and were summoned to Paris. Prince Charles died in 1800, and his widow
married a Count de Montleart and for some years led a wandering
existence, chiefly in Switzerland, neglecting her son and giving him
mere scraps of education, now under a devotee of J.J. Rousseau, now
under a Genevan Calvinist. In 1802 King Charles Emmanuel abdicated in
favour of his brother Victor Emmanuel I.; the latter's only son being
dead, his brother Charles Felix was heir to the throne, and after him
Charles Albert. On the fall of Napoleon in 1814 the Piedmontese court
returned to Turin and the king was anxious to secure the succession for
Charles Albert, knowing that Austria meditated excluding him from it in
favour of an Austrian archduke, but at the same time he regarded him as
an objectionable person on account of his revolutionary upbringing.
Charles Albert was summoned to Turin, given tutors to instruct him in
legitimist principles, and on the 1st of October 1817 married the
archduchess Maria Theresa of Tuscany, who, on the 14th of March 1820,
gave birth to Victor Emmanuel, afterwards king of Italy.

The Piedmontese government at this time was most reactionary, and had
made a clean sweep of all French institutions. But there were strong
Italian nationalists and anti-Austrian tendencies among the younger
nobles and army officers, and the Carbonari and other revolutionary
societies had made much progress.

Their hopes centred in the young Carignano, whose agreeable manners had
endeared him to all, and who had many friends among the Liberals and
Carbonari. Early in 1820 a revolutionary movement was set on foot, and
vague plans of combined risings all over Italy and a war with Austria
were talked of. Charles Albert no doubt was aware of this, but he never
actually became a Carbonaro, and was surprised and startled when after
the outbreak of the Neapolitan revolution of 1820 some of the leading
conspirators in the Piedmontese army, including Count Santorre di
Santarosa and Count San Marzano, informed him that a military rising was
ready and that they counted on his help (2nd March 1821). He induced
them to delay the outbreak and informed the king, requesting him,
however, not to punish anyone. On the 10th the garrison of Alessandria
mutinied, and two days later Turin was in the hands of the insurgents,
the people demanding the Spanish constitution. The king at once
abdicated and appointed Charles Albert regent. The latter, pressed by
the re