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!