At Naples the news of the revolt led to the taking of extreme measures. The vessels of the royal marine, along with merchant ships appropriated by the Government for the occasion, were despatched to Palermo. All were filled with soldiers and munitions of war. In a few days there were 13,000 of the king’s troops in and around the city, to face the insurrection. In spite of the vigilance of the police, a newspaper from northern Italy had been smuggled into Palermo, making known to the inhabitants that the committee at Genoa was organising an expedition to come to the aid of the Sicilian patriots. On the 10th of April a secret messenger, Rosolino Pilo, who had been under proscription in his native land for ten years, succeeded in landing safely at Messina. He made his way from village to village by night. In the morning the sign of his presence was found written on the walls-- “_Viene Garibaldi! Viva Vittorio Emanuele!_” Soon, in Palermo itself, the very children cried after the _sbirri_ as they passed--“Garibaldi is coming!” Word was passed around that, on a certain day, all whose sympathies were with the revolution should walk in the fashionable promenade of the Via Maqueda--the broad, straight street that divides the city in two halfway up from the sea. Even the greatest ladies came on foot; there was no room for the splendid equipages for which Palermo has always been noted. No one was armed. All kept an ominous silence. Maniscalco was at his wits’ end. He sent a band of soldiers and _sbirri_ along the promenade to cry from time to time, “_Viva Francesco Secondo!_” There was no response from the crowd. Then the _sbirri_ surrounded a group of the citizens and ordered them to repeat the cry, “_Viva Francesco Secondo!_” After a moment of deep silence one of the group, tossing his hat in the air, shouted, “_Viva Vittorio Emanuele!_” The soldiers bayoneted him on the spot, and then discharged their guns into the crowd. Two men were killed, and there were thirty women and children among the wounded. The mounted gendarmes charged on their horses, and swept the streets clear. But the next morning Maniscalco could read in huge red letters on every dead wall of the city, “_Garibaldi viene!_”--“Garibaldi is coming!” II.--WITH THE KING’S ARMY. The regular troops were now kept constantly on the alert, and daily and nightly drawn by new alarms from the city toward the mountains, it was useless for them to give chase to the _picciotti_ in their retreat along the winding goat-paths of the hills. In return, they brought their artillery against houses sheltering the helpless women and children of the insurgent villages. It was on the 9th of May that the demonstration of the Via Maqueda took place, followed by the bloody police outrage on the people and the threatening prophecy written by night upon the walls. On the 13th word passed through the city that the prophecy was fulfilled. “Garibaldi has landed at Marsala!”