become of me!" He was soon
after arrested; and, after being kept in doubt of his fate for nearly
two years, he was condemned to death. His case excited sympathy even in
Vienna, where the Empress interceded for his life; and at last, after
long entreaty, his sentence was commuted to imprisonment for life in the
fortress of Spielberg. There Metternich in vain tried to extort from him
the betrayal of his fellow-conspirators. But the crafty statesman
little knew the result of this treatment. One of those who suffered
imprisonment about the same time describes the effect of Confalonieri's
influence by contrasting him with the head of the Austrian police in
Lombardy. "Confalonieri and Salvotti seemed to represent, in the eyes of
the Milanese, the angel of Liberty and the demon of Slavery, striving
not more for the success of their respective causes than for the triumph
of their individual personalities. About Confalonieri gathered the
prayers of honest people, of men of feeling hearts, who saw in him an
unfortunate persecuted being whom adversity clothed with all the lustre
of devotion and courage."
This passage strikingly exhibits that noble, but illogical, popular
instinct which so often confuses the hero and martyr with the mere
victim of unjust oppression. Confalonieri had undoubtedly organized an
insurrection, and his arrest and imprisonment might fairly be
justified by the ordinary rights of self-defence which exist in every
Government. Yet the instinct of horror and pity for this imprisonment
had a truth deeper than logic. Under the system of government then
prevailing, the prison or the scaffold was the natural place for such
men; but the pity of it was that a system of government should prevail
which logically necessitated the imprisonment of Confalonieri and the
triumph of Metternich. And it was a sign of the deep folly of the
latter that he called the attention of the public to this fact, and
provided the cause of Italian unity with its first prominent martyr.
The stories of Confalonieri's imprisonment spread from mouth to mouth,
and were preserved as tender memorials. It was told, for instance,
how, when his wife had visited him, he had tried to preserve the
cushion on which her tears had fallen, and how the guards had
insisted on taking it from him; how his friends had devised a plan for
his escape, and he had refused to avail himself of it because his
fellow-prisoners would not be able to escape with him; and lastly, of
the continual pressure which had been brought to bear upon him to
reveal the secrets of his fellow-conspirators, and his steady refusal
to purchase health and liberty by their betrayal.
The defeat which despotism had sustained by the imprisonment, and
still more by the persecutions, of Confalonieri would hereafter be
plain. At present Metternich might think that he had conquered in
Lombardy; but elsewhere he could not feel sure of victory, for there
came to him at this time two unmistakeable warnings that he was no
longer to be allowed to reign undisturbed in Europe.
Even at that very Congress of Laybach which succeeded in crushing out
the independence of Naples, the question of Greece, which could
not be so easily disposed of, came before the Powers, and puzzled
considerably the mind of Metternich. The pietistic maunderings of
Alexander might be made use of in defence of the rights of Roman
Catholic kings, but he could not be persuaded that the principles of
the Christian religion justified him in supporting the tyranny of the
Turks over Christian populations. He had indeed abandoned the
Wallachian leader, Alexander Ypsilanti, when he discovered that the
rising in Wallachia was simultaneous with the risings in Naples and
Piedmont; but the Greeks could not so easily be persuaded that their
patron, the Czar of Russia, had deserted their cause.
The Hetairiai of Wallachia and Greece had done the same work which the
Carbonari had accomplished in Spain and Italy; and on April 4, 1821,
the Greeks suddenly rose at Patras and massacred the whole Turkish
population. In three months the southern part of Greece was free; and
by January, 1822, a Provisional Government had been formed, with
Alexander Mavrocordatos at its head.
Religious feeling, classical sentiment, and the loathing of the
barbarous rule of the Turks combined to rouse in Europe an amount of
sympathy which Metternich could not afford to disregard. He admitted
the right of Alexander of Russia to sympathise with the Greeks, both
on the ground of Christian sentiment and on the pretext of rights
granted by previous treaties with Turkey; and he even intervened
diplomatically to secure concessions from the Porte to its Christian
subjects.
But, though he felt the danger of the precedent which even this amount
of concession to the revolutionary spirit would cause, Metternich yet
believed that, by timely compromise and judicious diplomacy, he could
bring back Alexander to sounder principles. The influence of Capo
d'Istria was indeed an antagonistic power in the Court of St.
Petersburg; but, on the other hand, Tatischeff, the rival minister at
the Russian Court, seems to have been a mere tool of Metternich, and
could be used effectively for the interests of Austria.
So successfully did this diplomacy work, in Metternich's opinion, that
on May 31, 1822, he writes exultingly in his memoirs, that he has
"broken the work of Peter the Great, strengthened the Porte against
Russia, and substituted Austrian and English influence for Russian in
Eastern Europe." So he wrote in May; in August of the same year "that
upright and enlightened statesman," Lord Londonderry, committed
suicide. Then George Canning became Minister for Foreign Affairs, and
hastened to cut the knot which linked the interests of Austria with
those of England.
The change in England's policy soon became evident. No doubt the feeling
of dislike to Metternich had been gradually growing in that country. Its
representatives had held aloof even from the Congress of Laybach; and
when, in 1822, the Powers met again at Verona to encourage the French
Cabinet in their attempt to restore Ferdinand of Spain, England entered
a decided protest against the proceedings of the Congress. Nor did the
protest remain a barren one. The invasion of Spain by the French was
followed by the recognition of the independence of the Spanish colonies
by England; and when the absolutist movement threatened to spread to
Portugal, Canning despatched troops to protect the freedom and
independence of that country.
It is amusing to note the growth of Metternich's consciousness of the
importance of the opponent who had now arisen. "A fine century," he
writes at first, "for these kinds of men; for fools who pass for
intellectual, but are empty; for moral weaklings, who are always ready
to threaten with their fists from a distance when the opportunity is
good."
But in the following year he writes: "Canning's nature is a very
remarkable one. In spite of all his lack of discernment, the genius
which he undoubtedly has, and which I have never questioned, is never
clouded. He is certainly a very awkward opponent; but I have had
opponents more dangerous, and it is not he who chiefly compels me to
think of him." And in 1824 he sums up this difficulty, satisfactorily
to himself, in these words: "What vexes me with the English is that
they are all slightly mad. This is an evil which must be patiently
endured, without noticing too much the ludicrous side of it."
This outburst of insanity on the part of England naturally drove
Metternich back into the arms of Russia; and this change became more
congenial to him when, in 1825, the fickle Alexander died and was
succeeded by the stern despot Nicholas.
It seemed, too, as if the Greek rising might end about that time in
the success of the Turks. Ibrahim, the Pasha of Egypt, had come to the
rescue of the Sultan, and was carrying all before him. Marco Botzaris,
the chief general of the Greeks, had been killed in battle; and in
1826 the garrison of Messolonghi blew up their fortress and themselves
to avoid surrendering to the Egyptian forces.
But Metternich soon found that, whatever objection Nicholas might have
to revolution elsewhere, he felt as much bound to protect the Greeks
as had Alexander before him; and in August, 1827, Nicholas consented
to Canning's proposal that England, France, and Russia should send a
fleet to the Bay of Navarino to enforce an armistice between the
Greeks and the Turks. Then followed the celebrated battle which
Wellington afterwards described as "that untoward event." This
convinced even Metternich that the results of the Greek insurrection
would have to be recognized by the Powers, and perhaps even secured by
force. The Russian war of 1828 followed, and Metternich had to admit
that the European alliance of 1814-15 was practically broken.
But though the effect of the Greek insurrection in weakening the
chances of Metternich's system was certainly important, it soon began to
be doubtful whether the change would be permanent. England, indeed, in
spite of the death of Canning and the short rule of Wellington,
was evidently hopelessly lost to the cause of despotism. But the
revolutionary movements of 1830-31 seemed to leave far less trace of
freedom in Europe than the previous risings of 1820-22. The July
monarchy of Louis Philippe was soon forced to become Conservative; and
the Belgian revolution seemed to have little connection with the other
movements of Europe. The Polish rising and its sudden collapse only
secured Nicholas to the side of despotism. The treachery of Francis of
Modena to Ciro Menotti destroyed for a time the tendency to believe in
revolutionary princes. The rising in Bologna, by compelling the
intervention of the Austrians, strengthened their hold over the Papacy,
and even enabled Metternich cheaply to pose as the adviser of reforms
which, out of respect for the independence of the Papacy, he would not
enforce.
But his greatest triumph of all was in Germany. There Constitutions had
been proclaimed in Bavaria, Wuertemberg, and Saxony; and Metternich
resolved to follow up the Carlsbad Decrees by a still more crushing
enactment. So it was decided at the Federal Diet of 1832 that a German
prince was _bound_, "as a member of the Confederation, to reject
petitions tending to the increase of the power of the Estates at the
expense of the power of the Sovereign," and further, "that the internal
legislation of the States belonging to the German Confederation
should in no case be such as to do prejudice to the objects of the
Confederation."
Thus Metternich had again triumphed; but it was for the last time. Two
forces of very different kinds were already in motion, to undo the
work of his life. Two men were about to cross his path, very different
from each other in moral calibre, in width of sympathy, and in the
means at their disposal, but alike in that power of reaching the heart
of a People, for want of which the leaders of the previous Liberal
movements had failed in their objects. These men were Giuseppe Mazzini
and Louis Kossuth.