The Express.
London, England, 1861-11-02 00:00:00

FROM PARIS.

(riot 01:1 OWN

PARIS, FRIDAY EVENING.

This being All Saints•day—one of the strictest
holidays in the year—is nearly a dies non, politi-
cally speaking, and the Bourse and public oboes
are clowl.

The Temps, the only evening journal which ap-
pears, has the following paragraph at the head of
its leading column

M. RicasOli baring, as we learn from our Turin corres-
pondence, last all hope in the direction of Rome, and not
by any means abounding in the ideas of those who would
concentrate the immediate efforts of Italian patriotism
upon Venice, is said to be about to devote his attention ex-
clusively to the organisation of the kingdom of Italy with
ita present boundaries. In other words, be adopts the new
programme of the Patric. IS this programme practicable!
We doubt it much. True, it is hazardous to think of
Venice. True, it is impossible to go to Rome without the
permission of the French government. But it appears to
ns still more impossible that any Italian ministry can live
without advancioj—aan organise and administer Italian
unity before that unity is made.

The court-martial on the Versailles carabineers
has naturally excited extraordinary interest in
military circles. It will be remembered that the
Moniker made very light of the affair for which
they were tried, and complained of the exaggeration
of foreign journals on the subject. It now comes
out, however, that a large body of the carabineers
were guilty of a military riot of a highly repre-
hensible character, and one showing that very
lax notions of discipline must prevail in that
favoured corps. As many as sixty men drew their
swords and attacked a guard post, and false patrols
paraded the streets of Versailles, pretending to be
on duty, in order to support their riotous comrades
and strike terror into the artillery, of whom they
were jealous. It is true that the affair began in a
drunken row as some soldiers were coming from a
ball, but it was in evidence that a bad feeling
existed between the carabineers and the artillery,
on account of the superior attainments of the latter,
and the fact that the carabineers were a picked
corps, which had never seen any actual service. The
artillery were in the habit of calling the carabineers
gendarmes," "useless," and,worst term of oppro-
brium of all, "English !" It is a curious, fact show-
ing the necessity for indulgence under circumstances
of military crimes, that out of so many delinqueuta the
authorities could only collect prinal facie evidence
against six individuals, and that the captain
reporter (judge advocate) was of opinion that there
was no C. 140 against them. The Minister-at-War,
however, insisted on the trial going on ; but the
court-martial acquitted every one of them, and
the men left the court in triumph, throwing them-
I selves into the arms of their friends, and adjourn-
ing fora jollification.

The Temps warmly applauds the French govern-
ment for accepting the proposal :of the Swiss
Federal Council to refer the affair of Ville-la-
Grand to a mired cootumisan. I hear and
believe that the Emperor, being convinced that K
Thouvenel hadgoue too Estrin peremptorily exacting
an indemnity, personally interfered and insisted
upon the present solution. The commissioners on
both sides are to be persons not iu any way con-
nected with the locality in which the affray oc-
curred. If the evidence shall bear out the very
clear statement of the Swiss government, it will be
quite plain that France is not the aggrieved party.
Louis Ballet, a redacteur of the Patrie, has
just received the Crow of the Order of the Saviour
from the King of Greece.

ITALY.

FLORENCE, Ocr. 23.

The Roman question is now the great pre-occu-
patiou of the Italians. Everything relatmg to it
excites to the utmost the public interest. Till the
present moment it was merely a political question ;
it was considered as a business to be left only in
the hands of the minister of foreign affairs, and to
be concluded with diplomatical notes and de-
spatches. But the signs of the times are changing,
and if I am not mistaken a new religious interest
is growing very fast in Italy. People now begin
to talk about religious affairs as matters which
positively are relative to their own conscience, and
which must be settled by themselves.
The pamphlets of the famous ex-Jesuit Padre
Passaglia, printed in Florence by the publisher Le
Meunier have had au enormous success. They
have been sold by thousands, they are everywhere
read and commented on. The first book which
produced a similar impression on the public mind
was that of Monsignor Liverani, on the Popedom.
But of it it was said, the book is written by a
man who had been always near Pio IX., who is
merely a narrator of clerical scandals and anecdotes
relative to the court of Rome ; all its success must
therefore be attributed to the name and the position
of the author.

The same cannot be said of the simple ex-Jesuit,
a mere professor in the university of Rome. His
pamphlets enter more decidedly into the heart of
the (pestles. They talk of the right of the Italian
nation to possess Rome ; they treat of the tem-
poral power and the authority of the Pope, and so
on. It is the same starting point whence Luther
cummenceiL How far the Padre Paaaaglia is going,
and where he will stop, we do not yet know. Bat
what we know certainly is this—that Padre Pas-
Begin' was considered the first theologian of the
court of Rome. He was charged with the delicate
and difficult miasiou of writing some of the most
important bulls which Pio IX. has ever
_published.
The last (which ho was nut able to finish) was
destined to ge a confutation of all modern heresies.
This is the man to whom Pio IX. had confided sae
dentate a charge ; it is the same whose first
pamphlet has been condemned by the Commimione
dell' Indies. Perhaps all the last pamphlets
which he has published, and is going to pub-
lish, will be condemned in odium °uteri: ;
and in this coati Pio IX. will be obliged
to condemn several of his own bulls, and amongst
them that of the "lunnacolata coucezione,"
written by the same author.
When it became known to Padre Passaglia that
the anonymous pamphlet, "Pro Causes Italien,"
was condemned, he wrote to the Pope to
inform him who was its author. After that he
went to Rome, to present himself to the Sacra
Congregazione dell' Indic*. He asked only that,
according to the toolesdastal laws, he should be
allowed to defend all he had written, declaring
himself ready to accept the judgment and penalties
that might be inflicted according to the laws of the
Curia Romana and of the Santo Ufficio. The
answer to such a declaration was an order given by
Pio IX. to put Padre Passaglia into the prisons of
the Santo 11fficio. The house of Mrs. Foljambe
itn Englishwoman converted to catholicism by
assaglia), where ho then concealed himself, was
immediately surrounded. The Pope's sbirri came
in, took all the papers of Pasigiglia, who in the
meantime was able to go into the next apartment,
belonging to Count Spode, where nobody had any
idea of going to search for him. The Pope's sbirri,
after the perquirizione, went out, but some of them
remained near the house on the look out for what
might happen.
Several large and gala carriages of the Roman
aristocracy came that way to ask about Padre
Passaglia, when Mrs. Foljambe went out in
her carriage, and at her side there was seated a tall
man, resembling Padre Passaglia, and dressed in his
clothes, and the sbirri followed the carriage u best
they could. By this time the Padre Passaglia,
who had left his ecclesiastical garments and taken
those of a friend, went out in one of the gala car-
riages. At five o'clock next morning he left his
friend's house, and found awaiting him one of the
Roman barrocci and three men, apparently pea-

same, with long beards and large mantles, who
were to be his companions on the road. They
offered him a large mantle like their own, and
away they went out by Porta Portese at full
speed. When they were at some ten miles' distant*
from Rome they took off their beards, and
Padre Passaglia found himself with three of his
dearest Mends. They went on for some ten nuke
more, and then found awaiting them at a certain
place three horses and two men, armed from head to
foot. To these the Padre•Passaglia was confided,
whom he was to follow on horseback. All at once
they leaped over the gioncate (a kind of Roman
hedge), and Padre Passaglia, not familiar with that
sort of operation, asked the unknown men how he
ought to manage with his own horse. But they
answered, " Don't care about it ; let the beast take
care of itself and of you." And on they went jump-
Mg and plunging about, and Padre Passaglia trying
to imitate the not very comfortable operation. Per-
haps he thought it was not so easy a matter after all
to fly from the hands of the venerable Santo Ufficio.
But suddenly they halted, and the men informed
the Padre Passaglia, " Now we are on Italian
ground." He fell on his knees, returning thanks
to God for his deliverance, then to the two men
who bad been his companions. and who now re-
turned to that which is not yet Italian ground.
Padre Passaglia is now at Florence, on his way
to Turin. Here several of his friends came to wel-
come him, and the question whether it would not
be well to establish a religious 'review was mooted,
and to begin a religions agitation in Italy. The
idea has struck several people at the same time,
and some of the ablest clergymen of Italy are going
to take an active part in it.