schemes to set Italy free, but the Austrians were too strong for them, and for years nothing was done. In the year 1848, the year of the European revolлtions, Charles Albert, the King of Sardinia, who ruled over the north-west of Italy, declared himself ready to fight for Italian independence. He attacked the Austrians, but the Austrians were too strong for him, and he was beaten, and forced to resign his throne. His son Victor Emmanuel, who succeeded him, longed for the day when he might carry out his father's design. At last in 1859, two years after the breaking out of the Indian mutiny, he was able to do what he wished. Napoleon offered to help him. A French army, with the Emperor at its head, came into Italy, and defeated the Austrians in the two great battles of Magenta and Solferino. The Italians hoped that the Austrians would at last be driven out of Italy. It was perhaps as well for them that they had to wait a little longer. No one trusted Napoleon. He thought it a very fine and noble thing to help the Italians, but he wanted to get some advantage for himself. The Prussians threatened to join the Austrians, and the French made peace. The country about Milan was given to Victor Emmanuel. Venetia, as the country about Venice was called, was left to the Austrians.

3. The Kingdom of Italy.—It was difficult to say what was to be done with the rest of Italy. The Emperor's plan was that the dukes should remain where they were, and live in a friendly way with Victor Emmanuel. But the dukes had run away, and their people did not want to have them back,

The people asked that Victor Emmanuel should be their king, and so the central part of Italy was joined to the north-west. Savoy and Nice had to be given to France. A year or two later the new kingdom had a further increase. Garibaldi landed in Sicily with a thousand men, to attack the kingdom of Naples. The King of Naples did not know how to make himself popular amongst his subjects, and his kingdom fell like a house of cards. Victor Emmanuel now ruled in Naples as well as in Turin. The next question was whether the dominions of the Pope were to become part of the new kingdom. Many Catholics from other nations, especially Frenchmen and Irishmen, came to fight for the Pope. An Italian army attacked them and defeated them. Rome itself and the country round Rome was only saved to the Pope by the French Emperor, who insisted on keeping a French garrison at Rome. Victor Emmanuel ruled over all Italy except over Rome and Venetia.

4. The Volunteers.-The English Government had been very friendly to Italy all through these changes. Most Englishmen were glad to hear that there was another independent nation in Europe, and they were glad that, at all events, the French had not gained any part of Italy for themselves. In England there was a great suspicion of the French Emperor. He had all sorts of schemes in his head, and no one could tell what he was likely to do next. Lord Palmerston thought the best thing to be done was to prepare for the worst. Already, before Lord Palmerston came into office, young men engaged in

all kinds of employments had offered to form volun teer regiments, to be ready to resist invasion if it came. Every encouragement was given to them, and the Rifle Volunteers were established as a permanent part of the British army.

5. The Commercial Treaty with France.-In Palmerston's ministry the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that is to say, the minister who had to make all arrangements about taxation, was Mr. Gladstone. Year after year he tried to carry out the work which Peel had left uncompleted, of improving the system of taxation by removing burdensome duties. He did not like to see the growing risk of a quarrel between England and France, and he gladly forwarded a plan for inducing the Emperor of the French to agree to a commercial treaty, by which English goods should be admitted into France upon payment of no more than a low duty, and French wines and other articles should be admitted in the same way into England. The treaty was arranged by Cobden, who went to Paris to talk it over with the Emperor. He and Mr. Gladstone hoped that if the two nations traded with one another more, they would be less inclined to quarrel.

6. The Civil War in America.-Whilst the treaty with France was being made, events beyond the Atlantic drew the attention of every one in Europe. The United States of America were divided into two parts. In those of the South some millions of black slaves worked for their masters, mostly in producing sugar and cotton. In the North there were no slaves. There was a vast amount of rich, wild land

open to emigrants from both sections, and sometimes slaveowners thought they would be better off if they could go to fresh soil further west, and carry their slaves with them. The free states were willing that they should keep their slaves where they were already, but not that they should take them anywhere outside the slave states which already existed. In 1860 there was an election of a new President, the officer who stands at the head of the American Republic for four years. This time Abraham Lincoln was elected, a man who was determined not to allow the fresh land outside the slave states to be cultivated by slaves. The Southern States declared themselves independent, and formed a government of their own under the name of the Confederate States. The Northern States kept the old name of the United States, and resolved that the Confederates should not be allowed to separate. A terrible war followed, which lasted for four years.

South, to prevent any Many merchants in steamers as blockade powder and shot and

7. The Blockade Runners and the Privateers. English feeling took different sides. The upper classes and the merchants were mainly on the side of the South. The Northern navy was strong, and blockaded the ports of the goods being carried in. England fitted out quick runners, to carry arms and other stores to the Confederates. In time the Confederates thought that it would be an excellent thing if they could buy from their English friends armed ships, and have them sent out from English ports. The English merchants did as they were asked, took

the money, and sent out these ships to plunder and to burn the merchant vessels of the United States. One of the most famous of these was the Alabama. It did an enormous amount of damage, for which England had afterwards to pay, as the English Government had not stopped the vessel's sailing, as it ought to have done.

8. The Cotton Famine.--To one part of England the American War brought terrible suffering. Masses of men in many of the large towns in the north depended for their daily bread upon making cotton goods. The cotton used in this manufacture came at that time almost entirely from the Southern States. There was no possibility of bringing it from those states, as the blockading ships of the North would have stopped it on the way. All that could be done was done to get together supplies of cotton from Egypt and India and other parts of the world. That which came from these sources was not nearly so good as the American cotton had been, and even of the bad cotton there was not enough. The cotton famine, as it was called, stopped the mills, or caused them to work at short time. Thousands of persons ready to work to earn their livelihood were thrown out of work through no fault of their own. In many a house there was want and hunger. That want and hunger were nobly borne. Not only were the sufferers patient under their misfortune, but they were not to be tempted to speak evil of the Northern States, whose blockade was the cause of their misery. They believed that the slaveowners of the South were in the wrong, and that if the war went on long