'And will the Pope,' I asked, 'remain?'
'Not this Pope,' said Ampère, 'but his successor. Nor do I see the great evil of the absence of the Pope from Rome. Popes have often been absent before, sometimes for long periods.'
'Most of my French friends,' I said, 'are opposed to Italian Unity as mischievous to France.'
'I do not believe,' he answered, 'in the submission of Naples to this Piedmontese dynasty, but I shall be delighted to see all Italy north of the Neapolitan territory united.
'I do not think that we have anything to fear from the kingdom of Italy. It is as likely to be our friend as to be our enemy. But the Neapolitans, even if left to themselves, would not willingly give up their independence, and Celui-ci is trying to prevent their doing so.'
'What do they wish,' I asked, 'and what does he wish?'
'I believe,' he answered, 'that their wishes are only negative.
'They do not wish to recall the Bourbons, and they are resolved not to keep the Piedmontese. His wish I believe to be to put his cousin there. Prince Napoleon himself refused Tuscany. It is too small, but he would like Naples, and Louis Napoleon would be glad to get rid of him. What would England say?'
'If we believed,' I said, 'in the duration of a Bonaparte dynasty in
France, we should, of course, object to the creation of one in Naples.
But if, as we think it probable, the Bonapartists have to quit France, I
do not see few we should be injured by their occupying the throne of
Naples.
'I should object to them if I were a Neapolitan. All their instincts are despotic, democratic, and revolutionary. But even they are better than the late king was. What chance have the Murats?'