is economy, and Napoleon for his victories. No statesman
should be judged upon the testimony of his enemies. The only evidence
we should admit either for or against him, is his public acts. The
only witnesses to which any weight should be attributed are the
greatness and the prosperity of the country he governs.

Such an inquiry would, I fear, be ruinous to Antonelli. The nation
reproaches him with all the evils it has suffered for the last ten
years. The public wretchedness and ignorance, the decline of the arts,
the entire suppression of liberty, the ever-present curse of foreign
occupation,--all fall upon his head, because he alone is responsible
for everything.

It may be alleged that he has at least served the reactionary party. I
much doubt it. What internal factions has he suppressed? Secret
societies have swarmed in Rome during his reign. What remonstrances
from without has he silenced? Europe continues to complain
unanimously, and day by day lifts up its voice a tone or two higher.
He has failed to reconcile one single party or one single power to the
Holy father. During his ten years' dictatorship, he has neither gained
the esteem of one foreigner nor the confidence of one Roman. All he
has gained is time. His pretended capacity is but slyness. To the
trickery of the present he adds the cunning of the red Indian; but he
has not that largeness of view without which it is impossible to
establish firmly the slavery of the people. No one possesses in a
greater degree than he the art of dragging on an affair, and
manoeuvring with and tiring out diplomatists; but it is not by
pleasantries of this sort that a tottering tyranny can be propped up.
Although he employs every subterfuge known to dishonest policy, I am
not quite sure that he has even the craft of a politician.

The attainment of his own end does not in fact require it. For after
all, what is his end? In what hope, with what aim, did he come down
from the mountains of Sonnino?

Do you really believe he thought of becoming the benefactor of the
nation?--or the saviour of the Papacy?--or the Don Quixote of the
Church? Not such a fool! He thought, first, of himself; secondly, of
his family.

His family is flourishing. His four brothers, Filippo, Luigi,
Gregorio, and--save the mark!--Angelo, all wore the _cioccie_ in their
younger days; they now, one and all, wear the count's coronet. One is
governor of the bank, a capital post, and since poor Campana's