Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1853-10-29
From the New York Tibune.
ITALY.
PRESENT STATE OF THE PENINSULA.


ROVE, October 1893.
The American public are more or less familiar
with the unhappy condition of ltaly by periodical
reports, which reach the United States from Euro
pcan sources. But it is necessary that something
more than mere iragmentary notices OF passing
events should from time to time place the public in
possession Of the progress ofta great struggle for
Freedom which began in 1919 and is still going on
under the eye of the police spy and amid the bayou
cts of foreign soldiers ltnly is becoming daily
more and more interesting to America, both in a
political and commercial point of view. Hundreds
of her most intelligent and bravcst sons have left
their classical land, with all its associations and
hopes Of political regeneration personal friendships
and material interest for the country now almost
the only home Of the political martyr European
dcspotism to this day is hard at work hunting
down the men of education in Italy, and driving
them off TO the United States, or throwing them in
to dungeons, where they die in chains. What
American can fail 10 take lively and painful in
tcroSt in such state of things? Let us never for
get that few generations back, and the iurclhth-
of some of our nobcst citizens were precisely in
the same position. Let us remember, too, that thc
pac-iaccd Italian Of to-day, thrown into tie arms
of American Freedom. is the brother of Columbus,
Rcnzi, Sayonroa, the Medici, and an endless list
oiillustrious bencNctors Of humanity, who were
lighting for that liberty, political and religious,
which forms the very swaddling-clothcs of our in
fancy. The tale told by the llugucnots, the Puri-
tans and those political exilcs who fled from Eng
land in Charles H.. time, is repeated by the
Roman and Neapotan who lands in America in
1858, toascape the persecution of the same Rome,
and the dungeon of the same dcspotism which so
long cursed the Anglo-Soxon race.
/ Beyond such considerations (which cannot fail
to excite interest in the fate of ltaly there are
other reasons for watching the progress of Italian
generation. A steam fleet is forming gradually,
but surely, which will place in continual and
close communication with the United States; and
/ Nonlas VusronX aud Roma will f,ll,,v ~,
SHALL ere long know the Italians ms merchants to Il
much greater extent than formerly; and If they
succeed in obtaining free and progressive consttu
tons, vast commercial field will he thrown opcr
to the advantage Of all parties. With the existing
governments, however, every difficulty is thrown IL
the way of national prosperity Priests, spies ant
soldiers are not the instruments of human happi
ness-they are the great drdmdtis persOHg of hlsto
ry, who have played the worlds tragedy; and Italy
has had her full share oftheir blighting influence
both in Pagan and Christian times. Ariosto says
"Then pass'd he to Aowery mountain green,
| Which once smelt sweet, now stinks so odiously
This was the gift, if you the truth will have,
That Constantine to good Sylvester gave"
i The modern troubles of Italy began when Eng
land and the allied Powers of 1915 restored the
princes priests, and those bad governments OF Tho
Peninsula which had so long degraded the people
and impoverished the country, before Napoleon :
army crossed tne APPS hlhSs leuih hotiii"S ''''
revolutions, if the crown eventually trlumphs'-
Thus it was that the restoration Of the Bourbons
and the House of Savoy was restoration OF sys
tenn Of rule which brought about the great move
ment of lS48. At that period every government
Italy had its vast machinery of policespies ant
drawing-room reporters, In Rome and the TwC
Sicies there were little armies of Swiss, while th'
church of st. Peter worked under the cowl to sup
port royal immortality and court corruption. 1e
with all this the peopehad the power, almost with
out bood-shed, to triumph over all, and force th
sovereigns of Italy to grant Constitutional Govern
, ments, which each solemnly swore to maintain
I This new state of things had scarcely come int
full operation when Austria. the despotic prop o
everything that is bad in Italy, was enabled b,