Page:Great Men and Famous Women Volume 2.djvu/249

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GIUSEPPE GARIBALDI 393 the Austrians, were shot by them without any forms of trial and by an act of bar- barism which no human or divine law could justify. The heart-broken hero, with a few trusty men, made his way from the Adriatic to the Mediterranean, was ar- rested by the Sardinian Carabinieri at Chiaveri, conveyed to Genoa, where La Marmora QS in command, and there embarked for Tunis ; hence, findino- no- where a refuge, he proceeded to the Island of La Maddalena, off the shore of Sardinia, and hence again to Gibraltar and Tangier. La Marmora received the heart-broken fugitive as a brother, supplied him with ample means for his journey to Tunis, and obtained for him from the Turin Government the assignment of an honorable pension, which Garibaldi did not in his straits disdain to accept. But, in his opinion, all seemed now over for Italy; Charles Albert's son, Victor Emmanuel, after the defeat of Navara, had made his peace with Austria in March, 1849. Venice had succumbed after heroic suffer- ings in August, and Garibaldi, again crossing the ocean, settled at New York as a tallow chandler, and only came back to Europe in 1855. When Garibaldi returned from America he did not look out for Mazzini or his Republicans in England or Switzerland, but sought a home in Piedmont, a Constitutional State, which allowed him an obscure but peaceful retreat in his hermitage at Caprera, an island rock on the Sardinian coast near the Maddalena, and conveyed to him a hint that the time might soon come in which his country's cause would summon him from retirement. And, truly, four years later (1859) the destinies of Italy were nearing their fulfilment. France and Piedmont took the field against Austria. Garibaldi, leaving his island home, was met and highly welcomed by Victor Emmanuel, to whom he swore fealty as the only hope of ' Italy. He now took the command of the Chasseurs des Alpes, aided the royal army in its defence of the territory previous to the arrival of its great French auxiliary, and, following in the upper region a line parallel to that kept in the plain by the conquest of Palestro, Magenta, and Solferino, beat the Austrians at Varese and San Fermo, bewildered his adversary Urban, by the rashness of his movements on the mountains above Como, advanced upon Bergamo and Brescia, and pushed on to the Valtellina up to the very summit of the Stelvia Pass. Here the peace of Villafranca put an end to the struggle, and Garibaldi, afflicted by the arthritic pains to which he was a martyr all his life, travelled for a few days' rest to Tuscany and Genoa. At Genoa, during the autumn and winter. Garibaldi, hospitably entertained by his friend Augusto Vecchi outside the city, busied himself with that expedi- tion of " the Thousand" which made one state of the south and north of Italy. He embarked on May 1 1, i860, at Genoa, landed in Sicily, at Marsala, beat the Neapolitans at Calatafimi, followed up his success to Palermo, and, aided by the insurgent city, compelled the garrison to surrender. He again routed the Bour- bon troops at Milazzo, and had soon the whole island at his discretion with the exception of the citadel of Messina. He then crossed over into Calabria, and. almost without firing a shot, drove the Neapolitan king's troops before him all over the mainland, compelled the king to abandon the strong pass of La Cava