Italy consoled herself with the thought that she had set an example which Prussia, in spite of her protests, would find useful “in conquering the hegemony of Germany.” On the 17th of March the Turin Parliament proclaimed Victor Emmanuel King of Italy, and two days afterwards England recognised his position. France delayed her recognition till June, Napoleon’s chief difficulty being the disposal of Rome. Opportunity, said Italian statesmen, will open the way to Venice; and as for Rome, though it must be the capital of free Italy, we only desire to go there, not at the head of a revolutionary army, but hand in hand with France. Personally, Napoleon would have wished to evacuate Rome. Its occupation was a heavy burden on his finances--which had become seriously embarrassed. To uphold the temporal power of the Pope, which he had disavowed, against the will of the Italian people, which in other quarters he had enforced by the sword, put him in a false position. On the other hand, the priests in France had to be conciliated, and there was a strong party among Frenchmen who thought that France should be compensated, by the occupation of Rome, for the rise of a new naval Power in the Mediterranean.[98] Early in the summer Cavour, who like Themistocles lived to convert a small state into a great one, died--his policy being cherished as a sacred legacy by his successor, Riccasoli. Cavour, however, lived long enough to see the failure of an intrigue to procure the evacuation of Rome by the cession of Sardinia to France. Mr. Kinglake in July tried to convince the House of Commons that this cession was practically agreed on, and he pointed out that Nelson had declared Malta would be useless to England whenever the Bay of Cagliari passed into the hands of a great naval power. But Lord John Russell--in the last speech he ever made in the Lower House--assured the country that he could find no evidence pointing to the existence of such a scheme. At the same time he made it plain, though he did not say so in as many words, that England would regard the cession of Sardinia to France as a _casus belli_.[99]