right of self-government. The great powers at once took alarm at the
rapid spread of revolutionary ideas and proceeded to adopt measures for
the suppression of the movements to which these ideas gave rise. At
Troppau and Laybach measures were taken for the suppression of the
revolutionary movements in Italy. An Austrian army entered Naples in
March, 1821, overthrew the constitutional government that had been
inaugurated, and restored Ferdinand II to absolute power. The
revolution which had broken out in Piedmont was also suppressed by a
detachment of the Austrian army. England held aloof from all
participation in the conferences at Troppau and Laybach, though her
ambassador to Austria was present to watch the proceedings.

The next meeting of the allied powers was arranged for October, 1822,
at Verona. Here the affairs of Greece, Italy, and in particular Spain
came up for consideration. At this congress all five powers of the
alliance were represented. France was especially concerned about the
condition of affairs in Spain, and England sent Wellington out of
self-defense. The Congress of Verona was devoted largely to a
discussion of Spanish affairs. Wellington had been instructed to use
all his influence against the adoption of measures of intervention in
Spain. When he found that the other powers were bent upon this step
and that his protest would be unheeded, he withdrew from the congress.
The four remaining powers signed the secret treaty of Verona, November
22, 1822, as a revision, so they declared in the preamble, of the
Treaty of the Holy Alliance, which had been signed at Paris in 1815 by
Austria, Russia, and Prussia. This last mentioned treaty sprang from
the erratic brain of the Czar Alexander under the influence of Baroness
Krüdener, and is one of the most remarkable political documents extant.
No one had taken it seriously except the Czar himself and it had been
without influence upon the politics of Europe. The text of the treaty