of renouncing claims which, for a very long spell, had cast nothing but discredit on religion.  Ricasoli’s attitude towards the Temporal Power was unique in this century.  Like Dante’s, his hatred of it was religious.  He was a Catholic, not because he had never thought or studied, but because, having thought and studied, he assented, and from this standpoint he ascribed most of the wounds of the Church to her subordination of her spiritual mission to material interests.  He encouraged Padre Passaglia to collect the signatures of priests for a petition praying the Pope to cease opposing the desires of all Italy; 8943 names were affixed in a short time.  The only result of these transactions was that Cardinal Antonelli remarked to the French Government that the Holy See would never come to terms with robbers, and that, although at war with the Turin Cabinet, ’the Pope’s relations with Italy were excellent.’  More harmful to Ricasoli than the fulminations of the Vatican was the veiled but determined hostility of Napoleon III.  Cavour succeeded in more or less keeping the Emperor in ignorance of the degree to which their long partnership resembled a duel.  He made him think that he was leading while he was being led.  With Ricasoli there could be no such illusions.  Napoleon understood him to be a man whom he might break, not bend.  He thought it desirable to break him, and Imperial desires had many channels, at that time, towards fulfilment.

The Ricasoli ministry fell in February 1862, and, as a matter of course, Rattazzi was called to power.  The new premier soon ingratiated himself with the King, who found him easier to get on with than the Florentine grand seigneur; with Garibaldi, whom he persuaded that some great step in the national redemption was on the eve of accomplishment; with Napoleon, who divined in him an instrument.  Meanwhile, in his own mind, he proposed to eclipse Cavour, out-manoeuvre all parties, and make his name immortal.  This remains the most probable, as it is the most lenient interpretation to which his strange policy is open.

Garibaldi was encouraged to visit the principal towns of North Italy in order to institute the Tiro Nazionale or Rifle Association, which was said to be meant to form the basis of a permanent volunteer force on the English pattern.  For many reasons, such a scheme was not likely to succeed in Italy, but most people supposed the object to be different—­namely, the preparation of the youth of the nation for an immediate war.  The idea was strengthened when it was observed that Trescorre, in the province of Bergamo, where Garibaldi stopped to take a course of sulphur baths, became the centre of a gathering which included the greater part of his old Sicilian staff.  There was no concealment in what was done, and the Government manifested no alarm.  The air was full of rumours, and in particular much was said about a Garibaldian expedition to Greece, for which, it was stated and re-stated, Rattazzi had promised