The Sun.
London, England, 1859-07-15 00:00:00

THE PEACE.

(From the Times.)
The Emperor of the French has confided to his
army the reasons which induced Kira to grant Aus-
tria the just accomplishedpeace. It is a document
which requires frequent reperusal, and which in-
vites unceasing conjecture. The principal 4im of
the war was, it seems, to render Italy a nation, and
this principal aim, it also seems, has been obtained.
" It is true, ' says Napoleon 111. (illustrating the
proverb, " Qui s'excuse s'ay.cuse"), "that Venetia
remains to Austria;" but Ile explains that this ex-
ception is immaterial, berJ ause Venetia will continue
to be an Italian provinue,formingpart of an Italian
Confederation. We confess we do not follow the
Emperor in this explanation. That Venice will re-
main Italian we can clearly see; we should have
more difficulty in. understanding how it could be-
come BehrAnian or Hungarian ; but how this fact
renders its possession by Austria of lass importance
we cannot pretend to explain. It is one of those
logical sequences which none but an Emperor at
th head of many legions can enounce with effect.
To the eye of common understanding this posses-
sion of Venetia by Austria, would seem to give Aus-
tria a right which she never before had to inter-
meddle in the politics of all Italy. Austria, argreat
military monarchy, is, by this possession, a member
of a Confederacy which is made up of Austria and
a few insignificant and unwarlilce States. In this
Confederacy who will influence and who will obey?
Austria is right in boasting that it matters not to
her what may be the fortune of arms ; for, beaten
or victorious, she always gains the prize in the
contest. That which was limited is now to
become universal ; that ' which was an encroach-
ment is now to become a right. We have
nothing to say when the French army is told
that the union of Lombardy and Piedmont creates
for France a powerful ally. It is undoubtedly
true. But France has bought this alliance at a
frightful cost, and the independence of Lomhardy is not that independence for which the Lombards
sighed.

I+ L. n0+0rL,,...1.7 ~,.y turmoil, to get ttt tne mean-
ino. of Louis Napoleon. He is the great modern
Sphynx, and his very existence depends upon his
not being found out. But, of all the riddles he has
proposed to Europe, none is more puzzling and in-
tricate than this Treaty of Villafranca, the sense of
which we have attempted to read in the descrip-
tion he has himself given. It is usual when we
doubt as to the authorship of an act to ask—for
whose benefit was it done ? Here, however, we
ask this question in vain. The treasure is spent
and the blood is shed, the war is ended, and the
peace is made ; but no one, so far as we can see, is
the better for the fight. Sardinia is not quite
happy in her new possessions, and even Victor
Emmanuel will find in Lombardy a poor substitute
for the enthusiastic affection of all Italy. France
has gained no accession to her territory, and no
friendship from the oppressed populations of the
earth. She has gained nothing but the knowledge
that her Emperor is able to manoeuvre an army.
She has not, even at this mement, the conviction
that his sparing Austria was an act of unmixed
generosity. The Emperor now says that he stayed
his hand under an apprehension that the struggle
was likely to assume larger proportions than he
desired. It is tot a very chivalrous reason to give
to 'an army which had just fought a campaign and
lost thousands of its comrades for no result which
any one of them would have desired. These sol-
diers want work and glory and promotion. To tell
them he made peace for fCar the war would spread
could only be to set them guessing who it was who
had thus stayed them in their full march of conquest.
It was not England. Was it Prussia ? It is not
very probable, unless this pause is fighting
should be rather a diversion than ' a cessation.
WEIS it Russia ? Did Russia think Austria had
been beaten enough ? Was Russia acting ail the
time as the surgeon, with his finger upon the pulse
of the patient, and did she give the signal to cease
when that symptom of Hungarian fever developed
itself ? All or any of these reasons may have ope-
rated. Or the Emperor Napoleon might have known
the state of his own army best. There is, indeed,
a last supposition, which we offer to the considera-
tion of those who were not long ago so fiercely
scolding us because we doubted that Napoleon was
about to set up a free Constitutional Government
in Italy—perhaps the French Emperor has imposed
some secret obligation upon Austria never again to
interfere in the affairs of Italy. If this should be
so, then all is right. The pope and the Grand
Dukes are put up in pride of place merely to give
NaNkleon's great principle—" the sovereignty of
the people"—a clear stage. If they can hold their
own, good. If they cannot, then down topple
Pope and Kaiser, and Italy, left to herself, works
out her own regeneration. There is no limit to
human credulity, and there may be credulous idola-
ters of Chaos who, even at this thirteenth hour,
may believe in such impossibilities as these. The
sane men of the age, however, know better. They
recognise in this new settlement nothing hut an
universal and irresistible despotism. We yester-
day announced that Cavour, disgusted, by the dis-
appointment of all his hopes, had thrown up his
employment. The telegram of to-day confirms our
previous information, and announces that the King
of Sardinia has accepted Count Ca.vour's resigna-
tion, and has replaced him by Count Arese. This
event determines the nature of the peace. Cavour
was an earnest man. He believed in Italia:n inde-
pendence as a future work of Napoleon 111. lilwas
by means of the confidence he felt himself and in-
*tired in others that Mazzini and his emissaries were
discredited throughout Italy. It was Cavour who
gave the signal for the successive risings in the
smaller Italian States. It was by means of his in-
fluence that the revolutions at Florence, Parma, and
Modena were bloodless, and that Rome remained
tranquil. Cavour believed in a Constitutional
Italian Unity, and unfortunately he believed that
the Emperor Napoleon entertained the same views
as himself. Warnings were thrown away upon him.
Patriots and young ladies have a faith in men's pro-
mises which no expositions can shake, and which
nothing but bitter personal experience can destroy.
Poor Cavour ! _He once had a great career before
`hull, for he was honest and zealous ; but he was
credulous and impatient, and he became the tool of
crafty selfishness.

History tells us what passed at Tilsit, and some
French memoir will doubtless at a future day re-
late what was the conversation at Villafranca. It
is not necessary, however, to wait for the authentic
report ; the results suggest what the conversation
must have been. " Surely," we can imagine Francis
Joseph to have said, " my Imperial brother cannot
intend to revolutionise Hungary, and to establish a
focus of insurrection in Italy P" "Not the least in
the world. I care no more for these Italians than
you do. This matter has gone quite far enough for
my purpose. You see now that France is necessary
to Austria. We will settle this affair, atd-I dill