OH, IL THE EUROPEAN REVOLUTION 129 
It had expected an easy victory; it met instead with 
an heroic resistance. Thanks largely to Garibaldi’s leader- 
ship, a first attack was severely repulsed, and the great 
zuerilla followed up his success by completely defeating a 
Neapolitan force which was moving against the Republic. 
* Our soldiers have been received as enemies, your military 
honour is engaged,” wrote Louis Napoleon to his general ; 
in the meantime, to give an opportunity for reinforcements 
to be sent, Ferdinand de Lesseps was despatched to negotiate 
with the triumvirs. Directly fresh troops arrived. Oudinot 
broke off the armistice, and made a treacherons attack upon 
the outer works. The heroic story of the defence cannot 
here be told in detail. On June 30 the Roman Assembly 
decided upon surrender, and three days after the French 
ccupied the city. For a week Mazzini braved the in- 
vaders and the Papalists alike, then quietly returned to 
exile. On the day before Oudinot’s entry, Garibaldi and 
his wife, accompanied by a considerable following, had 
ridden out of Rome to begin a retreat across Italy which 
tanks among the most wonderful of modern feats of arms. 
On September 2 he made his escape from Cala Martina, 
having crossed and recrossed the peninsula. His wife had 
died from exhaustion, his comrades were scattered, dead, 
or imprisoned. "The Tuscan Republic had been overthrown 
in May. ‘ Bomba ” had completed the subjugation of Sicily 
in the same month, Venice had surrendered on J uly 24, 
Italy was abandoned once more to its despots, native and 
foreign. Piedmont alone, though defeated and discredited, 
retained its constitutional institutions. 
The National Parliament of Frankfort, to the lasting 
misfortune of Germany and of Europe, proved itself unequal 
to the mission of providing the German peonle with © form 
of government at once liberal and national. Cortal. the