4764. EBB to Theodore Tilton
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 28, 200.
[Florence]
[Postmark: 20 October 1860]
<***> Public affairs here are passing into the phase of triumph. We all feel the end near, and that a great nation is called up from the grave. There was danger from the Mazzinians in the South, and great anxiety for a moment, but the popular vote silences the unwise majority, [1] and justifies the inspiration of the people. ‘Vox Populi, vox Dei.’ There is anxiety still about Venetia. Nothing but the sword, I fear, will cut that knot. [2] … In regard to prose-writing, my voice is spoiled for speaking, perhaps,-by singing. [3] <***>
Address: Etats Unis d’Amerique / Theodore Tilton Esqre / Office of ‘The Independent’ / New York / U.S. [4]
Text: The Independent (New York), 6 December 1860, p. 1 and 25 July 1861, p. 1.
1. EBB anticipates the plebiscites on annexation that were held in Sicily and Naples (i.e., the Neapolitan states) on 21 October and in Umbria and The Marches from 4 to 5 November. The results were overwhelmingly in favor of union with a greater Italy. “Voters were asked to say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the question whether they wished to form an integral part of an Italy one and indivisible under Victor Emmanuel as their constitutional king. The votes were: Sicily, 432,053 to 667; Naples, 1,302,064 to 10,312; the Marches, 133,072 to 1212; Umbria, 99,628 to 380” (Edgar Holt, Risorgimento: The Making of Italy, 1815–1870, 1970, p. 255).
2. An allusion to the Gordian Knot.
3. See the fourth and fifth paragraphs in letter 4733.
4. Envelope at University of Texas.
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