Wanderings in Corsica: Its History and Its Heroes. Vol. 1 of 2Gregorovius, Ferdinand
History
Wanderings in Corsica: Its History and Its Heroes. Vol. 1 of 2
Gregorovius, Ferdinand
Corsica (France) -- Description and travel; Corsica (France) -- History
Paoli had counted on the English king's naming him viceroy; but he was
deceived, for Gilbert Elliot was sent to Corsica in this capacity--a
serious blunder, since Elliot was totally unacquainted with the
condition of the island, and his appointment could not but deeply wound
Paoli.
The gray-haired man immediately withdrew into private life; and as
Elliot saw that his relation to the English, already unpleasant, must
soon become dangerous, he wrote to George III. that the removal of
Pasquale was desirable. This was accomplished. The King of England,
in a friendly letter, invited Paoli to come to London, and spend his
remaining days in honour at the court. Paoli was in his own house at
Morosaglia when he received the letter. Sadly he now proceeded to San
Fiorenzo, where he embarked, and left his country for the third and
last time, in October 1795. The great man shared the same fate as most
of the legislators and popular leaders of antiquity; he died rewarded
with ingratitude, unhappy, and in exile. The two greatest men of
Corsica, Pasquale and Napoleon, foes to each other, were both to end
their days and be buried on British territory.
The English government of Corsica--from ignorance of the country very
badly conducted--lasted only a short time. As soon as Napoleon found
himself victorious in Italy, he despatched Generals Gentili and Casalta
with troops to the island; and scarcely had they made their appearance,
when the Corsicans, imbittered by the banishment of Paoli and their
other grievances, rose against the English. In almost inexplicable
haste they relinquished the island, from whose people they were
separated by wide and ineradicable differences in national character;
and by November 1796, not a single Englishman remained in Corsica. The
island was now again under the supremacy of France.
Pasquale Paoli lived to see Napoleon Emperor. Fate granted him at least
the satisfaction of seeing a countryman of his own the most prominent
and the most powerful actor in European history. After passing twelve
years more of exile in London, he died peacefully on the 5th of
February 1807, at the age of eighty-two, his mind to the last occupied
with thoughts of the people whom he had so warmly loved. He was the
patriarch and oldest legislator of European liberty. In his last letter
to his friend Padovani, the noble old man, reviewing his life, says
humbly:--
"I have lived long enough; and if it were granted me to begin my life
anew, I should reject the gift, unless it were accompanied with the
intelligent cognisance of my past life, that I might repair the errors
and follies by which it has been marked."
One of the Corsican exiles announced his death to his countrymen in the
following letter:--
GIACOMORSI TO SIGNOR PADOVANI.
"LONDON, _July 2, 1807_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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