did any thing that fell from him announce the intention of employing force; and it is certain that these young men had no idea that their complaints would be answered by the sabre; they were even told they should have an answer in two hours. A quarter of an hour had elapsed, and the answer was brought by four companies of grenadiers.

The principle of severity got the better. But it will be seen presently, whether the authors of this determination had no other motive than to restore order, or whether they were desirous of intimidating public opinion by a cruel lesson. It is but justice to say that Count Balba was in no way to blame. He had recourse only to mild measures, and would have been placed in an unpleasant predicament by the event, if his reputation for probity had not placed him even beyond the reach of suspicion.

I must observe, that the number of these students did not exceed 200 or 300: they had, it is true, arrived at the highest degree of presumption (exaltation). They walked about under the piazzas like madmen, exclaiming: "We demand our comrades, and we will have them, cost us what it may." They wrung their hands, embraced each other, swearing to live and die together; but, amidst all this folly, no cry of revolt was set up amongst them. The word Constitution was never named by them. They were mere children, aggravated by injustice.

The grenadiers arrive at seven o'clock at night; they were commanded by the Chevalier Ignace Thaon de Revel, Count of Pratolongo, governor of Turin. Several officers belonging to different regiments, and some of the body-guard, followed the Governor by an impulse that might have been termed zeal, if the conduct of the greater part of them had not stamped it with a very different character. Count Castelborgo, commandant of the province, began to harangue the students, who thereupon threw several stones at the grenadiers. I confess this circumstance: but it is also true, that there was scarcely time for these young people to hear the warning to retire: for there were persons present who reflected with pain on the bloody scene which was about to take place, whilst others regarded as a mere form the words spoken by the Governor to the grenadiers on quitting their barracks: "Remember that they are but children." Besides, the Governor was there; and it behoved him to prove that these expressions came from the heart of this we shall be able to judge. The doors are broke open, and the unarmed students dispersed by the bayonet. Some stones thrown from the galleries terminate a resistance, which could not but prove fruitless. Nothing would have been easier at this time than to stop the effusion of blood, and bring every thing back to order; but this was not the object of a certain party.

The students are pursued up the staircases, into the schools, even to the Professors' chairs; and, shocking to relate, there were young men sabred in the chapel, and on the very steps of the altar In the midst of this disgraceful carnage, it is pleasing to be able to mention some names without blushing. Colonel Ciravegna kept back his grenadiers, and, wrapped in his cloak, and favored by his tall figure, saved more than one victim. Count Cesar Balba, son of the minister, and the Chevalier Angelino Olivieri, rushed into the thick of the fray to restrain the soldiers.

Five and twenty students were carried off wounded to the hospital; many others, although wounded, contrived to escape from the carbineers, and reach their homes. It was soon ascertained that there were few of the wounded that had not received sabre cuts. Some, indeed, had been slashed, and others maimed in a shocking manner. It was not then by the bayonet that the most blood was shed! a circumstance that was repeated with horror in every company. Cries of indignation arose; and there seemed to be but one opinion. Never was public feeling more forcibly expressed, especially by the women; and the odious appellation of Sabreurs was applied to certain officers, whom I shall abstain from naming; they are in fact already too well known.

The University was not shut up; but many of the students were sent to their homes, and the remainder dispersed in several schools that were opened in different quarters of the town. Patroles of horse were continually traversing the streets of Turin.

The Government thought, or affected to think, that the 12th of January 1821 was a sort of prelude to revolution; it was no such thing. The friends of liberty were total strangers to the enterprise of these scholars, and had lamented its sad termination: but it was easy to foresee that the event would be attended with results favorable to the Liberal cause. Public opinion had proclaimed that the popular hatred would be entailed on those soldiers who should embrue their hands in the blood of their brethren ; and facts, speaking a language to which alone the common people will listen, taught them how many misfortunes may be brought on by the non-execution of the laws, and the capricious conduct of the police: but it was highly important that the great cause should not be stained by acts of individual vengeance. This was the object of our most anxious solicitude. There were some among the students whose minds were filled with wrath: they went to see their friends in the hospital, they heard their groans, they witnessed those suf

A rumour was whispered at Turin, of the death of several students, whose bodies, it was said, had been removed under cover of night, and secretly buried. I have heard some probable grounds as to this fact; but probabilities are not proofs, and I therefore give it only as a popular report.

ferings worse than death. Several Liberals promised these young people to call down a legal vengeance on the authors of the 12th January, when the reign of the laws should have arrived. They conjured them to await that solemn day, to consecrate their lives to attain it, and to leave to the enemies of liberty garments dyed with civic blood. I might here enter into details which would show in what detestation the Liberals regarded the sanguinary career which the devoted friends of absolute monarchy had opened out to the Piedmontese.

The two months that elapsed between the 12th January and our revolution, were passed in a state of apparent tranquillity which seemed to forebode a storm. The Piedmontese silently watched each other, and asked questions with their eyes oftener than their voice, with a view to discover each other's sentiments. Let it be recollected that the minds of the public had already been agitated, on the 1st January, by the harangue of the chief president of the senate, of which I have spoken, and that the occurrence of the 12th must have materially increased the general discontent and uneasiness. A discerning and active police would have detected the conspiracy: but establishments of police are in general more apt to render hateful, than to preserve, those governments which depend on their care.

What occurred in the beginning of March is one of the most palpable proofs of this. The Prince de la Cisterna, the Marquis de Prié, and the Chevalier Hector de Perron were arrested, the first on the French frontier, the other two at Turin. The agents of government imagined they had frustrated a conspiracy; but it turned out that neither of the three individuals had any concern in that which was about to explode. The private papers of Prince Cisterna were seized; and though they might serve to place in

'After the 12th January, the Governor took his walks under the Piazzas of the Rue du Pô, at night-fall, and alone. A citizen of Turin, a true friend of liberty, followed him at a short distance, with the view of interposing himself between the Governor and the first student who should attempt his life. One evening, when he had taken his station on the Castle walk, he meets a young student who was known to him. His fixed look and pallid complexion alarmed the honest citizen. He goes up to him: "What do you here? where are you going?" The student is silent, and avoids the looks of his friend. "What have you there," continues the other, opening the young man's cloak, "a poniard! wretched man! what are you going to do with it?"-"To avenge my comrades?" he replies, in a stern voice. The citizen embraces him, leads him away, speaks to him the language of virtue, and with such force and sensibility, that the student swears to abandon his design. What a pity I cannot tell the name of this worthy man! His disinterestedness, his love for liberty, the simplicity and amiableness of his manners, would make him one of the best citizens of a free state.

VOL. XIX.

Pam.

NO. XXXVII.

C

a strong light the liberality of his principles and the warmth of his patriotism, it also became evident that there was no question of employing force. The Marquis de Prié could have no other fault in the eyes of government than having spoken for some time past the language of freedom. The crime of the Chevalier Perron consisted in an ardent but ill-dissembled attachment to the great Italian cause.

But the Court and the Ministers in general entertained a deep resentment against Prince Cisterna and his friends. He publicly professed his opposition to government, and had kept himself aloof from public affairs from the time of the death of his father, and in his name had solicited certain legal exemptions, not with the view of depriving the creditors of his family of their rights, as many of the Noblesse have done, but in order more promptly to satisfy the incumbrances on his entailed estates. His situation in society, his generous disposition, his personal acquirements, in short every thing seemed to designate him for the leader of a party, and as one who would be the more likely to justify the confidence of the Italian Liberals, because he had no vestige remaining of that aristocratic spirit which might give them alarm. He however never assumed that post; and I have always considered as unfortunate for the country those circumstances which kept him at a distance from Piedmont during the winter of 1820, and caused him to be thrown into a state-prison the moment he arrived.

The arrests I have mentioned were a warning to the friends of liberty to make a proper estimate of their forces, and to set them in motion without further delay. The Austrian army was in full march, and could not retrace its steps with the view of overwhelming us before we were prepared to receive it. It was besides important to encourage the Neapolitans after their first encounters, by the display of an auxiliary force at the other extremity of Italy. Some people thought it would be better for us to wait the issue of affairs in Naples; but most of the leaders of the conspiracy considered, that if these encounters, however unimportant, should turn out to the disadvantage of the Neapolitans, the Piedmontese would grow cool in the cause.

It will be concluded, from all I have said of the character of the King, that he did not participate in this resentment; I have even reason to think that he felt the greatest reluctance in consenting to the recent arrests. It is false, besides, that a letter of Prince Cisterna to his sister, seized amongst his correspondence, was transmitted to its address unopened. The author of the pamphlet entitled Thirty Days' Revolution,' who relates this fact, has been misinformed. The letter was returned to Prince Cisterna, open, after he came out of prison. I wish to believe that the King has respected family secrets; but he has either not enjoined his Police Minister to respect them also, or he has been ill obeyed.

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The conspiracy was not without leaders, but it had no head, The individual who naturally occurred to our minds as best quali fied to fill this important station was General Gifflenga. A Lieutenant-General and Inspector of Cavalry, well known in the Piedmontese army and in the former Army of Italy; signalised by his gallantry in the campaign of 1812, and by his skilful conduct in the winter campaign of the Viceroy of Italy in 1814; possessing personal courage and a cool judgment; well acquainted with men, and knowing how to lead them such was the man who was afforded a chance of showing himself the Washington of Northern Italy, and who, in the worst issue of things, could but have met with the enviable fate of Kosciusko: but unfortunately, bred up in the school of Napoleon, riches and grandeur were his greatest attraction, and he looked on glory as but a secondary object. He had, besides, the misfortune to possess a certain subtilty of character, accompanied by a wish to appear over-wise, and to leave nothing to the decision of chance. In the present day, too great a refinement and too complex a manner of viewing things are calculated to prove the ruin of reputation. Even the passions themselves are perhaps better guides, because their course is more direct and more constant.

Gifflenga, it must be admitted, had not the smallest confidence in the Neapolitans; and possessing too much discernment not to see that the success of our revolution depended on their resistance, I can easily conceive the reluctance he must feel to place himself at the head of the Piedmontese conspiracy. And indeed the faults I would lay to his charge, rather apply to his conduct subsequently to the consummation of our revolution. At this latter period, whether we regard him as a Piedmontese or an Italian, his line of duty was clear; and a man at once devoted to his country and mindful of his reputation could not have hesitated as to the course he should adopt.

Although the conspirators were without a principal, still had they a right to reckon upon a young prince who had long since attracted the attention of all Italy: it will be easily perceived of whom I am speaking. Ah! here it is that I would willingly keep silence, and that I have long hesitated to lift up the veil: but my silence would be of little use. Public opinion is loud and universal in his condemnation. I will not aggravate his faults. Would that I could excuse, and that he could make amends for them!

Charles Albert of Savoy, Prince of Carignan, was restored to that dignity at the age of seventeen. Whether he was actuated by a desire of following the opinions of the day, or by a secret ambition, or whether in his heart he felt a propensity for true glory, it was not long before he showed a disposition in harmony