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The Calabrians, I was told, distinguished themselves by unearthly ferocity; Reggio was given over to a legion of fiends that descended from the heights during the week of confusion. "They tore the rings and brooches off the dead," said a young officiai to me. "They strangled the wounded and dying, in order to despoil them more comfortably.
Why, I wonder, has Reggio paid such exceptional attention to this department of its daily life?
Together with his wife, Virginia Medici and his children, he left the old palace of his ancestors and betook himself to Modena, the title of duke of that city and the estates of Reggio and Carpi having been conferred upon him. Don Cæsar continued the branch line of the Este.
During the few weeks of comparative inaction which ensued, the affairs of Italy claimed his attention. The prospect of an Austrian re-conquest had caused no less concern to the friends of liberty in the peninsula than joy to the reactionary coteries of the old sovereigns. At Rome and Naples threats against the French were whispered or openly vaunted. The signature of the treaties of peace was delayed, and the fulminations of the Vatican were prepared against the sacrilegious spoilers. After the Austrian war-cloud had melted away, the time had come to punish prophets of evil. The Duke of Modena was charged with allowing a convoy to pass from his State to the garrison of Mantua, and with neglecting to pay the utterly impossible fine to which Bonaparte had condemned him. The men of Reggio and Modena were also encouraged to throw off his yoke and to confide in the French. Those of Reggio succeeded; but in the city of Modena itself the ducal troops repressed the rising. Bonaparte accordingly asked the advice of the Directory; but his resolution was already formed. Two days after seeking their counsel, he took the decisive step of declaring Modena and Reggio to be under the protection of France. This act formed an exceedingly important departure in the history of France as well as in that of Italy. Hitherto the Directory had succeeded in keeping Bonaparte from active intervention in affairs of high policy. In particular, it had enjoined on him the greatest prudence with regard to the liberated lands of Italy, so as not to involve France in prolonged intervention in the peninsula, or commit her to a war
I left them together, and in a short time we were on our road, cheerful, pleased, and merry. Before reaching Reggio the honest captain told me that in his opinion it would be better for him to proceed to Parma alone, as, if we arrived in that city all together, it might cause some remarks, and people would talk about us much less if we were without him.
There also lived in Venice throughout almost the whole course of his life the Florentine sculptor, Simon Bianco, as did Tullio Lombardo, an excellent master of intaglio. In Lombardy, likewise, there were excellent sculptors in Bartolommeo Clemente of Reggio and Agostino Busto; and, in intaglio, Jacopo Davanzo of Milan, with Gasparo and Girolamo Misceroni.
'But when we crossed the Lombard plain, Remember what a plague of rain Of rain at Reggio, at Parma, At Lodi rain, Piacenza rain, are not among his best, but they evidently come from his very heart. When he used prose upon that journey his language was probably stronger.
His friend Paganelli of Modena, who wrote a Latin poem on the Empire of Cupid, extolled the Governor of Reggio for ranking among the deity's most generous vassals, one who, in spite of his office of magistrate, looked with an indulgent eye on errors to which himself was liable, and who was accustomed to prefer the study of love-verses to that of the law.
Nay, not content with being Minister and Ambassador, as well as naval officer, the gallant captain must needs act, at least speculate, as a Secretary of the Treasury, or whipper-in for the Sicilian Commons; so he proceeds to discuss the returns for the new elections: 'Should the small Sicilian force', says he, 'recently landed in Calabria probably under 1,000 men succeed in raising the inhabitants of that part of the country against the present Government, they may be able to beat the 12,000 Neapolitan troops at present in Calabria, and then by getting possession of Scylla and Reggio, the Sicilians will gain the control of the Straits, and ultimately so distress the citadel of Messina, by cutting off its communication, as well as by other military operations, as to bring on its surrender.
She was the directress, the secretary, the factotum, of the Duchess of Berry. The Abbe Tripied, who pronounced her funeral eulogy at Bar-le-Duc, May 21st, 1868, traced a very lifelike portrait of her. Let us hear the ecclesiastic witness of the high virtues of this truly superior woman. "She bore," he said, "with equal force and sagacity her titles of lady of honor and Duchess of Reggio.
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