PREFACE THIS year is the centenary of Garibaldi's birth, which took place on July 4, 1807. It is not on this account that the present volume has been written and published, but the coincidence may be an additional reason why some Englishmen should be curious to read about the man for whom their fathers entertained a passionate enthusiasm, pure of all taint of materialism and self-interest. On the occasion of his famous visit to our country in 1864, the ovation which he received was so universal and so overwhelming that there was nothing in the nineteenth century like it, except perhaps the Jubilee procession of the Queen herself. The feeling for Garibaldi had by no means become universal among the English in 1849, the year with which this book is concerned, but even then Italian sympathies were stronger here than anywhere else in Europe. We English retain to this day the lion's share of Italy's gratitude. Nor is the reason far to seek. Though England was not the country which actually accomplished most for Italian freedom and unity, it was the country in Europe where the passion for that cause was, beyond all comparison, strongest and most disinterested, and where it will be for ever connected with such names as Byron and Shelley, Palmerston and Gladstone, Browning and Swinburne. The attachment of our fathers to Garibaldi grew out of their Italian sympathies, but it grew also out of something in his personality peculiarly captivating to the English, who saw in him the rover of great spaces of land and sea, the fighter against desperate odds, the champion of the oppressed, the patriot, the humane and generous man, all in one. He touched a chord of poetry and romance still latent in the heart of our city populations, so far removed in their surroundings and opportunities from the scenes and actions of his life. Whether his memory will now appeal to the English of a generation yet further removed from nature, and said to be at once more sophisticated and less idealist than the Victorian, I do not know. But I doubt whether we have really changed so much. Certainly the help and encouragement in my task which I have received from English people leads me to suppose that the name of Garibaldi can still stir many hearts in this island. Foremost among them I must thank Lord Carlisle; then Mrs. Hamilton King; Mr. A. L. Smith, of Balliol; Dr. Spence Watson; Mr. Hubert Hall of the Record Office; the editor of the Illustrated London News;' Mr. Brand, the Librarian of the Admiralty; Dr. F. S. Arnold; Mr. J. A. Bruce; the Rev. F. W. Ragg; Mr. Bolton King; Mrs. Humphry Ward, and many others, some of whom are mentioned by name in the notes of this book. Three persons have read the proofs of the whole book at a cost of time to themselves from which I have greatly profited-Mr. Hilton Young, my companion on the last part of the 'Retreat'; my wife; and Count Ugo Balzani. Count Balzani, whose time has been lavished upon me with a kindness which I can never forget, not only aided me in a hundred ways himself, but introduced me to many of my now numerous Italian friends; for their work on my behalf I am all the more grateful because it was largely inspired by an enthusiasm which we have in common. Without trying to distinguish between the various services which they have each rendered me, I will merely name Signori Carlo Segré, G. Guerrazzi, and G. Stiavelli of Rome; Sign. Pier Breschi and General Canzio himself of Genoa; Sign. Luigi Torre of Casale Monferrato; Sign. Cantoni of the Museo Civico, Bologna; Count Alessandro Guaccimanni of Ravenna; Sign. Ermanno Loevinson (the author of Garibaldi e la sua Legione) and Cav. Ernesto Ovidi of the Archivio di Stato, Rome; Sign. Mario Menghini of the Bib. Vitt. Em.; Captain Carlo Paganelli of the Ufficio Storico; Major Eugenio de' Rossi of the Bersaglieri; and Lt.-General Saletta, Chief of the Staff of the Italian army; the family and friends of Nino Costa; Count and Countess Pasolini and Count Pasolino Pasolini; and the Signorina Dobelli of London. I do not know whether to thank my friend Mr. Nelson Gay more for putting his splendid Risorgimento library at my disposal, or for giving me so much of his valuable student's time, which he spends with such zeal on behalf of Italy. I am indebted to Mr. R. M. Johnston of Harvard for a correspondence which has been to me both pleasant and useful. I heartily thank Commandant Weil of Paris for his friendly offices, and the French Ministry of War for a liberality of which I am most sensible. I trust they will not think that I have abused their kindness; no one is more aware than the author of this book of the courage, discipline, and humanity of the French troops in 1849, or of the immense debt that Italy owes to the First Napoleon, and, in spite of Rome and Mentana, to the Third. CHELSEA: March 1907. G. M. TREVELYAN. |