t yet publicly arisen to
invalidate the accepted method.

FOOTNOTES:

[35] Alexander Henderson, the Scottish ecclesiastic and diplomatist, was
at this time most prominent among the Presbyterian leaders.

MASANIELLO'S REVOLT AT NAPLES

A.D. 1647

ALFRED VON REUMONT

Among the various popular insurrections of which Naples has
been the scene, the most memorable in violence and in effective
results is that which Masaniello headed. Naples, with Sicily,
was then subject to Spain, and a Spanish viceroy governed
there. Popular discontent had already shown itself in tumults.
These were provoked by various acts of oppression, but
especially by burdensome taxation and the draining of the
province of men for the Spanish service.

At the same time Naples was subject to French intrigue. It was
the aim of Cardinal Mazarin, the successor of Richelieu as
prime minister of France, to seize the rich Spanish
possessions, Naples and Sicily. He foresaw the coming
insurrection, and prepared to take advantage of it. Although
his schemes added to the Neapolitan complications, he was not
to profit by them as he hoped.

Finally, in Naples the half-smothered spirit of revolt broke
out when Spain imposed a duty on fruits, raising the cost of
productions upon which the majority of the people depended for
subsistence.

Reumont, whose mastery in the field of Italian history is well
known, brings out in full light the circumstances and
consequences of Masaniello's rising.

In May, 1647, a rebellion broke out in Palermo among the lower class of
people, which the viceroy, Don Pedro Fajardo Marquis de Los Veles, was
not in a condition to resist. The constant increase of the taxes on
articles of food, which, especially in the manner in which they were
then raised, were the most felt and the most burdensome kind of taxation
for the people, excited a tumult which lasted for many months,
occasioned serious dissensions between the nobility and the people, and
was only subdued by a mixture of firmness and clemency on the part of
the Cardinal Trivulzio, the successor of Los Veles. The news of the
disturbances in Sicily reached Naples, when everything there was ripe
for an insurrection, which had for a long time been fermenting, and
agitating men's minds.

On all sides the threatening indications increased. Notices posted upon
the