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A SERIES OF INSURRECTIONS 41
State, that source of all evil, and that especially taking
part in any election was a mortal sin." (20)
The anarchists were of course very bitter over this
attack on their policies, and they concluded that the socialists
had become reactionaries who no longer sought
the emancipation of the working class. They were more
than incensed at the reference Engels had made to an
act of the insurgents of Cartagena, who, in order to gain
allies in their struggle, had armed the convicts of a
prison, "eighteen hundred villains, the most dangerous
robbers and murderers of Spain." (21) According to
Engels' information, this infamous act had been undertaken
upon the advice of Bakounin, but, whether or not
that is true, it was a fatal mistake that brought utter disaster
to
the insurgents.
Certainly of this fact there can be no question — the
divisions among the revolutionary forces in Spain, which
Engels deplored, resulted, after many months of fighting,
in returning to power the most reactionary elements in
Spain. And this was foreseen, as even before the end
of the summer Bakounin had despaired of success. In
his opinion, the Spanish revolution miscarried miserably,
"for want," as he afterward wrote, "of energy and revolutionary
spirit in the leaders as well as in the masses.
And all the rest of the world was plunged," he lamented,
"into the most dismal reaction." (22)
France and Spain, having now failed to launch the
universal revolution, Bakounin's hopes turned to Italy,
where a series of artificial uprisings among the almost
famished peasants was being stirred up by his followers.
Their greatest activity was during the first two weeks in
August of the next year, 1874, and the three main centers
were Bologna, Romagna, and Apulia. In spite of
the fact that the followers of Mazzini were opposed to