Footnote 14: The Queen had written:—"There are people who pretend that the Emperor, who was once a member of the Carbonari Club of Italy, and who is supposed to be condemned to death by the rules of that Secret Society for having violated his oath to them, has offered them to pardon Orsini, if they would release him from his oath, but that the Society refused the offer. The fact that all the attempts have been made by Italians, Orsini's letter, and the almost mad state of fear in which the Emperor seems to be now, would give colour to that story." Orsini had written two letters to the Emperor, one read aloud at his trial by his counsel, Jules Favre, the other while lying under sentence of death. He entreated the Emperor to secure Italian independence.
Mr Disraeli to Queen Victoria.
House of Commons, 12th March 1858.
(Friday.)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer with his humble duty to your Majesty.
The Opposition benches very full; the temper not kind.
The French announcement,15 which was quite unexpected, elicited cheers, but only from the Ministerial side, which, he confesses, for a moment almost daunted him.
Then came a question about the Cagliari affair,16 on which the Government had agreed to take a temperate course, in deference to their predecessors—but it was not successful. The ill-humour of the House, diverted for a moment by the French news, vented itself on this head.
What struck the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the course of the evening most was the absence of all those symptoms of "fair trial," etc., which have abounded of late in journals and in Society.
Lord John said something; Mr Gladstone said something; but it was not encouraging.