The voice of the piazza, with its simple unanimity, its childlike psychology, came nearer to expressing the soul of Italy than the German Chancellor can comprehend, than any sophisticated diplomat, who has associated only with "thinking" and "leading" people, can believe. The Latin soul of Italy which cursed its politician and thrilled at the words of its poet! That soul of a people which is greater than any individual, which somehow expresses itself more authoritatively through the simple people who must suffer for their faiths than through the intellectuals and the protected members of a society….
"Viva Italia!" the tanned conscript leaning from the car window at Subiaco shouted back to his friends and home. And the old men and girls left in the fields raised their hats as the train passed and shouted in reply,—"Viva Italia!" It was not English gold, nor the desire for Trent and Trieste, that brought that cry to the boy's lips!
V
Italy Decides
Whatever one may think of the piazza voice, whether the disposition is to sneer with the German or to trust with the democrat in its spontaneous expression, it is a matter of history now that Italy's decision had been made before the question came to a vote in the Chamber of Deputies, a fortnight or more before the reluctant ambassadors of the ex-Alliance backed into their waiting trains and departed homeward across the Alps. It is a significant fact of personal psychology that the crisis of a decision takes place before action results to calm the disturbed mind. So it was with Italy. Her decision had really been taken when the Lusitania sank, when the politician, in face of this fresh outrage, advised the safer course of neutrality, which would amount to a connivance with her former associates in their predatory programme. Traditore! meant but one thing—a betrayal of the nation's soul. In the light of more recent events, since Italy entered the war, there are probably many Italians who secretly wish that the safer counsel had prevailed, that, like Greece and Rumania, Italy had "preserved a benevolent neutrality" in the great war, even possibly that she had concluded to make her bed in the Teutonic camp. If the world is to be Teutonized, they would argue, why put one's head in the wolf's jaw! There are prudent people of that stripe in every nation, but since the end of May they have kept silence in Italy. And it should be forever remembered to her honor that Italy made her decision in face of Teutonic successes. If the military situation did not look so black for the Allies at the end of May as it does this December, it looked black enough with the crumbling Russian resistance before Mackensen's phalanx. Neuve Chapelle had been a costly and empty victory. There had been no successful drive in Champagne and Artois to encourage those who bet only on winning cards. There were heavy clouds in the east, merely a sad silence along the western wall. It was long past Easter, when England had boastfully expected to open the Dardanelles and the truth was beginning to appear that Constantinople might never be reached by the allied operations in Gallipoli. Italy threw in her lot with the Allies in a dark hour, if not the darkest.
The great decision which had lain in solution in the hearts of the people was evoked by events and made vocal by the flaming words of D'Annunzio, interpreted by a faithful king, who resisted the temptation to dethrone himself by calling Germany's hired man to power, and finally registered by the Deputies at Montecitorio on May 19. It was virtually made, I say, the tumultuous week that came on the resignation of the Salandra Government. What followed the return of the ministry to power was merely automatic, as peaceful as any day's routine. Parliament was called to meet on Wednesday, the 19th. The Sunday afternoon before, the piazza, and the palace and all other elements of Roman citizenship met in a great gathering of content and consecration at the foot of the Pincian Hill in the Piazza del Popolo, again the day after in the Campidolgio above the Forum. How fortunate a people are to have such hallowed places of meeting, steeped in associations of great events!
It was a warm, brilliant, sunny day, that Sunday, and in the afternoon every one in Rome, it seemed, was as near the Piazza del Popolo as he could get. The meeting was addressed by a number of well-known Romans of varied political affiliations. But the high note of all the speeches was a fervid patriotism and harmony. Rome was calm, believing that it had chosen nobly if not wisely. On the Campidolgio, D'Annunzio again sounded the tocsin of the heroic Thousand, and lauded the army which had been belittled by the followers of Giolitti. Already the troops were leaving Rome…. Then Parliament opened. The meeting of the Deputies if memorable was short. The square and streets about Montecitorio had been carefully cleared and held empty by cordons of troops. There was to be no shouting, no demonstration within hearing of Parliament. Long before midday the Chamber was crowded with all the notables who could gain admission. The proceedings were extremely brief, formal. All knew that the die had been cast: what remained was for the army to accomplish. The Premier Salandra made a brief statement summarizing the diplomatic efforts that his Government had undertaken to reach a satisfactory understanding with Austria, the record of which could be followed in the "Green Book," which was then given to the public. He informed the Chamber, what was generally known, that the Triple Alliance had already been denounced on the 5th of May, and he offered a "project of law," which was tantamount to a vote of confidence in the Government and which also gave the King and his ministers power to make war and to govern the country during the period of war without the intervention of Parliament. It thus authorized both the past acts of the Salandra Ministry and its future course. The measure, undebated, was voted on secretly. And it is significant that of more than five hundred Deputies present only seventy-two voted in the negative. Of these seventy-two who voted against the Government, some were out-and-out neutralistas, and some few were Socialists who had the courage of their convictions. The great majority of the Giolittians must have voted for war. Had they seen a great light since the piazza raised its voice, since their leader had fallen from his high place? Possibly they had never been with Giolitti on this vital national question. At least, the fact illustrates how representative government does roughly perform the will of its people when that will is clear enough and passionate enough: the will registers itself even through unwilling instruments.
After the vote had been taken, the Chamber adjourned, and when the following day the Senate ratified, unanimously, the action of the Chamber of Deputies, Parliament was dissolved. Many of the members enlisted and went to the front. Since the end of May Italy has been autocratically governed. The decrees of the King and his ministers are law—an efficient method of governing a country at war, avoiding those legislative intrigues that latterly have threatened the concord of France.
It is noteworthy that the Italian Senate voted unanimously for war. The Senate is not an elective body. It is composed of dignitaries, old, conservative men from the successful classes of the nation, who are not easily swayed by the emotions of the piazza. From this unrepresentative body might have been expected a show of resistance to the Government's measure, if, as Giolitti and the German party asserted, there was a serious sentiment in the country in favor of neutrality which had been howled down by the mobs. It is inconceivable that such a body could have been completely cowed by rioting in the streets. The unanimous vote of the Italian Senators is sufficient refutation of the Bethmann-Hollweg slur.
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