t him in the execution of his office, and the
people, in their turn, flew to their weapons. The revolt spread, and
soon the whole island was in arms. The Genoese, as vassals of the
Empire, sought the aid of their sovereign lord, the Emperor Charles the
Sixth, who sent a strong body of troops to the island. The Corsicans
were unable to resist, and "laid down their arms, upon condition that a
treaty should be made between them and the Genoese, having for guarantee
the Emperor." Hostages were sent by the islanders, to whom the Republic
was inclined to show but scant respect. In fact, the Emperor's consent
to their execution had been almost obtained, when the Prince of
Wirtemberg, the commander of the imperial forces in Corsica, sent an
express to Vienna, "with a very strong letter, representing how much the
honour of Caesar would suffer, should he consent to the death of those
who had surrendered themselves upon the faith of his sacred protection."
The great Prince Eugene also spoke out, and for this time, Caesar's
honour--at all events, all that was left of it--was saved.

The suspension of hostilities was but short; for neither was the cruelty
of the Genoese, nor the hatred of the Corsicans easily confined within
the limits of a treaty. "There is not," writes Boswell, "a Corsican
child who can procure a little gun-powder, but he immediately sets fire
to it, huzzas at the explosion, and, as if he had blown up the enemy,
calls out, 'Ecco i Genovesi; there go the Genoese!'" In 1734, the whole
island once more was in the flames of an insurrection. Giafferi and
Giacinto Paoli, the father of the famous Pascal Paoli, were chosen as
leaders. The Genoese hired Swiss mercenaries. They thought that against
soldiers, brought up amidst the Alps, as these had been, the mountains
of Corsica would provide no shelter for freedom. But the Swiss "soon saw
that they had made a bad bargain, and that they gave the Genoese too
much blood for their money." When at Lucerne we gaze at the noble
monument set up by Switzerland in memory of her sons who were massacred
in Paris, it is well at times to remember how the Swiss lion was at the
hire of the very jackals of the world.

Genoa next published an indemnity to all her assassins and outlaws, on
condition that they should fight for the Republic, in Corsica. "The
robbers and assassins of Genoa," writes Boswell, "are no inconsiderable
proportion of her people. These wretches flocked together from al