Gaeta had now become the last bulwark of the kingdom of Naples and the Bourbon dynasty. The valorous defence of the sea-port town, during which the unfortunate young queen Maria of Bavaria displayed remarkable heroism, was afterward to constitute the one praiseworthy period in the short regency of Francis II.
The appeals for help of the beleaguered Bourbon king to the different powers of Europe failing to bring about any armed intervention, and his manifestos addressed to the Sicilian people resulting in no uprisings in his favour, lack of food and ammunition finally compelled the king to capitulate. On the 13th of February, 1861, he embarked on a French ship for Rome where he resided for the next ten years, constantly supported by the hope that his partisans in Naples would bring about a counter-revolution which would reinstate him on the throne. The following month the citadel of Messina also surrendered to General Cialdini.
With this event the kingdom of both Sicilies came to an end, and the supremacy of the Bourbons was forever destroyed in the beautiful peninsula. On the 18th of February, King Victor Emmanuel assembled in Turin about his throne representatives from all those states which acknowledged his rule, and with their joyful acquiescence adopted for himself and his legitimate descendants the title of “king of Italy.” (Law of March 17th, 1861.) The protests of the dethroned princes as well as of the pope and the emperor of Austria were received as so many empty words.
In this manner the impossible had been accomplished; the various states of Italy with the exception of Austrian Venice in the northwest and the papal city of Rome with its surroundings, had been united into a single kingdom. Cavour’s statecraft, Victor Emmanuel’s firmness and decision, Garibaldi’s patriot devotion, the political tact shown by the educated classes, had all contributed to bring about the wonderful result; and now that it had been brought about, equally powerful factors would be needed to make permanent the newly acquired possessions of freedom and unity.
A safe and satisfactory solution of the “Roman question” could be attained only by gradually accustoming the Catholic world to the idea of the separation of the spiritual power from the temporal. According to Cavour’s idea the papacy should be relieved from all obligations of worldly rule that it might the better achieve the full glory of its special mission—the spiritual guidance of Catholic Christendom. “A free church is a free state,” was the watchword of the question as understood by Cavour; but an offer which he made to the pope embodying those conditions was indignantly refused; it would be indeed a work of time to reconcile the Catholic world to the idea of a church without territorial possessions.
THE DEATH OF CAVOUR AND THE REVOLT OF GARIBALDI
Such being the condition of affairs the seditious utterances of a band of agitators calling themselves “Italians of the Italians” caused Cavour no little trouble and annoyance. Garibaldi himself, who had passed the greater part of his life in arms against monarchical power, and who in his idealism and self-sacrificing love of freedom and country was incapable of seeing existing conditions exactly as they were, was not a stranger to some of these new revolutionary movements. On the 20th of April, 1861, he appeared in the Turin parliament to condemn the action taken in disbanding his army of volunteers, and to protest against the treatment accorded some of his former comrades-at-arms. He was finally pacified and induced to return to his lonely island life by the persuasive representations of Cavour.
Shortly afterward, June 6th, 1861, occurred the death of Count Cavour, the greatest statesman the world had seen since Cardinal Richelieu. He was but fifty-one years of age, and his untimely end was undoubtedly brought about by overwork and the feverish anxiety in which his later years were passed. “For twelve years,” he declared, “I have been a conspirator in the cause of my country’s freedom—a most unique conspirator; I have avowed my aim in parliament and in every court of Europe, and now at the last I have for fellow-conspirators twenty-five millions of Italians.” His life-work had not quite reached completion, his last idea was little more than the vision of a dream; but he had at last the satisfaction of seeing his own creation, the young kingdom of Italy, advancing on the road to maturity.[g]
The chief thought which had haunted him in the midst of his delirium was the south. “Oh! there is great corruption down there, but it is not their fault, poor things. The country is demoralised but it is not by hurting it that it will improve.” And above all that the state should not force itself upon it, nor impose upon it the means of absolute governors. This was the chief thought of his brief illness and it was also his political testament. To-day after many years the boundless faith placed by the great minister in the salutary influence of liberty has been solemnly confirmed by the facts. The south relinquished brigandage and accomplished the work of annexation without ever veiling the statue of liberty.
The highest praise that can be given to Count Cavour was made by a great statesman whose name was not less celebrated than that of the great minister, Lord Palmerston. “The name of Cavour,” he said before the British parliament, “will always live, and will be embalmed in the memory, in the gratitude, and in the admiration of the human race. The story of which he is the ornament is truly wonderful, and the most romantic in the annals of the world. We have seen a people under his direction and authority wake up from the sleep of two centuries.”[c]