That night the city was illuminated, the streets were filled with shouting and triumphant crowds, and there was scarcely a window in the poorest and narrowest alley of the mediæval slums that did not show its candle. It was no vulgar conquest which they celebrated. After long centuries of disgrace, this people had recovered its self-respect, and from the highest to the lowest ranks men felt, 'We are again Romans.' On April 30, Garibaldi, being put to the test, had secured the position which had already been instinctively accorded him in the popular imagination of his countrymen.

1 Hoff. 19; Gabussi, iii. 357. (See Manara MS., Letter of May 1. The honour of Italy, Manara declares, has been saved. It is the first time since Novara that he expresses anything but shame and despair for his country.)

CHAPTER VIII'

GARIBALDI IN THE NEAPOLITAN CAMPAIGN-PALESTRINA

AND VELLETRI, MAY 1849

'Say by what name men call you,

What city is your home?

And wherefore ride ye in such guise
Before the ranks of Rome?'

MACAULAY, Lays of Ancient Rome.

THE first of a series of quarrels between Mazzini and Garibaldi, which marred the fraternity of the Roman Republic, arose on the question whether or not the victory of April 30 should be turned to full military advantage. Garibaldi, advising well as a soldier, wished to follow it up and drive the retreating French into the sea. But Mazzini, relying on those elements of genuine Republicanism in France of which he had some personal knowledge, though he did not know how fast their strength was ebbing away, hoped to propitiate the one country whose friendship might yet save the State, and preferred to turn the Roman armies from further pursuit of the French to the more congenial task of expelling the Neapolitan and Austrian invaders. It is not necessary, in this matter, to find fault with either of the Chiefs, for although Mazzini's policy was tried and failed, Garibaldi's root-and-branch remedy would have made the French all the more determined to send another and larger expedition to retrieve their military honour; so that, whatever had been done, the Republic must sooner or later have fallen a victim to the combination of the Catholic powers.

Mazzini's magnanimity at least had the effect of putting

1

the French more than ever in the wrong, and afforded a pleasing occasion for a display of the gentleness and human sympathy which have so large a place in the Italian character. The French wounded were nursed with such enlightened and devoted' tenderness that Oudinot declared himself profoundly grateful' for it; the prisoners were fêted and set free to return unconditionally to their regiments. The treatment accorded to them was prompted by sentiment as well as policy, and, though initiated by the rulers, was carried into effect by the people of Rome. Captain Key, who had come up on a visit from Civitavecchia to provide for British interests in the capital, wrote home that he had seen the French prisoners

'brought out into the streets and received with every mark of good feeling by the people, who cheered them, gave them food, and showed them round St. Peter's and the monuments, the French in return saying,' as no doubt the occasion demanded, 'that they had been deceived; having entered the Roman territory with the idea that they were to join the Romans against the Austrians and Neapolitans.' "

But the rest of the French army and the Home Government would not so easily relent, and Mazzini was to find that it is dangerous to play with coals of fire.

For the present, however, it was not safe for Oudinot to show further hostility. In return for the several hundred men restored by the generosity of their friendly enemies, the French felt bound to set free a body of Bolognese volunteers under Colonel Pietramellara, whom they had made prisoners in Civitavecchia at the time of their disembarkation. They also released Ugo Bassi, who, unarmed, but in the

De Lesseps, 120, Doc. No. 14. See App. D below.

2 Key, 198; Gabussi, iii. 366, 367; Saffi, iii. 311-313, describes the scene, and adds that the French wounded, when visited by Mazzini and himself in the hospital, expressed the same sentiments in acknowledging their gratitude for so much kindness; Vecchi, ii. 201. See also Précis Hist. (Pièce just. No. 6) for Picard's evidence to extraordinary kindness shown to them in Rome, which he calls attempts at seduction.

Bittard des Portes, 115. Précis Hist. 38. There were 400 of them, as is proved by Mannucci, 137, and many other sources.

BOMBA IN THE ALBAN HILLS

137

red blouse of the Legion, had been captured on April 30, while pursuing his spiritual office among the wounded, in the ebb and flow of the bayonet charges. After this exchange of courtesies, Oudinot settled down to wait for reinforcements. Until their arrival the Triumvirs could spare a part at least of the troops in the capital, now rapidly on the increase, to meet another foe who, if not actually at the gates, was now literally within sight.

The Alban Hills, whence, in prehistoric times, the original settlers of Rome had come down to the plain and pushed on to the river-side, still seem to enjoy a patria potestas over the city, by the place which they hold in any prospect from Roman streets or gardens; when we catch a glimpse of the country outside, it is less often the low-lying Campagna than the more distant Alban Mount that heaves in view. Among those hills-where of old lay the chief strength of the cities of the Latin League, Rome's cousins and earliest enemies-rises the Porcian height, and there, too, is the high plateau on which once shone, a dangerous rival :

the white streets of Tusculum,

The proudest town of all.

Its site is now swept bare, save for a few ruins, and Rome sees instead the harmless village of Frascati poured out over the hillside below.

In Frascati, and in Albano by the lake, was encamped Ferdinand King of Naples, with an army of 10,000 men, eager not to assist, but to forestall the French, who for their part would not consent to any co-operation with the Neapolitans, regarding them, apart from diplomatic rivalry, with the utmost personal contempt.' The Pope, who was heart and soul with Ferdinand, distrusted, more than need was, the half-hearted words of Oudinot's proclamations, and thought the conquest of Rome by the Neapolitans the best security for that unlimited restoration of clerical

Torre, ii. 122, 123; D'Ambrosio, 18; Johnston, 277-281, 292; Roman MSS. F. R. 36, f. 23.

despotism which in the end he obtained from the French. Early in the year there had been some demonstrations in favour of Pio Nono on the southern frontier and in the Alban Hills, but the feeling at the back of this movement did not long survive the arrival of Bomba, who at once initiated a political proscription after his manner, and made the inhabitants long for delivery by the Republican armies.1

To keep these invaders in check, Mazzini consented that Garibaldi should cross the Campagna, at the head of a small force which, in its numbers and in the half-civilian character and training of the men who composed it, somewhat resembled the citizen armies which the earliest Roman Consuls had led over the same ground to battle with the Latin League. Not more than 2,300 troops 2 could safely be spared while Oudinot's attitude was still doubtful, and they consisted almost entirely of the volunteer regiments -Garibaldi's own Legion, the Students, the Gagers, the Emigrants and Manara's Lombard Bersaglieri-together with a few dragoons. Since it was impossible for Garibaldi to make a frontal attack on the Alban Hills, guarded by an army four times as numerous as his own, he determined to threaten the right flank of the Neapolitans and keep it sufficiently engaged to prevent them from advancing on Rome. His object, therefore, was to move on Palestrina, a suitable base for such a campaign.

As a master of guerilla war, where the chief art is the concealment of movements and the deception of the enemy, he made it a custom frequently to march at night, and to go first in some direction other than that of the real point of attack; hence, though destined for Palestrina, his column crossed the plain in the direction of Tivoli on the night of May 4-5, and next day encamped in the grounds of Hadrian's villa. Here, in the most beautifully situated

Key, 198, who visited Albano on April 8; Dandolo, 221; Johnston, 278; Hoff. passim; MS. Lanza, on the system of arrests.

2 Torre, ii. 370 (Doc. xcii.). This document is a better authority on the numbers than Hoff. 20. In Miraglia, 306, an officer who was on the expedition says 2,500.