Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-07-20 00:00:00

ITALY.

TURIN, JULY 13.7
gine Senate proceeded to-day to the consideration of
the bill for a new convention between the Government and
the Savoy Railway Company, including the project for
tunnelling the Mont Cenis. Oa the discussion being de.
Glared opened,
Senator Selopis said, that although opposed in principle
to extraordinary expenditure undertaken for future years,
he would vote in favour of the present project, because it
regarded the completion of the national railways and the
closer union of Piedmont and Savoy, which always shared
each other's dangers, and whose sons fought side by side
on the fields of Lombardy. He thought it wise, then, of
-Government to undertake what could not be attempted
by private enterprise.

Senator Mosca, after acknowledging the political and
commercial utility of the railway, said that no other
system for passing the Alps could bear comparison
.with
that of tunnelling, and that he had confidence in the
engineers who proposed the new discovery to be applied
for this purpose, and in the commission that had examined
it. He should like, however, that experiments on a large
scale should be made at Genoa, so as to ascertain more
precisely the time and expense that might be probably
calculated on.

Senator Giulio said hat the Examining Commission had
not expressed any opinion on the length of time or the
expense requisite, not only on account of the novelty of
the mpnea to ha emnloved. but also because of the nature
of the ground and the length of the tunnel. This was not
a case to be solved by the rule of three. He hoped, he
said, because he believed—and perhaps he believed because
he hoped—that they would encounter nothing but prac-
ticable rock. Whether there might be resistance or not, an
experiment at Genoa would only serve to show the celerity
of the machine, and the front it would offer in battle, but it
could give no idea of the strength of the enemy. An
experiment at Bardonneche would be infinitely better
The difficulties increased the further the boring went. It
would be absolutely necessary to commence with ordinary
means. It would require time for making aquaducts and
buildings, and erecting machinery ; and, as a great num—
ber of workmen must be employed at both ends, it would
sot be possible to apply the new means in the first
instance. Afterwards the grand experiment would be
seen, and it would last, perhaps, for years, until one of
those terrible diffiulties was encountered which would
cause a stop, but which will ultimately be conquered by
modern art. No case has yet occurred where the energy
Of art and the power of genius have been obliged to beat
a retreat in face of the resistence of nature, and he
thought that the pertinacious Piedmontese would not be
Stopped by difficulties in this case.
The Minister of Finance having replied briefly to some
economical objections raised by the Senator Cotta, the
'question was put to the vote by ballot, when there ap.
peered 51 votes in favour, and only 5 against the bill.

Lord Lyons left Turin this morning to rejoin his squad-
ron at Genoa and Spezzia. His lordship had arrived here
the day before yesterday, and King Victor Emanuel came
from the country yesterday morning expressly to receive
him. Yesterday afternoon, accordingly, Lord Lyons an d
several officers of his squadron were presented to his
Majesty by Sir James Hudson, and in the evening they
had the honour of dining at Court, where they met the
Ministers of the King of Sardinia, the great officers of
State, and several superior officers, military and naval.
The squadron sails on Wednesday for Toulon and the
coast of Spain. The Brunswick having sailed for the
West Indies, and the Curacoa having been despatched to
Tunis, the squadron, after the arrival of the Princess
Royal, which is daily expected from the Tagus, will con-
sist of the Royal Albert, Princess Royal, Conqueror, and
Centurion screw ships of the line, Ariel steam corvette,
and Osprey and Wanderer steam gunboats.
The Giornale di Roma announces that Commendatore
Filippo Farina, Minister of War to the Pope, expired on
the 9th inst.

The late Mdzzinlan attempts naturally form the staple
of all discussions on Italian politics at present ; and it is
really curious and amusing to see the efforts of certain

Absolutist journals—German, Russian, French, and
Italian—to cast the onus on the Sardinian Government,
whereby they generally succeed in proving so much that
they ;end by making themselves supremely ridiculous.
According to these critics, the Sardinian Government is
ill-informed by its secret agents, badly served by its police,
and is itself wanting in the essential qualities of caution
and prudence• If it had not been for the warning of the
French police the train of the plot would never have been
discovered, and, even as it was, the town of Genoa was

°4l3r saved from destruction by accident, and not in any
legree owing to the vigilance of the authorities, who were
lost in a dream of fancied security. All this. they say, is
the consequence of constitutional government, and there-
fore, of course, they infer that constitutionalism is a per-
petual source of disquietude to the neighbouring
Governments, and ought forthwith to be rooted out.
Admitting these assertions, then, for the sake of argu-
.ment, let us compare the conduct of the Sirdinian Govern -
ment with that of a genuine paternal and absolute Govern-

ment•under somewhat similar circumstances. Let us look
at Tuscany, where the Government received the same
indefinite warnings from Paris two months ago as were
.received here, and compare the precautionary measures
taken in both cases, and the results at Leghorn and Genoa.
In Tuscany we have constantly heard of the irritating
interference of the police at public festivals any time the
last two months, and yet when the outbreak really came
the Goverment was taken by surprise, and some score of
people or more lost their lives in consequence. At Genoa,
on the other hand, neither public amasement nor personal
liberty was in any way meddled with by the police—in
fact there was far too much laiss3r faire, say the advocates
of despotism—yet on the night appointed for insurrec •
tion both the civil and military powers were fully pre-
pared, and only one life was lost, and that was the cease.
quence of neglect of instructions given for the occasion.
It will strike impartial people as something excessively
strange that a Government so perfectly impotent for good,
as the Sardinian Government is represented to be by its
enemies, should have so well succeeded in crushing an
insurrectionary conspiracy in a city which was known to
be in a state of much discontent at some recent acts of
internal legislation. Supposing the Sardinian Govern-
ment to have been careless and ignorant as it is accused
of, being, it will naturally occur to most people to ask,
what Government could have done better ? Would any
•°other form of government have insured greater security
and comfort to its own subjects and its own neighbours ?
And I believe the prosecution now in progress at Genoa
will satisfactorily show that the greater part of those
:persons who sought to create a disturbanoo at Genoa
'entered the Sardinian States, with pasallorts perfectly en
''egle, from one or other of the noi•ghbouring countries
enjoying the advantages of 13,_spotie government and a
political police,