d the Sicilian prisoners as if they
had been our allies, our own subjects. They were taken in rebellion,
with arms in their hands, against their lawful Sovereign. But Lord
Napier complains to Prince Cariati of his treatment of the prisoners,
and says it would be observed upon in England, would raise a strong
feeling on its exposure and publication, and that the feeling would be
such that Her Majesty's Government could scarcely fail to take notice
of it. But how? For those prisoners were guilty of municipal offence
against the municipal law of their own country. Suppose, contrary to
all probability and possibility, hostilities had ensued upon the late
attempt at rebellion in Ireland, and some of the prisoners having been
taken and sent to Bermuda or Australia, that the Ministers of France,
Holland, Belgium, or any other country had taken it into their heads
to object to our treatment of those prisoners and to say, 'Don't
treat them in that way. Give them their native Parliament on College
Green--you are acting cruelly in sending them to Bermuda or Australia.
I shall write home to France, I shall write home to Holland, I shall
write home to Belgium; and depend upon it your conduct will raise such
a ferment of execration and hatred against you, that the President of
the Republic, the King of Holland, and the King of Belgium will be
absolutely obliged to take notice of it.' How should we have received
that intimation? I think with a horse-laugh, and there was no reason
why the Neapolitan King should not receive that dispatch of Lord
Napier's in the same way, except that he, no doubt, gave it
good-naturedly a more polite and courteous reception. Now we thus
presume to interfere with the domestic affairs of Naples as neither
France nor Holland would dare interfere with ours, and as we never
durst interfere with theirs. True, we never should dream of urging the
great Republic to treat its rebellious subjects, when charged with
treason, otherwise than as its Government pleased! True, Naples is
a feebler Power than France! But is that all the ground for the
proceeding? Is that all the warrant for reading lectures such as those
we have read, for doing the things we have done, threatening the
things we have threatened, claiming the right we have asserted of
protecting criminals imprisoned for rebellion from the justice of
their lawful Sovereign? I say that to a generous nation, to a manly
feeling heart, to a person of true British