(Translation.)

IMMEDIATELY after the reunion of the Southern Provinces to the Kingdom (21st October, 1860), Rome being occupied by the troops of General Guyon, and the relations between France and Italy being rendered difficult by the hesitation of the Emperor to recognize the new Kingdom, and by the obstacles offered by the French navy to the blockade of Gaeta, Count Cavour appointed two negotiators to treat with the Court of Rome, which the application of the principle of non-intervention disposed to come to terms with Italy. After November, 1860, Count Cavour drew up a plan of agreement with the Holy See, upon the basis of perfect freedom of the Church, and the complete cessation of the temporal power of the Pope. The French Government, to whom this plan was communicated, forwarded to Turin a counter-project, founded upon the restitution in principle to the Pope of his former domains, and the transformation of his power into a simple right of high sovereignty (27th December, 1860). Count Cavour absolutely rejected this counter-project, and reserved his opinion upon another scheme, which limited the temporal sovereignty of the Pope to the Leonine City.

The plan of direct arrangement between Italy and the Holy See, proposed by Count Cavour, was presented 10th January, 1861, to the Pope, by Cardinal Santucci, and, according to his testimony, His Holiness was much struck and convinced by it. The propositions of the Court of Turin were regarded at Rome as concessions; and the Pope declared, that as the Powers did not give armed assistance to the Holy See, he released Cardinals Antonelli and Santucci from their oath, in order to permit them to discuss the conditions for the cessation of the temporal power upon the bases proposed.

During that time, the Emperor of the French, who at first confined himself to expressing a desire for the success of the negotiations (13th of January, 1861), at last decided in a Ministerial Council to support the negotiations of the Court of Turin, by declaring to the Court of Rome that, in the default of an arrangement, it would be left to its own resources (18th January, 1861).

While temporizing was the course pursued at Rome, Count Cavour added to his scheme further concessions respecting ecclesiastical temporalities, but still maintaining the complete cessation of the Pemporal Power. The French Government soon showed apprehension lest the interest of the Cardinals should cause the negotiations to fail; and the Court of Turin supposed, from certain hints, that the difficulties which might be entailed upon the ecclesiastical system in France by the full liberty of the Church in Italy, caused the Imperial Government to hesitate in the good intentions which it had manifested. The Emperor of the French, when consulted, re-assured the King's Government, and said that the essential thing for him was that an arrangement of some kind soould be made. The French Government showed itself confirmed still more in the same views by the opportuneness with which the Corps Législatif of France showed itself no less favourable to the friendship of Italy than the Chamber of Deputies of Prussia, which had just adopted a resolution approving our unity, and then had been shown by Russian diplomacy, which declared at Paris that Russia had no personal interest in the Pope, and would not interfere with Rome becoming the capital of Italy.

But these very circumstances of political order were soon regarded at Rome as means of escaping from an arrangement with Italy, and of once more profiting by external complications. Representations were made from Rome to France and England, that the unity and independence of Italy would not be for their interest, and much reliance was placed upon the advantage which Austria then had in preventing any understanding. The "Journal of Rome" denied, with bitterness, the existence of any negotiations. On his side, the Emperor of the French, causing the hesitation of the Pope between the solicitations of the Italian negotiators and the opposition of Cardinal Antonelli, to be pointed out to Count Cavour, begged of him to find speedily some means of overcoming the ill-will of the Secretary of State of His Holiness. The Minister, M. Billault, declared to the principal members of the Senate, that an arrangement was probable between Italy and Rome; and a pamphlet was published by Comte de Persigny, to facilate the agreement, according to what was stated by the Emperor to an Italian negotiator. Thereupon our Plenipotentiaries at Rome received official instructions and powers.

But the arrival of Francis II at Rome, and the organization around him of a centre of European reaction, corresponding with influential persons in France, Spain, and Austria, had the effect of reviving hopes of foreign intervention to prevent the unity of Italy; and Cardinal Antonelli went so far as to tell the Italian Representatives that the Pope could not treat in the presence of his guest the King of Naples. On the 19th of March, 1861, the Pope pronounced an allocution, declaring Catholicism to be incompatible with Liberalism, and the pretended maxims of modern civilization, which accepted the reconsti

tution of Italy; to which Count Cavour replied by a speech in the Chamber of Deputies, declaring that the independence and dignity of the Pontiff and of the Church could not be better assured than by the separation of the two Powers, and by the loyal and wide application of the modern principle of liberty to the relations of civil society, and of religious society.

Parliament confirmed those views by voting the Boncompagni order of the day, declaring that the Chamber was convinced that the dignity and perfect liberty of the Church would be assured, that the application of the principle of non-intervention would be adopted, in concert with France, and that Rome, the capital proclaimed by the national sentiment, would be restored to Italy. That Order of the day of 1861 was confirmed by the Parliament on each occasion that it had to discuss the affairs of Rome; and lately, again, in the sittings of the Chamber and the Senate, on the 20th and 24th of August.

Count Cavour wrote on this occasion to the Italian negotiators at Rome that his declaration to the Chambers were calculated to prove how advantageous were the unprecedented concessions which Italy was prepared to make to the Church, and that therefore he believed they could not fail to convince the Court of Rome of the propriety of treating so as to permit the King's Government to yield to the wishes of the Holy See to restore order to the position of ecclesiastical affairs in Italy (April 1861).

On April 5 Cardinal Antonelli declared to one of the negotiators that the Holy See, always ready to submit to the force of things, must for the time regard the existence of the Roman State as an international question, respecting which he could not treat alone. The Italian negotiators having remarked that the known desire of the Catholic Powers was for some arrangement to be made without intervention on their part, the Cardinal replied that Spain was opposed to the proposition of Piedmont, and that the Court of Rome would await events.

Thus, while Italy was endeavouring to remove from the Roman question all factitious and foreign interests, the Court of Rome relied upon those interests to refuse any solution.

Count Cavour then, being convinced of the necessity of separating the question of the settlement of the affairs of Rome from the question of foreign intervention, opened a negotiation with France upon the bases which were subsequently embodied in the Convention of September 15, 1864.

He reserved freedom of action for Italy in case the Roman States should become a hot-bed of disorder or a cause of danger, or if the foreign volunteers should constitute a disguised intervention; he stipulated for the freedom of communications for all unarmed citizens. He repeated expressly at the same time that Rome was indispensable to guarantee unity and the monarchic principle in Italy; that the King's Government would, nevertheless, only employ the most pacific means possible while protecting the spiritual authority of the Pope, the dignity of the Holy See, and the interests of religion.

These negotiations with France, interrupted by the death of Count Cavour, were continued after the recognition of the kingdom of Italy by France, which soon followed. The French Government recommended Baron Ricasoli to continue direct negotiations with the Holy See, and the Italian Chargé d'Affaires wrote from Paris that the Imperial Government was very desirous to escape from the difficulty arising from the threat of the Pope to quit Rome if the Emperor should withdraw his troops.

In August 1861, the Minister of France at Turin declared, according to his instructions, that the Emperor remained the best friend of Italy; that in the event of a vacancy in the Papacy, or in other and more imminent events, he would find an opportunity to disengage himself by recalling his troops without inconvenient results; that, in the meantime, Italy could keep open the negotiations with Rome to place the Pope in the wrong, should assure tranquillity in Naples, and act upon public opinion; and that the French Government would not cease to interest itself in the Roman question in a friendly spirit towards Italy.

In November 1861, the Minister Ricasoli believed the time had come to publish, as Count Cavour had intended to have done, the heads of agreement concerted in principle with France. The King's Minister in Paris was ordered to state that, while leaving to France the selection of the moment when it would leave Rome to itself, the King's Government felt bound to neglect nothing that would tend to facilitate an arrangement, and hoped to obtain the good offices of France to obtain the assent of the Court of Rome to a formal proposition. It was after the French Government had declined, upon the plea of inopportuneness, the request for mediation that the project of arrangement ("Capitolato") was made public, in consequence of which the Parliament confirmed the Boncompagni Order of the day before-mentioned.

On April 24, 1862, the King's Minister at Paris received communication from

M. Thouvenel of a plan to be proposed by the Emperor simultaneously at Rome and at Turin. If Italy had accepted it the French occupation would cease at once or within a year, according as the Court of Rome accepted it or not. The bases of this plan were as follows:

The Papal territory should be governed under a municipal form; the Pope would retain all the rights and privileges of sovereignty; the Catholic Powers should contribute, pro ratá, to his Civil List-France contributing 3,500,000 francs; a Customs' union with Italy; the public debt to be divided in proportion to the territory; the Italian Legislature to be applicable to the Pontifical territory, with the assistance of a Pontifical Council of State; the Roman population to send their Deputies to the Italian Parliament; the Pope to appoint a certain number of Senators, and the Pontifical coinage to bear the Pope's effigy, but to be equalized to the Italian coinage. The Pontifical flag was to be Italian tricolour, with the Papal arms in place of the Cross of Savoy, the Pope to have a body-guard, and the finances and the army to be in common. At the same time the kingdom was to restore to the Pope a portion of the provinces to the west of the Apennines, containing a population of nearly 100,000 souls.

This plan, with the exception of the last clause, was accepted at Turin, but before it was officially proposed to the Courts of Turin and of Rome, differences arose between the Ministers of the Emperor upon this subject, two of them being desirous of suppressing the last clause and reverting to Count Cavour's proposition, while others advocated delay, on account of the internal political condition of France. Thereupon eusued the revolutionary movement of Sarnico. The desire to avoid a responsibility of a solution ruled supreme in the Councils of the Emperor.

From that time until when the Roman question had been discussed with a view to a definitive and precise solution the negotiations were directed to the other view of the question to find means of preserving the affairs of Rome from foreign intervention and external complications.

The French Government freed itself from its responsibility upon the main ground of the Roman question by the Emperor's letter to M. Thouvenel, of the 26th of May, 1862. The same desire inspired the instructions given on the 30th of the same month to the Ambassador of France, at Rome; they were conceived in the sense of persuading the Court of Rome to forego all foreign intervention, but in any case the French Government announced its intention of reverting to the restricted project of Count Cavour by submitting the principle of non-intervention and reserving the arrangement of the affairs of Rome. That was later the object of the Convention of the 15th of September, 1864. The negotiations had resumed their course in that direction of ideas, when the expedition which ended at Aspromonte occurred to create an obstacle.

The Italian Government believed then that it was a convenient time to revive the main question by the note of General Durando, of September 10th, 1862, in the terms of the first negotiations for a definitive solution. The reply of M. Drouyn de Lhuys, 26th October, 1862, who had succeeded M. de Thouvenel in the Foreign Office of France, was opposed to the determination of the Italian Ministry to raise the question of a definitive solution, and showed the intentions of the French Government to adhere to the limited question of the evacuation of Rome. Matters remained in that state.

In July, 1863, the Italian Government proposed to France the resumption of limited negotiations, on the basis of the principle of non-intervention, Italy reserving its national aspirations, avoiding the collective guarantee of the Catholic Powers, and definitively excluding any foreign occupation. This new phase resulted in the Convention of the 15th of September, 1864. It was declared, at the time of the conclusion of this agreement, that the Convention must not and could not signify more or less than it said; that as to its spirit it was the consequence of the principle of non-intervention; that Italy reserved to itself the making this principle respected by any one with respect to insurrection from without, and that Italy would continue to pursue, in the terms of the Conventions the conciliation of the essential interests of Italy with those of the Papacy, on the basis of the reciprocal separation and liberty of the powers of the State and the Church. The question of non-intervention was formerly distinguished from that of the arrangement of the affairs of Rome. This latter object was touched on by the negotiators in conversations in which the Emperor recommended that the nominal sovereignty should be left to the Pope, Rome being administratively united to Italy, and in which the Emperor's Minister of Foreign Affairs expressed an opinion that the French evacuation should not be the cause of the fall of the Temporal Power, Rome, according to his conviction, properly belonging ultimately to Italy.

The French Government, also, avoiding interpellations on the part of Austria and Spain, declared to the agents of those Powers that they had no right to interfere ;that

the Convention solved the question of occupation, and not the Roman question, which remained without solution, and that a guarantee of the Catholic Powers was inadmissible. These proceedings on the part of Spain and Austria had been instigated by the Pontifical Government, which, faithful to its policy of reliance on foreign interventions, had by a Circular to its Nuncios of the 18th September, 1864, made the formal admission that the territory of St. Peter could not subsist by itself, notwithstanding the execution by Italy of the Convention of September; an admission which proved that cases were to be foreseen, reserved on the conclusion of the Convention, when the stipulations accepted by Italy would cease to be applicable.

It was inevitable that in the Parliamentary discussions to which the Convention gave rise, the thorough solution of the Roman question reserved by the Convention was handled, as well as the Convention itself. The Italian Government having presented to Parliament (October 24, 1864), among other documents, the Report of Chevalier Nigra of the 15th September, 1864, the Imperial Minister of Foreign Affairs, while admitting its accuracy, thought it necessary, in view of the discussions of the Italian Parliament, that it should be completed on some points. This Chevalier Nigra did in a fresh despatch of the 30th October, 1864, which showed that, in reserving its national aspirations, Italy gave no right of supposing that it wished to employ subterranean means; that Italy reckoned on the natural and normal process of things; that the reserve of liberty of action for the Contracting Parties in the event of the Pontifical Government being unable to stand by itself was perfectly proper, the Plenipotentiaries not having been obliged to foresee expressly in their official declarations eventualities caused by the fault and powerlessness of the Pontifical Government; that the aim of the national aspirations is the conciliation of the interests of Italy and of the Papacy by liberty of Church and State; and that he consequently, and with these explanations, adhered to his Report of the 15th September. These two Reports of the King's Minister were recognised as the correct interpretation of the Convention in the frank explanations given in the presence of the Emperor between MM. Nigra and Drouyn de Lhuys on the 2nd November, 1864. The successive despatch by Italy to Rome of MM. Tonello and Vegezzi for arrangements respecting the Episcopal Sees, and the interchange of ideas, commenced with General Fleury, and since continued with the French Government, respecting the economic facilities to be introduced between the two territories, proved that the Italian Government, while reserving the definitive solution, was very anxious for the amelioration of conditions of fact in which that solution could be produced naturally apart from foreign interventions. The despatch addressed by the King's Government to Chevalier Nigra on the 20th December, 1866, and the note of the 5th February previous, by which Italy set aside the pretensions of Spain to espouse the interests of the temporal power, prove, on the other hand, the care taken to preserve the root of the question.

The revolutionary invasion of October, 1867, came, unfortunately, to disturb the normal progress of the Roman question. At the moment when France decided again to intervene, a French circular of the 25th of October, 1867, admitting that the September Convention ought to subsist, and invoking the solicitude of the Powers on the reciprocal situation of Italy and the Holy See, deferred to Europe the very solution of the Roman question.

It is material to note that the French policy thus entered on a new phase. In 1861 it had been seen to recommend a direct solution between the Pope and Italy without foreign participation; then in April and May, 1862, it took the bold initiative of a solution; afterwards it freed itself from responsibility by insuring non-intervention by the Convention of the 15th of September; and France recognized again, after Mentana, the necessity of an immediate and decisive solution of the question itself, and called on Europe to sanction it.

The Italian Government did not believe that the participation of Europe could, under the circumstances, facilitate a solution; it did not, reject, however, the meeting of a general or limited Congress. But the Powers invited unanimously declared a Congress could only sanction a solution already effected between Italy and the Holy See. The principle of non-intervention, and the elimination of every political complication from the Roman question, essential maxims of Italian policy, were thus spontaneously endorsed by the Powers. The Governments of Austria and Prussia were particularly explicit in this sense. The declarations of M. Rouher at the French Tribune followed, which were regarded by the Powers as rendering impossible the Congress which France itself had just proposed.

The King's Government having proved, then, that the preparation of a definitive solution by a Congress was impracticable, nothing remained for the moment but to negotiate through the medium of France, leaving intact the national programme, in order

to make tolerable the actual relations between the two territories, and thus to facilitate the withdrawal of the French troops. Under the reserve, therefore, of a definitive solution to be prosecuted, it presented, on the 24th of January, the basis of a modus vivendi of simple administration, which, like all the rest, the Court of Rome refused.

The attempt made by France for the solution of the Roman question in a Congress, furnished an opportunity of proving how equitable the opinion of all the other Governments had become towards the views of Italy. Italian diplomacy has since been able to ascertain that Austria, Spain, and Portugal desire a solution of the question in a liberal sense, and one conformable to the interests of Italy, while securing the independence of the Holy See; that the German Governments, Belgium, and Holland, do not interest themselves in political questions relative to Rome; that Russia does the same; that Switzerland, taking note of the declarations of France in the sense of an immediate evacuation, would only sanction a solution consistent with the popular sovereignty, the base of its public law.

Let us, then, here sum up the bases of a definitive solution which were recognized as acceptable in principle, excepting questions of opportunity and political convenience, at various periods of the negotiations just recalled, when these negotiations bore on the final arrangement of the Roman question considered in itself. These bases are the following:

The Sovereign Pontiff preserves the dignity, inviolability, and all the other prerogatives of sovereignty, and also the privileges towards the King and other Sovereigns which are established by custom. The title of Prince and corresponding honours are conceded to the Roman Cardinals of the Church.

The Leonine City remains under the full jurisdiction and sovereignty of the Pontiff.*

The Italian Government guarantees on its territory:

(a.) The liberty of communication between the Sovereign Pontiff and foreign States, clergy, and peoples.

(b.) The diplomatic immunity of the Pontifical Nuncios or Legates to foreign Powers, and of the foreign Representatives to the Holy See.

The Italian Government engages to preserve all the institutions, offices, and ecclesiastical bodies, and their officials, existing at Rome; but it does not recognize the civil or penal jurisdiction.

The Government engages to preserve entire, and without subjecting them to special taxes, all the ecclesiastical properties whose revenues belong to ecclesiastical charges, offices, corporations, institutes, and bodies, having their seat at Rome, or in the Leonine City.

The Government has no interference in the interior discipline of ecclesiastical bodies at Rome.

The bishops and priests of the kingdom, in their respective dioceses and parishes, shall be free from all interference of the Government in the exercise of their spiritual ministry.

His Majesty renounces in favour of the Church all right of Royal patronage over the smaller or larger ecclesiastical benefices of the city of Rome.

a fixed

The Italian Government grants to the Holy See, and the Sacred College, and unalterable revenue, of a value not inferior to that actually assigned them in the budget af the Pontifical State.

The Royal Government preserve their rank, salaries, and precedence to the civil and military servants of the Pontifical State who are Italians.

These Articles would be considered a public bi-lateral contract, and would form the subject of an agreement with the Powers having Catholic subjects. Italy is to-day still ready to adopt the same bases of a solution. Florence, August 29, 1870.

Note on the Leonine City.

IT is known that the Tiber divides the City of Rome into two parts, one of which, situated on the right bank of the river, was called in old times the Holy City, and was built "per Apostolorum Petri et Pauli suffragia et ob salutem Christianorum omnium." It is this part of Rome which is usually called the Leonine City, from the name of the Popes Leo III and IV, of whom the former undertook its foundation and the latter completed its construction in 849.

* See the note at the end of the Memorandum.