SUCCESS OF PRUSSIA AGAINST AUSTRIA. I

fighting for, worth dying for, if need be. ‘ I appreciate this anxiety about the lives of the princes,’ he said, ‘ but my sons are soldiers and must fight. If we princes of Savoy remained at home at ease while our soldiers fought for us, we should end like the Bourbons of Naples.’

Meantime the Prussian arms were everywhere victorious over Austria, and about ten days after the battle of Custozza it was announced in the Moniteur that Austria had asked the Emperor Napoleon’s médiation, offering to cede him Venice, and that he was making over that province to the King of Italy. Italy could not accept it without the consent of her ally Prussia ; and while negotiations were going forward on the subject, the brief seven weeks’ campaign was brought to a conclusion by the great victory of Sadowa, and on July 26 the preliminaries of peace were signed by the Austrian and Prussian plenipotentiaries,

Though defeated by the Prussians, the Austrians had been victorious in two encounters with the Italians, and these reverses, coming after such sanguine expectations, having sunk the country in gloom and misery, the national misfortune had to be accounted for by imputirig mismanagement to the government,

The king, finding his army very much diminished, and hemmed in between the Austrian forces, the Po and the Adige, began to see the necessity of an immédiate armistice. But to take upon himself the responsibility of concluding an armistice, so sure to be unpopular, would be rash. He despatched General Menabrea to

Il8 LIFE OF VICTOR EMMANUEL IL

Florence to explain the desperate state of things at the seat of war, and ask the approval of the govemment to what was an unavoidable step. To wait for a reply might be dangerous ; and the king and General La Marmora opened negotiations with the Austrians at once, resolved to disregard every considération but what was best for the country.

It was then that La Marmora, with that highsouled loyalty which always distinguished him, resolved to throw himself between the king and the nation. A constitutional sovereign must not be permitted by his minister to do anything that would bring upon him the odium of his people. ‘ I take the whole responsibility, whatever may happen,’ said he.

‘ This is too much, dear La Marmora,’ replied Victor Emmanuel, pressir.g both his hands with émotion ; ‘ I must hâve my share.’

The king and the general sustained each other in their patriotic resolution to conclude an armistice. ‘ They will accuse us of having betrayed the country,’ said Victor, ‘ but we will sacrifice even our réputation to preserve the army, and with it the nation.’

The govemment approved of the armistice. Venice was restored to Italy by the Emperor of France, with the approval of Prussia. There was a sting in the thought that it was not wrung from the talons of the Austrian eagle by the valeur of Italian arms, but by the force of diplomacy ; still it was a delightful fact that Venice was free, with the tricolour waving on St. Mark’s. The Italian soil was delivered from foreign occupation ;