The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1878-01-11
III Re GaIantuOmn,


first king of Italy, now dead in the fifty
eighth year of his age, has been the most for
tunate OF rulers. His was the happy lot to
refute the sneer of European statesmen that
"Italy is buta geographical expression"
Ele realized In his own person the national
aspirations of centuries and the long-cher-
ished dreams of his House. Under his reign
the number of his subjects increased from
five millions to twenty-seven millions, and
the limits of his domain expanded until they
embraced the entire peninsula from the Alps
to the Adriatic, from the Hospice of st. Ber-
nard to the Castle of Pessare. He saw
his kingdom grow from weak state in the
northwestern corner of Italy to great and
puissant nation. He fixed his capital in the
city which for ages was mistress of the world
and which is now the ecclesiastical metropo-
lis of Catholic Christendom. Last and best
of all he died in the prime of his manhood,
beloved and mourned by the people over
whom he so mildly ruled, and leaving to the
world name which will be remembered un.
til the unifcation of Italy is forgotten.
Yet Victor Emanuel was not great man,
He was an easy, good-tempered, jovial fellow,
fond Of hunting and dining and women,
averse to public business and Indifferent to
art and literature. a brave soldier, he was
poor general. Had not he been born to q
throne this man who conquered the fairest
part of the heritage of imperial and sacerdotal
Rome would have been unknown. But as he
was the head of family which had been
Counts and Dukes and Kings Of Savoy and
Piedmont for eight hundred years, as he in
herited the traditions of race that made the
sovereignty OF the peninsula the object of all
their aims, as he succeeded to the place of
monarch who was identified with the heroic
struggle for Independence in 1S49, as be had
the fortune to come to power when all cir
cumstances favored the fulfllment of the
long-cherished italian aspirations for liberty
and unity and all eyes were turned to him as
the born leader of the liberal crusade, and as
he had the good sense to avail himself of the
service of the best minds and stoutest hearts
of his country, he will live long in history.
He was peculiarly fortunate in his advisers
and supporters. Cavour, the wisest states
man of the time, was his minister, and the
mantle of Cavour fell successfully upon the
shoulders of Ricasoli and Ratazzi, worthy to
bear it. In Mazzini he had the greatest po-
litical agitator OF the age, a man who fired the
young hearts of Italy, and formed that potent
and far-reaching organization, GioUine Italia.
In Garibaldi he had the first partisan chief in
Europe, a soldier who repeated the
deeds of the Paladins and laid the coro-
nets of Dukes and the crowns OF kings as
offerings at his feet. He had the wisdom
to know that he, the king, was not wise
enough to rule alone, and the rare good
judgment to avail himself at only proper
times Of the counsels of statesmen, the in
trigues of consprators, the swords of war
brought fortune out of misfortune, victory out
of defeat. His first battle, the dolorous rout
of Navarro, in which he personally led ac-
cording to the custom of his House, the
Brigade of Savoy, resulted in the utter defeat
of the Sardinians. His last battle, the bloody
conflict of Custozza, was the most disastrous
check that ever befel the italian arms. Yet
from these defeats he built up the kingdom
of Italy, and finally after having gotten the
better of all his temporal adversaries con-
quered his spiritual foe as well and won with
out blow the patrimony of st. Peter. The
first year Of his reign found him excommu-
nicated. The last year found him ruling all
Italy from the Quirinal, while the Pontiff
who put him under ban was indebted TO his
clemency for permission to live in the Holy
City.
Strange fate that an excommunicant should
be peaceful ruler of Rome; that an unsuccess-
full general should extend his kingdom by
war until its boundaries were only the noun
tains and the sea; that devout Catholic
should be the hope OF heretics; and that
hereditary ruler in whom the pride of birth
was strong, who traced his descent through
long line of crowned ancestors to the last
king of the Saxons, should be the idol of
liberal Europe, the object of admiration of
English radicals, French republicans and
Italian conspiratorsl