to traverse the whole extent of Germany, and, connecting Trieste and Hamburg, interchange within a few hours the industry of the East, the South, and North. To such a scheme the free navigation of the Adriatic is essential, but, while compromising their relations in the Baltic by their blundering aggression, they are permitting the ruin of a member of their community at a point still more destructive to their prospects.

If the internal distractions of Austria are such that she is unable to cope with her rebellious provinces and the regular and irregular armies that have invaded them, no foreign assistance can avail her; but if, on the other hand, common sense, national pride, and insulted reason again assert their dominion, and a period is put to this state of anarchy, and if the armies of Austria recover that steadiness and discipline which enabled them to struggle so long and at last so successfully with Buonaparte, then we do affirm that, if Germany ever intends to occupy that place among the great European nations which she claims, France should loudly hear that, by crossing the Alps to attack the first member of the German Confederation, she declares war on the whole of that vast continent. Such language would better become a great nation than the absurd edicts and trivial discussions in the Diet of Frankfort or the bear-garden scenes in the assembly at Berlin.

If, however, the result be otherwise, and the victory is decided in the Sardinian invader's favour, we still, we must repeat, cannot think that his Majesty will long afford an example of successful treachery. The enormous lying' about Austrian cruelties, the repetition of which in a hundred journals too probably encourages the Italians in their own undenied atrocities, will by and by be understood everywhere; and close to him, wherever he may be found, and everywhere around him, a reaction and a reckoning will begin. His dangers will be many. France professes to view the annexation of Lombardy to his dominions with serious disapprobation; it certainly formed no part of the schemes of the revolutionary clubs in Paris that Charles-Albert should reign over a powerful kingdom in Italy, nor will any French Government venture to permit it unless some offering is made to national vanity and ambition. The Duchy of Savoy and the county of Nice, M. Lamartine informs us, were destined by the immutable laws of nature to form a portion of The Republic. Should these be ceded by the king, France might be bribed to consent to his possessing a territory which she is convinced would be to him a source of weakness and not of strength, and which, at any rate, he would but hold during the good pleasure of his overshadowing

protectors.

protectors. But his greatest difficulties may be nearest home; and when endeavouring to conciliate the claims of his different capitals and their arrogant inhabitants, trying to satisfy the appetite of greedy patriots and to countermine the endless plots of unscrupulous republicans, we fancy he will regret the delusions of his ambition, and perhaps feel some inclination to abdicate an authority that he may foresee will not long be left in his power to wield. The war has been waged at his own expense; he has neither been assisted by the money nor the troops of the provinces he came to support; nothing has been done to gratify his vanity or to testify confidence in his intentions. The annexation of Lombardy with Piedmont was not adopted till it was obvious that no other course was open; and he cannot forget that the union with Austria was voted in 1814 with far greater unanimity and enthusiasm. We think it not improbable that some compromise will be attempted-by which no one will be satisfied-and no one bound beyond the limits of mere convenience. Before a permanent and satisfactory settlement takes place, we fear much time must elapse and much suffering be endured. The policy of Italy has been proverbially dark and tortuous; her modern republicans are not more scrupulous than their ancestors, and we hardly expect from them a better result. We deeply deplore the prospect. We are not of that class of speculators who can calmly sacrifice the happiness of one generation to the problematical advantage of that which is to succeed. That the ferment now convulsing the Peninsula will ultimately produce good all the analogy of history, as illustrating the moral government of Providence, justifies us in hoping; but how it is to work, whether as a chastisement or as a regeneration, we cannot tell-our fears are stronger than our hopes. The process-be it what it may-will, we fear, involve much misery to a people who, with all their faults, have many amiable and attractive qualities; nor is our philanthropy sufficiently stern to look forward with calmness to remote good through the vista of heavy and imminent calamity.

Buonaparte thus addresses the accredited agent of the French Republic to that of Venice in a letter dated 1797: Jamais la république Française n'adopte pour principe de faire la guerre pour les autres peuples. Je sais bien qu'il n'en coûte rien à une poignée de bavards, que je caracteriserais bien en les appelant fous, de vouloir la république universelle. Je voudrais que ces messieurs vinssent faire une campagne d'hiver.' We would recommend this explicit declaration to the careful study of the King of Sardinia, his cabinet, and his allies or subjects in the Milanese states.

ART.

ART. X.—1. Revue Rétrospective, ou Archives Secrètes du dernier Gouvernement. No. 1-13. Paris. 1848.

2. De la Dictature de Paris sur la France. Par Le Baron Gustave de Romand. Londres, 1848.

3. Libertas Gallica, or Thoughts on the French Republic. By Manlius.

4. Correspondence relating to the Marriages of the Queen and Infanta of Spain. Presented to Parliament. 1847.

5. The Navigation Laws: Three Letters to Lord John Russell, showing the Justice, Necessity, and Economy of Protection to British Shipping.

6. Germany Unmasked: or Facts and Circumstances explanatory of her real Views in seeking to wrest Schleswig from Denmark. London.

IT

1848.

would be an idle and dangerous self-deception to endeavour to persuade ourselves that the last French Revolution, which, from a variety of concurrent accidents, has found such an unexpected echo in the rest of Europe, has not also had a considerable degree of mischievous influence in this kingdom. We had already abundant elements of anxiety and alarm-Repealers, Chartists, and Radicals-O'Connells, O'Connors, and Cobdens -a House of Commons possessing less public respect or confidence than any we had yet seen a Cabinet weak and irresolute between its own sense of duty and the innovating influences of its motley partisans-and no opposition!—or worse than none; for the Conservative party, that might have been abundantly capable of counteracting and correcting the disorganizing tendencies of the Whigs, is itself so disorganized by apostacies, jealousies, disgusts, and the almost despair of good faith, principle, or honour in public men, that it-the only solid basis of government in this country-seems rather an addition than an antidote to the danger. On this very uncomfortable state of things burst forth the French Revolution, taking precisely the direction of all the tendencies that had already excited our anxiety at home; and creating, at first sight, a very general extension of the existing alarm; but we have not yet seen any reason to change the hopeful opinion which we very soon began to form, and which we conveyed to our readers in our last number, that the grand experiment of republican government which France had again, in spite of all her former failures, undertaken to make, would prove— with more practical force than the arguments of even a Burke or a Pitt, if we had such giants in these days-the infinite superiority of our old English Constitution for every purpose of good government.

Upon the progress of the French experiment, therefore, it be

hoves us to keep a watchful eye, and particularly on those points in which that revolution professed to remedy abuses and evils analogous to those which are complained of by the disaffected here. It will be seen, by the evidence of the revolutionists themselves, that it was made by a small, and, but for the results, contemptible clique, on pretences either utterly futile or false;-that the grievances complained of have been reproduced by the Republic in even more oppressive forms; and that, after a four months' crisis of injustice, confusion, and distress-which, to use the reluctant admission of one of their partisans, has made their revolution the derision of mankind'-they seem farther than ever from any safe and stable system-moral, social, or political.

The Revue Rétrospective, which stands at the head of our list, professes to exhibit selections of papers belonging to King LouisPhilippe and his ministers, left behind them in the unexpected precipitancy of their flight: the character of the editor-M. Taschereau, an old republican and a member of the New Assembly-and the tenor of his notes and comments, sufficiently show that the main design of this publication was to expose the secret delinquencies of the late Government; and if it has failed to do so, we may fairly assume that there was no very serious delinquency to expose; indeed, we think our readers will very soon be of opinion that the publication, whatever damage it may do to the Government which has prompted it, has done the very reverse to that which it was designed to injure.*

One of the prodigies by which the Parisian Journals endeavoured to glorify this revolution was the scrupulous integrity of the populace, who, after the sack of the Tuileries, not only committed no depredations, but, in the one or two cases in which some kind of larceny was attempted, inflicted summary justice on the delinquents. The same praise had been with audacious mendacity bestowed on the captors of the Tuileries on the 10th of August, 1792; but on the late occasion we did give it some credence-not that we suspected that the morals of a Parisian mob had been essentially changed, but that, as there had been little or no opposition as the palace had been left in the hands of the National Guard-and as the insurrection had been conducted by men invested on the instant with the government of their country-we easily believed that there might have been no pillage. A part of

Is it through bad faith or mere ignorance that the Editor has given, as found amongst M. Guizot's papers, a letter from Louis Philippe to Bishop Watson in 1804, which has been often published, and especially by Sarrans in his work on Louis Philippe and the Counter-revolution of 1830' (vol. i. p. 94), printed in Paris in 1832? See Quarterly Review,' vol. lii. p. 556,

the

two 6

the truth has, however, transpired. When rogues fall out, honest men do not always, as we shall see, come by their own goods; but the rogues at least exhibit their own characters. From amongst several police reports, showing that there were many important robberies committed at the palace, we select one exemplary case. On the 6th of May there were brought before the magistrates four individuals ouvriers,' shoemakers, and two shopkeepers, a marchand de vaisselle, and a marchand de vin-one of the first charged with having stolen sundry diamonds and other jewels from the Tuileries on the 24th of February, the others with being his accomplices. The principal, one Boutron, dignified with the honourable surname of le Parisien, had broken open a press in the palace, and there found several magnificent ornaments of diamonds and pearls, which were proved to have belonged to the Duchess of Orleans. The parties quarrelled about the division of the spoil, and the two marchands had exercised their superior intelligence in cheating the two ouvriers. Some of the details are instructive. The marchand de vaisselle, when asked what might be the value of the articles, replied—‹ To a thief, only 2000 francs; but to me they may be worth about 50,000. When le Parisien was reproached with the robbery, he answered, with great naïveté, Bah! tiens! J'ai fait comme les autres.' And when some surprise was expressed that the marchand de vaisselle— lui un pensionné de l'état!'—should have compromised his character by such an affair, he answered, Bah! bah! en tems de révolution on ne craint rien.' To this specimen of revolutionary honesty we are tempted to add a proof of the sagacity of those heroes of the republic. It was proved that the two ouvriers, previous to their quarrel about the jewels, had had a violent dispute as to the most desirable result of the great popular victory-one declaring pour la République !—and the other pour la Nation!

We have little doubt that hundreds of similar instances. of integrity and intelligence could be produced of the peuple généreux autant que brave; but we confess we had not expected the very early--especially the voluntary-exposition of something very like the same laxity of principle in higher quarters. The editor of the Revue Rétrospective avows that his documents are derived from a bundle of papers carried off during the conflict from the residence of M. Guizot's private secretary, and two portfolios of the King's found in the Tuileries. No details are given, either as to the mode by which the papers were abstracted or the authority by which they are now published. The republican journals give obscure and conflicting statements as to the mode in which they were lost and found. There is some mystery

on