THE ISLANDS OF SICILY AND SARDINIA
[1801-1814 A.D.]
In the meantime, while the whole peninsula was subject to the French emperor, or to his vassal-princes, the English had preserved Sicily for King Ferdinand.
When the court first removed to that island, the discontent of the lower orders was general; and on its breaking out into violence at Messina and elsewhere, the marquis Artali subdued the spirit of the people by cruelties which no remonstrances of the British could stop. The British, indeed, were not popular; and they soon lost the favour of the imperious queen, who entered into secret dealings with Napoleon. The reckless extravagance of the court, rendering necessary an excessive taxation, completed the disgust of the nation; and the barons, in their parliament of 1810, besides protecting themselves and others by refusing the supplies, except on conditions which made the collection of them all but impossible, voluntarily aided the popular cause, by abolishing many of their own feudal privileges.
Matters were coming to a bloody crisis, when Lord William Bentinck, the new ambassador at Palermo, executed the resolutions of the English government. The queen was forced to consent that her husband should resign his power to his son, as vicar or regent, while Bentinck was named captain-general of Sicily. Parliament was summoned in 1812, and framed a charter which, after violent resistance from Caroline, was ratified by the prince-vicar.
The history of Sardinia, during the French reign on the mainland, possesses neither interest nor importance enough to detain us long. Its king, Charles Emmanuel, weary of the world, abdicated in 1802 and retired to Rome, where he lived many years in devotional exercises, receiving a pension from Napoleon on his seizure of the city, and becoming a Jesuit when that order was restored. His brother and successor, Victor Emmanuel, held his island-crown by the same tenure as his Sicilian neighbour, or, in other words, by the protection of the English fleet.[d]