DEATH OF CAVOUR

and put out his feeble hand. ‘ Ah, Maestà ! ’ he said, and murmured some faînt words of farewell. Victor Emmanuel, with tears in his eyes, bent down and kissed him, and departed with a heavy heart.

Next morning, June 6, he received the news of the death : and though he expected it, it was still a shock to leam that the heart and brain that beat and thought only for Italy and for him, were cold and senseless.

* Better for Italy if it were I who had died ! ’ sobbed the poor king in the privacy of his own apartments, where he gave way unrestrainedly to his grief for his own and his country’s loss. But in public he held the calm and dignified language which became his position. While gratefully acknowledging ail Cavour had been to him, and mourning for him with undisguised sorrow, he let the World know that he could stand alone, and that he meant not to deviate one iota from the bold policy on which he had entered.

The grief of ail Italy was equal to that of the king. Every patriotic Italian felt that he had lost a personal friend in the great statesman, and feared for the conséquences of his sudden demise at such a critical moment. Massimo Azeglio wrote from his retirement on Lago Maggiore to Farini : —

Thanks, dear friend, for your letter, though it made me weep afresh like a child. Poor Cavour ! It is only now I know how much I loved him. The last two days hâve seemed like a frightful dream to me. I am no longer good for anything, but I hâve prayed to heaven for our country, and a gleam of comfort

has corne to me. If God will He can save Italy cven

without Cavour.

But ît was the opinion of many that without Cavour nothing short of a miraculous interposition of Providence could save Italy.

The king, who felt he never could bestow enough honour on the memory of his illustrious minister, wanted to bury him with the royal family in Superga, but was prevented by the count’s will, which provided that he should be laid in the vault of the Cavour family.

Count Cavour’s réputation had spread to foreign lands, and ail the friendly nations sent spécial envoys to Italy with condolences and testimonies of sympathy for the misfortune which had befallen the country. The Emperor Napoléon wrote an affectionate letter to Victor Emmanuel, and sent an ambassador, which was his first récognition of the kingdom of Italy. There was a grâce in choosing the time, when the king was in trouble ‘ for the loss of the man who had most powerfully contributed to the régénération of his country.’ Camillo Cavour had cherished the dream that, Rome won and his king crowned in the Campidoglio, he would retire to repose himself under his olives at Leri and give up political life. But such a peaceful old âge was not for him. He was eut down with his armour on, in the beat of the combat, almost in the moment of victory, and like a true soldier breathed his last sigh with the battle cry of his party on his lips. ‘ Frate,’ he said, pressing the hand of his confessor, a fçw minutes before he expired, 'Frate, libéra Chiesa in libero Stato! ’