Chapter Summaries

Venetian officials and merchants argued over a proposed unified tax system, and Marco Bianchi urged them to pursue Italian independence. Franz received a petition opposing tax reform, but he confronted Olga about who had persuaded her to plead for a delay.

• Rossi told Venetian officials and merchants that the Empire was considering a unified tax system, prompting outrage among the gathered elite.
• Marco Bianchi called for Italian independence and promised that a free Venice could dominate world trade, while Federico de Luca warned that independence would worsen people's lives.
• Franz received a petition from Northern Italian gentry claiming poor harvests and famine made further taxes unbearable.
• Olga tearfully asked Franz to postpone tax reform, but he challenged her to reveal who had prompted her and insisted the taxes were owed by wealthy interests, not the poor.

Franz warned Olga that people around her had been manipulating her for political ends and refused to spare her friends. He then renewed a plan to eliminate Italian nationalist leader Mazzini, who was secretly spreading his ideas in Rome.

• Franz explained how political schemers had shaped his siblings and told Olga that her acquaintances were dangerous interests behind the suffering she had learned about.
• Olga hesitated to trust Franz, but he rejected her plea to protect her friends and swept her into his arms despite her pregnancy.
• Franz considered the renewed Italian unification movement in Northern Italy and distinguished the ambitions of Venetians from the passive discontent of Lombards.
• Franz decided that persuasion and deportation were not enough for some opponents and reopened the plan to eradicate Mazzini.
• Mazzini remained in hiding in Rome with his adopted daughter, Italy, disguised as a priest while secretly spreading his ideas.

Austrian intelligence agents tracked Giuseppe Mazzini to a church in Rome, where his escape plan destroyed the church and killed many people. Mazzini escaped through a tunnel, but Ruby shot him at a cliff, where he plunged toward the stormy sea.

• Mazzini used his priestly cover in Rome to recruit Italian nationalists and spread pamphlets in preparation for a coming European upheaval.
• Austrian agents raided Saint Ina Church and confronted Father Matt, while Brother Peter tried to protect him.
• Matt triggered explosives hidden in the church’s holy statue, killing Peter and many agents and mercenaries, but Mazzini escaped through a tunnel.
• A day later, Mazzini emerged from a hidden grave on a cliff and Ruby shot him several times.
• Mazzini leaped from the cliff into the stormy sea as Ruby watched.

Ruby believed she had killed the suspected Mazzini, and Franz received reports of the man’s death and the destruction of an Italian separatist printing den. In Genoa, Crooked Joseph abandoned the nationalist struggle and chose an ordinary life, leaving a cigar on Giuseppe Garibaldi’s grave.

• Ruby shot at the suspected Mazzini, threw grenades after him over the cliff, and left believing he had died.
• Franz learned that a suspected Mazzini had fallen to his death and that Austrian forces had destroyed a separatist printing works beneath a church in Rome.
• Franz reflected on Austrian rule in the Papal States and allowed Italian nationalist leaders to flee or remain in hiding rather than provoke unrest.
• Crooked Joseph heard of the deaths of several nationalists and concluded that Italian leaders could not defeat Austria or improve ordinary people’s lives.
• Crooked Joseph left a burning cigar on Giuseppe Garibaldi’s gravestone and chose a peaceful, ordinary life.

Franz strengthened Austrian colonial defenses with barbed wire, hunting dogs, and strict limits on military expeditions. After West African natives attacked a fenced border and were caught, the colony prepared a cautious counterattack against their tribe.

• Franz ordered colonial borderlands cleared and guarded, while barbed wire and specially bred hunting dogs were introduced to protect settlements and farmland.
• A West African tribe gathered at night with muskets, matches, and explosives supplied by outsiders, then tried to cross the colony’s fence.
• Barbed wire injured several natives, whose cries alerted Austrian guards and militia.
• A mounted patrol found the abandoned, injured natives and learned the location of their tribe and that someone had supplied them with weapons and explosives.
• The colonial forces planned to verify the tribe’s location with hunting dogs and follow Franz’s rule that no expedition deploy more than one-third of the colony’s forces.

Franz rejected direct slave trading and instead established a ransom system for prisoners captured in the colonies. The chapter also explained the risks of colonial agriculture and the deadly consequences of private groups withholding or smuggling Quinine, while noting that freely supplying it could accelerate rival empires’ colonial expansion.

• Franz refused to let the Austrian Empire enter the slave trade and arranged for prisoners to be released to buyers who paid ransoms.
• Franz used the ransom system to shift responsibility for the prisoners’ fate onto the countries and merchants who acquired them.
• The chapter described how war, natural disasters, and long recovery times made colonial agriculture too risky for most private investors to sustain.
• Private Austrian colonial groups falsified population figures, withheld or smuggled Quinine, and concealed malaria outbreaks, worsening deaths and epidemics.
• Franz’s government required colonial groups to buy Quinine because opening the supply could have fueled rapid expansion in British and French colonies.

Franz tightened Austria’s control over Quinine, strengthened its colonial position, and ordered a fire along the American border to stop native incursions. In London, Prime Minister John Russell reviewed Prince Albert’s vision for the Great Exhibition and saw it as a way to advance Britain’s economic and political interests.

• Franz ordered Austrian forces in Chenla to kill everyone in a county involved in smuggling Quinine and rubber, ending large-scale smuggling there.
• Franz used his influence to establish the Saint Andes Alliance, which coordinated Quinine-producing countries and planned to restrict production.
• Franz bought colonial assets abandoned by private groups and absorbed unemployed colonists after the native crisis shook confidence in Austria’s colonies.
• Franz ordered the border mountains burned to prevent natives advancing from British Honduras and the Republic of New Granada from gaining a foothold.
• Prime Minister John Russell reviewed Prince Albert’s Great Exhibition plan and recognized its potential to display British industry, expand trade, and promote Britain’s values.

John Russell confronted the Duke of Northumberland over Britain’s losses in the Honduras border fire, while Franz’s blockade pushed New Granada into political crisis. José Hilario López called for resistance and foreign mediation, but his opponents and regions seeking independence weakened his government as Austrian warships arrived.

• John Russell questioned the Duke of Northumberland about the troops and supplies lost in the fire, and the duke proposed canceling the border plan.
• New Granada’s diplomats were turned away in Vienna, and Franz sent warships to blockade its key ports and demand the return of the natives.
• José Hilario López mobilized New Granada to resist Austria and sent envoys to Europe to seek mediation.
• Crowds in New Granada welcomed Austrian warships and sent them maps, deployment charts, and letters of surrender, but Captain William von Tegetthoff obeyed his orders and did not seize the port.
• José Hilario López’s opponents attacked his reforms as regions declared independence or sought a return to Habsburg rule, while the reforms had weakened New Granada’s finances and central authority.

José Hilario López faced a nationwide rebellion after his reforms alienated New Granada’s Church, landless people, political rivals, and other groups, while foreign powers refused to help him. Franz discovered that Britain and France would stay out and that Russia supported Austria, leaving him scrambling as the crisis escalated.

• José Hilario López’s abolition of slavery and Native American reservations, attacks on the Church, and other reforms left freed people landless, displaced Native Americans, and religious forces hostile to him.
• Rebellion spread across New Granada after the Austrian Imperial Navy’s arrival, and José Hilario López was confined to Bogotá as provinces, military leaders, and even his servants turned against him.
• José Hilario López learned that Britain, France, and Russia had ignored his requests for help and that his government had no money to raise troops, so he decided to appeal to Washington through the Monroe Doctrine.
• Franz realized New Granada’s size and distance made it difficult for Austria to absorb, but Britain and France declined to intervene because they saw little benefit and faced their own constraints.
• Nicholas I supported Franz’s actions, and Russian leaders proposed sending a fleet to aid Austria and gain experience overseas, leaving Franz scrambling.

Franz arranged for Spain to reclaim New Granada rather than let Austria annex it, and the European powers recognized Spanish rule. Spain’s new government imposed steep fees on American trade and transit, leaving Zachary Taylor furious as Britain urged the United States to respond.

• Habescu offered Ferdinand II Austria and Russia’s help in recovering New Granada, and Ferdinand accepted without asking for payment.
• Britain, Austria, Russia, France, Prussia, Spain, and Portugal recognized Spain’s right to rule New Granada, and José Hilario López’s government went into exile.
• José María Dionisio Melo y Ortiz became Governor of New Granada, while Britain gained trade privileges there.
• Ferdinand II refused to recognize the Mallarino–Bidlack Treaty and raised Panama’s tariffs by 40 percent and transit fees by 120 percent.
• British newspapers urged the United States to challenge Spain, and Millard Fillmore questioned Zachary Taylor’s reluctance to send troops.

At Franz's celebrations for his coronation as Archduke of Moldavia and Wallachia, foreign representatives debated how to counter Austria's growing power. Britain courted France and Prussia and tried to alarm Russia, while Archduke Mikhail admired Franz; the chapter left their diplomatic maneuvering unresolved.

• Zachary Taylor angrily rebuked Millard Fillmore for urging war, and Fillmore recruited pirate William Walker.
• After Spain recovered New Granada, Franz was crowned Archduke of Moldavia and Wallachia at celebrations protected by 100,000 Austrian troops.
• Viscount Stratford sounded out Marquis Lamberta, who hinted that France might help preserve peace in Europe.
• Viscount Stratford urged Baron Honard to seek British support for Prussia against Austrian influence, and Honard agreed to brief the king and Parliament.
• Viscount Stratford warned Russian representatives that Austria's control of the Danubian Principalities threatened Russian trade, provoking arguments between pro-British and pro-Austrian factions.
• Archduke Mikhail Nikolaevich silenced the noisy Russian representatives and reflected on his admiration for Franz.

Franz and Anna Ipadis discussed the future of Wallachia and her role in overseeing its officials. Meanwhile, Weishate incited Scarlet Crusaders to seize Franz, and fireworks signaled that the attack had begun.

• Franz offered Anna Ipadis a position overseeing the summer palace, and they discussed the need to supervise those in power.
• Weishate gathered disgruntled Scarlet Crusaders and accused Anna Ipadis of selling them out to the Austrians.
• Weishate urged the group to capture Franz at the imperial residence and promised them wealth and freedom.
• Franz and Anna Ipadis watched the night sky as fireworks rose in the distance, and Franz remarked that she was still too kind.

Weishate’s failed attempt to seize Franz at his coronation led Franz to investigate the remaining Scarlet Crusaders, while the ceremony confirmed Wallachia and Moldavia’s incorporation into the Austrian Empire. In Central America, Franz’s campaign against indigenous resistance began with Japanese laborers volunteering to fight for colonial merit.

• Weishate’s Scarlet Crusaders fell into an Austrian military trap after he tried to kidnap Franz, and Franz ordered an investigation of the remaining members.
• Anna Ipadis accepted Franz’s actions, and Franz’s coronation concluded with Wallachia and Moldavia officially becoming Austrian territory.
• The Austrian colonial government began an internal sweep in Central America after earlier campaigns failed to eliminate support for indigenous resistance.
• Arkadyev Liebnsteinsky feared the Japanese laborers would cause trouble, but they volunteered to fight for merit.
• The colonial merit system rewarded laborers with tax exemptions, residency, or Austrian nationality, and Japanese laborers pursued it despite the harsher path they faced.

Arkadyev learned why Franz’s merit rules had been imposed and announced them to Japanese laborers, who began attacking native tribes in the jungle. As construction on the Nicaragua Canal stalled at its volcanic isthmus, Spain’s pressure on the United States and Mexico’s ambitions around California increased the region’s tensions.

• The adjutant explained to Arkadyev that Japanese laborers had exploited the merit system by killing their own families, and Arkadyev condemned them while acknowledging the colonies still needed their labor.
• Japanese laborers presented Arkadyev with German blood-letter petitions asking to fight for merit, and he announced Franz’s rules, including that each killed able-bodied adult male native counted for ten merits.
• Japanese laborers pushed into the mountain jungles, inflicting enough losses to make native tribes surrender or flee the Austrian Empire’s Central American colonies.
• The widening of the San Juan River was nearly complete, but work on the Nicaragua Canal’s nineteen-kilometer isthmus remained slow because of the nearby active volcano, sacred mountain, and harsh conditions.
• Spain refused to recognize the Mallarino-Bidlack Treaty and began disrupting American trade, while Santa Anna and other Mexicans considered California’s value and possible annexation.

Franz planned to secure Austria’s position in Mexico and California through railways, economic leverage, and military strength while keeping the Nicaragua Canal project moving. The chapter ended with British and American efforts to undermine California thwarted by the colony’s strict controls and loyal population.

• Franz continued to pursue a railway linking San Francisco and Veracruz despite Mexico’s delays and obstruction.
• The Austro-Mexican Joint Development Company retained vast economic influence in Mexico, while Franz relied on Santa Anna and Metternich to deter attempts to drive it out.
• Franz supported the Nicaragua Canal because it would sustain Japanese labor migration to Austrian colonies, where displaced Japanese merchants and money changers worked as laborers.
• Franz refused to return Mexican mines and land without compensation for Austrian development and defended the company’s written treaties and role in supporting Mexico.
• The British and Americans tried to weaken or infiltrate California, but Austrian restrictions, Native American patrols, and the colony’s loyal soldiers and residents blocked them.

Franz judged Cuba’s tangled social conflicts and political loyalties far more dangerous than California’s and prepared to change the island’s status quo. In Washington, Zachary Taylor let Vice President Millard Fillmore take charge of an invasion of Cuba, expecting it to fail and weaken their domestic rivals.

• Franz considered Cuba’s divisions among slaves, natives, whites, separatists, loyalists, merchants, and landowners, as well as British and American interference.
• Franz noted that Governor de la Concha had ruled Cuba harshly, remained loyal to Spain before Isabella II’s death, and then swore allegiance to Austria.
• Zachary Taylor learned that Narciso López’s force had landed in Cuba but distrusted the report and feared a confrontation with Austria.
• Millard Fillmore urged an invasion, insulted Taylor’s caution, and promised to seize Cuba for America.
• Taylor made Fillmore responsible for the invasion while privately expecting it to fail and viewing it as a way to weaken the Southern slave states.

Millard Fillmore pushed the United States toward liberating Cuba and confronting the Austrian Empire, despite strong opposition from politicians and business interests tied to Austrian trade. Narciso López unexpectedly built a force of more than five thousand in Cuba and asked Washington for reinforcements, leaving Zachary Taylor stunned.

• Millard Fillmore advocated purchasing Cuba for one hundred million dollars and seizing it by force if the Austrian Empire refused, then leaked his hard-line position to newspapers.
• American political and business leaders remained wary of war because the Austrian Empire dominated trade and supplied much of the country's tools and machinery.
• Narciso López held out in Cuba for more than three weeks, recruited resistance groups and abolitionists, and expanded his forces to over five thousand.
• Narciso López sent a letter to the American government requesting reinforcements in exchange for offering Cuba to the United States.
• Millard Fillmore presented the letter to Zachary Taylor, who exclaimed that the report was impossible.

Millard Fillmore’s effort to bring America into war against the Austrian Empire was overwhelmingly rejected by Congress, while John Russell considered whether Britain should support the Americans against the Holy Alliance. The chapter ended with Spencer Walpole urging Britain to fight, despite Russell’s warning against returning to war.

• Zachary Taylor collapsed from his stomach ailment as Millard Fillmore moved to impeach him, and the Whig Party split.
• Congress rejected Millard Fillmore’s war proposal, with 266 votes against, 15 abstentions, and 14 in favor.
• Millard Fillmore blamed Congress for opposing the war, while Abigail reminded him that lawmakers had only been flattering him at the banquet.
• John Russell explained to Spencer Walpole that Russia and Spain could side with Austria because of the Holy Alliance.
• Spencer Walpole urged John Russell to help the Americans and declared that the British Royal Navy feared no enemy.

John Russell rejected calls for Britain to intervene in the American conflict, citing the armistice with the Austrian Empire and Britain's strained finances. The British government turned instead toward the idea of a World's Fair.

• John Russell warned that blind confidence could destroy the Royal Navy, while the Duke of Northumberland solemnly accepted the Navy's duty to fight.
• Spencer Walpole praised the Navy and urged Britain to support the United States, but John Russell insisted British officials must serve Britain's interests.
• John Russell confronted Spencer Walpole over the armistice with the Austrian Empire and asked what Britain would gain by entering the conflict.
• Spencer Walpole backed down, while John Russell considered Britain's economic crisis and the high cost of war.
• The British government recognized that it could rely more on its homeland, colonies, and non-European markets, leading to the idea of the World's Fair.

Napoleon III and Alexander Walewski discussed America’s attempt to recruit allies against Austria before turning to Napoleon III’s search for a wife. Walewski advised using possible alliances with Austria and Russia to strengthen France’s position, leaving Napoleon III eager to pursue the plan but uneasy about Walewski’s talent and Bonaparte blood.

• Napoleon III joked about America’s attempt to annex Cuba, while Alexander Walewski warned that the Americans were recruiting allies and urged France to stay out of the conflict.
• Napoleon III asked whom he should marry, and Alexander Walewski suggested a marriage alliance with Austria or Russia.
• Napoleon III considered how an alliance with the Habsburgs or Romanovs could improve France’s standing and legitimize the Bonaparte family.
• Alexander Walewski argued that Napoleon III could appeal to Austria’s need for allies and use Russia as leverage if Austria refused.
• Napoleon III approved Walewski’s plan, then grew uneasy that Walewski’s abilities and lineage might make him a rival.