as a representative of a “state,” and obtained from Count de
Rémusat, French foreign minister, a formal declaration that the
presence of Father Secchi on that occasion could not constitute a
diplomatic precedent. The irritation displayed by Bismarck
at the Francophil attitude of Italy towards the end of the
Franco-German War gave place to a certain show of goodwill
when the great chancellor found himself in his turn involved
in a struggle against the Vatican and when the policy of Thiers
began to strain Franco-Italian relations. Thiers had consistently
opposed the emperor Napoleon’s pro-Italian policy. In the case
of Italy, as in that of Germany, he frankly regretted the constitution
of powerful homogeneous states upon the borders of France.
Personal pique accentuated this feeling in regard to Italy.
The refusal of Victor Emmanuel II. to meet Thiers at the opening
of the Mont Cenis tunnel (a refusal not unconnected with offensive
language employed at Florence in October 1870 by Thiers during
his European tour, and with his instructions to the French
minister to remain absent from Victor Emmanuel’s official
entry into Rome) had wounded the amour propre of the French
statesman, and had decreased whatever inclination he might
otherwise have felt to oppose the French Clerical agitation for
the restoration of the temporal power, and for French interference
with the Italian Religious Orders Bill. Consequently relations
between France and Italy became so strained that in 1873 both
the French minister to the Quirinal and the Italian minister to
the Republic remained for several months absent from their
posts. At this juncture the emperor of Austria invited Victor
Emmanuel to visit the Vienna Exhibition, and the Italian
government received a confidential intimation that acceptance
of the invitation to Vienna would be followed by a further
invitation from Berlin. Perceiving the advantage of a visit
to the imperial and apostolic court after the Italian occupation
of Rome and the suppression of the religious orders, and convinced
of the value of more cordial intercourse with the German
empire, Visconti-Venosta and Minghetti advised their sovereign
to accept both the Austrian and the subsequent German invitations.
The visit to Vienna took place on the 17th to the 22nd
of September, and that to Berlin on the 22nd to the 26th of
September 1873, the Italian monarch being accorded in both
capitals a most cordial reception, although the contemporaneous
publication of La Marmora’s famous pamphlet, More Light on
the Events of 1866, prevented intercourse between the Italian
ministers and Bismarck from being entirely confidential. Visconti-Venosta
and Minghetti, moreover, wisely resisted the chancellor’s
pressure to override the Law of Guarantees and to engage in an
Italian Kulturkampf. Nevertheless the royal journey contributed
notably to the establishment of cordial relations between Italy
and the central powers, relations which were further strengthened
by the visit of the emperor Francis Joseph to Victor Emmanuel
at Venice in April 1875, and by that of the German emperor
to Milan in October of the same year. Meanwhile Thiers had
given place to Marshal Macmahon, who effected a decided
improvement in Franco-Italian relations by recalling from
Civitavecchia the cruiser “Orénoque,” which since 1870 had been
stationed in that port at the disposal of the pope in case he
should desire to quit Rome. The foreign policy of Visconti-Venosta
may be said to have reinforced the international position
of Italy without sacrifice of dignity, and without the vacillation
and short-sightedness which was to characterize the ensuing
administrations of the Left.
The fall of the Right on the 18th of March 1876 was an event destined profoundly and in many respects adversely to affect the course of Italian history. Except at rare and not auspicious intervals, the Right had held office from 1849 to 1876. Its rule was associated in the popular mind with severe administration; hostility to the democratic elements represented by Garibaldi, Crispi, Depretis and Bertani; ruthless imposition and collection of taxes in order to meet the financial engagements forced upon Italy by the vicissitudes of her Risorgimento; strong predilection for Piedmontese, Lombards and Tuscans, and a steady determination, not always scrupulous in its choice of means, to retain executive power and the most important administrative offices of the state for the consorteria, or close corporation, of its own adherents. For years the men of the Left had worked to inoculate the electorate with suspicion of Conservative methods and with hatred of the imposts which they nevertheless knew to be indispensable to sound finance. In regard to the grist tax especially, the agitators of the Left had placed their party in a radically false position. Moreover, the redemption of the railways by the state—contracts for which had been signed by Sella in 1875 on behalf of the Minghetti cabinet with Rothschild at Basel and with the Austrian government at Vienna—had been fiercely opposed by the Left, although its members were for the most part convinced of the utility of the operation. When, at the beginning of March 1876, these contracts were submitted to parliament, a group of Tuscan deputies, under Cesare Correnti, joined the opposition, and on the 18th of March took advantage of a chance motion concerning the date of discussion of an interpellation on the grist tax to place the Minghetti cabinet in a minority. Depretis, ex-pro-dictator of Sicily, and successor of Rattazzi in the leadership of the Left, was entrusted by the king with the formation of a Liberal ministry. Besides the premiership, Depretis assumed the First Depretis Cabinet. portfolio of finance; Nicotera, an ex-Garibaldian of somewhat tarnished reputation, but a man of energetic and conservative temperament, was placed at the ministry of the interior; public works were entrusted to Zanardelli, a Radical doctrinaire of considerable juridical attainments; General Mezzacapo and Signor Brin replaced General Ricotti Magnani and Admiral Saint-Bon at the war office and ministry of marine; while to Mancini and Coppino, prominent members of the Left, were allotted the portfolios of justice and public instruction. Great difficulty was experienced in finding a foreign minister willing to challenge comparison with Visconti-Venosta. Several diplomatists in active service were approached, but, partly on account of their refusal, and partly from the desire of the Left to avoid giving so important a post to a diplomatist bound by ties of friendship or of interest to the Right, the choice fell upon Melegari, Italian minister at Bern.
The new ministers had long since made monarchical professions of faith, but, up to the moment of taking office, were nevertheless considered to be tinged with an almost revolutionary hue. The king alone appeared to feel no misgiving. His shrewd sense of political expediency and his loyalty to constitutional principles saved him from the error of obstructing the advent and driving into an anti-dynastic attitude politicians who had succeeded in winning popular favour. Indeed, the patriotism and loyalty of the new ministers were above suspicion. Danger lay rather in entrusting men schooled in political conspiracy and in unscrupulous parliamentary opposition with the government of a young state still beset by enemies at home and abroad. As an opposition party the Left had lived upon the facile credit of political promises, but had no well-considered programme nor other discipline nor unity of purpose than that born of the common eagerness of its leaders for office and their common hostility to the Right. Neither Depretis, Nicotera, Crispi, Cairoli nor Zanardelli was disposed permanently to recognize the superiority of any one chief. The dissensions which broke out among them within a few months of the accession of their party to power never afterwards disappeared, except at rare moments when it became necessary to unite in preventing the return of the Conservatives. Considerations such as these could not be expected to appeal to the nation at large, which hailed the advent of the Left as the dawn of an era of unlimited popular sovereignty, diminished administrative pressure, reduction of taxation and general prosperity. The programme of Depretis corresponded only in part to these expectations. Its chief points were extension of the franchise, incompatibility of a Programme of the Left. parliamentary mandate with an official position, strict enforcement of the rights of the State in regard to the Church, protection of freedom of conscience, maintenance of the military and naval policy inaugurated by the Conservatives, acceptance of the railway redemption contracts, consolidation of the financial equilibrium, abolition of the forced
