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This was done both as a retaliatory measure, and to put a stop to the use which French privateers and parties of Corsicans had hitherto made of it, under cover of Genoese neutrality.
Why should they learn anything else, they say. Everybody around them, and with whom they come in contact speaks Italian. Here are the Corsicans, with their peculiar ideas of the vendetta and the cheapness of life in general, and the Sicilians and Genoese and Milanese. Here are some from the slopes of Vesuvius or Aetna, with inborn knowledge of the grape and of wine making.
There was no one, he believed, so self-possessed as to be willing, when he had heard, merely to observe operations and be silent. Cp. For the Ligurians occupy the whole shore from Etruria up to the Alps and as far as Gaul, according to Dio's statement. The Romans at first sent Claudius to the Corsicans and gave him up.
"The Italian," he says, "acquiesces, but does not forgive; an ambitious man keeps no faith, and estimates his life by his power." The agent further describes the Corsicans as so accustomed to unrest by forty years of anarchy that they would gladly seize the first occasion to throw off the domination of laws which restrain the social disorder.
I do not mention the Corsicans, who were also very numerous on that occasion, because, during my four years of service at the Caisse Territoriale, I have become accustomed to pronouncing those high-sounding, interminable names, always followed by the name of a place: "Paganetti of Porto-Vecchio, Bastelica of Bonifacio, Paianatchi of Barbicaglia."
In spite of the French occupations, from 1708 to 1756, in spite of the refusals with which Cardinal Fleury had but lately met their appeals, the Corsicans, newly risen against the oppression of Genoa, had sent a deputation to Versailles to demand the recognition of their republic, offering to pay the tribute but lately paid annually to their tyrannical protectress.
The Consulta chose the latter position, and named Paoli for president as well as for general-in-chief of the Corsicans. The National Convention at once called the culprit to its bar, and ordered him to Paris to justify his conduct, or to receive the punishment due.
"A day or two like that would bring these vile Corsicans to their senses. `Give them plenty of bayonet, say I. And if you want real sport, do as I did: chase the mothers until they drop, then bayonet their children first, and themselves afterwards. But do not bayonet the mothers too soon, or you rob yourself of half your amusement." "Good! ah, ah! very good indeed!" laughed the wretches.
In that notable work, "Le Contrat Social" , Rousseau called attention to the antique energy shown by the Corsicans in defence of their liberties, and in a startlingly prophetic phrase he exclaimed that the little island would one day astonish Europe. The source of this predilection of Rousseau for Corsica is patent.
Wars as they are called, of a similar character with those against the Ligurians, were waged with the Corsicans and to a still greater extent with the inhabitants of the interior of Sardinia, who retaliated for the predatory expeditions directed against them by sudden attacks on the districts along the coast.
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