Keep the flame burning, because that which has not been, may be, because if victory was maimed once, it does not follow that it can be maimed a second time! (Loud cheers, repeated cries of “We swear it!”) I keep in mind your oath. I count upon you as I count upon all good Italians, but I count, above all, upon you, because you are of my generation, because you have come out from the bloody filth of the trenches, because you have lived and struggled and suffered in the face of death, because you have fulfilled your duty and have the right to vindicate that to which you are entitled, not only from the material but from the moral point of view. I tell you, I swear to you, that the time is passed for ever when fighters returning from the trenches had to be ashamed of themselves, the time when, owing to the threatening attitudes of Communists, the officers received the cowardly advice to dress in plain clothes. (Applause.) All that is buried. You must not forget, and nobody forgets, that seven months ago fifty-two thousand armed “black shirts” came to Rome to bury the past! (Loud cheers.) Soldiers! Fellow-Soldiers! Let us raise before our great unknown comrade the cry, which sums up our faith: Long live the King! Long live Italy, victorious, impregnable, immortal! (Loud cheers, whilst all the flags are raised and waved amidst the enthusiasm of the immense crowd in the square.) THE RELATIONS BETWEEN ITALY AND THE UNITED STATES Speech by the American Ambassador to Rome. On the 28th June 1923 the Italo-American Association held in Rome a banquet in honour of Mr. Richard Washburn Child, American Ambassador to Italy, and of the Hon. Mussolini, President of the Italian Council. The two distinguished guests delivered the following speeches,[14] which have a special importance, both with regard to Fascismo and to Italo-American relations. Footnote 14: The two speeches have been courteously given at his request to Baron Quaranta di San Severino for publication by the American Ambassador, Richard Washburn Child. The object of this meeting was clearly explained by the Hon. Baron Sardi, Italian Under-Secretary of State for Public Works, in an appropriate address to the illustrious guests (published in full by the Bulletin of the Library for American Studies in Italy, No. 5), in which, after having thanked them in the name of Senator Ruffini, President of the Association, still detained on account of important duties in Geneva, and also in the name of the other members, for the honour they conferred on the Society by their presence, went on to lay stress on the purpose for which the Association exists, namely, to promote a better reciprocal understanding between the American and Italian peoples through the manifold activities of their respective countries.