Italian Government (or rather La Marmora, for there were
then two Italian Governments, and the real one was on the Mincio) with
his own expectation of Prussian disasters, and it is possible that
this expectation had a material and unfavourable influence on the
manner of conducting the war in Italy.

Through the Prussian Minister at Florence, General La Marmora received
the draft of a plan of campaign which is known to have been prepared
by Count Moltke; in it the great feature was a descent on the
Dalmatian coast. From an independent quarter he received another plan
in which a descent on the east coast of the Adriatic was contemplated,
the main difference being that Istria, instead of Dalmatia, was
proposed for the landing-point. This second plan was modestly
submitted to him by Garibaldi, who was thus in substantial accord with
the Prussian strategist. The prospect which either of these plans
opened was one of great fascination. What Italian can look across the
sea to where the sun rises and forget that along that horizon lies a
land colonised by Rome and guarded for four hundred years by Venice?

Istria was marked out by Dante as the frontier province of Italy:

Si come a Pola presso del Quarnero
Che Italia chiude e i suoi termini bagna.

It forms, with the Trentino, what is called _Italia Irredenta_.
Although the feeling of Italians for unredeemed Italy is not what
their feeling was for Lombardy or Venetia, it is a mistake to imagine
that they have renounced all aspirations in that direction. Only
fanatics of the worst kind would be disposed to attempt, in the
present situation, to win those provinces by force, but that has
nothing to do with the matter. The aspiration exists and cannot help
existing. It has always been shared by patriots of all denominations.
An English statesman who called on Pius IX. was somewhat surprised by
the Pope saying that Italian unity was very well, but it was a pity it
did not include Trento and Trieste.

The case of Dalmatia is different; there the mass of the population is
unquestionably of a non-Italian race, though that race is one which,
whenever left to itself, seems created to amalgamate with the Italian.
Slav and Teuton are racially antagonistic, but the Slav falls into
Italian ways, speaks the Italian language and mixes his blood with
Italian blood: with what results Venice can tell. For more than two
thousand years the civilisation of Dalmatia has been exclusively
La