The Express.
London, England, 1851-04-12 00:00:00

EFFECT OF TIIE TEENER ILEvoirrzoN..

The February revolution of Paris removed from the
Italians all controul over their own actions; it did away i
with all the spontaneousness and unanimity of their move-1
meat. Not, indeed, that they could, or ever did, actually
build any hope on the sympathy of the French republicans, '
or on the magniloquent proclamations of Lamartine ; for
Italy had been able to set a right value on French promises
and declarations in 1831. Indeed, the promulgation of a
republic was by no means in the programme of the patriots
of the Gioberti and D'Azeglio school, now at the head of
public opinion, who had hitherto,—many of them in good I
faith, most of them from a sense of expediency,—acted
under the auspices of popes and princes, who proceeded
hand in hand with their nobility and clergy, who had just
framed their own statutes on the model of that now down-
trodden French charter of 1830, and whom the vague ter-
rors of ancient Jacubinism and recent communism were not
likely to remove front their already firmly adopted system.
Mad the French revolution been without results in any
other part of Europe, had Austria otherwise been able to
keep her seat, there is reason to believe that the Lombards
would have continued in the inaction to which they seemed
to have resigned themselves from February 22 to March 18,
hanging back in suspense, ready even, perhaps, for the pre-
sent, to listen to suggestionsof reconciliation or compromise,
ready to submit to Austria, if unbroken and invincible, if
inclined to the measures that the terrible juncture seemed
inexorably to die,ate.
It was not the promulgation of martial law that spread
the "order of the grave through the streets of Milan, as
many might be willing to suppose ; for the Milanese were
long since under the rule of tile sabre, and a mere imperial
decree could add nothiug to their terror. That decrm,
however, shook:meow it was withlthe tidings of the Pari-
sian riots, gave evidence of the perseverance of the Vienna
cabinet in its relentless course. Anon, and that cabinet
itself had ceased to be. All Europe was on fire. Prussia—
all Germany—convulsed throulhout. Vienna without go-
vernment. the great bond of Austrian unity di.aolved.
Why should Lombardy be behindliand with her nektli-
hours ? What prudent considerations could prevail on the
trampled, goaded Milanese to endure any longer
The revolution of i'eclin:is was sudden, violent, irresist-
ible.

They rose—they bled. On the 17th of March the news
of tumults at Vienna, and of the " proclamation of a republic
there," reached Milan and Venice. That was the signal
fur attack. Within five days a host of seventy thousand
combatants was routed and scattered, with a panic and con-
fusion such us the world never witnessed since the days
when angels smote the host of the Assyrian.
God Li great. But it was fated that the Italians should
forgetthat that astounding del'eat was God's work, not their
own.

It was—and we shall have occasion to see flagrant proofs
of tic melancholy fact—it was hy tho very promptitude and
facility- of that fled success that ltaly was undone. Only on
the 16th of March Austria appeared invincible; on the .2ud
it was thought she had ceased to exist.

M. Mariotti details, with great minuteness, the
mrnner of Itadctsky's retreat from Milan, and satis-
factorily disposes of the gross mis.statemcnts of the
qtartrrly lterittc. The revolt of the Venetians, the
capitulation of Ziehy, and the advent of Daniel
Mania—the Kossuth of the Venetians—is well told.
The cause of Italy, he remarks, was to be partly won
by the small regular armies, but tar more by the
volunteers. Of the latter, M. Mariotti writes: