BOURBON CLAIMS TO RESPECT.

SIR WALTER SCOTT has addressed a letter to the people of Edinburgh admonishing them to be mindful of the honour Charles the Tenth has conferred on their city in selecting it for his residence, and to be civil and respectful in consideration of the Prince's altered fortune, the smallness of his court, and the greyness of his hair. He declares the Ex-king has done nothing to forfeit the "good will" of Scotchmen, who must if so regard as matters of indifference an ardent lust for tyranny, and the slaughter of many hundreds of gallant people. Whatever may have been his errors towards his own subjects, adds Sir Walter, he sent a princely benefaction to certain sufferers in Edinburgh, and was attentive to individuals connected with the city, and entitled to respect. "But," continues the Baronet, "he never did or could

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display a more flattering confidence than when he "shows that the recollections of his former asylum "here have inclined him a second time to return "to the place where he formerly found refuge." That is to say, when he shows his opinion that the Scotch will find nothing in his faithlessness and

sanguinary excesses to forfeit the "good will" they formerly bore towards him.

How large is the charity for princes, how liberal the allowance for their little errors in throat-cutting, and how tender the sympathy with their distresses, the greatest of which is the sad privation of the power of mischief. Had Charles succeeded against the people, what would have been the fate of the Patriots who resisted his royal will? What would have been the pleadings of the Duchess of Angouleme for whose feelings Sir Walter claims a special regard? Would she or any partizan of the Burbon throne have talked of the errors and misguidance of their enemies, or would any words have been in their mouths but words of the axe and the block, and the rigour of justice?

We know they have been merciless; we know they would be merciless again. The indulgence to error they claim in their misfortunes they never extended in their days of power. They have had the mercy from their enemies they would never have granted, and the charity that has spread the mantle over their fall, they would have endeavoured by every art to deny to any of the brave men who in the event of a different result had sunk under the triumph of despotism. Respect for these royal criminals is but respect for fallen vice. Freedom from insult is all they have a moral right to claim, and that immunity they should have, as the expression of

insult would be unworthy of those who have the just sense of their deserts.

Sir Walter remarks that the ex-King remains the most striking emblem of the mutability of human affairs, which our mutable times have afforded. The assertion is not accurate, as we suppose the instance of Napoleon will be admitted to be a stronger example, and Napoleon's treatment was somewhat severer than that of Charles, as certainly his offences were on a larger scale.

But how the examples of mutability are altered in type. The Belisarius of modern times quarrels about the quantity of fish and flesh at his table, and grieves upon short allowance of claret; and a King cast from his throne falls to the luxuries of a Lulworth or the state of Holyrood, rattles miserably about the country in a barouche and four, and experiences destitution in the services of ten times more persons than mortal man can require the

aid of.

But yet it is a sad thing to be crossed in despotism, and it is the disappointment of tyranny for which we really are required to compassionate Charles.

VOL. II.

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON'S PROSECUTION OF THE "MORNING JOURNAL."

THE Duke of Wellington has performed one of the master strokes of the strategic art—he has surprised his enemies, ay, and his friends too. With the paper-cutter of the Law in his martial hand, he has taken the field against the Morning Journal, and made a jury-box the key of his position in the world's esteem. The Court of King's Bench is his field of Waterloo, a rule of Court his truncheon, a Proprietor of copy-right his Napoleon; Law Officers are his soldiers, blatant lungs his loud artillery, costs his charges, and for hollow squares of men he has the vast hollowness of the AttorneyGeneral. The Conqueror, the Emancipator, the all-powerful Minister, the boasted man of iron, the great insensible, is-heu gloria!-reduced to give battle to a newspaper! Oh Cervantes, thy Quixote is fast becoming a common-place—windmills are giants to be encountered with lances, and wineskins must be quelled with swords. How can a Minister vindicate the Dulcinea of his fame, but by giving battle to all who question its peerless lustre? The Duke dons the wig for the

helmit of Mambrino, and enters the King's Bench lists.

Is he possessed of a devil? We hope not; but we know him to be possessed of a devil of an Attorney-General. The case is, in our opinion, one of delirium from Scarletina. Has not his Grace the wit to see how that disease in their system is bringing them, one after another, to the blush?

We declare, with all earnestness, that the wantonness of this prosecution has filled us with amazement. It is a volunteered confession of sensitive weakness and spontaneous bidding for contempt, which is absolutely incomprehensible, if we exclude the supposition of the working of an evil spirit. The first reflection, indeed, on the matter is, "Some enemy hath done this." The nature of the folly is discordant with all that is known of the character of the Duke of Wellington. A disregard for opinion, amounting to contempt, has been accounted among his distinguishing peculiarities. He has been considered a callosity, and now he is exposing himself as a sore. He was esteemed a cast-iron Statesman, and suddenly he proclaims "Touch me not, I am potter's clay." This may be hypochondria, or it may be Scarlett, for surely it cannot be intended to countenance the measures of Prince Polignac, and to persecute the Press with a view to preserving conformity of councils. The coincidence is, at least, curious.