Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. I.djvu/462

478 when, in order to support the revolution in Lombardy, it declared war against Austria, Cavour has ever since maintained with intrepid mind and steady glance, although frequently without the certainty of victory. When peace was again broken with Austria, in the spring of 1849, Cavour said to some one who represented to him his imprudence and danger:

“We must risk the game if we would maintain our self-respect. If we remain quiet with our miserable truce, we shall perish in our own mud; if we fall on the field of battle it will be in the blood of our enemies, and with the maintenance of honor.” Austria and other European powers opposed the right of Italy to have a national flag. But Piedmont had adopted the tricolor, which Italy raised in the insurrectionary year of 1848, and as this flag participated in the victories of the allied powers in the war against Russia, no one has ventured to oppose the right of the Italian flag to be raised amongst those of the independent nations. When later, at the Congress in Paris, Cavour appeared as the representative of the state of Sardinia, it appeared probable that he might be refused the same rank and suffrage as the representatives of the larger states. Cavour on this let it be understood that he should, in that case, leave the Congress and depart from Paris. This was not desired; and the worthy representative of brave little Sardinia sat and voted on equal terms with the rest.

The same heroic course of politics had led Cavour to carry through the opening of the subterranean-railway-communication of Mont Cenis, and to undertake the work in the name of the state, in order to have