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Updated: June 24, 2025
By and by comes the hour of vengeance. Madame Rattazzi gives a ball, and not a woman will go to it. In 1870 she gave one at the Grand Hotel, to which half the town was invited. There arrived at the festal scene about five hundred men and just thirty-two women. It was funny enough.
The thirty-two women besported themselves with thirty-two partners in the centre of the hall to the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and all kinds of musical instruments, whilst the rest of the men stood round the hall five deep, like a deep dark fringe on a Turkish carpet. Madame Rattazzi, however, achieved a great triumph against all odds.
The Papalini would have complained and remonstrated, and Rattazzi could have conscientiously assured the people at Paris that they were dealing with exaggerations and bugbears; the very existence of the frontier force would have become a controversy, and, while the newspapers were proving it was a myth, we should have been in the Vatican." "And when shall we be there, general?"
He was succeeded by Urban Rattazzi, under whose administration a measure was passed which, though drastic in appearance, has not prevented the re-establishment of a great many convents of which the property was bought in under the name of private individuals.
Cavour rarely made a man's antecedents a reason for not turning him to account; but there was one point on which he required to be reassured before seeking an understanding with Rattazzi this was whether his fidelity to the monarchy could be entirely depended on.
He made him think that he was leading while he was being led. With Ricasoli there could be no such illusions. Napoleon understood him to be a man whom he might break, not bend. He thought it desirable to break him, and Imperial desires had many channels, at that time, towards fulfilment. The Ricasoli ministry fell in February 1862, and, as a matter of course, Rattazzi was called to power.
The more sure he felt of their opposition the less easy is it to justify him for taking so grave a step without their knowledge. D'Azeglio was very angry, but he hated scandal, and he refrained from disowning the act of his imperious colleague. He was none the less determined never to sit in the same Cabinet with Rattazzi. One reason he gave for it was characteristic.
The law was known as the 'Rattazziana, from Urbano Rattazzi, whom Cavour appointed Minister of Grace and Justice, thereby effecting a coalition between the Right Centre, which he led himself, and the Left Centre, which was led by Rattazzi; an alliance not pleasing to the Pure Right or to the Advanced Left, but necessary to give the Prime Minister sufficient strength to command the respect, both at home and abroad, which can only be won by a statesman who is not afraid of being overturned by every whiff of the parliamentary wind.
Walewski confirmed this by stating that the simple annexation of Lombardy was not a sufficient motive "for demanding a sacrifice on the part of our ally in the interest of the safety of our frontiers," and in August he formally repeated to Rattazzi that they did not dream of annexing Savoy.
Rattazzi yielded, and the king, though still remembering with bitter feelings the scene at Villafranca, sacrificed his pride to his patriotism. Cavour did not like the idea of serving under Rattazzi, but he agreed to accept the post in order to prevent an antagonism which would have proved fatal to Italy. Napoleon astutely uttered no word of protest.
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