any other things--he ruined, for instance, the
economic life of the town. Everything had for a time gone swimmingly.
The Chief of the Republic of San Marino was voicing the sentiments of
numberless Italians when he saluted the poet as a great Italian patriot.
Such was the feeling of the majority of the army and navy, so that the
Government in Rome was made to look ridiculous. "Mark well what I am
telling you," said the poet to the special correspondent of the
_Gazzetta del Popolo_. "I have received a call from a superior hidden
force, and though the fever burns within me I am consoled, because the
War has made me a mystic and I feel I am inspired from on high in this
mission." D'Annunzio and his cohorts refused to have anything to do with
the Cabinet. Signor Nitti, supported by the Parliament and the more
responsible people, was openly attacked by the Nationalists and secretly
by the profiteers and the newly rich on account of his bold taxation
programme, by which he hoped to bring 30 milliards of francs into the
Exchequer. The Nationalists assisted d'Annunzio to win over the army;
and in northern Italy there were many who realized that an army which
can be moved by such an appeal can, on the next day, rally to
Bol[vs]evism. No other troops remained in Rieka, the small French and
British detachments having been withdrawn. Before this happened there
occurred a repetition, on a larger scale than usual, of a few French
soldiers being attacked by a body of Italian warriors who greatly
outnumbered them. Some of the French were Annamites, than whom no more
harmless persons can be imagined.[44] And it was in order to avoid such
untoward incidents that the Franco-British troops were evacuated.
D'Annunzio was left to do his worst. Rieka was one of the problems which
the Peace Conference had failed to solve, and now they were in much the
same inglorious position as the Great Powers who in 1913 warned Turkey
not to mobilize, since they would not allow the Balkan Confederation to
make an attack, and after the attack gave it out that the Balkan States
would not be permitted to acquire any new territory. The Supreme Council
in Paris was losing its prestige very rapidly. "A little patience,"
begged Tittoni, "and my Government will turn out d'Annunzio." "What we
want," exclaimed Clemenceau, "is a Government in Italy!"--and the
Italian delegates, with flushed faces, pointed out that it was not Italy
which wanted Rieka, but Rieka which wan