The Revolutionary Movement of 1848-9 in Italy, Austria-Hungary, and Germany / With Some Examination of the Previous Thirty-three Years

by C. Edmund Maurice

Professor Montanelli, who had been taken prisoner by the Austrians at Curtatone, but who had since been allowed to return to Tuscany, was propounding there his scheme for a Constituent Assembly, which was to embrace all Italy. And this proposal, welcomed eagerly in Tuscany, and accepted by the Grand Duke, was being advocated in Rome, especially by Charles Buonaparte, the Prince of Canino. On this plan Rossi threw cold water, desiring to substitute for it a League of Princes, to be begun by a Congress of Ambassadors at Rome. This idea, unwelcome and unpopular in itself, was made more unpopular still by Rossi's eager advances to Ferdinand of Naples, to whom he actually consented to surrender fugitives who had escaped from his tyranny. While, too, he made this alarming concession to the Prince, who was most deservedly hated throughout Italy, he allowed General Zucchi, whom he had sent to Bologna, to refuse Garibaldi entrance into that city on his return from Lombardy; and when Gavazzi, one of the most popular preachers of the Italian war, protested against this act, Rossi ordered him to be arrested. And as if the Clericals, the Republicans, and those who placed Italian unity above any special political creed, were not enemies enough for one man, Rossi proceeded, by special signs of suspicion towards Charles Albert, to irritate against him the powerful party of the Albertisti, who looked to the King of Sardinia as the necessary leader of a movement for Italian liberty.

All this was done in the most open and scornful manner. Rossi ridiculed the proposed Constituent Assembly as a Council of Drunkards, and scornfully told Sterbini that every one knows "that there are praises which injure and blame which honours." Rumours were spread of his intention to bombard Rome; and the students mobbed him in the streets. On one occasion when they were following him, he crossed a bridge; and as he passed he handed to the toll-man a much larger sum than was his due, saying, with a wave of his hand towards the students, "Take for them too." Rumours came to him of plots against his life, but he refused to pay any attention to them. At last, on November 15, as he was going down to Parliament, a priest came to him, and told him that he would die if he went. He answered, "The cause of the Pope is the cause of God. God will help me." As he passed through the square, the crowd hooted at him. He warded them off with his stick, and ascended the stair. Suddenly an umbrella struck him; he turned his head, so that his neck became exposed; and, in the same instant, a dagger pierced him, and he fell mortally wounded. So died Pellegrino Rossi, a man who undoubtedly deserved a better fate; but who was thrust upon a position and a time which required a man of genius and humanity; while he had nothing to give but cut-and-dried maxims, enforced with a courage which was too nearly allied to insolence.

That the guilt of Rossi's death should be laid to the account of different parties by different people, with equal confidence, was natural enough, considering the variety of enemies which his policy and character had stirred up against him; but it is a strange fact that actual eye-witnesses dispute as to whether it was received with joy or indignation by the people of Rome. It is tolerably evident, however, that all feelings about the actual event were quickly merged in the panic about its consequences. A general demand was made for a popular Ministry; and Galletti, who had been Minister of Police under Fabbri, went to the Pope to ask leave to form a Ministry. The Pope refused, and the people who had followed Galletti soon came to blows with the Swiss Guard. The Guard were driven back, and the crowd succeeded in getting cannon into their hands; but Federico Torre thrust himself in front of the cannon, exclaiming, "Shame to point cannon at the men who gave us the amnesty." Pius had hoped that some of the inhabitants of the Trastevere would have risen on his behalf; but, finding no support from them, he yielded to the demand for a Liberal Ministry, and appointed as his Prime Minister Rosmini, a champion of Charles Albert, and suspected of heresy by the Cardinals. Mamiani, who was at the time absent from Rome, was made Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Sterbini Minister of Commerce and Public Works. On the refusal of Rosmini, the Premiership was given to Muzzarelli. But these appointments, like Ferdinand's acceptance of a Democratic Ministry under similar circumstances, did not express the real feeling of the Pope. He was completely panic-struck by the events which had taken place; and, urged by Cardinals and Ambassadors, he fled secretly from Rome on the night of the 24th of November disguised as a footman, and took refuge at Gaeta, under the protection of the King of Naples.

Mamiani had reluctantly accepted the office of Foreign Minister; but he still believed that it was desirable to uphold the authority of the Pope, because, as he expressed it, "the only choice for Rome lay between Pius IX. and Cola di Rienzi." Nor was he shaken in his determination, even when a letter came from the Pope at Gaeta, denouncing the acts of the people, repudiating his Ministers, and appointing as Commissioners of State men of the most violently reactionary character.

But, in the meantime, a strong force of public opinion was growing in the Roman provinces, in favour of the election of a Constituent Assembly; and at last Aurelio Saffi, who had been so prominent as a champion of reform in the time of Gregory XVI., succeeded in gathering together, at Forli, representatives of different local Societies, and preparing an Address to the Ministry, which set forth in a concise form those feelings which were floating in the provinces at that time. This address expressed great regret at the flight of the Pope, whose name the petitioners declared they had been wont to reverence as "the symbol of a magnanimous idea." They went on to say, however, that, as Pius IX. had thrown himself into the arms of the worst enemies of Italy, it had become necessary to take steps to prevent civil war and anarchy. As Constitutional Monarchy had been cut short by the departure of the Pope, and as it was impossible to accept Commissioners whom the Pope had appointed since his flight to Gaeta, it was necessary for the Council of Deputies to nominate a Provisional Government which should issue writs for the election of an Assembly by universal suffrage, and should settle definitely the political arrangements of the State, "saving only the rights of the nation united in an Italian Constituent Assembly, such as has been proclaimed by the Tuscan Parliament." This Address produced a great effect in Rome; and Armellini urged his colleagues to accept the proposals of the petitioners. Mamiani, seeing that the Constitutional compromise which he desired had become impossible, refused to remain a Minister of State. A Provisional Government of eight members was then formed, in which Sterbini, Galletti, and Armellini took part; and the new Government on December 29 issued an Address to the Roman people, calling upon them to elect an Assembly for the Roman State, which was to meet in Rome on February 5.

In the meantime, the flight of the Pope had startled the other Princes of Italy. Leopold of Tuscany had seemed more ready than most of his brother Princes to accept Constitutional Government, and even to look forward to arrangements for the unity of Italy. Guerrazzi, from what motives it may be difficult to guess, had discouraged Montanelli's plan of an Italian Constituent Assembly, and had warned the Grand Duke that his own position would be destroyed by such an institution. But, when the Pope fled from Rome, Guerrazzi had conceived the idea that Leopold might be chosen President of the new Assembly, and that the combination of Tuscany with the Roman States might prove a check on the ambition of Charles Albert. Leopold, however, seems to have been actuated by very different motives from those to which Guerrazzi appealed. So far from being strongly moved by personal ambition, or by a sense of official dignity, he was particularly inclined to accept the lead of other Princes. He had imitated Ferdinand of Naples in proclaiming Constitutional Government; he had followed Charles Albert in proclaiming war on Austria; and he had accepted first the Italian League, and afterwards the plan of an Italian Constituent Assembly, without a sign, as far as is apparent, of any other motive than the desire to promote the unity of Italy. But this very willingness to act with other Princes made Leopold averse from the idea of standing alone in his policy. It was therefore that flight of the Pope which seemed to Guerrazzi to open a new chance for Tuscany, which awoke in Leopold scruples and hesitations; and when Pius issued from Gaeta his denunciation of the proposals of the Roman Council, Leopold lost heart, and secretly fled from Florence to Siena, leaving a written statement to the effect that the Pope's opposition to the Italian Constituent Assembly compelled him to revoke the decree by which he had just sanctioned that Assembly.

On February 8 the news of the Grand Duke's flight was received in Florence, and it was immediately followed by a rising, in which the insurgents demanded the appointment of a Provisional Government composed of Guerrazzi, Montanelli, and a man named Mazzoni. Just about the same time Mazzini arrived in Leghorn. Guerrazzi, who still wished to act in the name of the Grand Duke, tried to forbid Mazzini's entrance; but the Livornese went out to meet him with banners bearing his motto, "Dio e il Popolo." He exhorted them to preserve order, and then went to Florence to urge the Tuscan Ministry to join their country to the Roman State. But Guerrazzi succeeded in preventing the acceptance of this proposal, and Mazzini went on to Rome.

Gioberti, on his part, had been much exercised in his mind by the new aspect of affairs. His great desire that the Pope should unite Italy seemed utterly frustrated by the flight of Pius from Rome, and still more by his placing himself under foreign protection. For, though it was to the King of Naples that the Pope first appealed, Gaeta soon became the gathering place of the ambassadors of the extreme Roman Catholic Powers; and, when Gioberti sent messengers to Gaeta, they found the Pope surrounded by men who had no sympathy with the ideas of the Primato. When the Piedmontese envoys offered him a refuge at Nice, and promised that their King would join with other Italian Princes in restoring him to Rome, the Pope answered that he had appealed to the European Powers, and must await their decision; and he further reproached Charles Albert with the sanction which he had given to the idea of an Italian Constituent Assembly, accusing him of intriguing with those who were opposed to the rights of the Church. Though discouraged by this rebuff, Gioberti hoped to find a new mission in the restoration of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, who had now followed the Pope to Gaeta. But in this plan he found himself opposed at once by Guerrazzi, and by the Austrians; while his own colleagues were so indignant at the proposal, that he was compelled to leave the Ministry which he had only just joined.

In the meantime, the Austrian conquerors of Lombardy had been supplying justifications for a new Italian war. The capitulation of Vicenza had been violated almost as soon as it had been made, by the infliction of new vexations on those to whom a free pardon had been granted; and the more important capitulation of Milan had been followed by similar breaches of faith. Special burdens had been laid on those who had taken an active part in the struggle against Austria; while some of the regulations of General Welden in Pavia had been so cruel as to excite a protest even from the Viennese Assembly. He had ordered that anyone who went about with arms was to be shot within twenty-four hours, and that his patrols should fire on any group of men more than three in number who were found in the streets at night. The Council of Lombardy had, therefore, appealed to Charles Albert to secure them justice, because Radetzky had acted "in defiance of his own word, in defiance of the orders of his Sovereign, in defiance of the military conventions, in defiance of the mediation of England and France." The stronger Liberals of Piedmont soon began to cry out for war; but, for a long time, Charles Albert and his Ministers hoped to stave off action, and to secure a settlement of these differences by diplomacy. But the rebuffs which Gioberti had received gradually convinced them that no further help was to be found in appeals to foreign Powers; and, urged on by a strong popular feeling, Charles Albert for the last time declared war upon Austria.