4390. EBB to Arabella Moulton-Barrett
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 26, 128–132.
[Rome]
[Postmark: 30 April 1859]
<***> And these sounds follow Sophie [1] at church to the very communion table—so loud, that she is afraid of the congregation being disturbed– She thinks there must be another medium there which, doubling the power, makes them louder– I tell you all this under seal of secrecy, because she is very shy & timid of being associated with these phenomena– Not like me, Arabel, who have none of that sort of shame about me. If it’s truth at all, it’s God’s truth—& why should a man or a woman be ashamed of it. Nevertheless a great many pure women & intellectual men know these things for facts, & recoil from recognizing them–
I write of the only subject (apart from private anxieties) which attracts me at all from politics– Arabel, why is it that you who profess a low opinion of the truth of the “Times newspaper,” yet accept its politics literally? If you took in the Daily News instead of the Times, you would not talk of the Emperor Napoleon “provoking Europe to war.” It has been estimated that about “ten persons” in England are well-informed on foreign politics .. which is at once a reproach & an excuse. A reproach—because if the English had more sympathy for the outside world, they would be at the pains to get information—the head follows the heart. The truth is that Louis Napoleon is now justifying his warmest friends, & changing the minds of some of his most violent enemies– One of the latter said here the other day, .. “I forgive him everything.” Never has he showed more grandeur of sentiment, never more prudence in tactics than in the management of this question– He has forborne long, in the Roman states—& now all comes out, how there has been a continued struggle for reform, on the part of France, rendered impotent by Austria– The last point was the “Mortara case”– [2] He wrote a letter with his own hand to the pope to beseech for the release of the child—&, the pope refusing, another dishonorable responsibility (of supporting such a state of things) rested on his government– To withdraw his troops would have been a cession to Austria of the last hope of Italy– Meantime Piedmont, threatened in the north, cries out for help– Also, all the antecedents of Napoleon engaged him into this path,—& if he had receded, I for one, would have given him up for ever– Robert feels precisely as I do on the present question,—& indeed there are many English liberals here, who after wriggling a little to prove their English blood, have come out clean, in their sympathy for Italy & France– The inequities of Austria are full & she will lose Lombardy by war, which she never could have done by Congress– Her last infamy against Piedmont, by making a necessity of the war, destroys her– [3] From north to south of Italy there is one unity of burning enthusiasm– If there had not been war, there would have been revolution– If France had not assisted Piedmont, Austria would have crushed Italy with overwhelming legions– You dont understand the alternative. — The alternative was not peace– To prove to you how null the power of France is on this government,—at the great Easter festival of the benediction of the pope .. when the grand piazza of St Peter was crammed with people, there was a demonstration .. The Romans cried Viva la Francia, Viva l’Italia, viva l’Imperatore dis Francesi. I was there. The French ambassador stood up in his carriage & took off his hat– In the evening the Austrian ambassador applied to Cardinal Antonelli [4] for redress, & there was in consequence a general sweep into the prisons .. even of the young Roman nobles who were implicated. [5] Think of that insolence! & the city occupied by French troops! Another demonstration took place at night before the French minister’s house, & he was informed of the circumstances– He “prayed the people on the part of the emperor” to cry no more “Viva la Francia” at present, as they would only increase their own suffering by it– Then he insisted with the cardinal (proposing a telegram to Paris) on the liberation of the victims– But it is said that every night people are put into prison for their expressions of irrepressible patriotism– [“]And these things,[”] says England, [“]we must let stand– In Lombardy, there is a treaty. We sold that slave to the Austrian, & we must keep him at the whipping-post– The crime of 1815 must be clenched by another worse crime”– [6]
Do you know what goes on in Lombardy, Arabel, & how it is more galling than anything here or at Naples? & are you of opinion, because we were conquerors in 1815, we had a right to throw a refined people bound like a dog, to the huntsman’s whip, saying “This is yours!”,—And because we did it once, sealed this hideous compact, are we to hold to it for ever as if it were Holy Scriptures? A treaty against the interest of a nation, & without its consent, .. nay, in defiance of its protest– And this treaty to hold? Yet we wink at the breach of treaties when it suits our interests– The establishment of Belgium was against these very treaties, [7] —yet we let it pass. The restoration of a Buonaparte was against them also, yet we found it convenient to agree. And when Austria swallowed up Cracow alive, she tore those same treaties from top to bottom, while we stood by quietly. [8] No government ought to stand, against the consent of a nation,—and no treaty ought to hold, against the consent of a nation,—just as no law is good a moment, against a general moral sense– You shd see the bitter smile with which the Italians talk of the English plea for “treaties!” The Devil keeps his special approbation for this sort of honesty—while the angels turn away their eyes to the professed thief rather–
The war has begun, we hear. May God defend the right– [9] Railroads stopped, horses taken away, steamers likely to be distrained for military uses, .. people are rushing off as they can– The prince of Wales goes on board his frigate tomorrow morning. [10] In Tuscany the Grand Duke has ceased to reign [11] —but there is great tranquillity (unless Austria comes in) & three of the most excellent men in Florence compose the provisional government– I wish we were back—but we shall stay out our month here, & then, if the country is much disturbed, & the sea difficult, we shall unite with the Eckleys to get an escort of gendarmi to Sienna. Meanwhile there’s no danger we think of the funds, though they are of course down to the floor– Tuscany wont sink, nor Italy, Arabel– And really I have a sort of pleasure in sharing the risk a little. A priest came to our door to ask for contributions this morning– Robert told Ferdinando to tell him that we “kept all our money for the war of Independence”–
When Ferdinando repeated which message, the priest was insolent, & told him “he had surely made up the message himself”—for “we were English, he knew,” said the priest– The intention was too noble for the English, I suppose he thought!– Oh Arabel—we have covered ourselves with dishonor indeed.
Only the last move of Austria will instruct the public mind a little, it is to be hoped, as to who is the ‘provoker,’—and so save us the ineffable disgrace of riding openly with such a power as Austria–
We know many things here of which I cant speak even to you. Be sure of this, that I am not a partizan nor intellectually blind, in forming my judgements–
Our bearing at Naples has been very bad—especially in that business of the Cagliari .. the Piedmontese vessel. [12] On that occasion the whole history of the wrong was suppressed bodily by the Times (this came to me from their “own correspondent,” [13] who wrote the suppressed papers) in order to leave the English ministry free not to act for Piedmont. It has been bad, bad, bad– May we retrieve ourselves!—but to do so will take years–
Write to me, darling– Write still to Rome for the present—till the 24th of May–
I prayed for you in the Sistine chapel at the great miserere [14] —which was wonderful—supernatural in effects.
Three days ago we went to Tivoli with the Eckleys & others, [15] —& I who was not quite ripe for the sort of thing, was broken to pieces by it—but today I am in a state of resurrection– Write to me darling– I long to hear of you—& of Storm too–
Your own
Ba–
Roberts & Pen’s best love.
Address: Angleterre / Miss Moulton Barrett / 7. Delamere Terrace. / Harrow Road / London.
Publication: EBB-AB, II, 403–407.
Manuscript: Berg Collection.
1. i.e., Sophia Eckley.
3. On 23 April, Austria issued an ultimatum that Piedmont disarm and remove her troops from Lombardy or face war. The demand was rejected, and Austrian troops crossed the Ticino into Piedmont territory on 29 April. This was taken by France as a declaration of war, and French troops soon began landing at Genoa, followed by Napoleon III himself on 12 May. The first engagement of the war took place on 20 May at Montebello (midway between Milan and Genoa), where a superior Austrian force was turned back by the French and Piedmontese.
4. Giacomo Antonelli (1806–76), cardinal and chief administrator for Pius IX since 1848, directed his energies “almost exclusively to the struggle between the papacy and the Italian Risorgimento, the history of which is comprehensible only when the influence exercised by his unscrupulous, grasping and sinister personality is fully taken into account” (EB). According to Odo Russell, Antonelli had “complete control over the amiable but weak mind of Pius IX” (The Roman Question, ed. Noel Blakiston, 1962, p. 80).
5. The French and Austrian ambassadors to Rome were, respectively, Antoine Alfred Agénor de Gramont, 10th Duc de Gramont (1819–80) and Count Franz Colloredo (1799–1859). A similar account of the events that EBB describes was recorded by Odo Russell: “On Easter Sunday when the French Ambassador and General Count Goyon left St Peter’s they were loudly cheered, from the steps of the Basilica to the Fort of St Angelo, by the Roman population with cries of ‘Vive l’Empereur’, ‘vive la France’ and Vive l’Italie’. On the same night the leaders of this demonstration in favour of the French Emperor were arrested by order of Cardinal Antonelli. They were all respectable men of the middle classes” (The Roman Question, p. 17).
7. As a result of the Congress of Vienna, the area known as Belgium was incorporated with Holland and Luxembourg to form the Kingdom of the Netherlands. In 1830, however, the Roman Catholic Belgians revolted against the Calvinist Dutch. There followed a conference of the great powers in London in November, at which time a treaty of separation was signed, and in January of 1831 Belgium became a sovereign nation.
9. Cf. Richard II, I, 3, 101.
10. Actually, the morning of the day after tomorrow, as indicated in a report filed on 30 April by The Morning Post’s Rome correspondent in the issue of 6 May 1859: “The Prince of Wales’ departure is to be rather hastened in consequence of the war having broken out already, and his route has been altered in consequence of the disturbed state of Tuscany. His royal highness abandons the idea of seeing Florence for the present, and sets out on Monday morning [2 May] for Civita Vecchia, where he will embark probably for Malta on board the recently-arrived paddle-wheel war steamer Scourge” (p. 6).
11. A bloodless coup d’état in Florence deposed Grand Duke Leopold II of Tuscany on 27 April 1859. Soon afterwards a provisional government was formed, headed by Ubaldino Peruzzi (1822–91), former mayor of Florence; Vincenzo Malenchini (1813–81), who represented the moderate wing of the Società Nazionale; and Major Alessandro Danzini (1825–74), who had encouraged the benevolent behavior of the Tuscan army during the uprising. On 11 May 1859, a new provisional government was formed, consisting of Peruzzi; Bettino Ricasoli (1809–80), who succeeded Cavour as Italian prime minister in 1861; and Cosimo Ridolfi (1794–1865), who had formerly held office in the Grand Duke’s government (see letter 2757, note 5). This second provisional government remained in place until Tuscany united with Piedmont in March 1860.
12. A mail steamer which was hijacked by a band of Mazzinians, led by Carlo Pisacane, a Neapolitan Duke. The mission failed, Pisacane committed suicide, and his surviving fellow revolutionaries were tried and sentenced to long prison terms. “Repercussions of the Pisacane affair were felt in England for several months. The crew of the Cagliari … were arrested and imprisoned in Naples; among them were two British engineers, and in view of the curious circumstances of the whole episode the British government took no action to secure their release. The men were still in jail when the whig government went out of office in February 1858, and it was left to Lord Malmesbury, the new foreign secretary, to complete the arrangements for setting them free” (Edgar Holt, Risorgimento: The Making of Italy, 1815–1870, 1970, pp. 198–199).
13. Henry Wreford (see letter 4368, note 2).
14. On Friday, 22 April; see letter 4387, note 2.
15. On 27 April (see letter 4388).
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