.

In exchange for this proposed cession the Austro-Hungarian Government
demanded a number of pledges, including among them an assurance of
entire liberty of action in the Balkans. _Note should be made of the
fact that the cession of the territory around Trent was not intended to
be immediately effective as we demanded, but was to be made only upon
the termination of the European War._

SIGNOR SONNINO.
_Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs._
_May 25, 1915._

[Illustration]

_THE BROKEN ALLIANCE AND ITALY_

"_Twenty years and more you've forced me to wear this chain_"

For the guardianship, therefore, of these treaties the government of
the kingdom of Italy found itself constrained to notify the Imperial
Austrian Government on the fourth of this month, May, 1915, that it must
withdraw all of its proposals of agreement, denounce the treaty of the
alliance, and declare its own liberty of action. Nor, on the other hand,
was it more possible to leave Italy in isolation without security and
without prestige, just at the moment in which the history of the world
was taking on a decisive phase.

Everything else we must forget from this moment, and remember only this:
to be _Italians_, to love all Italy with the same faith and fervor. The
forces of all must be cemented into one single heart; only one single
will must guide all toward the wished for end; and force, and art, and
will must find their expression one, alive, and heroic in the army and
navy of Italy and in the august leader who conducts them toward the
destiny of the new history.

ANTONIO SALANDRA.
_President of the Ministerial Council._
_Rome. May 20, 1915._

[Illustration]

_GOTT STRAFE ITALIEN_

Neither Serbia nor Russia, despite a long and costly war, is hated.
Italy, however, or rather those Italian would be politicians and
business men who offer violence to the majority of peaceful Italian
people, are so unutterably hated with the most profound honesty that
this war can produce.

_The Frankfurter Zeitung, May 25, 1915._

[Illustration]

_THE LATIN SISTERS_

_Italy: "Indeed she is my sister"_

Giuseppe Garibaldi with a corps of Italian soldiers went to the defense
of the French Republic in the war of 1870 against the Prussians,
performing heroic deeds at Dijon worthy of an epopee.

Ricciotti Garibald