The Sun.
London, England, 1856-05-12 00:00:00

SPAIN.

Our accounts from Madrid are of the 7th inst.
General Zabala was shortly expected from Va-
lencia, where order was completely restored. The
Government had invited General Villalonga to
await further orders at Valencia, and it was gene-
rally believed that he would be reinstated in the
government of the province.
The Duke and Duchess of Alba had returned
from Paris.

The drawing of the conscription took place at
Saragossa without the least opposition. The Duke
of Victory was expected in that city on the Bth
inst.

The last accounts from Barcelona state that some
agitation prevails] among the labouring classes.
Several persons convicted of having published a
Socialist pamphlet, which was distributed in pro-
fusion throughout Catalonia, had been banished
from Barcelona.

SARDINIA.

The following is the "Note," or " Protest,"
presented by MM. Cavour and Villamarina to the
Governments of France and England, dated April
the 16th, 1856, and read by Count Cavour in the
Chamber :
"The undersigned, Plenipotentiaries of his Majesty
the King of Sardinia, full of confidence in the senti-
ments of the justice of the Governments of France and,
England, and in the friendship which they profess for
Piedmont, have never ceased since the opening of the
Conferences, to hope that the Congress of Paris would
not separate without taking into serious consideration
the state of Italy, and deliberating on the means to be
adopted for the re-establishment of its political equili-
brium, disturbed now by the occupation of a great riart
of the provinces of the Peninsula by foreign troops. Cer-
tain of the concurrence of their allies, they could not
think that any other Power, after having testified so
lively and so generous an interest in the fate of Eastern
Christians of the Slave and Greek races, would refuse to
interest themselves in the people of the Latin race, who
are still more unhappy on account of the advanced degree
of civilisation which 'they have attained making them
feel more acutely the effects of bad government.
"This hope has been disappointed.
"Notwithstanding the goodwill of France and Eng
land—notwithstanding their well intentioned eff Irts, the
persistence of Austria obliged the discussions of the Con-
gress to be strictly bounded within the sphere of the
questions marked out before its meeting, and is the
cause of this assemily, on which the eyes of Europe are
fixed, being about to dissolve, not only without having
effected the least amelioration for the ills of Italy, but
without giving a ray of hope for the future to the other
side of the Alps calculated to calm the minds and make
them bear the present with resignation.
"The peculiar position occupied by Austria in the
Congress perhaps rendered this deplorable result inevit-
able. The undersigned are forced to acknowledge this.
Also, without addressing the least reproach to their allies,
they believe it their duty to call their serious attention
to the sad consequences that this may have for Europe,
for Italy, and especially for Sardinia.
"It would be superfluous to trace here an exact pic-
ture of Italy. What has taken place in those countries
is too notorious. The system of repression and violent
reaction commenced in 1843 and 1849—justified in its
origin, perhaps, by the revolutionary disturbances which
had just been suppressed, continues without the smallest
relaxation. It may even be said that, with few excep-
tions, it is exercised with redoubled vigour. Never were
theprisons and dungeons more full of persons condemned
for political causes ; never has the number of exiles been
greater ; never has the police been more vexatious, nor
martial law more severely applied. What is taking, place
at Parma only proves this too clearly.
" Such means of government must necessarily keep
the populations in a constant state of irritation and re-
volutionary ferment.
"Such has been the state of Italy for seven years.
Nevertheless the popular agitation appeared recently to
be calmed. Italians, seeing one of their national princes
coalesced with the Great Western Powers for the sup-
port of the principles of right and justice, and for the
amelioration of the fate of their co-religionists in the
East, conceived a hope that peace would not be made
without some relief for their misfortunes. This hope
kept them calm and resigned ; but when they know the
negative results of the Congress of Paris, when they
learn that Austria, notwithstanding the good offices and
benevolent intervention of France and England, refused
all discussion—that she would not even enter into an
examination of the means proper for remedying such a
sad state of things—there can be no doubt that the dor-
mant irritation will be awakened among them more vio-
lently than ever. Convinced that they have nothirg to
expect from diplomacy and the efforts of the Powers
which take an interest in their fate, they will throw
themselves with southern ardour into the ranks of the
revolutionary and subversive party, and Italy will again
become a hotbed of conspiracies and tumults, which may
perhaps be repressed with redoubled vigour, but which
the least European commotion make burst forth in the
most violent manner. So sad a state of things, if it
merits the attention of the Governments of France and
England, equally interested in the maintenance of order
and the regular development of civilisation, must natu-
rally preoccupy the Government of the King of Sardinia
in the highest degree. The awakening of revolutionary
passions in all the countries surrounding Piedmont, by
the effect of causes of a nature to excite the most lively
popular sympathies, exposes it to daegers of ex, e sive
gravity, which may compromise that firm and moderate
policy which has bad such happy results for the in erior,
and gained it the sympathy and esteem of enlightened
Europe.
"But this not the only danger threatening Sardinia.
A still greater is the consequence of the means employed
by Austria to repress the revolutionary fermentation in
Italy. Called by the Sovereigns of the small States of
Italy who are powerless to repress the discontent of
their subjects, this power occupies militarily the greater
part of the valley of the Po and of Central Italy, and
makes its influence felt in an irresistible manner even in
the countries where she has no soldiers. Resting on one
side on Ferrara and Bologna, her troops extend them-
selves to Ancona, the length of the Adriatic, which has
become in a manner an Austrian lake ; on the other, the
mistress of Piacenza, which, contrary to the spirit, if not
to the letter, of the treaties of Vienna, she labours to
t ransforin into a first-class fortress, she has a garrison at
p. srma, and makes dispositions to deploy her braes along
the Sardinian frontier, from the Po to the summit of the
Ape "nines.
'oese permanent occupations by Austria of territo-
res w, Vol). do not belong to her render her absolute
mistress k if nearly all Italy, destroy the equilibrium esta-
blished
, the treaty of Vienna, and are a continual
menace for _Piedmont.

—..,—......,, ..... . _.
" Surrountx'ed in some degree on all sides by the Aus-
trians, seeing sd,wireloped on her eastern frontier, com-
pletely open, the .
forces of a Power which she knows not
to be animated b) ' friendly feelings towards her, th,B
country is held in, a state of constant apprehension,
which obliges her tv _remain armed and to take defensive
measure
alreadyswhich
taars:
-ed by the events of 1848 and 1849,
excessively burdensome for her
finances,
and by the waein whi,lh she has just participated.
"The facts that the ui
,dersigned have exposed suffice
to make appreciated the a.
angers of the position in which
the Government of the IC ug of Sardinia finds itself
placed. Disturbed within by t..he action of revolutionary
passions, excited all round by .:,:, system of violent re-
pression and by the foreif;n occilpation, threatened by
the extension of Austrian power, it,' may at any moment
be forced by an inevitai- ,le, necessity to adopt extreme
measures of which it is it apossible to calculate the con- 1
sequences. I

!‘ The undersigned do not doubt but that such a state

of tliinqs will excite. the solicittOe of the Government•
of France and Eirl,land, not only on nec writ of the
sinct,:re friendship and real sympathy that these powers
profess for the Sovereign who al, ne, among all at the
moment when their t-uccoss was rentst uncertain, dee'ared
himself openly in their favour, hut, above all, beeau,e
it constitutes a real danger for Europe.
"Sardinia is the only State ii Italy that, has been ab!e
to raise an impassable barrier t tle revolutionary spirt,
and at the same time remain imispenthtnt of Austria.
It is the counterpoise to her invading influence.
"If Sardinia succumbed, exhausted of power, aban•
doned by her allies—if she also was obliged to submit
to Austrian domination, then the conquest of Italy by
this power would be achieved ; and Austria, after hav-
ing obtained without its costing her the least sacrifice,
the immense benefit of the free navigation of the Dan-
ube and the neutralisation of the Black Sea, would ac-
quire a preponderating influence in the West.
"This is what France and England wouldnever wish :
this they will never permit.
" Moreover, the undersigned are convinced that the
Cabinets of Paris and London, takin into serious con-
sideration the state of Italy will decide, in concert with
Sardinia, on the means for applying an efficacious re•
medy.

"C. CAVOUR.
"DE VILLAMARINA.

" Paris, April 16, 1856."

SARDINIAN NOTE ON THE PAPAL
STATES.

The following is a translation of the " verbal
note" presented by the Sardinian Plenipotentiaries
to the Ministers of France and England on the
27th of March, 1856 :
" At the moment when the glorious forces of the
Western Powers tend to assure the benefits of the peace
to Europe, the deplorable state of the provinces under
the Government of the Holy See, and, above all, of
the Legations, calls for the special attention of the
Governments of her Britannic Majesty and of his Ma
jesty the Emperor of the French.
" The Legations have been occupied by Austrian
troops since 1849. The state of siege and martial law
have been in vigour since that time without interruption.
The Pontifical Government only exists in name, since
above its legates an Austrian general takes the title, and
exercises the functions of civil and military governor.
Nothing evinces that this state of things will terminate,
since the Pontifical Government, is as convinced of its
impotence to preserve public order as in the first days of
its restoration, and Austria asks for nothing better than
to render her occupation permanent. Here, then, 'are
the facts which present themselves—a deplorable situa-
tion existing always in a country nobly peop'ed, and in
which conservative elements abound; impotence of the
legitimate Sovereign to govern ; a permanent danger t f
disorders and anarchy in Central Italy—extension or
Austrian dominion in the Peninsula beyond what the
treaties of 1815 had provided.
"The Legations before the French revolution were
under the high Sovereignty of the Pope ; but they en-
joyed privileges and franchises which rendered them, at
least in the internal administration, almost independent.
At the same time the clerical dominion was even then so
antipathetical that the French army was received in 1796
with enthusiasm.
"Detached from the Holy See by the Treaty of Tolen-
tine, those provinces formed a part of the Republic, after-
wards of the kingdom of Italy until 1814. The organi-ing
genius of Napoleon changed their aspect as by enchant-
ment. The Frei:rob laws, institutions, and administration
in a few years developed wealth and civilise ion. For
this reason, in those provinces, all the traditions, all the
sympathies are fixed on that period. The government
of Napoleon is the only one that survives in the memory
not ony of enlightened classes but of the people. His
memory recalls an impartial justice, a strong adminis-
tration, a state altogether of prosperity, of riches, and of
military greatness.
"At the Congress of Vienna they hesitated a long
time about replacing the Legations under the govern-
ment of the pope. The statesmen who sat there, al houeh
p-e
-occupied with the th. tight of re-establishing the an-
cient order of things above every other, felt, neverthe-
less, that they were thus leavine a hot-bed of disorders
in the midst of Italy. The difficulty in the choice of a
Sovereign to whom. to give those provinces, and the
rivalry which might be brought f rth by they prss s-
sion, made the balance preponderate in favour tf the
Pone; and Car -final Gonsalvi obtained, but only alter
the Battle of Waterloo, this unexpected concession.
"The Pontifical Government, at its restoration, took
no account of the progress of ideas and the profound
changes that the French regime had introduced in this
part of its States. From this a struggle between the
Government and the people was inevitable. The Le_ a-
tions have been the prey of an agitation more or less
secret, but which at any opportunity may break out int o
revolution. Three times Austria intervened with her
armies to re-establish the authority of the Pope, con•
stantly repudiated by his subjects.
"France replied on the second Austrian intervention
by the occupation of Ancona, on the third by the taking
of Rome. Every time that France has found herself in
presence of such events, she has felt the necessity of mo-
derating this state of things, which is a scandal for
Europe and an immense obstacle to the pacification of
Italy.
"The Memorandum' of 1831 proves the deplorable
state of the country, the necessity and urgency of admi-
nistrative reform. The diplomatic eorrespondence of
Gaeta and Portici carry the impression of the same feel-
ing. The reforms which Pius IX, himself initiated in
1846 were the fruit of his long sojo+tea at. Irnole, where
ne could judge with his own eyes of tse effects of the
deplorable regime imposed on those provinces.
"Unfortunately the counsels of the Powers, and the
good intentions of the Pope, were destroyed by the ob-
stacles which the clerical organization opposed to any
species of innovation wbatever. If there is one fact that
is clear from the history of latter years, it is the difficulty,
or we should rather say the impossibility, of a reform by
the Pontifical Government responding to the wants of
the time and the reasonable desires of the populetien.
" The Emperor Napoleon 111., with that true and'firm
coup d'ceil which is his characteristic, has perfectly
affirmed and clearly indicated in his letter to CA. Ney
the solution of this problem, Secularisation' and the
Code Napoleon.'
" But it is evident that the Court of Rome will com-
bat to the last extremity, and with all the means in its
power, the execution of these two designs. It well
knows how to accommodate itself by apparently accept-
ing civil and even political reforms, sure of rendering
them illusory in practice ; but it also sees that secu-
larisation and the Code Napoleon introduced into
Rome itself, where the edifice of its temporal power
has its foundations, would bare it to the roots and
cause it to fall by cutting away the principal support—
' clerical privileges and canonical right.' Nevertheless
if it cannot be hoped to introduce a true reform exactly in
that centre where the union of the temporal authority
with spiritual power is so interlaced that it is im.
possib'e to di-connect them without running the ri,k of
destroying them, it may at least be realised in thou,
parts which show themselves less resigned to the clerical
yoke, which is a burning torch of turbulence and cor-
ruption, which furnishes a pretext for the permanent
occupation of the Austrians, excites diplomatic compli-
cations, and disturbs the European equilibrium.
" We are of opinion that it is possible, but on the con-
dition of separating, at least administrative, those parts
from the State of Rome. In such a manner an apos-
tolic principality would be formed of the Legations,
under the high dominion of the Pope, but ruled by its
own laws, having its own tribunals, finance and army.
We consider that renewing as much as possible that
order of the traditions of the Napoleonic kingdom
will be sure to produce soon considerable moral
effect, and will be a great step towards re establish-
ing tranquillity among those populations. With-
out flattering ourselves that combinations of this nature
can last eternally, we consider, however, that for a
long time it would be suffleient for the end proposed
to pacify those provinces, and give satisfaction to the
wants of the people, and thereby assure the temporal
government of the Holy See without the aid of a
permanent foreign occupation.
" We will indicate briefly the essential points of the
project, and the means of giving them effect :
" 'l. The provinces of the Roman State situate be-
tween the Po, the Adriatic, and the Appenines (from
the Province of Ancona to that of Ferrara), although
remaining subjects to the high dominion of the Holy
See, shall be completely secularised and organised as
regards administrative, judicial, military, and financial
matters, in such a way as to be separated from the
remainder of the State. Nevertheless the diplomatic
and religious relations will remain exclusively the con-
cern of the Court of Rome.
" '2. The territorial and administrative organization
of this Principality to be established in the ferm in
which it was under the reign of Napoleon I. until 1814.
The Code Napoleon to be
promulgated, except the ne-
cessary modification in the titles regarding the relations
between Church and State.
4c 3. A lay Pontifical Vicar to govern these Pro-
vinces, with Ministers and a Council of State. The
position
of the Vicar named by the Pope to be guaran
teed for 10 years at least. The Ministers, the Counsellors
of State, and all the Government officers to be named by
the Pontifical Vicar. Their legi,lative and executive
powers never would extend to religious matters, nor to
mixed matters that will be previously determined, nor in
fine to whatsoever regards political international rely

tins.
.4 4 4. These provinces to contribute a fair proportion
to the maintenance of the ',Court of Rome and to the
service of the public debt actually existing.
" 5. An indigenous army to be organised immedi-
ately by means of the military conscription.
" 6. Besides the communal 'and provincial councils,
a general council to be formed for the examination and
regulation of accounts.'
" Now, if the means of execution are considered they
will be found not to present so many difficulties as at
first might be supposed. In the first place, the idea of
an administrative separation•of the Legations is not new
at Rome. It was proposed several times by diploma-
' tists, and even advocated by some members of the Sa-
cred College, though in terms more restricted than those
necessary to make it a serious and durable work.
"The irrevocable will of the Powers and the determi-
nation to put an end without delay to the foreign occu-
pation will be two motives that will determine the Court
of Rome to accept this plan, which in the main respects
its temporal power and leaves intact the actual organ-
isation of the centre and the greater part of its States.
But, once admitted as a principle, it will be neces-
sary that the execution of the project should be con-
fided to a'high Commissioner named by the Powers,
since it is most clear that if this task should be left
to the Pontifical Government it would find in its
traditional government the means of falsifying en-
tirely the now institutions. Now it cannot be con-
cealed that should the foreign occupation cease with-