nd flowers on
this day, but this time the day was to be made memorable by a shower of
stones and bullets; this time they were not to appear in the harlequin
jacket, but in their true form, earnest, grand, commanding,
self-conscious, and self-asserting.

But the government had been informed of the intention of the
conspirators to avail themselves of the drive to the Corso, to begin the
revolution, and this procession was prohibited an hour before the time
appointed for its commencement.

The people arose against this prohibition, and the revolution they had
endeavored to repress by this means now broke out.

The thunder of cannon and the rattling of musketry now resounded through
the streets of Rome, and the people everywhere resisted the papal
soldiery with energy and determination.

The new pope trembled in the Quirinal, the old cardinals lost courage,
and in dismay recoiled a step at every advancing stride of the
insurgents. Gregory felt that the papal crown he had just achieved was
already on the point of falling from his head, to be trodden in the dust
by the victorious populace; he turned to Austria, and solicited help and
assistance.

But young Italy, the Italy of enthusiasm, of liberty, and of hope,
looked to France for support. Old Italy had turned to Austria for help;
young Italy looked for assistance to the free, newly-arisen France, in
which the revolution had just celebrated a glorious victory. But France
denied its Italian brother, and denied its own origin; scarcely had the
revolution seated itself on the newly-erected kingly throne and invested
itself with the crown and purple robe, when, for its own safety, it
became reactionary, and denied itself.

With all Italy, Rome was resolved to shake off the yoke of oppression;
the whole people espoused this cause with enthusiasm; and in the streets
of Rome--at other times filled with priests and monks and holy
processions--in these streets, now alive with the triumphant youth of
Rome, resounded exultant songs of freedom.

The strangers, terrified by this change, now quitted the holy city in
crowds, and hastened to their homes. Hortense desired to remain; she
knew that she had nothing to fear from the people, for all the evil that
had hitherto overtaken her, had come, not from the people, but always
from the princes only[59]. However, letters suddenly arrived from her
sons, conjuring her to leave Rome and announcing that they would leave
Florence within