hroughout Italy, nothing could save her;
the problem would be solved by war or revolution.

It ought to have been apparent that, as far as Piedmont was concerned,
the control of the situation had passed out of the hands of the
Government. The youth of Lombardy was streaming into the country to
enlist either in the army or in the corps of "Hunters of the Alps,"
which was now formed. Cavour looked on this patriotic invasion with
delight; "They may throw me into the Po," he said, "but I will not
stop it." Had he wished, he could not have stopped the current of
popular excitement at the point it had reached. It was the knowledge
of this, joined to the threatened destruction of all his hopes, that
well-nigh overpowered him when--at the eleventh hour--in spite of
engagements and treaties, Napoleon seemed to have suddenly decided not
to go to war. Prince Bismarck once declared that he had never found it
possible to tell in advance whether his plans would succeed; he could
navigate among political events, but he could not direct them. Since
the meeting at Plombieres, Cavour had undertaken to direct events,
the most perilous game at which a statesman can play. For a moment he
thought that he had failed.

CHAPTER IX

THE WAR OF 1859--VILLAFRANCA

On the whole it can be safely assumed that Napoleon's hark back was
real, and was not a move "pour mieux sauter." He was not pleased at
the cool reception given in Italy to a pamphlet known to have been
inspired by him, in which the old scheme was revived of a federation
of Italian States under the presidency of the Pope. The Empress was
against war--it was said "for fear of a reverse." Perhaps she thought
already what she said when flying from Paris in 1870: "En France il ne
faut pas etre malheureux." But more than this fear, anxiety for the
head of the Church made her anti-Italian, and, with her, the whole
clerical party. Nor was this the limit of the opposition which the
proposed war of liberation encountered. Though France did not know of
the secret treaty, she knew enough to understand by this time where
she was being led, and with singular unanimity she protested. When
such different persons as Guizot; Lamartine, and Proudhon pronounced
against a free Italy,--when no one except the Paris workman showed
the slightest enthusiasm for the war,--it is hardly surprising if
Napoleon, seized with alarm for his dynasty, was glad of any plausible
excuse for a retreat. Such an ex