Italy from the Alps to Mount Etna . edwith the House of Savoy,in all wars whose goal andobject lay in the south,Mont Cenis was theirnatural highway. Up tothat period it had seemedto be desired that theroad should be kept almostsecret, and so narrow asto be scarcely practicablefor a beast of now the object wasprecisely opposite. Al-ready in 1693 MarshalCatinat had widened itsufficiently to admit thepassage of small vehiclesand the lighter kind ofartillery. But the firstwho transformed it into amodern military road ona grand scale, was Napo-leon, whose engineer wasthe inofenious Giov
Italy from the Alps to Mount Etna . edwith the House of Savoy,in all wars whose goal andobject lay in the south,Mont Cenis was theirnatural highway. Up tothat period it had seemedto be desired that theroad should be kept almostsecret, and so narrow asto be scarcely practicablefor a beast of now the object wasprecisely opposite. Al-ready in 1693 MarshalCatinat had widened itsufficiently to admit thepassage of small vehiclesand the lighter kind ofartillery. But the firstwho transformed it into amodern military road ona grand scale, was Napo-leon, whose engineer wasthe inofenious GiovanniFabrane. The history of theorigin, and carrying outof the gigantic work ofthe Mont Cenis tunnel, issingularly remarkable. Ithas, like all great worksin the world, its tragic story; nay, this colossal idea has even had its martyr, who sacrified his whole life to itwithout ever being understood. This man was the engineer Joseph Medail, of Bar-doneche, who already in the year 1832 laid before King Charles Albert a plan for the a 2. ROAD OVER THE MONT CENIS. 4 ITALY. piercing; of the Cottian Alps, almost identical with the one at present adopted. Theplan was admired, as one admires and wonders at something entirely out of onesreach, but no one dreamt of carrying it into execution. But the courageous son of theAlps was not yet daunted. Ten years later he laid his project before the Chamber ofCommerce at Chambery; it was examined, and there also was deemed in the highestdegree ingenious, but its lot was the same as before ; no one dreamt of carrying it intoexecution. Medail died long before the great conception of his life was fulfilled. Heleft it as a legacy to posterity. It was long ere the fulfilment came ; but at length, under the direction of theengineers Grattoni, Grandis, and Sommeiller, the tunnel was completed after nine yearslabour, and on the 17th of September, 1871, the line was publicly opened for traffic; anew pledge of union between the nations of Europe. It was ab
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