In an instant I had at my side Nino Bexio, my ordonnance officer; Baverio, whom I believed to be, according to my orders, at Via Carozze; Marina, the ordinary commander of my lancers; and Sacchi and Marochetti, my old companions of the wars of Montevideo. They rallied round me the wrecks of the Bolognese Bersaglieri, placed themselves at the head of the Italian legion, and rushed forward the first, drawing others after them.

Nothing could check their impetuosity. The Villa Corsini was retaken; but before arriving at it, so many men were left upon the road it was necessary to traverse, that they could not resist the numerous columns that assailed them. They were obliged to fall back. But during this charge others had come up, others had joined them. The leaders, furious at the check, insisted upon marching on again. Marina, who had received a ball through his arm, raised his bleeding limb, shouting-" Forward!" I drew, in order to assist these valiant soldiers, all the men I could from Vascello. The charge sounded, and the Villa Corsini was retaken.

A quarter of an hour after it was lost again, and it cost us valuable blood! Marina, as I have said, was wounded in the arm, Nino Bexio received a ball in his side, and Baverio was killed.

At the moment when I was pressing Marina to go and get his wound dressed, when I was ordering Bexio to be carried away, Manara, who had hastened from Campo Vacino, in spite of the contradictory orders he had received, was by my side.

66

Bring out your men," said I; "you see plainly that paltry place must be retaken."

His first company, commanded by Captain Ferrari, an old aide-de-camp of General Burando, was already deployed as tirailleurs outside the gate of St. Pancrazio. Ferrari was a brave man, who had made with us the double campaign of Palestrina and Velletri. He had

been wounded at Palestri by a bayonet in the leg, but he was cured.

Manara ordered his trumpet to sound the recall. Ferrari rallied his men, and came to take orders from his colonel. He commanded the bayonets to be fixed at the ends of the guns, had the charge sounded, and sprang forward. From the moment he arrived at the gate, that is to say, three hundred metres from the Casino, a shower of balls poured upon him and upon his men. He nevertheless continued to advance headlong upon the villas, which growled and cast out flames like a volcano, when his lieutenant, Mangiagalli, pulling him by the sleeve of his tunic, cried out to him

"Captain! Why, Captain! do you not see that there are only us two?" Ferrari for the first time looked behind him; twenty-eight of his eighty men were lying dead or wounded, the others had beaten a retreat. They then did the same.

Manara was furious at seeing his men abandon their officers before his eyes. He called the second company, commanded by Captain Henry Dandolo, a noble, rich Milanese of Venetian race, as his ducal name indicated. He gave him the same orders he had given the first, and cried, "Lombards, forward! The matter is-retake that Villa, or lay down your lives! member, Garibaldi is looking at you!"

Re

Ferrari made a sign that he had a word to say. "Speak, then," said Manara. "General," said Ferrari, addressing me, "what I have to say is not with the hope of diminishing the danger, but with that of succeeding. I know the locality; I have just come out, and you have seen that I hesitated more at coming out than going in." I made a sign of assent. "Well, then, this is what I propose. Instead of following the garden path, and attacking in front, we will glide, the company Dandolo on the left, the first on the right, behind the myrtle hedge. A stone thrown by me to

the company Dandolo, will inform him that my men are ready; a stone thrown by him will be understood in the same way by us. Then our eight trumpets shall sound at once, and we will rush to the assault from the very foot of the terrace."

"Do you as you like," said I; "only retake that paltry place."

Ferrari set forward at the head of his company, and Dandolo at the head of his. I ordered them to be followed by Captain Hoffzletter and fifty students, charging them to occupy the house on the left, of which I have spoken, and which was afterwards known by the name of the Burnt House. At the expiration of ten minutes I heard the trumpets. This was what was going on:-The two companies, protected by the hedges and the vines, had penetrated, as Ferrari hoped they would, without being seen or heard, till within forty paces of the terrace; then the signals had been exchanged, the trumpets had sounded, and my brave Bersaglieri sprang forward to the assault. But from the terrace of the grand salon of the first story, from the circular staircase which led to it, and from all the windows, a murderous fire was poured upon them. Dandolo was struck down, his body pierced by a ball; the lieutenant, Sylva, was wounded close to Captain Ferrari; the sub-lieutenant, Manchi, received almost at the same moment two balls, one in the thigh and the other in the arm. And yet, led on by their captain, Ferrari, Dandolo being dead, the Bersaglieri, by a supreme effort, continued to march forward; they scaled the terrace, and drove back the French as far as the circular staircase of the villa. But there was an end of their efforts they had the French at once in front and on their flanks; the guns that were fired upon them almost touched them, and every shot brought down a man. I saw them fight and fall uselessly; I could perceive they would allow themselves to be killed to the last man, without a favourable result, I therefore sounded a retreat.

I had two thousand men, the French had twenty thousand. I took the Casino Corsini with a company, they retook it with a regiment. It was clear the French saw the importance of the position as well as I did.

My Bersaglieri returned to me, leaving forty of their number dead in the gardens of the villa. Almost all were wounded. It was necessary to wait for more troops. I despatched Onigone and Ugo Bassi with a charge to send me in all they could meet with. I wished, for the quiet of my conscience, to make one last and supreme effort. I placed my men in shelter behind La Vascello.

At the expiration of about an hour, companies of the line, students, douaniers, the rest of the Lombard Bersaglieri, and fragments of different corps, came pouring in pêle-mêle. Amongst them was Marina, on horseback, with a score of Lancers whom he had brought me. He had had his wound dressed, and came to take his share in the action. I then left Vascello with a small troop of Dragoons. At sight of me, cries of "Viva l'Italia! Viva la republica Romana!” resounded on all sides. The cannons thundered from the walls, and the bullets passing over our heads announced a fresh attack to the French; and altogether without order, pêle-mêle, Marina at the head of his Lancers, Manara at the head of his Bersaglieri, and I at the head of all, we rushed against that-I will not say impregnable, but untenable villa.

When arrived at the gate, we found it impossible for all to enter. The torrent flowed away to the right and left. Those who were dispersed in this manner, spread themselves about as tirailleurs on the two flanks of the Casino. Some scaled the walls, and leaped into the gardens; whilst others, directing their course towards the Villa Valentini, took it, and made some prisoners.

I beheld here an action performed that would be deemed almost incredible. Marina, followed by his Lancers, advanced at the head of the column. This

intrepid horseman devoured the ground before him, cleared the terrace, and arrived at the foot of the staircase. There, clapping spurs to his horse, he forced him up the stairs at a gallop; so completely so, that for au instant he appeared upon the landing-place which led into the grand saloon like a fine equestrian statue. But, alas! this apotheosis lasted but for an instant. A fusillade from guns close upon him brought down the brave horseman, and his horse fell upon him, pierced by nine balls.

Manara followed him, leading a charge with the bayonet which nothing could resist. For a moment the Villa Corsini was ours. That moment was short, but it was sublime! The French brought up all their reserve, and fell upon us all together before I could even repair the disorder inseparable from victory. The fight was renewed more desperately, more bloodily, more fatally than ever. I saw repass before me, repulsed by those two irresistible powers of war, fire and steel, those whom I had seen pass on but a minute before, now bearing away their dead. Among these was the brave Lieutenant Rozat.

"My account is settled," said he to me as he passed, pointing to his bleeding breast.

I have seen very terrible fights. I saw the fight of Rio Grande, I saw the Bayada, I saw the Salto SanAntonio, but I never saw anything comparable to the butchery of the Villa Corsini.

I came out the last, my puncho absolutely drilled with shot-holes; but without a single wound myself. Within ten minutes we were once more in the Vascello, in the line of houses which belonged to us, from all the windows of which we renewed our fire upon the Villa Corsini.

There appeared nothing more to be done, and yet in the evening, Emile Dandolo, brother of the Dandolo who was killed, and Goffredo Maneli, a young Genoese poet of great hopes, at the head of a hundred men, came to press me to allow them to make another attempt.