“From now on the direction of the Popolo d’Italia is intrusted to Arnaldo Mussolini.
“I thank and salute with brotherly love all the editors, collaborators, correspondents, employees, workers, all those who have assiduously and faithfully labored with me for the life of this paper and for love of our Country.
“Rome, October 30th, 1922.
“Mussolini.”
I parted with regret from the paper that had been the most constant and potent factor in our victory. I must add that my brother, Arnaldo, has been able to maintain the editorship with dignity and capacity.
When I had intrusted the paper to my brother I was off for Rome. To the zealous people who wanted to get me a special train to go to Rome to confer with the King, I said that for me a compartment in the usual train was quite enough. Engines and coal should not be wasted. Economize! That is the first and acid test of a true man of government. And after all I could only enter Rome at the head of my black shirts, then camping at Santa Marinella in the atmosphere and the shining rays of the Capital.
The news of my departure sped all over Italy. In every station where the train stopped I found a gathering of the Fascisti and of the masses who wanted to bring me, even through the pouring rain, their cheers and their good-will.
Leaving Milan was painful. That city had given me a home for ten years; to me it had been prodigal in the satisfaction it had afforded; it had supported me in every stress; it had baptized the most wonderful squads of action of Fascism; it had been the scene of historical political struggles. Now I was leaving it, called by destiny and by a greater task. All Milan knew of my going, and I felt that even in the feeling of joy for a departure that was a symbol of victory, there was also a shade of sadness.
But this was not the hour for sentimentality. It was the time for quick, sure decisions. After the kisses and farewells of my family I said good-by to many prominent Milanese, and then I went away, speeding into the night, to take counsel with myself, to refresh my soul, to listen to the echoes of voices of friends and to envisage the wide horizons of to-morrow’s possibilities.
The minor episodes of that trip and of those days are not important. The train brought me into the midst of the Fascisti; I was in view of Rome at Santa Marinella. I reviewed the columns. I established the formalities for the entrance into Rome. I established connections between the quadrumvirate and the authorities.