“San Maurizio, near Reggio,
September 4th, 1859.
“My dear Sir,—
... I went to Bologna to see the opening of the Assembly last Thursday, and I hope to give them some good advice as to the wording of the resolutions which are to be proposed to-morrow, proclaiming the independence of Romagna. On Thursday I shall go to Parma again to assist at the opening of their Assembly. I am now staying with some distant cousins at a villa which Ariosto, who lived here, had celebrated.
I cannot tell you how gratified I am at what I have seen ever since I came to this part of Italy, on Monday last. The order and quiet which prevail everywhere are only equalled by the unanimity with which every man, woman, and child is determined not to submit again to the fallen Government. I am happy to see that the determination is supported by large numbers of volunteers who flock to enlist: they come not only from the towns but from the country; and at night, since I have been here, I have heard a variety of songs in dialect in praise of Garibaldi and his soldiers, ridiculing the Austrians and the late Duke of Modena, in very expressive although in not very polite terms. I have seen persons who are well affected to the Duke—the cousins at whose house I am staying, and to whose family the Archbishop of Modena belongs, amongst them—and one and all say that a restoration of the fallen dynasty would be a great calamity. Here, in fact—at Parma as well as Bologna—the universal wish is to be united to Piedmont. The organization of the recruits proceeds with the greatest rapidity, and the instructors (old soldiers) are struck by the military qualities displayed by the population. The Republican and Mazzinian agents are secreted everywhere; still I think that the only danger to be feared is that if things were to continue long in this state of suspense, with hardly any Government in fact, anarchists might cause mischief, although not triumph ultimately.
Yours, &c., &c.,
A. Panizzi.”
“I have just heard that the Austrians, most of them dressed in the uniform of the Duke of Modena, are gathering their forces to cross the Po, and come to the right of it.”
Amongst the numerous letters in our possession, written by Count Cavour to Panizzi, the most important and interesting, and at the same time the most truly characteristic, both in form and substance, of the great Statesman, is one dated the 24th of October, 1859. It was written from Leri, Cavour’s country seat. Thither he had, immediately after the war, retired for a time from public life, and with a heavy heart; for the obscurity in terms and apparent treachery of the Peace of Villafranca, had affected him with a torturing suspicion that he had been betrayed. It is something of a tribute to Cavour’s greatness that Rattazzi, who succeeded him, was fain, in his embarrassment in carrying on the Government, to seek the counsel of his predecessor, the flame of whose patriotism (however deeply wounded his own feelings may have been) burnt as brightly in his retirement as in office, as it needs but the following letter to show:—