'Not this Pope,' said Ampère, 'but his successor. Nor do I see the great evil of the absence of the Pope from Rome. Popes have often been absent before, sometimes for long periods.'
'Most of my French friends,' I said, 'are opposed to Italian Unity as mischievous to France.'
'I do not believe,' he answered, 'in the submission of Naples to this Piedmontese dynasty, but I shall be delighted to see all Italy north of the Neapolitan territory united.
'I do not think that we have anything to fear from the kingdom of Italy. It is as likely to be our friend as to be our enemy. But the Neapolitans, even if left to themselves, would not willingly give up their independence, and _Celui-ci_ is trying to prevent their doing so.'
'What do _they_ wish,' I asked, 'and what does _he_ wish?'
'I believe,' he answered, 'that _their_ wishes are only negative.
'They do not wish to recall the Bourbons, and they are resolved not to keep the Piedmontese. _His_ wish I believe to be to put his cousin there. Prince Napoleon himself refused Tuscany. It is too small, but he would like Naples, and Louis Napoleon would be glad to get rid of him. What would England say?'
'If we believed,' I said, 'in the duration of a Bonaparte dynasty in France, we should, of course, object to the creation of one in Naples. But if, as we think it probable, the Bonapartists have to quit France, I do not see few we should be injured by their occupying the throne of Naples.
'I should object to them if I were a Neapolitan. All their instincts are despotic, democratic, and revolutionary. But even they are better than the late king was. What chance have the Murats?'
'None,' said Ampère. 'They have spoiled their game, if they had a game, by their precipitation. The Emperor has disavowed them, the Neapolitans do not care for them. The Prince de Leuchtenberg, grandson of Eugène Beauharnais, has been talked of. He is well connected, related to many of the reigning families of the Continent, and is said to be intelligent and well educated.'
'If Naples,' I said, 'is to be detached from the kingdom of Italy, Sicily ought to be detached from Naples. There is quite as much mutual antipathy.'
'Heaven forbid!' I answered. 'It would be another Corfu on a larger scale. The better we governed them, the more they would hate us. The only chance for them is to have a king of their own.'