ITALY. Mr. Seward to Mr. Marsh. [Extracts.] No. 3.] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, SIR: I know that you will be welcome at Turin. Count Cavour, a true exponent of the sentiments of a generous sovereign, will be rejoiced to receive from this country a minister who will not manifest repugnance to the aspirations of the Italian people for liberty and unity. The government of the United States practices non-intervention in all other countries and in the controversies between them. You are at liberty, however, and, indeed, are especially charged, to assure his Majesty that he is held in high consid eration by the President and the people of the United States. You will further assure him that it is a source of sincere satisfaction to this government that Italy seems to be even more prosperous and happy now under his government, although enjoying only short respites from revolutionary struggles for independence, than it has been at many periods long gone by, when despotism shielded that classic region from turbulence and civil commotion. You will learn from observation that government, even when its counsels are inspired by patriotism and humanity, has its trials and embarrassments as well in Italy as elsewhere. How to save the country from the ambitious designs of dangerous neighbors on either hand-how to reconcile the national passion for freedom with the profound national veneration for ecclesiastical authority-how to harmonize the lassitude of society in the Mediterranean provinces with the vigor that prevails along the Appenines, and how to conduct affairs with so much moderation as to win the confidence of the conservative interests, and yet not to lose the necessary support of the propagandists of freedom, are tasks witnessed there which will convince the American statesman that even in that country the establishment and maintenance of free government are attended with difficulties as formidable as those which sometimes produce political despondency in our own. Since the inauguration of the President it has been my duty to prepare, under his directions, instructions to many of our ministers going abroad. The burden of them all has been, not the ordinary incidents of international hospitality and commerce, which reduce diplomacy to a monotonous routine, but the extraordinary and sometimes alarming condition of our own internal affairs, threatened with the complication, most of all to be deprecated, of intervention, in some form or other, by European nations. This foreign danger arose chiefly out of the deplorable condition of affairs at home. The administration found the government disorganized by the presence of disunionists of high position and authority in all its departments. Some time was necessary to climinate them before any decisive policy could be adopted. It was, moreover, necessary to forbear from demonstrations of federal authority that might be represented as aggressive, to allow the revolution to reveal its alarming proportions and boldly proclaim its desperate and destructive designs. It was seen all the time that these needful delays were liable to be misunderstood abroad, and that the malcontents would endeavor to take advantage of them there. The government has, therefore, not been surprised, although it has been deeply grieved, to see the agents of the revolutionary party, perhaps even with the concurrence of some of our own demoralized ministers in Europe, insidiously seeking to obtain from some of its sovereigns a recognition of the projected treasonable confederacy. It has been no easy task to study the sophisms, arts, and appliances which they might be expected to use in the highly commercial circles of Belgium, Paris, and London. It was nevertheless necessary to attempt it, for human nature is at least no more moral, just, or virtuous in courts than it is in private life. There is no such embarrassment, however, in the present case. It often happens that foreign observers, if candid, understand American questions quite as well as Americans themselves. Botta and De Tocqueville were of this class. So Count Cavour cannot be at any loss to understand the present political condition of the United States. The American revolution of 1776, with its benignant results, was due to the happy combination of three effective political ideas: First, that of emancipation from the distant European control of Great Britain; second, popular desire for an enlargement of the political rights of the individual members of the State upon the acknowledged theory of the natural rights of man; third, the want of union among the States to secure safety, tranquillity, aggrandizement, and fame. The revolution attempted in 1861 is a spasmodic reaction against the revolution of 1776. It combines the three ideas which were put down, but not extinguished, in that great war, namely: First, European authority to regulate political affairs on this continent; second, the aggrandizement and extension of human slavery; third, disunion, dissolution, anarchy. Any impartial thinker can see that an attempt at a revolution so unnatural and perverse as this could never have been embraced by any portion of the American people, except in a moment of frenzied partisan disappointment; that it has no one element of success at home, and that it is even more portentous to all other governments than to our own. It is painful to see faction stalking abroad in one's native land. But faction is incident to every state, because it is inherent in human nature. We prefer, if it must come, that it come in just its present form and character. It will perish by simply coming to confront the American people, for the first time brought to meet that enemy of national peace and safety in arms. The people are aroused, awakened, resolute, and determined. The danger is, therefore, already passed. We no longer fear-indeed, we hardly deprecate-the disaster of civil war brought upon us without fault. We now see that it may be regarded as a necessary trial to preserve the perfection of our Constitution, and to remove all remaining distrust of its durability and its adaptation to the universal wants of mankind. I am, sir, your most obedient servant, GEORGE P. MARSH, Esq., &c., &c., Turin. WILLIAM H. SEWARD. Mr. Seward to Mr. Marsh. No. 5.] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, June 21, 1861. SIR: Your despatch No. 2, written at Paris May 29, has been received. The government not only accepts your explanation of the delay you have made on your way to your post of duty, but also appreciates and thanks you for the faithful service you have rendered to the country in an important crisis by your labors to correct an erroneous public opinion in Europe through the use of the press in London. We hear with sincere regret and sorrow of the death of Count Cavour, a statesman honored none the less by the people of this country because the theatre of his labors is remote from our own. If it shall seem proper to you, you may express these sentiments to his Majesty. I am, sir, your obedient servant, GEORGE P. MARSH, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Turin. WILLIAM H. SEWARD Mr. Dillon to Mr. Seward. [Extracts.] UNITED STATES LEGATION, SIR: Since my communication of the 16th of April last, to announce my arrival here the 12th of that month, from my late post, Rio de Janeiro, and of my having entered upon the discharge of my duties as chargé d'affaires ad interim, the event first in order of importance, though not of time, which it is my painful duty to communicate, is the sudden death, on the 6th instant, of his excellency the Count Camillo Benso de Cavour, late president of his Majesty's council and minister of foreign affairs. The count was taken ill on the evening of the 29th of May last at his residence, the hotel of his elder brother, the Marquis de Cavour, of what proved to be typhus fever. Injudicious and repeated bleedings at the commencement of the fever, though, I am told, at his own instance, hastened the sad event. The count was never married. Europe still echoes with eulogies to his memory. Among the most felicitous and important, as expressing at the same time a political programme, is a leading article in the Constitutionnel of Paris, semi-official, and supposed to emanate from the Emperor of the French. I extract a single sentence: "S'il y a aujourd' lui dans la péninsule un grand homme de moins il y a, grâce à Dieu, un grand peuple de plus. Et ce peuple affranchi ne saurait desormais retomber dans la servitude." In common with my colleagues, of the diplomatic corps, I attended the funeral obsequies in the parish church of the Madonna degli Angeli the evening of the 7th instant, and the following morning the remains were transferred to the burial vault of the Cavour family, at Santena, some six miles distant from Turin, there to remain-thus contradicting the reports of the public prints that, in compliance with the King's wish, they were to be entombed in the royal basilica of the Superga. "Exegi monumentum ære perennius, Shortly after my arrival, in consequence of the warlike disturbances at home, the applications, written and verbal, by disbanded officers and men of the late Garibaldian army of Southern Italy, for enlistment into the United States army, became so numerous that I would call attention to a card, of which I annex a copy, published at my request by his Majesty's government in the official paper. * * * * The President's proclamations of the 19th and 27th of April last, received at this legation, with the circular from the department, were by me duly communicated to his Majesty's government, and printed in extenso in the Gazetta Officiale del Regno d'Italia the 29th of May, 1861. His Majesty has summoned the Baron Ricasoli, a very prominent conservative member of the chamber of deputies, from Florence, to form a new ministry, which, though not yet announced, will, it is thought, be soon completed, in continuation of the Cavour policy. Mr. Marsh has arrived at Turin. I am, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State, Washington. ROMAINE DILLON. CARD. UNITED STATES LEGATION, In reply to numerous and continued applications to this legation, by letter and in person, of foreign volunteers for enlistment in the army of the United States of America, the undersigned takes this public means of declaring that he has no knowledge, official or non-official, of any instructions of his government authorizing any such enlistments out of the United States. ROMAINE DILLON, Mr. Marsh to Mr. Seward. [Extracts.] Chargé d'Affaires, &c. No. 3.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, Turin, June 27, 1861. SIR: The interruption of business in the foreign office of this government, occasioned by the illness and death of Count Cavour and a week's absence of the King, which immediately followed the formation of the new ministry, prevented me from obtaining an audience of his Majesty for the purpose of delivering my letters of credence until Sunday, the 23d day of this month. On that day I was received by the King, and, in accordance with my instructions, conveyed to him assurances of the high consideration in which he is held by the President and people of the United States, and of their satisfaction in observing the apparent prosperity and happiness of Italy under his Majesty's government. I further expressed the personal gratifica tion I had derived from being selected to represent the United States near the government of the Italian people-a people which I had long known, and which had always inspired me with deep interest-and especially from the honor of being the first diplomate accredited to the first King of Italy. His Majesty received these remarks very graciously, using some terms personally complimentary to me, testified much respect for the President and for yourself, and expressed a strong interest in the welfare and prosperity of the United States, as well as much solicitude for an honorable termination of the present contest between the government and the seceding States. The audience was strictly private, no person but his Majesty and myself being present, and the interview was therefore of a less formal character than is usual with royal receptions. It is, perhaps, proper to add that the communication was conducted in French, which is the usual language of oral intercourse between foreign ministers and the sovereign or the heads of departments at this court. With Baron Ricasoli, the new head of the ministry and minister of foreign affairs, I have had several interviews, as well before as since my reception by the King, and I therefore am not aware that the public interests have sustained any detriment by the delay of my official reception. In all these interviews American politics have formed a leading topic of conversation, and, though Baron Ricasoli speaks with proper caution, the tenor of his remarks leaves no room for doubt that his personal sympathies, as well as those of his government, are entirely on the side of the President and the constituted authorities of the Union in their great struggle. The first point which I brought to the notice of the minister of foreign affairs was the prevention of movements hostile to the United States in the territories of the King of Italy. I stated that I had been led to fear that some attempts were making at Genoa to fit out vessels or purchase arms for the service of the rebels, and begged that the attention of the local authorities at Genoa might be drawn to the subject. Baron Ricasoli replied that the government would not knowingly permit any such purchases to be made, and that he would request the minister of the interior to direct that the police of Genoa should be watchful to detect and prevent any negotiations for that purpose, The suggestions I made to Baron Ricasoli on this subject were founded partly on a letter from Mr. H. S. Sanford and partly on vague rumors circulating here, which I have been unable to trace to any certain foundation, though I have made inquiry in all quarters known to me which seemed to be probable sources of information. In the course of the last week I employed an Italian gentleman, then about to proceed to Genoa, and whom I believe to be entirely trustworthy, to investigate the subject on the spot. He is still absent, and as he has not written to me since arrivng at Genoa I infer that he has made no discoveries. I have communicated to Baron Ricasoli the substance of my instructions with regard to the proposed convention for the suppression of privateering and the exemption of private property from capture by national ships of war in certain cases. He replied that the Italian government had not yet become a party to the convention of 1856, and added that the pressure of business on his department would prevent his giving immediate attention to the subject; but he expressed no objection to a negotiation on the basis proposed in your instructions of the 24th of April, 1861, or even on the broader ground of the total exemption of all private property not contraband of war from capture at sea by ships of war in all cases. The Italian parliament is now in session, and will probably not adjourn before the 15th or 20th of July. The cabinet ministers are members, as in England, and regularly attend the sessions, which occupy a large part of Ex. Doc. 1-21 |