of July 1858, the day on which Napoleon III. and Cavour
entered into the compact that laid down the conditions of the Italian
war. The Emperor was to bring 200,000 men into Italy, and the King of
Sardinia undertook to furnish 100,000. The Austrians were to be
expelled from Italy. The kingdom of Upper Italy would embrace the
Legations and the Marches then under the Pope. Savoy would be ceded
to France. The marriage of the Emperor's cousin with the Princess
Clotilde was not made a condition of the war, and only in case it had
been made a condition, was Cavour empowered to agree to it. He,
therefore, left it uncertain; but he came away from Plombieres
convinced that nearly everything depended upon its happening. Napoleon
was beyond measure anxious for a marriage which would ally him with
one of the oldest reigning families in Europe. It would be a fatal
mistake, Cavour thought, to join the Emperor, and at the same time, to
offend him in a way which he would never forget. Directly after the
interview, he wrote a long letter to the King to persuade him to yield
the point. After all, where would the Princess find a more promising
match? Was it easy to provide husbands for princesses? Were not they
generally extremely unhappy in marriage? What had happened to the
King's four aunts, all charming princesses, who had married the Duke
of Modena, the Duke of Lucca, the Emperor Ferdinand of Austria, and
the King of Naples? Had they been happy? Prince Napoleon could not be
so very bad, as he was known to have hurried to Cannes to pay a last
visit to a woman whom he had loved, a great actress, then upon her
deathbed. This reminiscence was a singular one to evoke under the
circumstances, but Cavour was not an Englishman, and he was not
impressed by the propriety of drawing a veil over facts which everyone
knew.

The King's instinct told him that his young daughter, pious and simple
and destitute even of that seasoning of vanity which is so good and
necessary a thing in a woman, but proud at heart like all her race,
would derive no compensation from the outward brilliancy of the
Imperial Court for the absence of domestic joy which would be her
wedded lot unless a surprising change came over the bridegroom. When,
however, he was persuaded of the importance, or rather, of the
essential character of the concession, he said to Cavour: 'I am making
a great sacrifice, but I yield to your arguments. Still my consent is
subordinate to the fre