Landing at Nice on the 24th of June 1848, he placed his sword at the disposal of Charles Albert, and, after various difficulties with the Piedmontese war office, formed a volunteer army 3000 strong, but shortly after taking the field was obliged, by the defeat of Custozza, to flee to Switzerland.
The name was then given to the famous revolutionary song, composed in 1792, the tune of which, and the wild dance which accompanied it, may have also been brought into France by the Piedmontese.
The inhabitants of the north—the Piedmontese, Lombards and Genoese especially—have suffered less than those of the rest of the peninsula from foreign domination and from the admixture of inferior racial elements, and the cold winter climate prevents the heat of summer from being enervating.
To secure fairly uniform efficiency in the various corps, and also as a means of unifying Italy, Piedmontese, Umbrians and Neapolitans are mixed in the same corps and sleep in the same barrack room.
The treaty of Cteau Cambresis in 1559, and the evacuation of the Piedmontese cities held by French and Spanish troops in 1574, restored his state.
