_Foro_ becoming law, and the last sacraments
were denied to him because he refused to sign a retractation of the
political acts of the cabinet of which he was a member. Cavour was an
old friend of Santa Rosa. He was present when he died, and he heard
from the Countess the particulars of the distressing scene when the
priest in the harshest manner withheld the consolations of religion
from the dying man, who was a pious Catholic, but who had the strength
of mind even in death not to dishonour himself and his colleagues.
Cavour wrote an indignant article in the _Risorgimento_ denouncing the
party spite which could cause such cruel anguish under a religious
cloak, and the people of Turin became so much excited that if the
further indignity of a refusal of Christian burial had been resorted
to, as at first seemed probable, the lives of the priests in the city
would hardly have been safe. Everything seemed to point to Cavour as
Santa Rosa's successor, but Massimo d'Azeglio felt nervous at taking
the final step. He was encouraged to it by General La Marmora, the
friend of both, who declared that "Camillo was a _gran buon diavolo_,"
who would grow more moderate when "with us." Cavour accepted the
offered post of Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, but not without
making terms. He exacted the retirement of a minister whom he
considered incurably timorous, especially in ecclesiastical
legislation. The point was yielded, but D'Azeglio said to La Marmora,
"We are beginning badly with your _buon diavolo_." The good Massimo
got no comfort from the king: "Don't you see that this man will turn
you all out?" Victor Emmanuel casually remarked, or rather he made use
of a stronger idiom in his native dialect, which would not well bear
translation. The king refrained from opposing the appointment, but he
did not pretend that he liked it.

About that time Cavour paid a visit to the Piedmontese shore of the
Lago Maggiore, where he made the acquaintance of the author of the
_Promessi Sposi_. Perhaps by reason of his poetic instinct Manzoni
expected great things of him from the first. "That little man promises
very well," he told the poet Berchet. And he opened his heart to
Cavour, telling him that dream of Italian unity which he had always
cherished, but which, as he said in his old age, he kept a secret for
fear of being thought a madman. They looked across the blue line of
water; there, on the other side, was Austria. Had Cavour said wha