2-995-839 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The vote for annexation at Naples - polling booth at Monte Calvario - from a sketch by T. Nast, 1860. Italian elections on 21st October. 'Bands of people are coming down, men and women, Garibaldini and civilians, all mixed up in delightful confusion, with music and flags, clapping their hands and shouting 'Viva Garibaldi!' 'Viva Vittorio Emmanuele!'...a brass band is playing that beautiful hymn to Garibaldi...Even the women want to vote, but they are kept back. There is an exception made in favour of Marianna la Santa Giovannara, an old patriot of the quarter, known throughout the city for her devotion to Liberal principles...Some so old that they could scarcely totter passed before me, and men on crutches, and blind men, who groped their way to the urn, and cried out lustily 'Si, Si!' But there was one case so affecting that it moved me almost to unmanliness. It was a person in advanced life, with grey hair, who came up, threw in his 'Si,' and then knelt down and kissed the urn with devotion, being choked at the time with the excess of feeling. What a history did that act tell of!...The result of the voting in the kingdom of Naples was officially declared...as follows: Yes, 1,302,062; No, 10,312: majority in favour of annexation, 1,291,752'. From "Illustrated London News", 1860.