Captain Mansana and Mothers Hands | Page 2

the inhabitants of his native town, and that in the course of the next

few days, they were to be received by the town council and escorted by
deputations from various patriotic associations in Rome and the
neighbouring cities to A----, Mansana's birthplace. A monument had
been prepared there, and a ceremonial reception awaited the remains:
the deeds of the martyred hero were at length to receive tardy
acknowledgment.
It was in the house of this Mansana that I had lodged thirteen years
before; his wife and his younger brother's wife had been my hostesses.
Of the two brothers themselves, one was at that time in prison in Rome,
the other in exile in Genoa. The newspaper recapitulated the story of
the elder Mansana's career. With all, except the latter portion, I was
already pretty well acquainted, and for that reason I felt a special desire
to accompany the procession, which was to start from the Barberini
Palace in Rome the following Sunday, and finish its journey at A----.
On the Sunday, at seven o'clock in the morning of a grey October day, I
was at the place of assembly. There was collected a large number of
banners, escorted by the delegates, who had been selected by the
various associations: six men, as a rule, from each. I took up my
position near a banner that bore the legend: "The Fight for the
Fatherland," and amongst the group which surrounded it. They were
men in red shirts, with a scarf round the body, a cloak over the
shoulders, trousers thrust into high boots, and broad-leaved plumed
hats. But what faces these were! How instinct with purpose and
determination! Look at the well-known portrait of Orsini, the man who
threw bombs at Napoleon III.; in him you have the typical Italian cast
of countenance often seen in the men who had risen against the tyranny
in Church and State, braving the dungeon and the scaffold, and had
leagued themselves together in those formidable organisations from
which sprang the army that liberated Italy. Louis Napoleon had himself
been a member of one of these associations, and he had sworn, like all
his comrades, that whatsoever position he might gain, he would use it
to further Italy's unity and happiness, or in default that he would forfeit
his own life. It was Orsini, his former comrade in the Carbonari, who
reminded Napoleon of his oath, after he had become Emperor of the
French. And Orsini did it in the manner best calculated to make the

Emperor realise the fate which awaited him if he failed to keep his
pledge.
The first time I saw Orsini's portrait the idea flashed across my mind
that ten thousand such men might conquer the world. And now, as I
stood here, I had before me those whom the same feeling for their
country's wrongs had animated with the same intense passion. Over
that passion a kind of repose had fallen now, but the gloomy and
lowering brows showed that it was not the tranquillity of content. The
medals on their breasts proved that they had been present at Porta San
Pancrazio in 1849 (when Garibaldi, though outnumbered by the French
troops, twice forced them to retreat), in 1858, at the Lake of Garda, in
1859 in Sicily and Naples. And it was probable enough, though there
were no medals to testify to that fact, that the history of their lives
would have revealed their share in the day of Mentana. This is one of
those battlefields which is not recognised by the Government, but
which has burnt itself most deeply into the hearts of the people, as
Louis Napoleon learnt to his cost. He had formally secured the help of
Italy against the Germans in 1870; the remembrance of Mentana made
it impossible for King and Government to carry out the agreement. It
would have been as much as Victor Emmanuel's throne was worth to
have done that.
The contrast between this dark and formidable determination of the
Italians, and their mocking gaiety and reckless levity, is just as marked
as that, between the resolute countenances of the Orsini type, such as I
noticed here, and the frivolous faces, which express nothing but a
contemptuous superiority or mere indifference. Faces of this type were
also to be seen among the spectators, or among the delegates who
accompanied the banners inscribed "The Press," "Freethought,"
"Freedom for Labour," and so on. Involuntarily I thought, it is this
element of frivolity among one half of the population that brings out a
sterner element of resolution in the other half. The greater, the more
general, this frivolity, the stronger and fiercer must be the passionate
energy of those who would prevail against it. And through my brain
there coursed reminiscences of the past