Page:The drama of three hundred and sixty-five days.djvu/106

THE DRAMA OF 365 DAYS his "kingly word" for it that if Italy could not fight with her former friends she should not fight against them. This was a blow to Italian aspirations, for Victor Emanuel III is the best-beloved man in Italy, the father of his people, whose heads would bow before his will even though their hearts were torn.

Then came negotiations with Austria about the restoration of provinces which had once belonged to Italy and were still inhabited by Italians. It looked like paltering and peddling, like sale and barter. The people were losing patience; they thought time was being wasted. Beyond the Alps men were dying for liberty in a mighty struggle against the worst tyranny that had ever threatened the world, yet Italy was doing nothing.

But the people did not know all. Even then their country was already at war within the limits of her own frontier—silently in her tailors' workshops, where uniforms were being sewn for the immense army she was soon to call into the field, audibly in the forges of Milan and Terni, where vast quantities of munitions were being hammered out for a long campaign. Rh