honoured birthplace of the idolized Garibaldi!

Garibaldi was chosen by the people of Nice for the new Chamber of 1860,
for they hoped that he would make an effort to save his native town.
He had some idea of raising a revolution against French rule, but
decided to free Sicily as a mightier enterprise. Victor Emmanuel
completed the sacrifice which gave "the cradle of his race" to the
foreigner. He was reconciled to the cession at length because he
believed that Italy had gained much already.

Cavour did not openly approve of the attack which Garibaldi was
preparing to make upon the Bourbon's sovereignty. Many said that he
did his best to frustrate the plans of the soldier because there was
hostility between them. Garibaldi could not forgive the cession of
Nice to which the statesmen had, ere this, assented. He was bitter in
his feeling toward Victor Emmanuel's minister, but he was loyal to
Victor Emmanuel. His band of volunteers, known as the Thousand,
marched in the King's name, and the chief refused to enrol those whose
Republican sentiments made them dislike the idea of Italian unity.
"Italy and Victor Emmanuel," {204} the cry of the Hunters of the Alps,
was the avowed object of his enterprise.

Garibaldi sailed amid intense excitement, proudly promising "a new and
glorious jewel" to the King of Sardinia, if the venture were
successful. The standard of revolt had already been raised by Rosaline
Pilo, the handsome Sicilian noble, whose whole life had been devoted to
the cause of country. The insurgents awaited Garibaldi with a feverish
desire for success against the Neapolitan army, which numbered 150,000
men. They knew that the leader brought only few soldiers but that they
were picked men. Strange stories had been told of Garibaldi's success
in warfare, being due to supernatural intervention. The prayers of his
beautiful old peasant-mother were said to have prevailed till her
death, when her spirit came to hold converse with the hero before
battle.

[Illustration: The Meeting of Victor Emmanuel and Garibaldi (Pietro
Aldi)]

The Red-shirts landed at Marsala, a thousand strong, packed into
merchant vessels by a patriotic owner. Garibaldi led them to the
mountain city of Salemi, which had opposed the Bourbon dynasty warmly.
There he proclaimed himself dictator of Sicily in the name of Victor
Emmanuel, soon to be ruler of all Italy. Peasants joined the Thousand,
armed with rusty pistols and clad in pi