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    Untitled Article

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    THE TRIUMPH AT NAPLES,

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    MR. ROEBUCK'S POLITICAL DYSPEPSIA.

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    ALL the Sovereigns of Europe may learn a lesson from the undignified exit of the young gentleman who recently came into possession of the crown of the Two Sicilies , with a considerable revenue , a powerful army , and a people disposed to be contented . with very moderate reforms . The courts of England and France gave the new Sovereign obvious warnings and excellent advice . In his own dominions were men who pointed out the path of honour and safety ; and in the kingdom of Sardinia he saw an example well fitted for a nursery story—of how good behaviour was rewarded , and a honest and

    little King- made into a great one because he was true . To all these sights and sounds the last of the Neapolitan Bourbons was blind and deaf . He had been brought up to hate liberty and scorn justice ; to listen to the evil counsel of intriguing priests ; and to believe that heaven and earth would work miracles to enable an ignorant and vicious young man to revel in the satanic luxury of a brutal and despotic rule . His people were too enervated to throw off his yoke and effect their own liberation ; but from the hardier region of the North of Italy a , man set out—in the Charles Napier style—with a piece of soap and a towel—and with a handful of half-trained followers he declared his intention of overthrowing an old sovereignty which had great arsenals and while the

    80 , 000 soldiers at its command . In a little King of Two Sicilies was reduced to the King of One Sicily . There was a desperate skirmish , but . no great battle ; and the island crowned by Mount Etna , famous in classic story , and celebrated for having possessed a constitution older than that of England was once more free ; The Manof the Hour set outagain , landed in Calabria , did aj little more clever skirmishing , and sent word to Naples that he woxdd arrive there on a particular day , and take the Government into his own hands . The time came , and the representative of Italy reached the city of Parthenope . He had with him no force of arms , no means of compelling obedience to his commands ; but as he entered at one door , Bourbon royalty \ vent put at the other , and Francis II . vanished like a puff of bad smoke , leaving an evil

    odour behind . , Iii other stories of the fall of Kings there has been some ting e of tragic grandeur , or at least some elements of decency or dignity ; but in this case Francis II . made a more despicable Sovereign than the worst actor that ever strutted upon the melo-dramatic boards . The " great" Napoleon got Talma to teach him Iioav to put on his imperial robes , and strut and frown as an ernperor should . ; but Francis II . had not even a theatrical education . He did not know what to do with himself because he had no manner of belief in

    himself , and he fell from the rash confidence of presumptuous ignorance to the self-annihilation of hopeless imbecility . Morally and materially he was nowhere . His nobles and his coux'tiers , his generals and his admirals , could find nothing to support . He was too impalpable for loyalty to stick to , too rickety a peg to sustain , any manner of crown—even that of martyrdom could not stand on so weak a head . We may hear of the young gentleman loitering about the Courts pf Spain or G-ermany , but history has rubbed him out before she had finished inscribing his name .

    The old superstition Avhich adhered to anything that called itself a King , has left the world , and the whole fraternity of Sovereigns are startled at the facility with which one of their order has passed away . Italy is foitunatc in having a Gaiuualdi , and Europe is fortunate' in having the story , of how he went to Naples , to tell .. In every land this noblo tale is passing from immth to mouth ; it is kindling new flames of patriotic ambition in . the sunny south , and warming up the regions of the icy north . In many a land the people feel that they too Avant a GJ-aribaldi . Gormany has neod of one to hid her rabble of selfish . Princes vanish into smoke . Austria needs

    one to snuff out Francis Josisrii , and introduce a government based upon popular right . Russia wants one to lay the foundation of free institutions , and curtail the absolutism of the Cscar . Franco will require her Gaiu baldi when the Ianpexial fever-fili lias passed away . Although England has got beyond the warrior ' s sword , sho too wants a Garibaldi of poaco to rouso tho pooplo to a perception of their rights , and wring from tlio aristocracy a jitst measuro of parliamentary reform . .

    Successful in the Two Sicilies , \ vq trust tho cause of Italian nationality will be no less so in the Roman States , to which Sardinia haa wisely sent ; her troops . It was impossible for Victor Emmanuel to stand s till as the diplomatists wished . Gabxbaldi and Mazzxni , between whom , notwithstanding islanders to the contrary , there appears perfect unanimity , as

    far as action is concerned , represent forces which impel Sardinia onwards . Victor . Emmanuel must be King of Italy , or king of nothing ; To Ithis he is called by the general voice of the land ,. and he is wise in makinga willing response . : The non-intervention of Austria was a fraud , thousands of her best troops were in the Papal army , and if Victor Emmanuel had hesitated , a series of Perugia massacres would have speedily taken place . The speech of the King of Italy was worthy of the occasion , and those Sovereigns who disapprove of his proceedings , cannot deny that they tend to prevent revolution , and establish a possibility of peace .

    Meanwhile Emperors and Kings plot together , and as the news runs , Francis Joseph and the Czar exchange professions of friendship . An Austro-Russian alliance might at a former period , have been the signal for tremendous exertions to put " right divine" on its legs again , but times have changed , and Alexander will not dare to repeat the invasion of Hungary , merely to sustain a principle , and gain no personal advantage from a costly war . Up to these days the rich money Jews have been profound believers in the old despotisms , and easily managed to obtain the loans they required . Now Austria has brought her credit below that of Turkev , and Russia can get absolutist The

    no one to provide the money for an war . military expenditure of Austria , and the interest of her debt will absorb all the revenues she can raise , and any representative bodies she can form will protest against the system that has led to such a bankrupt result . The blandest person of the hour is the Emperor ISTa polbon III . He could make nothing of the phlegmatic Prince of Prussia , and the two potentates twiddled their moustaches , and looked at their boots during- the Toplitz interview , because they could contrive no basis upon which a diplomatic conversation was to proceed . Out of the quarrels of Kings and their subjects , Louis Napoleon ' s opportunities may arise . As he stands on the shores of the Mediterranean * " envious

    murmurs reach him from afar / ' but what matter , " ^ the works pf peace are in his eye as beautiful as crowns of laurel . " The innocence is quite pastoral , and might be believed in if forts were not rising contrary to European law . in the neutralised territory stolen froni the Swiss , and if all France as well as the rest of the world could not see the Imperial eye squinting at the Rhine . The French Treaty goes on bravely , but the nations are not yet tied together indissolubly by spun cotton , and England will do well to double her volunteers , and render her navy still more formidable as a " preventive check . " The German Potentates and Russia are murmuring threats

    pf intervention if the popular movement finds its way Hungary . Against this England should protest . The rights of the Hungarians are as sacred as those of the Italians , and Bonopartist ambition would be finely served , if he could rally all the elements of revolution and nationality around him ; and as the price of his assistance , demand the frontier of the Rhine .

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    THE Cutler ' s lfeast of last week ' afforded tho honourable and learned member for Sheffield , who delights in the self-imposed name of " Tear ' , " ah opportunity of favouring the country with his opinions on divers questions . He began by praising the men of Sheffield for having left him alone during the session , and not having « pestered" him with their suggestions . " His course had been entirely unprejudiced by almost any observation on the part of his constituents . " With reference to the position of an M . P ., he remarked , " while he is acting for them , any , pestering , any call of interest , or telling him that his constituents think this , that , or the other is wholly foreign to the representative system . " Mr . Roeiujok belongs tp a school of politicians who think they prove their trust tne

    honesty by exhibiting their ill manners . Indeed we school is confined to ¦ himself , and that no one else would have tho bad taste to call an expression of opinion on the part of his constituents a piece of " pestering . " A man must be wonderfully full of conceit , or waspishness , to resont a reasonable intercourse or exchange of opinions between the electors , tho elected , and the theory of representation put forward by Mr . Kobduok , although by no moans novel , is decidedly wrong . Tho services of mon of ability and integrity oan only bo had upon honourable terms , and no man i \ t for a m&cnhar oi I avliament would consent to be a mere puppet , whose strings jus constituents wore to pull at their discretion j but ttiero w » wide difference between this , and H" » t <™ pu « j »> ° i . iH » lfl ° -

    pondenoe whioh Mr . Eokbuck olaimi ? . «« w : A 1 , Historically he is' in - error , and may remember aouuo us passage in Coke , which shows that members formerly considered themselves bound to represent the views oi those who

    Untitled Article

    Sept . 15 , 1860 ] The Saturday Analyst and Leader . 795

    The Triumph At Naples,

    THE TRIUMPH AT NAPLES ,

    Mr. Roebuck's Political Dyspepsia.

    MR . ROEBUCK'S POLITICAL DYSPEPSIA .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 15, 1860, page 795, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2365/page/3/