ITALY.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 4, Issue 193, 31 May 1860, Page 4

ITALY.

The National Italian Parliament is to meet April 2nd, * Napoleon claims Savoy, Sardinia consents to cede to it.

Switzerland has protested against the annexation. The proposed annexation is strongly condemned by nearly all the powers. The affairs of Central Italy have reached a crisis. After the rejection of the English proposals by two .European Governments, Napoleon proposed jto the Turin Cabinet to withdraw his 60,000 troops, and to annex Parma and Modena to Piedmont, to erect Tuscany into a separate kingdom, an<l to con fer on Victor Emmanuel the administration oi the Romagna, as the Vicar of the Pope, Count Cavour nobly refused to acquiesce in an arrangement so distasteful to the Italian people, and intimated the resolve of the King to abide by the decision of the people. . On the 11th and 12th instant the entire male population of . Tuscany, Parma, Modena, and Bologna voted almost unanimouslyin favor of annexation to Sardinia.; Should the French army 'withdraw, United Italy can muster 200,000 fighting men to repel the intrusion of their Austrian or Neapolitan foe. The .Neapolitan Government, mad with terror, is making arrests by wholesale among the respectable classes. The prisons are c hoked. British and French ships of war are ordered to Naples. Kevolution is imminent. In Sicily political arrests and excesses of the police are increasing. Political prisoners have died under torture. A proclamation is in circulation exhorting the Sicilians to rise. It says, Let us hope that Naples will follow our example. The time for moderation has passed away ; henceforth we must be daring ; let us rise in the name of Italian nationality, and to the cry of ‘ Italy and Victor Immanuel for

ever.’ ”

Upwards of a hundred of the most respectable inhabitants of'Venice have been carried off by steamer to Trieste, for various inland prisons. General Garibaldi has received a present from the Americans of New York,, consisting of a handsome revolving rifle, which will fire 30 shots without being reloaded. The municipality of Milan have offered Victor Emmanuel 3,000,000 francs to aid him in supporting a national sovereignty ; other similar adhesions are expected.

The King of Sardinia is under the ban of the Pope. The Holy Father reserves to himself the duty of taking into consideration the interests of the Universal Church and the good Catholics of Piedmont before proceeding to severe measures, which in any event weigh from henceforth upon the person of the king.

The Government of the Holy See, in reply to France, refuses to regard the settlement of the Papal patrimony as a political question. It is reported that a great majority of the Roraagnese have resolved to turn Protestants rather then fall again tinder the government of the Pope in any form whatever. The correspondent of the Times at Florence gives a rather graphic description of the present state of mind of the Pope:—“Nothing in the world equals the peevishness and fidgettiness the Pope evinces at this present crisis. He had been gathering embonpoint during the period of leisure and security from 1849 to 1859 ; but these few weeks, since the publication of ‘ the Pope and the Congress,’ are not unlikely to wear him to a shadow. His great fear now is, or was till very lately (for the latest news talks of a reassuring communication from the Z’uileries to the -Vatican), a new secession of the Gallican Church from the bosom of Rome. 4 lt has pleased the Almighty,’ the Pope has been heard to say, ‘ to punish us at this present season; these are says of trial and tribulation, but those of peace and consolation will follow.’ 4.he Pontiffs visions are only of the Immaculate Conception, treading under her feet, not the serpent, but his great Imperial political enemy. This pet Madonna of his, (he Sine Labe, the new dogma and mystery which constitute the great achievement of his Pontificate, is balm upon tho sores of his wounded soul. His religion, such as it is, blends with all his thoughts and feelings, and he wonders how other men can be so utterly engrossed with mere worldly concerns. ‘ They all plague themselves about Italy, and no one thinks of Mary,’ he says ; ‘ they talk about independence, and do not see that they are under the thraldom of the Devil.’ A few days ago he was walking out of the Porta Angelica, preceded and followed by his Noble Guards, accompanied by two Monsignori. He was conversing with the prelates on the above matters, when he stopped short before an old countryman, who was kneeling on the high road, soliciting his blessing. * Are you a Christian ?’ asked the Pope, and as the poor fellow, all taken aback, was dumb, the question was again and again repeated with sharp eagerness. ‘ Please your Holiness, I am ’ [Santo Padre, si), at last stammered out the countryman. ‘Do you know the ten commandments ?’ pursued the apostolical catechist. ‘ Santo Padre, si/ was again the answer, whereupon the Pontiff bade him tell them one Dy one. xile poof aufltnv uuUcd -follow one or two, then jumped over to the fifth or sixth, perceived his mistake, and his confusion became worse confounded, till he fairly broke down. The Pope then walked on with his suite, and said triumphantly, ‘ Let the people learn God’s commandments by heart, and then they will be fit for independence.’ The anec dote is interesting; it is given to me as authentic, and at any rate si non e vero e bentirovato. That the Pope is subject tofits of ungovernable irritation is a matter no one seems to doubt. Moments of maudlin depression follow close upon periods of hysteric elation. He is greatly addicted to a retrospective survey and vindication of his own conduct; he strives hard to be at peace with himself, to reconcile his liberal freaks of the earlier with the severe reactionary measures of the latter part of his reign. He is, in his own conceit, the man ever sinned against, never sinning; and when the thoughts of impending evils crowd upon him, he takes shelter in his favourite retreat of the ‘ catacombs,’ or says, with a climax of enthusiasm, ‘ We shall rehew for the world’s edification Celestine V.’s sublime act of self-denial; we shall repair to a cloister; we shall put on a monk’s frock, and resign the tiara to another strong enough to bear its burden,’ ”