Thus fell the imperial city; captured by the army under Brigadier Wilson before the arrival of any of the reenforcements from England. The losses were heavy. From the beginning of the siege to the close, the British army at Delhi had nearly four thousand killed and wounded. The casualties on the side of the rebels were never estimated. Two bodies of sepoys broke away from the city and fled down the valleys of the Jumna and Ganges, followed by two flying columns under Brigadiers Greathed and Showers. But the great mutiny and revolt at Delhi had been stamped out, and the flag of England waved triumphantly over the capital of Hindustan.

The capture of Delhi, in September, 1857, was the turning-point in the sepoy mutinies. The revolt was crushed beyond redemption; the rebels were deprived of their head centre; and the Mogul King was a prisoner at the mercy of the power whom he had defied. But there were still troubles in India. Lucknow was still beleaguered by a rebel army, and insurrections still ran riot in Oudh and Rohilkhand.

In the middle of August General Havelock had fallen back on Cawnpore, after the failure of his first campaign for the relief of Lucknow. Five weeks afterward Havelock made a second attempt under better auspices. Sir Colin Campbell had arrived at Calcutta as Commander-in-Chief. Sir James Outram had come up to Allahabad. On September 16th, while the British troops were storming the streets of Delhi, Outram joined Havelock and Neill at Cawnpore with fourteen hundred men. As senior officer he might have assumed the command; but with generous chivalry the "Bayard of India" waived his rank in honor of Havelock.

On September 20th General Havelock crossed the Ganges into Oudh at the head of twenty-five hundred men. The next day he defeated a rebel army and put it to flight, while four of the enemy's guns were captured by Outram at the head of a body of volunteer cavalry. On the 23d Havelock routed a still larger rebel force which was strongly posted at a garden in the suburbs of Lucknow, known as the "Alumbagh." He then halted to give his soldiers a day's rest. On the 25th he was cutting his way through the streets and lanes of the city of Lucknow—running the gauntlet of a deadly and unremitting fire from the houses en both sides of the streets, and also from guns which commanded them. On the evening of the same day he entered the British intrenchments; but in the moment of victory a chance shot carried off the gallant Neill.

The defence of the British residency at Lucknow is a glorious episode in the national annals. The fortitude of the beleaguered garrison was the admiration of the world. The women nursed the wounded and performed every womanly duty with self-sacrificing heroism; and when the fight was over they received the well-merited thanks of Her Majesty Queen Victoria.

During four long months the garrison had known nothing of what was going on in the outer world. They were aware of the advance and retreat of Havelock, and that was all. At last, on September 23d, they heard the booming of the guns at the Alumbagh. On the morning of the 25th they could see something of the growing excitement in the city; the people abandoning their houses and flying across the river. Still the guns of the rebels kept up a heavy cannonade upon the residency, and volleys of musketry continued to pour upon the besieged from the loopholes of the besiegers. But soon the firing was heard from the city; the welcome sounds came nearer and nearer. The excitement of the garrison grew beyond control. Presently the relieving force was seen fighting its way toward the residency. Then the pent-up feelings of the garrison burst forth in deafening cheers; and wounded men in hospital crawled out to join in the chorus of welcome. Then followed personal greetings as officers and men came pouring in. Hands were frantically shaken on all sides. Rough-bearded soldiers took the children from their mothers' arms, kissed them with tears rolling down their cheeks, and thanked God that they had come in time to save them from the fate of the sufferers at Cawnpore.

Thus after a siege of nearly four months Havelock succeeded in relieving Lucknow. But it was a reenforcement rather than a relief, and was confined to the British residency. The siege was not raised; and the city of Lucknow remained two months longer in the hands of the rebels. Sir James Outram assumed the command, but was compelled to keep on the defensive. Meanwhile reinforcements were arriving from England. In November Sir Colin Campbell reached Cawnpore at the head of a considerable army. He left General Windham with two thousand men to take charge of the intrenchment at Cawnpore, and then advanced against Lucknow with five thousand men and thirty guns. He carried several of the enemy's positions, cut his way to the residency, and at last brought away the beleaguered garrison, with all the women and children. But not even then could he disperse the rebels and reoccupy the city. Accordingly he left Outram at the head of four thousand men in the neighborhood of Lucknow, and then returned to Cawnpore.

On November 24th, the day after leaving Lucknow, General Havelock was carried off by dysentery, and buried in the Alumbagh. His death spread a gloom over India, but by this time his name had become a household word wherever the English language was spoken. In the hour of surprise and panic, as successive stories of mutiny and rebellion reached England, and culminated in the revolt at Delhi and massacre at Cawnpore, the victories of Havelock revived the drooping spirits of the British nation, and stirred up all hearts to glorify the hero who had stemmed the tide of disaffection and disaster. The death of Havelock, following the story of the capture of Delhi, and told with the same breath that proclaimed the deliverance at Lucknow, was received in England with a universal sorrow that will never be forgotten so long as men are living who can recall the memory of the "Mutiny of Fifty-seven."

The subsequent history of the sepoy revolt is little more than a detail of the military operations of British troops for the dispersion of the rebels and restoration of order and law. Sir Colin Campbell [Footnote: Died at Chatham, England, August 14, 1863.—ED.]—later made Baron Clyde of Clydesdale—undertook a general campaign against the rebels in Oudh and Rohilkhand, and restored order and law in those disaffected Provinces; while Sir James Outram drove the rebels out of Lucknow, and reestablished British sovereignty in the capital of Oudh.



(1859) BATTLES OF MAGENTA AND SOLFERINO, Pietro Orsi

During the Crimean War (1853-1856) Austria remained neutral, while the Italian Kingdom of Sardinia joined Great Britain, France, and Turkey against Russia. The power of Austria still kept despotic sway over the States of Italy, and it was the aim of Victor Emmanuel, King of Sardinia, to throw off this hinderance to Italian liberty and union. It was the opinion of Count Cavour, Victor Emmanuel's minister, that, by acting with the allies against Russia, Sardinia would increase her prestige with the European Powers, and thereby promote the movement for independence. The success of the allies in the Crimean War confirmed the prescience of Cavour.

Napoleon III wished to secure for France supremacy in southern Europe. In 1855 he inquired of the Sardinian minister, "What can I do for Italy?" The Crimean War ended with the Treaty of Paris in 1856. At the congress which concluded that peace Cavour presented the case of Italy against Austria. Not long after this it became evident that Napoleon was prepared to espouse the Italian cause. In 1858 it was agreed that he should do this.

Sardinia now prepared for war. Austria sent an ultimatum demanding a reduction of the Sardinian army to a peace footing, This demand was refused. In January, 1859, Austria mobilized fresh troops on the Italian frontier, and Cavour requested Garibaldi to organize a volunteer corps to be called Cacciatori delle Alpi ("Hunters of the Alps"). Still Cavour disclaimed a warlike policy, denying that the hostile initiative was taken by Sardinia, although in this position he was opposed by some members of his own Parliament. Nevertheless Cavour declared: "I believe I am justified in proclaiming aloud, in the presence of Parliament, of the nation, and of Europe, that if there has been provocation it was offered by Austria." As shown by Orsi, the Italian historian, the great minister maintained this attitude as long as it was possible to hold back from the actual conflict.

Cavour insisted that Austria must be the aggressive party, for in the treaty with Napoleon III it had been stipulated that France would come to the help of Sardinia only in case of the latter being attacked by Austria. Hence Cavour was obliged to seek every means of putting his country into the attitude of the provoked party. How many disappointments, uncertainties, and anxieties crowded those days, from February to the end of April, 1859! In order to understand the enormous difficulties overcome by Cavour it would be necessary to follow literally, day by day, the history of that period. In March he repaired to Paris to ascertain Napoleon's action: it was too evident, however, that French public opinion was unfavorable to war, and the Emperor was wavering. Russia and England suggested that the question should be solved by a congress, to which proposal Napoleon III acceded: Cavour now believed all was lost, since Sardinia could not refuse without putting herself in the wrong. Fortunately, the difficulty was solved by Austria boldly insisting that Sardinia should disarm before being represented at the congress, and on April 23d this demand was enforced by an ultimatum, to be answered within three days.

Now ensued a genuine declaration of hostilities, and most joyfully did Victor Emmanuel make the following announcement to his troops: "Soldiers! Austria, who masses her armies on our frontiers and threatens to invade our country because liberty and order rule there; because concord and affection between sovereign and people—and not force—sway the State; because there the anguished cry of oppressed Italy is listened to—Austria dares to tell us, who are armed only in our own defence, to lay down those arms and put ourselves in her power. Such an outrageous suggestion surely merits a condign response, and I have indignantly refused her request. I announce this to you in the certainty that you will make the wrong done to your King and to your nation your own. Hence mine is a proclamation of war: arm yourselves therefore in readiness for it!

"You will be confronted by an ancient enemy who is both valiant and disciplined, but against whom you need not fear to measure your strength, for you may remember with pride Goito, Pastrengo, Santa Lucia, Sommacampagna, and, above all, Custozza, where four brigades fought for three days against the enemy's five corps d'armee. I will be your leader. Your prowess in action has already been tested in the past, and when fighting under my magnanimous father I myself proudly recognized your valor. I am convinced that on the field of honor and glory you will know how to justify, as well as to augment, your military renown.

"You will have as comrades those intrepid French troops—the conquerors in so many distinguished campaigns—with whom you fought side by side at Tchernaya, whom Napoleon III, always prompt to further the defence of a righteous cause and the victory of civilization, generously sends in great numbers to our aid. March then, confident of success, and wreathe with fresh laurels that standard which, rallying from all quarters the flower of Italian youth to its threefold colors, points out your task of accomplishing that righteous and sacred enterprise—the independence of Italy, wherein we find our war-cry."

The Austrian army to the number of one hundred seventy thousand men—besides those remaining in the Lombardo-Venetian fortresses—was commanded by General Gyulai, the successor of Radetzky, who had died the year before, at the age of ninety-one. Gyulai meant to attack and rout the Sardinian army before it could join its French allies. On April 29th he crossed the Ticino; then spreading out his forces along the Sesia, he reconnoitred as far as Chivasso. These districts abound in cultivated rice-fields and are intersected by many canals: it was therefore easy, by flooding the ground, to hinder the march of the Austrian troops on Turin.

Meanwhile, the Sardinian army, composed of sixty thousand men, awaited the arrival of the French forces on the right bank of the Po. On May 12th Napoleon III, already preceded into Italy by one hundred twenty thousand of his men, debarked at Genoa, and on the 14th was at Alessandria, where, near the mouth of the Tanaro, the allied armies met. The Austrian troops covered a long tract, from Novara to Vercelli, then extended down the line of the Sesia as far as the Po, and thence reached the mouth of the Tanaro. Gyulai, seeing the enemy concentrated on the right bank of the Po, believed that Napoleon. III intended crossing that river in the direction of Piacenza—as Napoleon I had crossed in 1796—and so massed his troops to the south. At this juncture a portion of his army encountered the French and Sardinians at Montebello, where the extreme right wing of the allies was posted. The Austrian General met with such a determined resistance that he imagined this must be the centre of the enemy, and felt convinced that he had guessed the latter's intention; he therefore caused his army to pursue its march southward.

By this movement Vercelli was abandoned by the Austrians and it was immediately reoccupied by the Sardinians.

Napoleon now prepared a bold flank movement, by leaving the Po for the Ticino, and to mask this manoeuvre ordered the Sardinians to make an advance. Thus, while Victor Emmanuel, at the head of his men, flung himself from Vercelli on Palestro—meriting, by the skill of his military tactics, the acclamations of a regiment of zouaves whom he headed as corporal—the French, taking ad vantage of the Alessandria, Casale, and Novara Railway, made for the bridge of Buffalora over the Ticino. Only then did Gyulai perceive this clever stratagem which threw Lombardy open to the allies, and he was consequently obliged to cross the Ticino to block the enemy's way to Milan.

On June 4th, at Magenta, nearly the whole of the Austrian army engaged the French forces; the battle, which was most desperate, lasted all day, and was remarkable for the prodigies of valor performed. The Austrians, driven back into Magenta itself, maintained, even in that village, such a stout resistance that they had to be dislodged by house-to-house fighting.

On June 8th Victor Emmanuel and Napoleon III made their triumphal entry into Milan—now freed from the Austrian yoke. On the same day a French corps repulsed the Austrians at Melegnano, while Garibaldi entered Bergamo from the other side. Garibaldi, who had been the last to leave Lombardy in 1848, was now the first to set foot in its territory in 1859. Since May 23d he had led his own Cacciatori to the Lombard shores of Lake Maggiore, had defeated the Austrians at Varese, entered Como, routed the enemy afresh at San Fermo, and was now proceeding to Bergamo and Brescia, with the intention of reaching the Trentine Alps, to cut off the enemy's retreat.

After the Battle of Magenta, Gyulai had been dismissed from the command, and his post was assumed by the Emperor Francis Joseph himself, assisted by the aged Marshal Hess. On the night of June 23d the retreating Austrians crossed the Mincio, but a few hours after retraced their steps and took up their position on the hills to the south of the Lake of Garda. On the morning of the 24th the Franco-Sardinian army began their march at dawn, and shortly afterward, to their great amazement, encountered the Austrians, who they imagined had crossed the Mincio the night before. The struggle was terrible; in fact, the line covered by the fighting extended a distance of five leagues.

A series of hills, dominated by Solferino and San Martino, formed the positions the Franco-Sardinian army had to assail. The French contested Solferino with the Austrians, and, after a hotly disputed battle of more than twelve hours, succeeded in occupying it. The Sardinians, led by Victor Emmanuel, made a violent assault on San Martino; four times in succession did they take it, only to lose it again, but the fifth time they made themselves masters of it for good and all. By six o'clock in the evening the strength of the Austrian army was everywhere broken. Just then a frightful hurricane, heralded by clouds of dust and accompanied by torrents of rain, burst over the two armies and thus favored the flight of the Austrian battalions. Napoleon III now fixed his headquarters at Cavriana, in the same house that Francis Joseph had tenanted during the action. On that vast battlefield the combatants had numbered three hundred thousand men—one hundred sixty thousand Austrians and one hundred forty thousand French and Sardinians—of all these, after that sanguinary struggle, twenty-five thousand were left dead or wounded.

After a few days' rest the Franco-Sardinian army crossed the Mincio and besieged Peschiera. Now there seemed a chance of the Italians fulfilling the hope they had so long cherished, of expelling the foreigners. They confidently awaited news of fresh feats of arms in the Quadrilateral and of the success of the fleet sent by France and Sardinia into Adriatic waters, but instead came the most unexpected tidings imaginable.

On July 8th Napoleon III had met Francis Joseph, and three days later the preliminaries of peace were signed at Villafranca. By this treaty Austria was to cede Lombardy to Napoleon, who was to relegate it to Sardinia; the Italian States were to be amalgamated into a confederation, under the Presidency of the Pope, but Venice, though forming part of this same confederation, was to remain under Austrian rule. Great indeed was the mortification of all Italy on hearing such terms of peace announced. Cavour, who had devoted all his marvellous talents to realizing the ideal of national redemption and had believed his ends so nearly attained, hastened to his Prince, and, in a melancholy interview, advised him not to accept such conditions. But Victor Emmanuel, although it caused his very heart to bleed, signed the treaty, adding these words: "I approve as far as I myself am concerned," whereupon Cavour sent in his resignation.

What was the motive that had induced Napoleon to break his lately made promise of freeing Italy from the Alps to the Adriatic? There were many reasons which influenced him: the sight of that immense battlefield, strewn with the bodies of the slain, the determined resistance of the Austrian soldiers, the difficulties which would have to be faced in the Quadrilateral, the hostile attitude of Prussia, were all motives which combined to sway the French Emperor's mind. But there was also another reason which counted for much. Napoleon had been drawn into this campaign without really knowing the state of Italian public opinion; he wished Italy to be free "from the Alps to the Adriatic," but did not want Italian unity; rather did he desire the formation of a confederacy wherein France could always make her own predominance felt in the peninsula. Scarcely had he arrived in Italy when he was forced to see that Italian ideals were very different from what he had imagined them to be. Trials had but ripened the virtues of prudence and wisdom in men's minds: in 1859 the people were little likely to repeat the blunders of 1848 or 1849, and there were now no longer discussions over forms of government, but everywhere a unanimous resolve to rally round the liberal monarchy of Savoy.

On the first proclamation of the war the Grand Duke of Tuscany had been compelled to fly from his States (April 27th). Napoleon had imagined that in this Province—the ancient stronghold of Italian municipalism—it would be easy to form a new kingdom with a Bonaparte to wear its crown. With this aim in view the fifth French army corps, commanded by Prince Jerome Napoleon, had debarked at Leghorn, under the pretext of organizing the military forces of Central Italy and harassing the Austrians on the extreme left. But the Tuscans soon divined the real intention of the French, and the Provisional Government in Florence, previously instituted under Bettino Ricasoli, suddenly avowed its intention of uniting Tuscany to Sardinia, whereupon Prince Napoleon, seeing the true attitude of the country, found it advisable to affect to promote the annexation.

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 Plombieres 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 Zooenomia, 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.

Since it is not an uncommon error to confound natural selection with evolution, it may be well to point out that, while based on evolution, Darwinism is distinct from it. Evolution is the development of new organisms through heredity, variation, and adaptation. Darwinism, or the doctrine of natural selection, as best defined in these pages by Darwin himself, is seen to involve quite different factors from those of evolution as thus restricted. For candor and childlike simplicity, the writings of Darwin are especially noteworthy among the modest utterances of great men, and nowhere are these qualities more strikingly revealed than in the following account of the production of his principal work.

From September, 1854, I devoted my whole time to arranging my huge pile of notes, to observing, and to experimenting in relation to the transmutation of species. During the voyage of the Beagle I had been deeply impressed by discovering in the pampean formation great fossil animals covered with armor like that on the existing armadillos; secondly, by the manner in which closely allied animals replace one another in proceeding southward over the continent; and thirdly, by the South American character of most of the productions of the Galapagos Archipelago, and more especially by the manner in which they differ slightly on each island of the group, none of the islands appearing to be very ancient, in a geological sense.

It was evident that such facts as these, as well as many others, could be explained only on the supposition that species gradually become modified; and the subject haunted me. But it was equally evident that neither the action of the surrounding conditions nor the will of the organisms (especially in the case of plants) could account for the innumerable cases in which organisms of every kind are beautifully adapted to their habits of life—for instance, a woodpecker or a tree-frog to climb trees, or a seed for dispersal by hooks or plumes. I had always been much struck by such adaptations, and until these could be explained it seemed to me almost useless to endeavor to prove by indirect evidence that species have been modified.

After my return to England it appeared to me that by following the example of Lyell in geology, and by collecting all facts which bore in any way on the variation of animals and plants under domestication and nature, some light might perhaps be thrown on the whole subject. My first note-book was opened in July, 1837. I worked on true Baconian principles, and without any theory collected facts on a wholesale scale, more especially with respect to domesticated productions, by printed inquiries, by conversation with skilful breeders and gardeners, and by extensive reading. When I see the list of books of all kinds which I read and abstracted, including whole series of journals and transactions, I am surprised at my industry. I soon perceived that selection was the keystone of man's success in making useful races of animals and plants. But how selection could be applied to organisms living in a state of nature remained for some time a mystery to me.

In October, 1838, that is, fifteen months after I had begun my systematic inquiry, I happened to read for amusement Malthus's Essay on the Principle of Population, and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on, from long-continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favorable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavorable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species. Here then I had at last got a theory by which to work; but I was so anxious to avoid prejudice that I determined not for some time to write even the briefest sketch of it. In June, 1842, I first allowed myself the satisfaction of writing a very brief abstract of my theory in pencil in thirty-five pages; and this was enlarged during the summer of 1844 into one of two hundred thirty pages, which I had fairly copied out and still possess.

But at that time I overlooked one problem of great importance; and it is astonishing to me, except on the principle of Columbus and his egg, how I could have overlooked it and its solution. This problem is the tendency in organic beings descended from the same stock to diverge in character as they become modified. That they have diverged greatly is obvious from the manner in which species of all kinds can be classed under genera, genera under families, families under sub-orders and so on; and I can remember the very spot in the road, while riding in my carriage, that, to my joy, the solution occurred to me; and this was long after I had come to Down. The solution, as I believe, is that the modified offspring of all dominant and increasing forms tend to become adapted to many and highly diversified places in the economy of nature.

Early in 1856 Lyell advised me to write out my views fully, and I began at once to do so on a scale three or four times as extensive as that which was afterward followed in my Origin of Species; yet it was only an abstract of the materials which I had collected, and I got through about half the work on this scale. But my plans were overthrown, for early in the summer of 1858 Alfred Russel Wallace, who was then in the Malay Archipelago, sent me an essay On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type, and this essay contained exactly the same theory as mine. Mr. Wallace expressed the wish that if I thought well of his essay, I should send it to Lyell for perusal.

The circumstances under which I consented, at the request of Lyell and Hooker, to allow of an abstract from my manuscript, together with a letter to Asa Gray, dated September 5, 1857, to be published at the same time with Wallace's essay, are given in the Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, 1858. I was at first very unwilling to consent, as I thought Mr. Wallace might consider my doing so unjustifiable, for I did not then know how generous and noble was his disposition. Neither the extract from my manuscript nor the letter to Gray had been intended for publication, and they were badly written. Mr. Wallace's essay, on the other hand, was admirably expressed and quite clear. Nevertheless, our joint productions excited very little attention, and the only published notice of them which I can remember was by Professor Haughton, of Dublin, whose verdict was that all that was new in them was false, and what was true was old. This shows how necessary it is that any new view should be explained at considerable length in order to arouse public attention.

In September, 1858, I set to work by the strong advice of Lyell and Hooker to prepare a volume on the transmutation of species, but was often interrupted by ill-health and short visits to Doctor Lane's delightful hydropathic establishment at Moor Park. I abstracted the manuscript begun on a much larger scale in 1856, and completed the volume on the same reduced scale. It cost me thirteen months and ten days' hard labor. It was published under the title of the Origin of Species, in November, 1859. Though considerably added to and corrected in the later editions, it has remained substantially the same book.

It is no doubt the chief work of my life. It was from the first highly successful. The first small edition of twelve hundred fifty copies was sold on the day of publication, and a second edition of three thousand copies soon afterward. Sixteen thousand copies have now (1876) been sold in England; and considering how stiff a book it is, this is a large number. It has been translated into almost every European tongue, even into such languages as Spanish, Bohemian, Polish, and Russian. It has also, according to Miss Bird, been translated into Japanese, and is much studied in that country. Even an essay on it has appeared in Hebrew, showing that the theory is contained in the Old Testament! The reviews were very numerous; for some time I collected all that appeared on the Origin and on my related books, and these amount (excluding newspaper reviews) to two hundred sixty-five; but after a time I gave up the attempt in despair. Many separate essays and books on the subject have appeared; and in Germany a catalogue, or bibliography, on "Darwinismus" has appeared every year or two.

The success of the Origin may, I think, be attributed in large part to my having long before written two condensed sketches, and to my having finally abstracted a much larger manuscript, which was itself an abstract. By this means I was enabled to select the more striking facts and conclusions. I had also during many years followed a golden rule, namely, whenever a published fact, a new observation or thought, came across me which was opposed to my general results, to make a memorandum of it without fail and at once; for I had found by experience that such facts and thoughts were far more apt to escape from the memory than favorable ones. Owing to this habit, very few objections were raised against my views which I had not at least noticed and attempted to answer.

It has sometimes been said that the success of the Origin proved "that the subject was in the air," or "that men's minds were prepared for it." I do not think that this is strictly true, for I occasionally sounded not a few naturalists, and never happened to come across a single one who seemed to doubt about the permanence of species. Even Lyell and Hooker, though they would listen with interest to me, never seemed to agree. I tried once or twice to explain to able men what I meant by "natural selection," but signally failed. What I believe was strictly true is that innumerable well-observed facts were stored in the minds of naturalists ready to take their proper places as soon as any theory that would receive them was sufficiently explained. Another element in the success of the book was its moderate size; and this I owe to the appearance of Mr. Wallace's essay; had I published on the scale in which I began to write in 1856, the book would have been four or five times as large as the Origin, and very few would have had the patience to read it. I gained much by my delay in publishing from about 1839, when the theory was clearly conceived, to 1859; and I lost nothing by it, for I cared very little whether men attributed more originality to me or to Wallace; and his essay no doubt aided in the reception of the theory. I was forestalled in only one important point, which my vanity has always made me regret, namely, the explanation, by means of the Glacial period, of the presence of the same species of plants and of some few animals on distant mountain summits and in the arctic regions. This view pleased me so much that I wrote it out in extenso, and I believe that it was read by Hooker some years before Edward Forbes published his celebrated memoir on the subject. In the very few points in which we differed I still think that I was in the right. I have never, of course, alluded in print to my having independently worked out this view.

Hardly any point gave me so much satisfaction, when I was at work on the Origin, as the explanation of the wide difference in many classes between the embryo and the adult animal, and of the close resemblance of the embryos within the same class. No notice of this point was taken, as far as I remember, in the early reviews of the Origin, and I recollect expressing my surprise on this head in a letter to Asa Gray. Within late years several reviewers have given the whole credit to Fritz Mueller and Haeckel, who undoubtedly have worked it out much more fully and in some respects more correctly than I did. I had materials for a whole chapter on the subject, and I ought to have made the discussion longer; for it is clear that I failed to impress my readers; and he who succeeds in doing so deserves, in my opinion, all the credit.

This leads me to remark that I have almost without exception been treated honestly by my reviewers, passing over those without scientific knowledge as not worthy of notice. My views have often been grossly misrepresented, bitterly opposed and ridiculed, but this has been generally done, as I believe, in good faith. On the whole I do not doubt that my works have been repeatedly and greatly overpraised. I rejoice that I have avoided controversies, and this I owe to Lyell, who many years ago, in reference to my geological works, strongly advised me never to get entangled in a controversy, as it rarely did any good and caused a miserable loss of time and temper.

Whenever I have found out that I have blundered, or that my work has been imperfect, and when I have been contemptuously criticised, and even when I have been overpraised, so that I have felt mortified, it has been my greatest comfort to say hundreds of times to myself that "I have worked as hard and as well as I could, and no man can do more than this." I remember when in Good Success Bay, in Terra del Fuego, thinking (and I believe that I wrote home to that effect) that I could not employ my life better than in adding a little to natural science. This I have done to the best of my abilities, and critics may say what they like, but they cannot destroy this conviction.

During the last two months of 1859 I was fully occupied in preparing a second edition of the Origin, and by an enormous correspondence. On January 1, 1860, I began arranging my notes for my work on the Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication, but it was not published until the beginning of 1868, the delay having been caused partly by frequent periods of illness, one of which lasted seven months, and partly by being tempted to publish on other subjects which at the time interested me more.

My Descent of Man was published in February, 1871. As soon as I had become, in the year 1837 or 1838, convinced that species were mutable productions, I could not avoid the belief that man must come under the same law. Accordingly I collected notes on the subject for my own satisfaction, but not, for a long time, with any intention of publishing. Although in the Origin of Species the derivation of any particular species is never discussed, yet I thought it best, in order that no honorable man should accuse me of concealing my views, to add that by the work "light would be thrown on the origin of man and his history." It would have been useless and injurious to the success of the book to parade, without giving any evidence, my conviction with respect to his origin.

But when I found that many naturalists fully accepted the doctrine of the evolution of species, it seemed to me advisable to work up such notes as I possessed, and to publish a special treatise on the origin of man. I was the more glad to do so as it gave me an opportunity of fully discussing sexual selection—a subject which had always greatly interested me. This subject, and that of the variation of our domestic productions, together with the causes and laws of variation, inheritance, and the intercrossing of plants, are the sole subjects which I have been able to write about in full, so as to use all the materials which I have collected. The Descent of Man took me three years to write, but then, as usual, some of this time was lost by ill-health and some was consumed by preparing new editions and other minor works. A second and largely corrected edition of the Descent appeared in 1874.



(1860) THE KINGDOM OF ITALY ESTABLISHED, Giuseppe Garibaldi and John Webb Probyn

After the suppression of the Italian Revolution, by Austria, in 1849, and the restoration of Austrian power in Italy, Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, who had headed the movement for Italian independence and had been defeated, abdicated in favor of his son, Victor Emmanuel. The new King, as Victor Emmanuel II, succeeded to the throne March 23, 1849, the day of his father's defeat at Novara. He was a liberal sovereign and zealous for the cause of his country. With the aid of his great minister, Count Cavour, he proceeded with the work of securing the unity and freedom of Italy. In 1859 Sardinia and France, in alliance, defeated Austria. In this war were made the substantial beginnings from which a new Italian nationality was to be realized. Italian unity was not the object of Napoleon III in his alliance with Italy against Austria, but he did much to advance its prospects. He even promised the complete liberation of Italy, but this promise he failed to fulfil, to the great disappointment of Italian statesmen. Napoleon wished to see an Italian confederation, with the Pope at its head, but this plan was rejected.

Sicily and Naples, in Southern Italy, were still governed by a Bourbon prince. It was necessary to get rid of him, but Victor Emmanuel did not desire another war. The matter was decided through the action of Garibaldi, whose first step toward ending the last remnant of Bourbon rule in Italy was a bold descend upon Sicily. This movement he made against the wishes of Cavour and in furtherance of the plans of "Young Italy." His own account of his landing at Marsala and of the Battle of Calatafimi—regarded by him as one of the most memorable in his military experience—is as characteristic of Garibaldi the man and writer as were his exploits characteristic of Garibaldi the soldier.

The events that quickly followed Garibaldi's descent upon Sicily marked the beginning of a new era in Italian history. After his victory at Calatafimi Garibaldi moved toward Palermo, the capital. On May 24th the Bourbon troops of Francis II, king of the Two Sicilies, marched out of the city to meet him. By shrewd tactics Garibaldi outmaneuvre them. On the 26th he marched on Palermo with about three thousand men, and attacked the city on the 27th. The battle was a confused struggle of military and civilians, many citizens of Palermo, armed with "daggers, knives, spits, and iron instruments of any kind," taking part, in favor of Garibaldi, in the street-fighting that accompanied the more regular conflict. The city fell through revolt of the people and defection of the King's troops rather than by the assaults of Garibaldi's men, "twenty thousand soldiers of despotism" capitulating "before a handful of citizens" self-devoted in the cause of freedom.

By June 6th Garibaldi had complete possession of Palermo; other successes in his famous campaign of liberation followed rapidly; and his final triumph was achieved in the later events so eloquently described by Probyn, the historian of Italy's progress through her most important transformations in the nineteenth century.

GIUSEPPE GARIBALDI

As we approached the western coast of Sicily we began to discover sailing-vessels and steamers. On the roadstead of Marsala two men-of-war were anchored, which turned out to be English. Having decided on landing at Marsala, we approached that port, and reached it about noon. On entering the harbor we found it full of merchant-vessels of different nations. Fortune had indeed favored us and so guided our expedition that we could not have arrived at a more propitious moment. The Bourbon cruisers had left the harbor of Marsala that morning, sailing eastward, while we were arriving from the west; indeed, they were still in sight toward Cape San Marco as we entered, so that by the time they came within cannon-shot we had already landed all the men out of the Piemonte and were beginning to debark those on board the Lombardo.

The presence of the two English men-of-war in some degree influenced the determination of the Bourbon commanders, who were naturally impatient to open fire on us, and this circumstance gave us time to get our whole force on shore. The noble English flag once more helped to prevent bloodshed, and I, the Benjamin of these lords of the ocean, was for the hundredth time protected by them. The assertion, however, made by our enemies, that the English had directly favored and assisted our landing at Marsala, was inaccurate. The British colors, flying from the two men-of-war and the English consulate, made the Bourbon mercenaries hesitate, and, I might even say, impressed them with a sense of shame at pouring the fire of their imposing batteries into a handful of men armed only with the kind of muskets usually supplied by the Government to Italian volunteers.

Notwithstanding this, three-fourths of the volunteers were still on the quay when the Bourbons began firing on them with shells and grape-shot—happily, without injury to anyone. The Piemonte, abandoned by us, was carried off by the enemy, who left the Lombardo, which had grounded on a sand-bank.

The population of Marsala, thunderstruck at this unexpected event, received us pretty well, all things considered. The common people, indeed, were delighted; the magnates welcomed us under protest. I thought all this very natural. Those who are accustomed to calculate everything at so much per cent, are not likely to be reassured by the sight of a few desperadoes, who wish to ameliorate a corrupt society by eradicating from it the cancer of privilege and falsehood, especially when these desperadoes, few as they are, and with neither three-hundred-pounders nor ironclads, fling themselves against a power believed to be gigantic, like that of the Bourbon.

Men of high rank—that is, the privileged class—before risking anything in an enterprise wish to assure themselves which way the wind of fortune blows and where the large battalions are; and then the victorious force may be certain of finding them compliant, cordial, and even enthusiastic if need be. Is not this the history of human selfishness in every country? The poor people, on the other hand, welcomed us with applause and with unmistakable tokens of affection. They thought of nothing but the sacredness of the sacrifice, the difficult and noble task undertaken by that handful of gallant young fellows, who had come from such a distance to the succor of their brethren.

We passed the remainder of the day and the following night at Marsala, where I began to profit by the services of Crispi, an honest and capable Sicilian, who was of the greatest use to me in government business, and in making all necessary arrangements which my want of local knowledge prevented my doing myself. A dictatorship was spoken of, and I accepted it without hesitation, having always believed it the plank of safety in urgent cases, amid the breakers in which nations often find themselves.

On the morning of the 12th the "Thousand" [Footnote: Garibaldi landed with a force of one thousand volunteers.—Ed.] left for Salemi, but, the distance being too great for one etape, we stopped at the farm of Mistretta, where we passed the night. We did not find the proprietor at home, but a young man, his brother, did the honors with kindly and liberal hospitality. At Mistretta we formed a new company under Griziotti. On the 13th we marched to Salemi, where we were well received by the people and were joined by the companies of Sant' Anna d'Alcamo and some other volunteers of the island.

On the 14th we occupied Vita, or San Vito, and on the 15th came in sight of the enemy, who, occupying Calatafimi and knowing of our approach in that direction, had spread out the great part of their forces on the heights called Il Pianto dei Romani.

The dawn of May 15th found us in good order on the heights of Vita; and a little later the enemy, whom I knew to be at Calatafimi, left the city in column, marching toward us. The hills of Vita are confronted by the heights of the Pianto dei Romani, where the enemy deployed his columns. On the Calatafimi side these heights have a gentle slope, easily ascended by the enemy, who covered all the highest points, while on the Vita side they are steep and precipitous.

Occupying the opposite and southern heights, I had been able to perceive exactly all the positions held by the Bourbonists, while the latter could scarcely see the line of sharpshooters formed by the Genoese carbineers under Mosto, who covered our front, all the other companies being drawn up en echelon behind them. Our scanty artillery was stationed on our left, on the highroad, under Orsini, who succeeded, in spite of the poverty of his resources, in making a few good shots. In this way both we and the enemy occupied strong positions, fronting each other, and separated by a wide space of undulating ground, broken by a few farmsteadings. Our advantage therefore clearly lay in awaiting the enemy in our own position. The Bourbon forces, to the number of about two thousand, with some cannon, discovering a few of our men without distinguishing uniform and mingled with peasants, boldly advanced a few lines of bersaglieri, with sufficient support and two guns. Arrived within firing distance, they opened with carbines and cannon while advancing on us.

The order given to the Thousand was to wait without firing for the enemy to come up, though the gallant Ligurians already had one man killed and several wounded. The blare of the bugles, sounding an American reveille, brought the enemy to a halt as if by magic. They understood that it was not the Picciotti alone they had to deal with, and their lines, with the artillery, gave the signal for a retrograde movement. This was the first time that the soldiers of despotism had quailed before the filibusters—for such was the title with which our enemies honored us.

The Thousand then sounded a charge—the Genoese carbineers in the van, followed by a chosen band of youths impatient to come to close quarters.

The intention of the charge was to put to flight the enemy's vanguard and get possession of the two guns—a manoeuvre that was executed with a spirit worthy of the champions of Italian liberty; but I had no intention of a front attack on a formidable position occupied by a strong force of Bourbon troops. But who could stop those fiery and impetuous volunteers in their rush on the foe? In vain the trumpets sounded a halt; our men did not hear, or imitated Nelson's conduct at the Battle of Copenhagen. They turned a deaf ear to the order to halt sounded by the trumpets, and with their bayonets drove the enemy's van back on their main body.

There was not a moment to be lost, or that gallant handful would have perished. Immediately a general charge was sounded, and the entire corps of the Thousand, accompanied by some courageous Sicilians and Calabrese, marched at a quick pace to the rescue.

The enemy had abandoned the plain, but, falling back on the heights where their reserve was, held firm and defended their position with a dogged valor worthy of a better cause. The most dangerous part of the ground we had to cross was the level valley separating us from the enemy, where we had to face a storm of cannon- and musket-balls which wounded a good many of our men. Arrived at the foot of Monte Romano, we were almost sheltered from attack; and at this point the Thousand, somewhat diminished in number, closed up to the vanguard.

The situation was supreme; we were bound to win. In this determination we began to ascend the first ledge of the mountain, under a hail of bullets. I do not remember how many, but there were certainly several terraces to be gained before reaching the crest of the heights, and every time we climbed from one terrace to the next—during which operation we were totally unprotected—we were under a tremendous fire. The orders given to our men to fire but few shots were well adapted to the wretched weapons presented to us by the Sardinian Government, which nearly always missed fire. On this occasion, too, great service was rendered by the gallant Genoese, who, being excellent shots and armed with good carbines, sustained the honor of our cause. This ought to be an encouragement to all young Italians to exercise themselves in the use of arms, in the conviction that valor alone is not enough on modern battlefields; great dexterity in the use of weapons is also necessary.

Calatafimi! The survivor of a hundred battles, if in my last moments my friends see me smile once more with pride, it will be at the recollection of that fight—for I remember none more glorious. The Thousand, attired just as at home, worthy representatives of their people, attacked—with heroic coolness, fighting their way from one formidable position to another—the soldiers of tyranny, brilliant in gaudily trimmed uniforms, gold lace, and epaulettes, and completely routed them. How can I forget that knot of youths who, fearing to see me wounded, surrounded me, pressing themselves closely together and sheltering me with their bodies? If, while I write, I am deeply touched at the recollection, I have good reason. Is it not my duty at least to remind Italy of those brave sons of hers who fell there?—Montanari, Schiaffino, Sertorio, Nullo, Vigo, Tukery, Taddei, and many more whose names I grieve to say I cannot remember.

As I have already said, the southern slope of Monte Romano, which we had to ascend, was formed of those ledges or narrow terraces used by the cultivators of the soil in mountainous countries. We made all possible haste to reach the bank of each terrace, driving the enemy before us, and then halting under cover of the bank to take breath and prepare for the attack. Proceeding thus, we gained one ledge after another, till we reached the top, where the Bourbon troops made a last effort, defending their position with great intrepidity; many of their chasseurs, who had come to the end of their ammunition, even throwing down stones on us. At last we gave the final charge. The bravest of the Thousand, massed together under the last bank, after taking breath and measuring with their eye the space yet to be traversed before crossing swords with the enemy, rushed on like lions, confident of victory and trusting in their sacred cause. The Bourbon force could not resist the terrible onset of men fighting for freedom; they fled, and never stopped till they reached the town of Calatafimi, several miles from the battlefield. We ceased our pursuit a short distance from the entrance to the town, which is very strongly situated. If one gives battle, one ought to be sure of victory; this axiom is very true under all circumstances, but especially at the beginning of a campaign.

The victory of Calatafimi, though of slight importance as regards acquisitions—for we took only one cannon, a few rifles, and a few prisoners—had an immeasurable moral result in encouraging the population and demoralizing the hostile army. The handful of filibusters, without gold lace or epaulettes, who were spoken of with such solemn contempt, had routed several thousand of the Bourbon's best troops, artillery and all, commanded by one of those generals who, like Lucullus, are ready to spend the revenue of a province on one night's supper. One corps of citizens—not to say filibusters—animated by love of their country, can therefore gain a victory unaided by all this needless splendor.

The first important result was the enemy's retreat from Calatafimi, which town we occupied on the following morning, May 16, 1860. The second result, and one abundantly noteworthy, was the attack made by the population of Partinicio, Borgetto, Montelepre, and other places, on the retreating army. In every place volunteer companies were formed which speedily joined us, and the enthusiasm in the surrounding villages reached its height. The disbanded troops of the enemy did not stop till they reached Palermo, where they brought terror to the Bourbon party and confidence to the patriots. Our wounded, and those of the enemy, were brought in to Vita and Calatafimi. Among ours were some men who could ill be spared.

Montanari, my comrade at Rome and in Lombardy, was dangerously wounded and died a few days after. He was one of those whom doctrinaires call demagogues, because they are impatient of servitude, love their country, and refuse to bow the knee to the caprices and vices of the great. Montanari was a Modenese. Schiaffino, a young Ligurian from Camogli, who had also served in the Cacciatori delle Alpi and in the Guides, was among the first to fall on the field, bereaving Italy of one of her bravest soldiers. He worked hard on the night of our start from Genoa, and greatly assisted Bixio in that delicate undertaking. De Amici, also of the Cacciatori and Guides, was another who fell at the beginning of the battle. Not a few of the chosen band of the Thousand fell at Calatafimi as our Roman forefathers fell—rushing on the enemy with cold steel, cut down in front without a complaint, without a cry, except that of "Viva L'Italia!" I may have seen battles more desperate and more obstinately contested, but in none have I seen finer soldiers than my citizen filibusters of Calatafimi.

The victory of Calatafimi was indisputably the decisive battle in the brilliant campaign of 1860. It was absolutely necessary to begin the expedition with some striking engagement such as this, which so demoralized the enemy that their fervent southern imaginations even exaggerated the valor of the Thousand. There were some among them who declared they had seen the bullets of their carbines rebound from the breasts of the soldiers of liberty as if from a plate of bronze. Far more men were killed and wounded at Palermo, Milazzo, and the Volturno, but still I believe Calatafimi to have been the decisive battle. After a fight like that, our men knew they were bound to win; and the gallant Sicilians, whose courage had been previously shaken by the imposing numbers and superior equipment of the Bourbon force, were encouraged. When a battle begins with such prestige, with omens drawn from such a precedent, victory is sure.

JOHN WEBB PROBYN

On June 27, 1860, about three weeks after Garibaldi had taken possession of Palermo, Francis II solemnly announced his intention to give a constitution to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, adopt the Italian flag, and ally himself with Sardinia. These promises only provoked the cry of "Too late!" They did but recall how often the Neapolitan Bourbons had promised in the hour of danger, and proved faithless to every promise when the danger was passed. Victor Emmanuel and his Government were now both unable and unwilling to agree to any such terms with a sovereign who had rejected similar offers at the beginning of his reign when such a settlement was possible. Every friend of freedom felt that the time had gone by for any common action between the houses of Savoy and Bourbon. Each had taken its own line of action, and each was now to abide by the result.

Garibaldi had overthrown the Neapolitan rule in Sicily, and raised the cry of "Italy and Victor Emmanuel!" which found a hearty response. Having been so successful he now determined, despite the warnings of friendly advisers and the hostility of enemies, to carry his forces from Sicily to the mainland, and take possession of Naples itself. He was at the head of about twenty thousand men under the command of Generals Medici, Bixio, Cosenz, and Turr. He had also the prestige of victory mingled with a kind of legendary fame which continually increased. These were formidable aids to further success, especially when brought to bear on the fervid feelings and imagination of a southern people. Francis of Naples still possessed an army of eighty thousand men, of which he despatched more than twenty thousand to arrest, if possible, the progress of his formidable opponent.

Victor Emmanuel sought to dissuade Garibaldi from an enterprise so full of danger as that of marching upon Naples against the wishes of the united cabinets of Continental Europe. The King desired that matters should proceed by negotiation, the basis of which should be that Neapolitans and Sicilians should be allowed to decide their future destinies for themselves. Garibaldi, who loved and trusted the honest King, replied that the actual state of Italy compelled him to disobey his majesty. "When," said the noble-hearted patriot, "I shall have delivered the populations from the yoke that weighs them down, I will throw my sword at your feet, and will then obey you for the rest of my life." In truth, Italians of all ranks were now so roused that neither Victor Emmanuel, Cavour, nor even Garibaldi himself could have stayed the movement.

The overpowering strength of foreign armies could alone have put it down. Circumstances, however, happily prevented so gross an abuse of mere force. For once Italians were allowed to do as they wished in their own country instead of being compelled by foreign powers to do as those powers commanded. Many things concurred to bring about this result. The French Emperor had just received Savoy and Nice; he had been spending the blood and treasure of France in giving the first blow to the old despotisms of Italy; how could he now fly in the face of his own principle of the national will in order to save the worst of those despotisms? He could not declare that Sicilians and Neapolitans should not dare have the opportunity of doing what he had at last permitted in Central Italy and profited by in Nice and Savoy. To have allowed Austria to do so would be to stultify himself in the eyes of Europe, to enrage Italians, and to lead France to ask what was the use of calling on her to make sacrifices for the overthrow of Austrian domination in the Peninsula if within a few months that domination was to be in a large measure restored.

Austria too had her own difficulties to encounter, and they were both numerous and complicated. Her military and priestly despotism had suffered defeat; her people disliked its rule and desired freer institutions; her finances were terribly disordered.

The Emperor was beginning to see the necessity of a change of system—a change by no means easy to effect—for the Hungarians were demanding the restoration of their ancient constitutional rights. Russia and Prussia contented themselves with protests which had, it may be, some diplomatic value, but were wholly without practical effect. England was favorable to the extension of Italian liberties, and France was her ally in Syria and in China. So it was that Garibaldi, having only to encounter the naval and military forces of Francis II, crossed the Straits of Messina, landed in Calabria, and marched on Reggio. On August 21st the town was occupied, and the citadel, with its commander and soldiers, capitulated. Another victory was gained on the 23d, dispersing the forces of the Neapolitan Generals Melendez and Briganti. Some of their soldiers joined Garibaldi; the rest returned to their homes and increased both his real and his legendary fame by their account of his victories. The insurrection against the Bourbon dynasty was now rapidly spreading.

At Cosenza in Calabria, and at Potenza in the Basilicata, provisional governments were proclaimed and were hailing with delight the progress of Garibaldi. The forces of Francis were disappearing from those provinces and leaving the road to Naples unprotected. The fleet was as little to be counted on as the army.

In Naples itself all was confusion and contradiction in the Government. None of its members trusted the others or believed in the duration of the Bourbon dynasty. Years of corruption, tyranny, falsehood, and cruelty had undermined the whole system, and it fell before the storm as if by magic. Francis II determined to leave his capital. When he ordered the troops which still remained faithful to him to retreat upon Capua and Gaeta, two-thirds of the staff sent in their resignation, as did many of the officers of the Neapolitan fleet. The King addressed a protest to the foreign powers in which he declared he only quitted his capital to save it from the horrors of a siege. He issued a proclamation to his people in which he expressed his wishes for their happiness, and declared that when restored to his throne it would be all the more splendid from the institutions he had now irrevocably given. On September 6, 1860, he left the capital on board a steamer accompanied by two Spanish frigates, and was taken to Gaeta. On September 7th Garibaldi entered Naples at midday in an open carriage, accompanied by some of his staff. For long hours he received a welcome such as has seldom if ever been given to any other man. Again and again he had to appear on the balcony of the Palazzo d'Angri, where he had taken up his quarters, to receive the applause of the multitude. At eight o'clock that evening it was at length announced that, worn out with fatigue and emotion, he had retired to rest. A sudden quiet fell upon the vast crowds, and repeating to one another "Our father sleeps," they dispersed to their homes, their right hands raised above their heads, with the first finger alone extended, a sign expressive of the cry reiterated again and again that day, "Italia Una!" ("One Italy").

On September 10th Garibaldi issued a proclamation to his soldiers, headed "Italy and Victor Emmanuel." In it the General called upon them to aid him in carrying to a successful termination the work so well begun. Nor did he hesitate to declare that Rome must be Italian, and the line of the Alps the frontier of Italy. He addressed another proclamation to the people in which he especially called on them to be united: "The first need of Italy is concord in order to realize the union of the great Italian family; to-day Providence has given us this concord, since all the provinces are unanimous and labor with magnanimous zeal at the national reconstruction. As to unity, Providence has further given us Victor Emmanuel—a model sovereign who will inculcate in his descendants the duties which they should fulfil for the happiness of a people who have chosen him as their chief with enthusiastic homage." The proclamation went on to speak with kindly warmth of those Italian priests who had sided with the national cause, and declared that such conduct was a sure means of gaining respect for their mission and work. Repeating again the demand for concord, the concluding words justly protested against all foreign interference: "Finally (be it known) we respect the houses of others; but we insist upon being masters in our own whether it please or displease the rulers of the earth."

Garibaldi united the Neapolitan to the Sardinian fleet, so forming an Italian naval force. He appointed a ministry comprising Liborio Romano (who had served under Francis II), Scialoia, Cosenz, and Pisanelli; he then proceeded to promulgate the Sardinian Constitution throughout the Neapolitan Provinces. But the Bourbon forces were still in possession of Capua and Gaeta. It became necessary, therefore, to undertake military operations against them.

Meanwhile the agitation in the Papal Provinces was increasing. The Pope's Government had refused to modify its policy or agree to any reduction of its territory. It accepted the protection of France in Rome and its immediate neighborhood, but declined further aid, as it was raising forces of its own under a French general, Lamoriciere. These soldiers were men of various European nationalities belonging to that Roman Catholic party which was determined to maintain intact the temporal rule of the Pope as against the wishes of the vast majority of Italians, themselves Roman Catholics, who desired to substitute for that rule the constitutional sovereignty of King Victor Emmanuel. The Italians were willing enough to remain under the spiritual headship of the Roman Pontiff, but they would not have a temporal power upheld by foreign soldiers. The moment was, like many others, a very critical one in the history of Italy. Garibaldi was victorious in Naples. The Papal forces, composed chiefly of Germans and French, under Lamoriciere, were holding the inhabitants of Umbria and the Marches who were longing to join the national movement. Indeed, some of the most influential men of those provinces, among others Marquis Filippo Gualterio of Orvieto, had already come to Turin to obtain the intervention of its Government and protection from the Papal troops, whose foreign extraction rendered them odious to the people.

On September 7th Count Delia Minerva was sent to Rome to demand, on the part of Victor Emmanuel, the disbandment of the foreign troops which the Papal Government had got together under the command of General Lamoriciere. The demand was refused. This refusal the Papal Government was quite competent to give, but whether its policy in upholding its temporal power by the aid of foreign mercenaries was wise or not was another matter. It was hardly to be expected that Italians, any more than Frenchmen, Germans, or English, would endure such a state of things if they could prevent it. The Government of Turin now ordered its troops to enter the Papal Provinces of Umbria and the Marches. On September **nth General Fanti crossed the frontier, easily took possession of Perugia with the aid of the inhabitants, and obliged Colonel Schmidt, the Papal commander, to capitulate. The General advanced with equal success against Spoleto, and in a few days was master of all the upper valley of the Tiber. At the same time General Cialdini, operating on the eastern side of the Apennines, marched rapidly to meet General Lamoriciere's forces, which he encountered and defeated completely at Castelfidardo, compelling the French General to fly to Ancona, which he entered in company with only a few horsemen who had escaped with him from the rout of the Papal army. The Italian fleet was off Ancona, before which General Cialdini's troops now appeared, thus completely preventing the escape of Lamoriciere, who was obliged to surrender. In less than three weeks the campaign was over. The Sardinian troops having thus occupied Umbria and the Marches, proceeded to cross into the Neapolitan Provinces and march upon Capua and Gaeta.

Austria, Prussia, and Russia protested against the course thus pursued by the Government of Victor Emmanuel. The Pope excommunicated all who had participated in the invasion of his territory. Francis II protested with no less earnestness. The Emperor of the French withdrew his minister from Turin and blamed the proceedings of Victor Emmanuel's Government; but in other respects Napoleon remained a passive spectator of all that occurred, and maintained the principle of non-intervention—at least as regarded Umbria and the Marches, Sicily and Naples—excepting at Gaeta, where his fleet prevented for a time any attack being made against that fortress from the sea. He also raised the number of his troops in Rome and the province in which it is situated, called the Patrimony of St. Peter, to twenty-two thousand men. This was now all the territory left to the temporal power of the Pope. Napoleon determined to preserve that much to the Roman See, defending it from the attacks of Garibaldi, and forbidding its annexation to the kingdom of Italy.

The English Government, however, decidedly vindicated the course taken under the circumstances by Victor Emmanuel and his advisers. Lord Russell, who was Secretary of Foreign Affairs under Lord Palmerston, wrote, on October 27, 1860, an admirable despatch to Sir James Hudson, the English minister at Turin, who was allowed to give a copy of it to Count Cavour. In that despatch Lord Russell gives good reasons for dissenting from the views expressed by the Governments of Austria, Prussia, Russia, and France; he justifies the action of the Government of Turin, admits that Italians themselves are the best judges of their own interests, shows how in times past they vainly attempted regularly and temperately to reform their governments, says such attempts were put down by foreign powers, and concludes by declaring that "Her Majesty's Government will turn their eyes rather to the gratifying prospect of a people building up the edifice of their liberties and consolidating the work of their independence amid the sympathies and good wishes of Europe."

It is gratifying to remember that at this very critical juncture in the cause of Italian unity and independence, the English Government gave its very cordial support to that cause, and ably defended the course pursued by King Victor Emmanuel, his ministers, and his people.

The cause of Italian unity and independence had indeed made prodigious strides, due not only to the marvellous victories of Garibaldi, which had brought him in four months from Marsala to Naples, but also to the skilful campaigns of Generals Fanti and Cialdini in Umbria and the Marches. Cavour now followed up these successes by advising a course calculated to give them consistency and endurance. He counselled the immediate assembling of Parliament, the acceptance by Victor Emmanuel of the sovereignty of the Papal, Neapolitan, and Sicilian Provinces, if such were the will of their inhabitants, and the departure of the King from Turin to take the command of his troops now advancing toward Capua. Victor Emmanuel entirely agreed with his minister's advice. On October 2, 1860, Cavour asked Parliament for full powers to annex all the new provinces of Central and Southern Italy if they desired it. He contended that the events which had taken place were due to the initiative of the people, the noble audacity of General Garibaldi, and the constitutional rule of Victor Emmanuel, united to his devotion to the cause of Italian freedom.

Even those deputies who represented the views of the extreme Left, some of whose members avowed a preference for Republicanism—in theory at any rate—supported the Government. One of them, Signor Bertani, declared he would not now raise any point of difference, and frankly acknowledged that in reality all Italians wished the same thing—"Italy one and free, under Victor Emmanuel." Cavour further satisfied the Chamber by saying that Rome and Venice must in the end be united to the mother country, though the questions involved in such union must, out of deference to Europe and France, be postponed for the present. A vote of two hundred ninety against six confirmed the policy of the Government and gave full expression to the wishes of the country.

Garibaldi had in the mean time pushed on his forces from Naples toward Capua and the line of the River Volturno. On September 19th his troops took Caiazzo, from which, however, they were dislodged on the 23d of the month. After this success Francis II determined to take the offensive and attack in force the Garibaldian lines with the object of driving them back to Naples or cutting them off from that city. This attempt was well planned and conducted on October 1, 1860. The struggle was hotly maintained on both sides throughout the day. Some companies of bersaglieri arrived from Naples and united in resisting the attacks of the Bourbon troops, who were in the end repelled and compelled to retire. But though beaten they had fought well and still held the fortresses of Gaeta and Capua, to which they had retreated. The army of Victor Emmanuel, however, led by the King in person, was now rapidly advancing, easily overcoming whatever resistance the Bourbon troops were able to offer. Francis II, unable to prevent the junction of the King's forces with those of Garibaldi, withdrew with the bulk of his soldiers to Gaeta, leaving four thousand men in Capua, who were soon obliged to capitulate.

On October 26th Victor Emmanuel and Garibaldi met near the little town of Teano. They greeted each other with great cordiality, for though Garibaldi had little faith in ministers or diplomatists, and could not forgive their cession of Nice to France, he felt the utmost confidence in the King himself. Victor Emmanuel on his part had the greatest regard for the heroic patriot who had ever been so devoted to his country's cause and whose marvellous exploits had now given freedom to Sicily and Naples. As they grasped each other's hands Garibaldi cried, "Behold the King of Italy! Long live the King!" The soldiers of both leaders shouted, "Long live Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy!"

On November 7th the King entered Naples with Garibaldi at his side. The reception was enthusiastic in the extreme; it reached its culminating point as Victor Emmanuel entered the royal palace. Long had it been the abode of those who hated and betrayed both constitutional liberty and national freedom; now it was taken possession of by one who had risked life and crown in their cause. The King issued a proclamation, in which he called to mind the increased responsibilities which fell henceforth upon himself and his people alike; nor did he fail to remind them of the necessity for union and abnegation: "All parties must bow before the majesty of Italy which God has raised up. We must establish a government which gives guarantees of liberty to the people and of severe probity to the public at large." In the succeeding days his majesty received the deputations of the newly acquired Provinces of Umbria, the Marches, Naples, and Sicily, which came to present to him officially the result of the plebiscite by which the inhabitants of those provinces declared their wish to be united to the rest of the King's dominions and so form a single Kingdom of Italy.

Many other receptions there were of societies belonging to several ranks and classes of men. Particularly impressive was the welcome given to the deputation which came from the Senate and Chamber at Turin in honor of so great an event as the union of Southern with Northern Italy under the constitutional rule of one sovereign. On December 1st Victor Emmanuel embarked for Palermo, where he was received with an enthusiasm at least as great as that which marked his arrival in Naples. In the capital of Sicily all orders of citizens pressed forward to pay him their willing homage.

These great results were not, however, achieved without difficulty, for there was considerable diversity of opinion and not a little jealousy between those that surrounded Garibaldi and those that followed the lead of Cavour in Parliament and in the country. Nor can it be denied that faults and mistakes may fairly be laid to the charge of both those parties, despite their sincere attachment to the cause of their common fatherland. A mistake was made by Garibaldi himself when he wished to postpone the immediate annexation of the Southern Provinces to the Northern Kingdom, and asked to be named Dictator of Naples for two years by Victor Emmanuel, whom he further requested to dismiss Cavour and his actual advisers.

The King rightly refused to agree to a course so subversive of all constitutional proceedings and liberties. He could not even entertain the idea of dismissing ministers at the request of any citizen, however illustrious, or however great the services he had rendered his country. It was for the national representatives alone to decide to what minister the King should give his confidence, and what course should be taken as to the annexation of Naples and Sicily. Garibaldi's good sense and honesty of purpose led him to give in to the King's judgment. Victor Emmanuel took the right view of the course to be pursued in this matter, just as he had taken the right view of the course to be pursued at the moment of the Peace of Villafranca. In the one case he showed himself wiser than Cavour, and in the other wiser than Garibaldi. The single-minded patriotism of the latter, and the statesmanship of the former, combined with the remarkably sure judgment and unfailing honesty of the King, gradually overcame all the difficulties of the situation. Victor Emmanuel ever kept aloof from political coteries, while deferring to the advice of his responsible ministers so long as they had the confidence of Parliament. He ever showed himself to be the head of the nation, not the head of a party.

His unswerving determination to be guided by the nation's will as expressed by the nation's chosen representatives, though nothing new in his career, won for him the absolute confidence of all Italians, not one of whom avowed it more frankly than Garibaldi himself. But what shall be said of the popular hero, sprung from the ranks of the people, who had given a kingdom to his sovereign? Rarely, if ever, has history recorded nobler conduct than that of the conqueror of Sicily and Naples when, having liberated those provinces, he laid down all power, refused all honors, turned away alike wealth and titles, to betake himself to his island home of Caprera, there to work with his own hands, to rejoice as he thought of how greatly he had advanced the independence of Italy, and to pray for the hour of its completion. Whatever defects may be found in the character or judgment of this heroic patriot, his name will assuredly be held in grateful remembrance wherever men are found who love freedom and rejoice as they see its blessings spread more and more among the nations of the earth. As Garibaldi retired to his quiet abode in Caprera, Victor Emmanuel returned to his duties in Turin. But neither the one nor the other forgot Rome and Venice.

The siege of Gaeta was now being carried forward with great determination. The place was defended with courage and endurance by Francis II and his Queen. For a time the French fleet prevented the Italians from attacking Gaeta by sea, but when Napoleon withdrew his ships further resistance became hopeless. On February 13, 1861, Gaeta surrendered after a defence of which those who took part in it had a right to be proud. The garrison marched out with the honors of war, the officers retained their rank. Francis and his wife embarked for Terracina, and went thence to Rome, where they were received by the Pope and lodged in the Quirinal palace. The citadels of Messina and of Civitella del Tronto surrendered soon after, and so passed away forever the rule of the Neapolitan Bourbons over the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

No less than twenty-two million of Italians were now united under the sceptre of Victor Emmanuel, who, in accordance with the advice of his Prime Minister, Count Cavour, dissolved the Parliament. The new election took place at the end of January, 1861. The constitution as established in Sardinia was put in force from Turin to Palermo. At the same time the King nominated, as suggested by his responsible advisers, sixty new Senators or Members of the Upper House. They were selected chiefly among the most prominent and influential men of the Provinces of Central and Southern Italy. The elections were everywhere favorable to the new order of things; namely, the formation of the single Kingdom of Italy under the constitutional rule of Victor Emmanuel. The majority of the new Chamber gave a hearty support to Count Cavour.

On February 18, 1861, the first Italian Parliament, representing all the Provinces of Italy—Venetia and the Roman patrimony alone excepted—assembled in the Palazzo Carignano at Turin. The title assumed by the King in concert with his ministers and Parliament was "Victor Emmanuel II, by the grace of God and the will of the nation, King of Italy." [Footnote: It was almost ten years later—when Victor Emmanuel entered Rome, September 20, 1870—that the emancipation and union of Italy were made complete.—ED.]



(1861) EMANCIPATION OF RUSSIAN SERFS, Andrew D. White and Nikolai Turgenieff

By the act that freed the serfs in Russia, Alexander II, to whom it was in great measure due, obtained a place of unusual honor among the sovereigns that have ruled his nation. It was the grand achievement of Alexander's reign, and caused him to be hailed as one of the world's liberators. The importance of this event in Russian history is not diminished by the fact that its practical benefits have not as yet been realized to the full extent anticipated. In 1888 Stepniak, the Russian author and reformer, declared that emancipation had utterly failed to realize the ardent expectations of its advocates and promoters, had failed to improve the material condition of the former serfs, who on the whole were worse off than before emancipation. The same assertion has been made with respect to the emancipation of slaves in the United States, but in neither case does the objection invalidate the historical significance of an act that formally liberated millions of human beings from hereditary and legalized bondage.

In the two views here presented, the subject of the emancipation in Russia is considered in various aspects. Andrew D. White's account, being that of an American scholar and diplomatist familiar with the history and people of Russia through his residence at St. Petersburg, is of peculiar value, embodying the most intelligent foreign judgment. White's synopsis covers the entire subject of the serf system from its beginning to its overthrow. Nikolai Turgenieff, the Russian historian, writing while the emancipation act was bearing its first fruits, describes its workings and effects as observed by one intimately connected with the serfs and the movement that resulted in their freedom.

ANDREW D. WHITE

Close upon the end of the fifteenth century the Muscovite ideas of right were subjected to the strong mind of Ivan the Great and compressed into a code. Therein were embodied the best processes known to his land and time: for discovering crime, torture and trial by battle; for punishing crime, the knout and death.

But hidden in this tough mass was one law of greater import than others. Thereby were all peasants forbidden to leave the lands they were then tilling, except during the eight days before and after St. George's Day. This provision sprang from Ivan's highest views of justice and broadest views of political economy; the nobles received it with plaudits, which have found echoes even in these days; the peasants received it with no murmurs which history has found any trouble in drowning.

Just one hundred years later upon the Muscovite throne, as nominal Czar, sat the weakling Feodor I; but behind the throne stood, as real Czar, hard, strong Boris Godunoff. Looking forward to Feodor's death, Boris made ready to mount the throne; and he saw—what all other "Mayors of the Palace" climbing into the places of faineant kings have seen—that he must link to his fortunes the fortunes of some strong body in the nation; he broke, however, from the general rule among usurpers—bribing the church—and determined to bribe the nobility.

The greatest grief of the Muscovite nobles seemed to be that the peasants could escape from their oppression by the emigration allowed on St. George's Day. Boris saw his opportunity: he cut off the privilege of St. George's Day, and the peasant was fixed to the soil forever. No Russian law ever directly enslaved the peasantry, but, through this decree of Boris, the lord who owned the soil came to own the peasants, just as he owned its immovable boulders and ledges. To this the peasants submitted; but history has not been able to drown their sighs over this wrong; their proverbs and ballads make St. George's Day representative of all ill-luck and disappointment.

A few years later Boris made another bid for oligarchic favor. He issued a rigorous fugitive-serf law, and even wrenched liberty from certain free peasants who had entered service for wages before his edicts. This completed the work, and Russia, which never had had the benefits of feudalism, had now fastened upon her feudalism's worst curse, a serf caste, bound to the glebe.

The great good things done by Peter the world knows by heart. The world knows well how he tore his way out of the fetichism of his time; how, despite ignorance and unreason, he dragged his nation after him; how he dowered the nation with things and thoughts that transformed it from a petty Asiatic horde to a great European Power.

We were present a few years since when one of those lesser triumphs of his genius was first unfolded. It was in that room at the Hermitage—adjoining the Winter Palace—set apart for the relics of Peter. Our companions were two men noted as leaders in American industry—one famed as an inventor, the other famed as a champion of inventors' rights.

Suddenly from the inventor, pulling over some old dust-covered machines in a corner, came loud cries of surprise. The cries were natural indeed. In that heap of rubbish he had found a lathe for turning irregular forms, and a screw-cutting engine once used by Peter himself: specimens of his unfinished work were still in them. They had lain there unheeded a hundred fifty years; their principle had died with Peter and his workmen; and not many years since, they were reinvented in America, and gave their inventors fame and fortune. At the late Paris Universal Exposition crowds flocked about an American lathe for copying statuary; and that lathe was, in principle, identical with this old, forgotten machine of Peter's.

Yet, though Peter fought so well and thought so well, he made some mistakes which hang to this day over his country as bitter curses. For in all his plan and work to advance the mass of men was one supreme lack—lack of any account of the worth and right of the individual man. Lesser examples of this are seen in his grim jest at Westminster Hall—"What use of so many lawyers? I have but two lawyers in Russia, and one of those I mean to hang as soon as I return;" or when at Berlin, having been shown a new gibbet, he ordered one of his servants to be hanged in order to test it; or in his review of parade fights, when he ordered his men to use ball, and to take the buttons off their bayonets.

Greater examples are seen in his Battle of Narva, when he threw away an army to learn his opponent's game; in his building of St. Petersburg, where, in draining marshes, he sacrificed a hundred thousand men the first year. But the greatest proof of this great lack was shown in his dealings with the serf system. Serfage was already recognized in Peter's time as an evil. Peter himself once stormed forth in protestations and invectives against what he stigmatized as "selling men like beasts; separating parents from children, husbands from wives; which takes place nowhere else in the world, and which causes many tears to flow." He declared that a law should be made against it. Yet it was by his misguided hand that serfage was compacted into its final black mass of foulness.

For Peter saw other nations spinning and weaving, and he determined that Russia should at once spin and weave; he saw other nations forging iron, and he determined that Russia should at once forge iron. He never stopped to consider that what might cost little in other lands as a natural growth, might cost far too much in Russia as a forced growth. In lack, then, of quick brain and sturdy spine and strong arm of paid workmen, he forced into his manufactories the flaccid muscle of serfs. These, thus lifted from the earth, lost even the little force in the State they had before; great bodies of serfs thus became slaves; worse than that, the idea of a serf developed toward the idea of a slave.

And Peter, misguided, dealt one blow more. Cold-blooded officials were set at taking the census. These adopted easy classifications; free peasants, serfs, and slaves were often huddled into the lists under a single denomination. So serfage became still more difficult to be distinguished from slavery. As this base of hideous wrong was thus widened and deepened the nobles built higher and stronger their superstructure of arrogance and pretension. Not many years after Peter's death, they so overawed the Empress Anne that she thrust into the codes of the empire statutes which allowed the nobles to sell serfs apart from the soil. So did serfage bloom fully into slavery.

But in the latter half of the eighteenth century Russia gained a ruler from whom the world came to expect much. To mount the throne, Catharine II had murdered her husband; to keep the throne she had murdered two claimants whose title was better than her own. She then became, with her agents in these horrors, a second Messalina. To set herself right in the eyes of Europe, she paid eager court to that hierarchy of scepticism which in that age made or marred European reputations. She flattered the fierce deists by owning fealty to "Le Roi" Voltaire; she flattered the mild deists by calling in La Harpe as the tutor of her grandson; she flattered the atheists by calling in Diderot as a tutor for herself.

Her murders and orgies were soon forgotten in the new hopes for Russian regeneration. Her dealings with Russia strengthened these hopes. The official style required that all persons presenting petitions should subscribe themselves "Your Majesty's humble serf." This formula she abolished, and boasted that she had cast out the word serf from the Russian language. Poets and philosophers echoed this boast over Europe—and the serfs waited.

The great Empress spurred hope by another movement. She proposed to an academy the question of serf emancipation as a subject for their prize essay. The essay was written and crowned. It was filled with beautiful things about liberty, practical things about moderation, flattering things about the "Great Catharine"—and the serfs waited.

Again she aroused hope. It was given out that her most intense delight came from the sight of happy serfs and prosperous villages. Accordingly, in her journey to the Crimea, Potemkin squandered millions on millions in rearing pasteboard villages, in dragging forth thousands of wretched peasants to fill them, in costuming them to look thrifty, in training them to look happy. Catharine was rejoiced, Europe sang paeans—the serfs waited.