The Sun.
London, England, 1861-09-04 00:00:00

NAPLES, AUG. 27.
It is one of the evil consequences of brutal ex-
cesses that they give rise to counter excesses, if they
do not even render them necessary. Such, I fear,
has been the case in Southern Italy, and I should
ill deserve your confidence if I permitted my sym-
pathies with a revolution which has terminated in
driving the Bourbons from the country to dissuade
me from telling the whole truth. Though the gene-
ral policy of the Government has been mild in the
extreme, still I fear that its agents, under the influ-
ence of great irritation, have committed many acts
which will not read well in the future history of
the country. The most recent " act of justice," the
counter-massacre inPontelandolfo, was one at which
humanity shudders. What the precise number of
those destroyed was I do not know, but this I know
that the report presented to General Cialdini was,
"that not one of those who remained in the town
was spared." There were women and children pro-
bably, as well as men, but all were indiscriminately
burnt or slaughtered. I believe that the Bersa-
glieri had no intention at first of destroying on so
large a scale, but the bloody spectacle of the body

of the captain of the company who had been mur-
dered infuriated them. So much and no more can
be said in palliation of an act of ferocity the cha-
racter of which will net be changed by its being
called an act of justice. I have heard, too, of other
military executions for which even so much cannot
be said. On one occasion, lam told, Gen. Pinch
shot 48 of his prisoners-in cold blood after thlrbattle.
One of them, who had been the prisoner of the Re-
actionists, appealed against the order, and in his
agony loudly called out to be heard, but the com-
manding officer, turning his back upon him, was
inexorable. The same informant states that on
another occasion 300 persons were burnt in a wood
near Potenza. Now I cannot vouch these facts ;
in a court of justice I could not swear to them,
but they are reported to me by one who is as well
informed as any man in Naples, who was long a
sufferer in prison under the late dynasty, whose
sympathies are strongly with the cause of an united
Italy, and who closed his report by saying " the
Bourbons committed great cruelties, but we must
be silent." In short, my impression is that the
sacrifice of human life has been much greater than
the world has any idea of, and I do not speak of
those who have fallen in the field, but of those who
have been made away with by a rough and sum-
mary kind of justice. As the mildest natures when
irritated sometimes become the most ferocious, so
has it been the case with those who have been en-
gaged in putting down the Reactionists. Compara-
tively mild and forbearing at first, they have warmed
in their work, until, if the true statistics could
be found, a very long list of sufferers could be pre-
sented. You will remember that I reported to you
the observation of a Piedmontese officer, anxious
to prove that they were acting with energy, that
"many more than those of whom the world ever
heard were shot." I fully believe it, and for
every man who falls in this way ten enemies
are raised up to the Government. If I were a
blind partisan of the great and good Italian
cause, I should not '.write in this way, but my
duty is to chronicle :the truth, whether as re-
gards facts or impressions, and I think much has
taken place in these latter days which will not bear
examination, and which will be a stain on the history
of the Italian revolution. This, of course, does not
palliate the brutal ferocities of the Reactionists. I
admit them all, and the dreadful provocations
which have been given to the civil and military
authorities, but a good cause must be stained as
little as possible with blood. " Every man," as
General Scott is reported to have said, " unneces-
sarily sacrificed is a murdered man," and will
raise up many avengers in the excitable South.
You will say, perhaps, that the statements which I
now give you are somewhat in opposition to those
of former letters, but really they are not so. The
policy of Government has been tolerant even to
a fault; up to a certain time, too, the action of
military power was weak, but the barbarities of
the Bourbonites have awakened the demon, and if
I write as I now do it is to induce greater caution,
and to put a stop to excesses which, however
characteristic they may be of the savage enemy,
are a disgrace to an army of gallant soldiers
fighting for fraternity and unity. And now for
my report of the " state of the country," as it is
called, and I fear that my view of it is justified by
facts. There is no real improvement. The very
multitude of the events renders it impossible for me
to enumerate them. We hear officially of incen-
diary fires in the province of Aquila, and others
again near Castellamare, of the invasion of Mer-
cogliano, and the disarming of the National Guard
and the opening of the prison; of several places in
Campobasso being attacked; of an attack on
Guardia Reggia, near hernia, and the burning of
the archives ; as also on St. Egidio, in the province
of Salerno, where the National Guards were com-
pelled to give up their arms. At Pollena, not very
distant from Naples, the Reactionists attacked a
rich proprietor, and demanded money, but not re-
ceiving it they murdered him immediately, his wife
and servants escaping as by miracle. An engage-
ment took place at about a mile distance from Mad-
daloni the other evening between the National
Guards, the troops, and the Reactionists, in which
five of the latter and their chief were killed. The
impression would be that " the band was dis-
persed," but a night or two after four companies
and a battery were despatched to Caserta, where a
considerable body of the enemy was concentrated,
and a sharp engagement is expected. The autho-
rities, of course, endeavour to make light of these
events, and say that, if it were not for this and not
for that, " the brigandage would be put down in a
fortnight ;" but it is not put down, and the end is
yet far distant, because the causes which led to it
still exist. A conspiracy was lately discovered on
board the Independente, which had been appointed
to take 427 disbanded "brigand" soldiers from Bari
to Ancona. These men had succeeded in corrupting
a part of the crew, and, having learned that there
were 2,000 muskets and a quantity of ammuni-
tion on board, had arranged to assault the com•
mender, and carry the vessel into Trieste. The
plot was, fortunately, discovered in time, the
ringleaders were severely punished, and the sol-
diers sent off to their destination. I still hold
to my opinion that if this country is to become
a part of an united Italy it must be held as a
conquest, and my reasons for thinking so become
stronger every day. The army, which from the very
elements of which it is composed and the recent-
ness of our political changes is looked upon more as
Piedmontese than national, has been compelled to
take such a hostile position as to render a voluntary
fusion impossible. In the provinces—let it be dis-
guised as much as von choose—there is great irrita-
tion, and 50,000 or 60,000 disbanded soldiers have
all their relatives, and so have those who have
fallen the victims of their own crimes and of the
impetuosity, in many cases just impetuosity, of the
soldiery. Were it possible, therefore, it would be
desirable to increase the regular force, putting little
dependence on such aid as Southern Italy itself can
furnish, The Government has been much re-
proached for not having armed the National Guard,
and I think with reason, but It should have done
so earlier, before the Reactionary element had be-
come so strong. At present it might admit of a
doubt whether the arming the detached bodies of
peasantry called National Guards spread among the
small communes would not be equivalent to the
establishment of so many depots of arms for the
service of the Reactionists. Arms are always sought
for, and it takes nothing, as we know from expe-
rience, to make a descent upon a station and disarm
the timid and undisciplined Johnny Raws.
We have now anchored off Castellamare her
Britannic Majesty's ships Marlborough, Exmouth,