1898.] on ^'Marked Unexplored" 677 



had had time to recover, and the Duke, encouraged perhaps by the 

 incident, interviewed him and pressed for an immediate decision. But 

 Lord Castlereagh was not so easily squeezable as Louis Philippe 

 imagined. An immediate decision is quite out of the question, he said ; 

 " your Eoyal Highness must wait, like all of us, for the Congress." 



" Je ue j)us rien gagner," he sighed. 



And yet, at the moment when he was complaining that he could 

 make no way, he had in fact won his cause. Ferdinand, by himself, 

 was a neglisjible quantity in his own cause. The sovereigns of 

 Europe held him as a incumbrance in their cause. They were 

 fighting the cause of monarchy, and he was a disgrace to the cause 

 of monarchy. They were fighting the cause of legitimacy, and 

 Ferdinand was the incarnation of all the qualities that made the 

 word legitimacy an abomination in the ears of the peoples; 



If it had not been for Bentinck and Louis Philippe, Ferdinand 

 would never have returned to Naples. 



Bentinck's conduct was highly improper, but, as a matter of fact, 

 it did prevent the definite recognition of Murat. Louis Philippe's 

 adroitness and pertinacity produced the general imjiression that 

 Murat was rather a nuisance than otherwise. The result was that 

 when the Dukes of Gallo and Campochiaro claimed admittance to 

 the Congress of Vienna as Murat's representatives, it was refused to 

 them. 



Talleyrand, the plenipotentiary of Louis XVIII., tried to push 

 his advantage further. But Metternich was firm. "I will never," 

 he said, " advise my master to repudiate the treaty with Murat. It 

 was made in an hour of stress when we had need of his help, and I 

 will be no party to repudiating it now. But," he added, " you know 

 Murat's temper. He has so far exhibited great self-restraint. Sooner 

 or later he will make a slip, and we shall profit by that." 



1 am glad that my time has drawn so near to its close, and that I 

 can do no more than hurry through the last year of Murat's life. 

 Prince Metternich was quite right, Murat did make a slip, and the 

 Austrians did take advantage of it. They entered his territory, he 

 was defeated in battle and fled. Ferdinand, the Messiah as he called 

 himself, returned to his faithful Neapolitans, and Murat wandered in 

 exile. His private fortune of twelve millions of francs had been 

 spent in maintaining the royal state of Naples. All that he carried 

 into exile with him was a handful of gold pieces and some diamonds. 



At last, when at the end of his resources, there came a helping 

 hand from Austria, The Emperor created him Count of Lipona, and 

 granted him a passport to Austrian dominions : doubtless a provision 

 would have followed. It came too late. That very morning he had 

 completed his preparations for a last desperate attempt. " The die 

 is cast," he cried, as with the patent of Count of Lipona in his pocket, 

 he set sail for Calabria, bent on a struggle for the throne of Naples. 

 He had miscalculated. There was no rising in his favour. He 

 was taken prisoner, tried by a Court Martial, of which nearly 



y(5L. XV (No 92.) 2 Y 



