The Sun.
London, England, 1862-10-18 00:00:00

711 E KINGDOM Or 17ALY.

♦
(From the Times' Correspondent.)
TURIN, OCT. 15.
" M. Benedetti," we are gravely informed by the
semi-official press, "came on MOnday from the place
where he is now enjoying this bright country sea-
son and trail a very long interview with the 131-esi-

dent of the Council. -The note of the Foreign

Minister, Durando, was the subject of conversation

of these two influential personages, and it is also
natural to suppose that the main object of the con-
ference was the expediency and opportunity of a

journey of M. Rattazzi to Paris, which ought to

take place within a few days." There are many of
the Italian public men whom I have occasion to

see, whom communications in this style fill with
indignation and disgust. The solution of the

Roman question is matter of vital interest and im-
portance for this country they think, but there is

something about which the Italians ought to be

anxious even more than about their national capital,
and that is their national honour and dignity. It

is unworthy of a people of 22,000,000 souls, they
urge, to be watching the sunshine or shade on the

countenance of a foreign Sovereign, as if they were

dependent on him for the very breath of their
nostrils. The Emperor Napoleon may have done

good or evil to Italy ; it may be in his power to do
more ; the Roman question may rest on him alone
for a favourable solution, but there is no reason
why the Italians should be helpless and inactive;
why all their efforts should be limited to a painful,
ignoble speculation on any whim that may happen
to pass through an uncertain and tenebrous mind ;
al) their business an unceasing survey of the vaga-
ries of a capricious weathercock. It was one of the
old tricks of Count Cavour to divert public attention
from domestic disorders by pointing at great foreign
contingencies. But Cavour was a man of vast genius
and unmatched good fortune. The schemes of his po-
licy were fraught with great consequences, an dit was
really worth his while, in his time, to drop the
small bone of a State of Piedmont for its great
shadow of an Italian Kingdom. There was then
little to lose and everything to gain, and the Sar-
dinian finances might well be allowed to go to rack
and ruin ; all was staked on a card that was very
nearly sure to turn up a trump as it did. But now
the great game has been played out and won ; the
country, or, at least the nation, has been made ; the
great edifice stands up quite—not nearly—com-
plete. Surely Italy is to be sought in the Italians,
not in the ruins of Rome, or even the stones of
Venice. If this country is to take its proper place
among the members of the European community;
if it is to show itself worthy of the sympathies its
cause has elicited ; even if it is to make good its
rights over Rome and Venice, andntretch its boun-
daries to the Julian Alps and the Adriatic, it is
necessary that it should live a life of its own, that
it should stand on its own ground,—assert iiself.
What can be imagined more mean, more undignified
more ungenerous than all this shilly-shallying about
M. Ratazzi's journey to Paris ? It was already
sufficiently wounding to our national pride to know
that this statesman, when he compassed the down-
fall of the Ricasoli Cabinet, durst not take the
management of the Italian Government without a
previous understanding with the French Emperor.
Ever since that ill-advised Paris journey of Feb-
ruary last, the complaint has been that a French
Minister has been presiding over the affairs of Italy ;
and now, because that same Minister conceives that
government has become impossible in Italy without
Rome for a capital, we have a month's talk about a
new Paris journey in October, and, what is more,
a very long interview between the Minister and the
Ambassador to ascertain what chances there are of
such a journey proving acceptable and profitable.
When M. Ratazzi gave up the portfolio of Foreign
Affairs to General I)uraudo, yielding to the pres-
sure of Parliament it was well felt and asserted
that for the Emperor of the French there would
be no other Foreign Minister in Italy than the man
of his choice, Rattazzi. We see, in fact, that M.
Benedetti not only transacts business with the
Homy Minister when the Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs is all the while in town, at his
office, ready at hand, two or three rooms off—the
said Secretary of State counting as the merest cipher
—but the chief theme of the two great negotiators'
conversation is precisely that Durando note About
which, apparently, Durando himself is not entitled
to be heard.
Surely, this is a strange proceeding—sharp law-
yers' practice, as one might feel tempted to say; and
all the while, as if Italy had absolutely no other task
whatever except finding her way to Rome—or the
way to Rome could not be thrown open by any other
means than the goodwill and pleasure of the French
Emperor—the whole of the semi-official Italian
press seems to have no other task but the very con-
temptible one of raking up all vague, insane, or
even positively false rumours, pretending to guess
and reveal the Emperor's real mind as to the solu-
tion of that "horrid bore" which is called the Ro-
man question ! I shall not transcribe for your edifi-
cation the offensive scraps of news by which the
Discussione, the Italie, and the Monarchia Nazion-
ale regularly and systematically impose upon a gul-
lible public. Mere eagerness for the sale of some
hundred additional copies may be for the editor of
an unprincipled paper an irresistible temptation to
lie ; but I can assure you, men of the highest stand-
ing in the Government, and even members of the
Cabinet here, do not disdain to sanction and even
to start the idlest reports on their own responsibility,
and think they have sufficiently acquitted them-
selves of their duty as rulers of the country if they
can quiet the curious idlers by supplying even the
east wholesome garbage to the general appetite for

news.

There are many men of honour and principle in
Italy, as I said, who are heartily sick of this un-
worthy truckling to the morbid tendencies of the
people. There are men who think that the evil
should be looked boldly in the face, and who
feel sure all the Emperor's devices will come to
nought the moment the Italians cease to look up
to him as to their special providence. The Em-
peror of the French is at Rome, and shows no pre-
sent intention to quit it. The Italian nation have
declared that Rome is their own ground, their
natural, eternal capital. There let the question
rest, and let not another word be wasted on the
subject. France is unwilling to give up to Italy her
capital, Italy is prevented by gratitude, or by weak-
ness, from attempting to oust France from Rome by
might of arms, Be it so. Each party has given
out its ultimatum ; French obstinacy is not to be
deprecated, nor Italian dignity to be compromised.
Let there be no entreaty, no reproach or recrimina-
tion. Jacob had worked seven years for Rachel ; he
had to put up with Leah ; he went to work for
seven years more ; at the end of this second period
it was out of Laban's power again to outwit hiro•
Italy cannot have her capital; she must shotw.
etghe
in
world that she can live without it. She m
housekeeping with Leah ; settle at Turin Flor-
ence—anywhere,or
so as to make it clear that her
stren ‘th lies in her people, in her living, thriving,
aspiring s fogs of the
noisomethe Palatine.
Tiber or the plague-stricken to the task of
Italy must show that she
.ostt r
enk
etnh the
uiun a
is equal
parliamentary in-
establishing real freedom that;to
set roots and ripen
that her
to maintain order and
in-
stitutions may be madteher
rulers have power to
among her people;
wise civil administration, to
build up an army an
build up their Church
security, to organise
on a rational basis
and decentralising is not above their
the
power ; that
tasu
of
uniting
gfreedorn bears its wonted fruits on
Italian foil; that, together with liberty, trade and