Pennsylvania School of Horticulture for Women - Wise Acres Yearbook (Ambler, PA)

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(Cnlunir anb the (iftaking of ,iHobent 3lialg Italy is one of the youngest States in Europe. Its first national Parliament met in 1861, and in that same year Victor Emanuel II became King of Italy. Victor Emanuel II had been, up till that time, King of Sardinia, with his capital in Turin, in Piedmont. The kingdom of Sardinia comprised the islands of Sardinia, the province of Piedmont, and Nice and Savoy. The steps by which Victor Emanuel II went from the kingship of a small Italian kingdom to become ruler of all Italy from the Alps to Sicily, are the steps which mark the unification of the Italian States into one nation. Many forces worked together in accomplishing the unifying of Italy, and the man who was foremost in leading these forces to the fulfillment of the task was a Piedmontese, Camillo Cavour. Cavour was born in Turin in 1810, when the whole Italian peninsula was under the rule of Napoleon Bonaparte. He grew up in the unsettled atmosphere in which Italy was left after the withdrawal of the French in 1815. Under the Napoleonic domination the Italian States had been divided into three groups for the purposes of government. Napoleon fell, the Congress of Vienna, in 1815, assigned the various States to their old governors or made changes in accordance with changed conditions. Southern Italy, from Naples southward, along with Sicily, was restored to the Bourbon dynasty, which had ruled them before the French invasion. The Bourbon king renamed his realm the “Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.” Piedmont and Genoa, in the northwest, and the island of Sardinia formed the Kingdom of Sardinia, under the former rulers, the House of Savory. Genoa had been a republic before the invasion, but against her will she was annexed to Sardinia. Lombardy returned to Austrian rule. Venetia, formerly a republic, was added to this to form the Austrian province of Lom-bardy-Vcnetia, governed by the Archduke Rainer of Austria, with capital at Milan. The duchies of Parma and Piacenza were assigned to Marie Louise, wife of Napoleon Bonaparte, and daughter of Francis I, of Austria. These duchies were really under the domination of Austria. The duchy of Modena was given to a prince of the House of Austria, who became Francis IV of Modena. Tuscany was restored to its former Grand Duke, Ferdinand III, a brother of the Austrian Emperor. The rest of Italy, the central States, was returned to the papacy as the Papal States, with Rome as the capital. Of these six separate governments Austria, it is seen, possessed the richest and strongest, Lombardy-Venetia. She also virtually possessed Parma, Piacenza and Modena, through members of the Austrian royal family. The French influence caused an awakening of the life of northern Italy, and renewed progress in commerce, agriculture and social life. A new middle class arose, filled with liberal idea-s and dissatisfaction with the forms of government. But the peasantry were too ignorant or indifferent to interest themselves in changing the existing conditions. The Liberal movement was strongest among the middle class, which bore the larger part of the burdens of building the new Italy. All over Italy secret societies were formed to promulgate liberalism, and many conspiracies were hatched and uprisings attempted. The largest of the secret societies was the “Carbonari.” The activity of this society caused a revolt in Naples in 1820, which was soon suppressed by the King’s troops with Austrian aid. Another revolt of the Carbonari in Turin and 8

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day we went home for Thanksgiving vacation, that the manure was finally sufficiently short and sweet to be packed in the permanent mushroom bed under the carnation bench. Contrast may enhance or it may detract; contrasted with the two original stacks of mushroom manure, the one remaining pile was indeed sweet, but, even so, it was not a bed of roses! Alas! I had put on my best shoes that morning preparatory to leaving for home, and I had no overshoes. One of the Seniors once remarked at the beginning of a certain unpleasant occurrence, “It will pass.” This disagreeable task likewise passed, amid much backache, and finally the manure was firmly packed under the bench and there was left to settle until our return. On December 3d the temperature of the bed had descended to 80 degrees Fahrenheit and the time had come to insert the spawn. We marked off the distances ten inches by ten inches in the bed. We had taken precautions to buy spawn from a reliable firm. This was soaked in tepid water, being broken into pieces the size of a turkey’s egg, and then inserted into the bed to the depth of an inch. The entire bed was then covered with straw. “In eight days,” my lecture notes state, “growth will have started.and at the end of two months the mushrooms may be gath- ered, and the crop continues for three months.” On the eighth day after the spawn was inserted, a group of curious students gathered around the mushroom bed to see what this mycelium looked like. But horrors ! the maggot of the common house fly, those destructive little maggots that cause the failure of one’s entire mushroom crop, had beaten us to it.” “The spawn was infested,” said one student. Maybe they were in the manure.” said another. But whatever their origin they were eating our embryo mushrooms with gusto and seemed determined to stay. My heart sank as visions of beefsteak heaped high with mushrooms faded away. However, we gave the culture the benefit of the doubt, and, proceeding according to instructions, covered the entire bed with finely sifted soil to the depth of an inch to an inch and a half, and replaced the straw. Since then our mushroom bed like the family skeleton has remained hidden under its cover of straw. Two months have come and gone but no mushroom has poked its little round, bald head above the ground. But a report has recently circulated that with the aid of a magnifying glass the mycelium threads have actually been seen. Hurrah ! for beefsteak and mushrooms—maybe. Adeline Greathead When I vast riches would acquire 1 get some paper and some pens, Sit down before the kitchen fire And spend the evening keeping hens. Next evening 1 would richer grow And soon annex the sum to suit, I get a catalogue or so. And spend the evening raising fruit. —Exchange. 7

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Allesandria in the same year was crushed without any thing having been gained by the revolutionists. Genoa was the hot bed of liberalism. The city had been formerly a republic, but by the terms of the Congress of Vienna it had come under the rule of the House of Savoy. The people always maintained a hatred for the Piedmontese government. In Genoa was born that most radical and energetic of the Italian republican partisans, Joseph Maz-zini, who became one of the leading spirits of the Carbonari, and lived most of his life as an exile from ;Italy on account of his out-spoken opposition to all the forms of government in existence in Italy. Such was the State of affairs into which Cavour entered to begin his public career. At the age of ten he had entered a military Academy in Turin, from which he had graduated at sixteen. He had served five years in the engineer corps of the army at Ventimiglia. Meanwhile the revolutions of 1820 had made strong impressions on the precocious mind of Cavour. He developed Liberal tendencies, which were nourished by visits to relatives in Geneva, Switzerland, where the different forms of religion and government opened his eyes to better possibilities for his native country. His ideas differed widely from those of his family, who were all reactionary. For this reason it was a relief to both himself and family when he was sent to Genoa, on the engineering staff of that city. The atmosphere of opposition to the government of Sardinia, in which he lived at Genoa, convinced Cavour more firmly that1 the old political institutions had to be changed. His enthusiasm led him to express his convictions too openly and he came under the sun eil-lance of the police. He left the military service in 1831, disgusted with the retrograde policy of the new Sardinian king, Charles Albert. He traveled in France, Austria and England. In the latter country he studied the English constitution. On his return he found life very monotonous since he could not engage in his favorite pursuit of politics, the king being decidedly unfriendly to him. lie settled down to the management of his fathers farm estate at Leri in 1835, remaining there about ten years, occasionally taking a trip to France and England. He spent much time in the study of political economy and languages, and evolved many schemes for the betterment of the industries and agriculture of the country, which he later put in practice when he came to power. Meanwhile Mazzini was stirring the Italian people with his fiery pamphlets, advocating revolution and the setting up of republican forms of government. Other patriotic writers, such as Gioberti, Balbo and d’Azeg-lio, advanced new ideas of political reform and protests against existing evils. The secret society, “Young Italy, flourished widely throughout Italy, spreading the seeds of revolt and educating the peasantry in the needs of new government and a unified Italy. A new era began when Pope Pius was elected in 1846. He was a man of kindly disposition and was animated by the best intentions. The people of Italy welcomed his promises for reform, and expected much from him. He was prevented from accomplishing any real results by the reactionary opposition of the Roman Curia and the representatives of the Powers. Yet the awakening was having its effects. In Sardinia, the king, Charles Albert, was impelled by the popular clamor to give certain privileges to his people; free election of communal and provincial councillors, improved police justice and a measure of liberty to the press. Political journals sprang up into existence. The first of these was “II Risorgimento,” (The Resurrection), which was founded by Cavour, in Turin. This paper at once advocated constitutional reform in Piedmont. Cavour’s plans now became evident. He wanted to prepare Piedmont for the leadership of the impending struggle of the Italian States against foreign domination. In a speech before a congress of journalists, Cavour declared that the king must take a decided stand and give the people a consti- 9