d foreign
domination. Austria, not content with the possession of Lombardy, which
was ceded to her by the treaty of 1815, had made her power felt in
almost every direction, and even at Naples her authority prevailed. The
Austrians were not merely an alien but a hated race, for they stood
between the Italian people and their dream of national independence and
unity, and native despotism could always count on their aid in quelling
any outbreak of the revolutionary spirit. The governments of the
country, Austria and the Vatican apart, were rendered contemptible by
the character of its tyrannical, incapable, and superstitious rulers,
but with the sway of such powers of darkness Sardinia presented a bright
contrast. The hopes of patriotic Italians gathered around Victor
Emmanuel II., who had fought gallantly at Novara in 1849, and who
possessed more public spirit and common-sense than the majority of
crowned heads. Victor Emmanuel ascended the throne of Sardinia at the
age of twenty-eight, immediately after the crushing disaster which
seemed hopelessly to have wrecked the cause of Italian independence.
Although he believed, with Mazzini, that there was only room for two
kinds of Italians in Italy, the friends and the enemies of Austria, he
showed remarkable self-restraint, and adopted a policy of conciliation
towards foreign Powers, whilst widening the liberties of his own
subjects until all over the land Italians came to regard Sardinia with
admiration, and to covet 'liberty as it was in Piedmont.'

[Sidenote: COUNT CAVOUR]

He gathered around him men who were in sympathy with modern ideas of
liberty and progress. Amongst them was Count Cavour, a statesman
destined to impress not Italy alone, but Europe, by his honesty of
purpose, force of character, and practical sagacity. From 1852 to 1859,
when he retired, rather than agree to the humiliating terms of the
Treaty of Villafranca, Cavour was supreme in Sardinia. He found Sardinia
crippled by defeat, and crushed with debt, the bitter bequest of the
Austrian War; but his courage never faltered, and his capacity was equal
to the strain. Victor Emmanuel gave him a free hand, and he used it for
the consolidation of the kingdom. He repealed the duties on corn,
reformed the tariff, and introduced measures of free trade. He
encouraged public works, brought about the construction of railways and
telegraphs, and advanced perceptibly popular education. He saw that if
the nation wa