ring an Italian crown for his Sovereign. 'The rule in politics,'
Cavour once observed, 'is to be as moderate in language as you are
resolute in act.'

At the end of 1855, Victor Emmanuel, with Cavour and Massimo
d'Azeglio, paid a visit to the French and English Courts. He was
received with more marked cordiality at the English Court than at the
French. No Prince Charming, indeed, but the ideal of a bluff and burly
Longobard chief, he managed to win the good graces of his
entertainers, even if they thought him a trifle barbaric. The Duchess
of Sutherland declared that of all the knights of St George whom she
had ever seen, he was the only one who would have had the best of it
in the fight with the dragon. The Queen rose at four o'clock in the
morning to take leave of him. Cavour was so much struck by the
interest which Her Majesty evinced in the efforts of Piedmont for
constitutional freedom, that he did not hesitate to call her the best
friend his country possessed in England.

It is not generally known, but it is quite true, that Victor Emmanuel
wished to contract a matrimonial alliance with the English royal
family. He did not take Cavour into his confidence, but a high English
personage was sounded on the matter, a hint being given to him to say
nothing about it to the Count. The lady who might have become Queen of
Italy was the Princess Mary of Cambridge. The negotiations were
broken off because the young Princess would not hear of any marriage
which would have required her living out of England.

The Congress which met in Paris in February 1856 for the conclusion of
the peace between the Allies and Russia was to have far more momentous
results for Italy than for the countries more immediately concerned in
its discussions, but, contrary to the general impression, it does not
appear that these results were anticipated by Cavour. He even said
that it was idle for Sardinia to send delegates to a congress in which
they would be treated like children. Cavour feared, perhaps, to lose
the ground he had gained in the previous year with Napoleon III., when
the Emperor's rather surprising question: 'Que peut-on faire pour
l'Italie?' had suggested to the Piedmontese statesman that definite
scheme of a French alliance, which henceforth he never let go. In any
case, when D'Azeglio, who was appointed Sardinian representative,
refused at the last moment to undertake a charge for which he knew he
was not fitted, it was only at t