The duchies of Parma and Modena had also been deserted by their dukes, and the papal legates had to quit Romagna, whose inhabitants now suddenly announced their fusion with Sardinia. Indeed this impulse for annexation now began to spread, and to the cry of "Victor Emmanuel" the Marches and Umbria revolted against the Pontiff, but in these regions the movement was sanguinarily suppressed by the Swiss troops.
Napoleon III was displeased to note how all Italian aspirations tended to unity, and thus it was that he had signed the Treaty of Villafranca. Peace was concluded at Zurich in the November following, and there the idea of an Italian confederation was mooted afresh.
The fugitive princes ought to have returned to their States, but how was it possible? They certainly could not hope to be recalled by their subjects, for the latter had expelled them; occupying their kingdoms with troops of their own was out of the question, because they had none; foreign aid, moreover, was not to be looked for, since Napoleon III had established the principle of non-intervention. Then the people of Central Italy showed themselves capable of a bold political coup: under the leadership of Bettino Ricasoli, dictator in Tuscany, and Luigi Carlo Farini—who held a similar office in Emilia and Romagna—they declared, by means of their assembled Deputies, their earnest desire to be incorporated with Sardinia.
The new Ministry formed at Turin, after Cavour's resignation, had pursued its way timidly, fearing to rouse the suspicion and displeasure of the European Powers, but at this momentous and difficult juncture Cavour again accepted the premiership (January 20, 1860). He immediately gave a bolder impetus to King Victor Emmanuel's policy by sending a note to all the Powers, in which he asserted it to be now impossible for Sardinia to offer any resistance to the inevitable course of events. Cavour imagined that since Napoleon III had obtained the imperial throne by a plebiscite, he would not deny the validity of such a claim in Italy, and forthwith submitted this idea to the Emperor, who was bound to approve of it. But the French nation was discontented, imagining that the blood it had shed for Italy had profited nothing, and was, moreover, very averse to the formation of a powerful kingdom beyond the Alps.
Now it was that Cavour determined on a great sacrifice. In the convention of Plombières it had been agreed that, in the event of a kingdom of eleven million inhabitants being established from the Alps to the Adriatic, Sardinia would cede Savoy to France. As, however, by the Treaty of Villafranca, Venetia had remained under the Austrian yoke, no more had been said about cession of territory, but by the annexation of Central Italy the number of Victor Emmanuel's subjects was now augmented to eleven millions. In order to induce Napoleon III to approve of such an annexation Cavour offered him Savoy, but the Emperor claimed Nice as well, and the Minister was obliged to accede to his demands. On March 24, 1860, Savoy, the cradle of the reigning dynasty, and Nice, Garibaldi's native Province, were ceded to France. Garibaldi, deeply wounded in his tenderest feelings, violently abused Cavour in Parliament, but the Chamber, although it respected the hero's emotion, ratified the treaty which was at this crisis a necessary concession.
At the same time Parma, Modena, Romagna, and Tuscany expressed by universal suffrage their cordial desire for union with Sardinia, and a few days later the fusion of these provinces with the dominions of the house of Savoy was an accomplished fact. On April 2, 1860, at the opening of the new Parliament, Victor Emmanuel could thus sum up the results already obtained by the nationalist party: "In a very short space of time an invasion repulsed, Lombardy liberated by valiant feats of arms, Central Italy freed by her people's wonderful strength, and to-day, assembled around me here, the representatives of the rights and hopes of the nation."
(1859) DARWIN PUBLISHES HIS ORIGIN OF SPECIES, Charles Robert Darwin
Whatever may be said of the credit due to other scientists for investigation or discovery in natural selection, the preeminence of Darwin in this field is undisputed. If of any scientific book it can be said that its appearance was "epoch-making" it is true of Darwin's work On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life. Not only did it command the earnest attention of the scientific and literary world, but it awakened the interest of thoughtful persons everywhere. Later research and criticism have modified the effect of his conclusions and led to new results, but the "Darwinian theory" or "Darwinism" still holds and seems likely long to maintain a central place in the history of modern scientific development.
Charles Robert Darwin was born at Shrewsbury, England, February 12, 1809. He was the grandson of Erasmus Darwin, an eminent physician, naturalist, and poet, who in 1794-1796 published an important work entitled Zoönomia, or the Laws of Organic Life. Charles Darwin was heir to a fortune, and in youth the possession of ample means prevented him from taking any deep interest in studying for a profession, although he did study medicine and, later, for the church. But before reaching his majority he turned to natural history. At Cambridge he enjoyed an intimacy with the distinguished botanist Professor John S. Henslow, who quickened the young man's enthusiasm for scientific investigation.
In his twenty-third year Darwin went as naturalist with a government expedition to Patagonia. The voyage, in the Beagle (1831-1836), was continued round the world. Darwin's journals of the expedition served him in his later work, and also furnished much material for popular information. From 1842, when he went to reside at Down, in Kent, he devoted himself wholly to a life of scientific research and writing.