grasping my hand, continued to speak, though in an | between them, I know not; but the reconciliation interrupted and faltering voice. "Dear, dear aunt was evidently complete. The young man's joy Peggy, forgive me how I have repulsed your was absolutely rapturous-he could not contain kindness, and put away your sympathy! Indeed, himself. He folded his sisters in the closest emindeed, I could not help it. And my sweet Janet brace, kissed his aunt Peggy a dozen times in a too, what must she think of me? But I had been minute, tossed up his boy, and flew at his baby, till schooled into calmness and moulded into submis- even the pale Adêle lifted herself from the sofa sion; I had promised him that nothing should where she lay, exhausted both in mind and body, to induce me to show what I really felt, and the only implore him to "take care of the children." And means of doing this was never to give way for a then, sobered in a moment, he stole to her side, and moment. I dared not even meet the kind eyes that wound his arm around her, looking at her with an I knew were looking upon me, or it would have expression in which the love of years was concenbeen all over with my self-command. Four trated, and calling her “his own sweet wife, to wretched, wretched days! and how have they whom he owed it all." I was surprised to see how ended! But I will go-this very night-I will not completely all Colonel Harwood's absurdities vansleep under the roof again-I will go back to him, ished beneath the refining and elevating touch of to my deceived, hoping, desolate husband, and nature. He now was what he had before professed bring him, at least, the comfort of one loving heart himself, a father in the highest sense of the word, that could never turn from him. But ah! how and the deep and affectionate respect with which shall I tell him-how can I crush his hopes? It Charles evidently regarded him, did not seem miswill kill him, I know it will! And it is his own placed or exaggerated. When we separated on father!" that happy Christmas night, the expressive manner in which he uttered the few simple words, "God bless you, my son," went to the hearts of all; and Charles himself involuntarily dropped on his knees, and kissed his father's hand, while his eyes over

acknowledgment of error, visible in my nephew's whole deportment, effectually connected the view of the case which Adêle's excited feelings and passionate love for her husband had given, and made the moral of the story as true as the end of it was beautiful. No one who saw or heard Charles could forget that he felt that he had offended deeply, and suffered justly, and the gratitude with which he received his father's forgiveness, showed clearly that he did not think that four years of poverty and unhappiness had been too hard a punishment for his disobedience. What a joyful fortnight was that which followed! Even Anna warmed into amiability-and, as to the colonel, I actually learned to love him, and to consider those foibles, which I had before found so annoying, as the most innocent peculiarities in the world.

She turned away as she pronounced the last agitated words, and was hurrying from the room. So excited was she, that I believe she would have been out of the house in another half-hour, children, trunks, and all, on the road back to her darling hus-flowed with tears. band. Her hand was on the lock of the door, but I felt that the sincere repentance, and open Colonel Harwood called her back. "Adêle," said he, in a low, strange, disturbed tone of voice, " do not go. Come here-I did not know that Charles, that my son-” He stopped speaking. Adêle was so absorbed in her indignation that she scarcely listened or comprehended, but I seized her hand, and vielding to the impulse of the moment, exclaimed, Go back, go back-he is going to forgive him." She gazed first in my face, then in the colonel's, with a wild look of amazement; then forgetting her anger in an instant, in the return of hope for Charles, she darted back, threw herself on her knees, and covered Colonel Harwood's hands with tears and kisses. I was not mistaken. In the bottom of every man's heart there is, there must be, a stream of true natural feeling; the difficulty is to penetrate deep enough to find it. Often, as in the present case, the rock must be stricken ere the waters will flow; and, certainly, it must be confessed that the stroke had been no light one. The idea of his son, suffering, repentant, but still loving and revering the father from whose displeasure his misfortunes proceeded, had unclosed the gates of the old man's heart. It had taken him by surprise. All this time he had looked upon Charles as a disobedient and rebellious child; upon himself as a justly severe and injured parent. The tables were turned, and he found himself the hard-hearted oppressor of one who had never ceased to deplore a fault for which he had already been bitterly punished. A thousand softening recollections had been called up by Adêle's vehement words-in short, he had been taken by storm, and was compelled to surrender at discretion. But the revulsion of feeling was too much for the young wife; she fainted, and was carried to her room, but not before she had mustered self-command enough to tell me to write to Charles, and to give me his address, which, somewhat to my surprise, was in Exeter. He had accompanied her to England, and was holding himself in readiness for the summons which he could not help hoping to receive, and which, I write it with joy, he received that very evening.

He arrived by daybreak the following morning, His father received him alone, and what passed

And how did I feel as I drove away from Duncombe Park, when my visit was concluded, and I recalled that sentiment which I had inscribed in my journal, namely, that I never liked to leave a house without being able to reflect that I had done some good in it? What good had I done here? Little enough-but I had received much. The reconciliation of father and son had indeed been effected, but not by any of my judicious contrivances and ingenious manoeuvres-it had been the straightforward work of genuine feeling, without any contrivance at all. And though I cannot but feel a little humbled when I recollect my anticipations of success, I have received a useful lesson, and one which in nowise diminishes my exceeding happiness in the result. Colonel Harwood and I parted excellent friends, and I am engaged to spend another month with them in the autumn of next year, to celebrate my favorite Janet's seventeenth birthday. To this visit I look forward with great interest. I am very curious to see how those various characters will assimilate, after the tension of feeling consequent upon the reconciliation has subsided sufficiently to allow their respective peculiarities to resume their usual prominence. I want to study Anna, who is still a mystery to me, 10 prosecute my intimacy with the interesting Adêle, to become as great a favorite with the baby as I

already am with little Everard, to enjoy the society | I must close my description of my first visit to of Charles and Janet, who both love me, and towards both of whom I feel more as a mother than as an aunt, and to do my best to regain the ground which I have lost in my brother-in-law's estimation.

ITALY.

ITALY has become a standing subject in the newspapers, and the interest in her position by no means diminishes. Austria seems to have reoccupied Ferrara; an act of hostility for which the pretext does not yet appear.

In the provinces of Naples there are immense military expeditions, professedly directed to quell banditti. It is reported that the excesses of the banditti have nothing to do with politics; but it is incredible that whole armies should be directed against mere thieves. The military movement is conjecturally explained by two suppositions-that the pretended robbers are really rebels; or that the banditti are a pretext for advancing troops to the Roman frontier in secret concert with Austria. There may be truth in both suppositions. In the capital of Naples, the educated classes show an unmistakable disposition to sympathize with the cause of national freedom.

Meanwhile, the pontiff is strengthening his government by secularizing many of the officers; he is replacing old effete intriguers by honest and vigorous men; and he has with him the very hearts of the people.

We observe that in Switzerland, as it is stated, Lord Palmerston has sent a verbal message to the president, through the British representative, Mr. Peel, promising to respect the independence of the Swiss, and recognizing their right to modify their federal relations. But the terms are equivocal, and the actual note addressed to Mr. Peel has not been published.

Duncombe Park, by heartily wishing a happy new year to all its inmates-and I shall be at least as much disappointed as grieved, if the wish does not attain fulfilment.

thinks that the effect would be attained.-Spectator, 21 Aug.

AUSTRIA has strengthened her grasp on the Roman territory; instead of merely throwing a garrison into Ferrara-which she had under certain treaty stipulations a right to do-she has taken military possession of the whole city. Although on a general view the object of Austria is quite plain, her immediate object and specific pretext do not yet appear. Some impute the demonstration to the dotage of Metternich; others to distraction of councils among the local authorities in the absence of suffi cient instructions from Vienna. The advance looks at least premature. It is probable that Austria may know that an explosion is imminent in her own territory, and that the demonstration ostensibly directed against Rome may really be meant to overawe Milan. But if so, there is the indiscretion as well as the foresight of fear in the sally. Austria has yet no sufficient reason to allege for her violation of Italian territory; for her allies in Rome and Bologna failed to get up a pretext. The aggression has only served to call out remonstrances from Rome, the most multitudinous offers of volunteer service from the young men of the Eternal City, and the sympathy of foreign powers. It is even said that French and English fleets have been ordered to move up the Gulf of Venice. Events have happened that were more improbable and more untoward than that would be.

If obscure signs in the London press may be trusted, our government is on the right course, and England will not fail in her duty to Italy.

It is to be presumed that, à fortiori, Lord Pal- A well-written letter to the Times calls to mind merston must be prepared to make a similar decla- technical difficulties to a direct diplomatic interration to the Italian powers. The case of the Italian course between the courts of London and Rome. states is very different from that of Switzerland, and Up to this hour, says "Ignotus," the legitimate much more deserving of such support. There is no title of the British sovereign to the throne is unquestion of violating established sovereign rights-recognized by Rome; sentences of excommunication of deposing sovereign authority: no one state pretends to dictate to the rest. It would be a great mistake to suppose that Italy presents an example of mere revolt; nothing can be more opposite. It is rather that she has regained her ancient strength, her ancient self-reliance, and knows that she has done so. She, once the mistress of the world, is about to put in her claim to take her place among the nations. It will probably be a consequence that she will shake off any alien rulers who may refuse to become thoroughly Italian, and continue to enforce their hold on Italian territory by an oppressive grasp; but that is not the object of the present movement in Italy: the object is, gradually to set free the intellect and independent powers of the people, and to endow them with institutions such as they have known before-institutions suited to a great people.

A suggestion often made has been revived by an intelligent writer in the Times, who lives at Rome -that the British government should give an invaluable moral support to the noble efforts of the Italian patriots, simply by sending a representative to Rome. Even if he went without a formal diplomatic style and title, but were deputed notoriously "for a purpose," this writer, "Anglo-Romanus,

and deposition put forth by the predecessors of Pius the Ninth against the Queen of England and all her adherents are unrevoked; and these include the bull" in cœnâ Domini," renewing every year anathemas of excommunication against the British sovereign, clergy, nobles, and people, for disobedience to the pontiff. It is suggested that Pius should revoke these obsolete acts. But, however reasonable such a step would be, there are obvious difficulties. It is hardly for Pius to go prying into the misdeeds of his predecessors, which have not been formally and specially brought before him. As compared with England, he is much the weaker party; and if he were to make the first advance proprio motu, and to take nothing by his motion, he would be left most awkwardly in the lurch. England can better afford to make the first advance; which might be done quite easily and decorously. A confidential messenger could be sent to Rome, with the powers but not the formal style of an envoy, to negotiate the renewal of diplomatic relations; offering an alliance, if the pope himself would remove those obstacles of which England has a right to complain. Such a mission would answer every purpose without in any way committing England.-Spectator, 28 Aug.

FRANCE.

THE French Chamber of Peers has been convoked by King Louis Philippe to try a peer for murder; but the prisoner has escaped from gaol and judge, by committing suicide.

remarks from other journals; and some for anticipating the stages of these strange proceedings with too much probability. A more uneasy and dangerous state of feeling has not existed in France since July, 1830.-Spectator, 28 August.

ROYAL ABDICATIONS.

WE hear on all sides of monarchs disgusted with the exercise of sovereignty. King Leopold of Belgium, one of the shrewdest and ablest of men, who has managed his most uneasy people with a success that few could have rivalled, is said to be at last weary of their exigencies. He has just given them a liberal or ultra-liberal ministry, but seeming to think they were foolish to insist upon such things. His majesty has yielded to his people's wishes, but not without a feeling of impatience and disgust, natural enough to sovereigns put out of their way.

There is a story of the Prince of Orange meditating an abdication of his rights as heir-apparent, and for the most singular of all reasons that ever entered into the head of prince-viz., to spite his wife, and prevent her ever becoming queen. The story is scarcely credible, though the mutual piques of the spouses is but too true.

Never perhaps did any atrocious crime excite more indignation than the butchery of the Duchess de Choiseul-Praslin. From the first, the wishes of the public anticipated the issue of the trial; and the execution of the suspected husband was demanded with such bitterness as amounted to intimidation of the judges. The government and the Court of Peers were threatened with the consequences of acquitting the accused. The public had altogether prejudged all the parties concerned. The injured duchess was worshipped as a faultless woman. The duke would be called a demon, but that it suffices the popular wrath to remember that he was a peer; his guilt was settled without extenuation of any sort. A governess, whom he is suspected to have admired too ardently, is adjudged to have been an accomplice. It is not, indeed, established on any known evidence that the duchess' jealousy of this person was well founded; that the dependent felt more than a reasonable attachment to her pupils and their father; or that the duke may not have had some provocation in the high-toned upbraidings Then we have the Emperor of Russia, whom rewhich he is supposed to have received from his port declares to be sick of reigning, and only anxwife. The public has settled, without the trial,ious for Italy, and the dolce far niente of private life. that she was spotless, the governess sinful, and the duke without a redeeming motive. His escape, though by a mortal and torturing way, is the signal for a shout of anger so bitter that it takes the shape of scornful jests. It is all but openly asserted that the government, by leave or wish of the king, must have permitted the police to supply the duke with poison, in order to spare shame to him who was their companion, and to save the institution of the peerage from the disgrace which the trial would have entailed upon it-such a trial at such a time! If these suspicions are correct, the indulgence extended to the duke is not more revolting to the notions of morality on this side of the channel than it was impolitic on the French side.

The manifest and general sense of contempt and hatred for those high in station or office has been only aggravated, not caused, by this incident. Already the charges of official corruption had provoked such a feeling that the sight of a minister in the streets raises a shout of Au voleur!" That this feeling, however, has now been worked up to a most dangerous pitch, is a fact corroborated by the demeanor of the royal family and the upper classes. The private murder is regarded as a public calamity, which must have ulterior consequences. Poor Queen Amélie, always so anxious for her husband, has fainted several times. The duke now accused of wife-killing was a friend and frequent companion of the Duke de Nemours; an awkward intimacy, and one which would make the suspected connivance at suicide only the more impolitic.

But the French government seem to have been exasperated by their reverses and difficulties to a pitch of desperation beyond all thought for policy. While this ferment goes on, the officials wage open war with the press. Seven journals have been seized; one for a licentiousness in a story-though the license, it is said, was not greater than has often passed; others for sneering at the demoralization of the privileged classes, for significant but generalizing exhortations on honesty, or for copying such

When he sent so much gold to purchase funds in France and England, it was said to be for the professed purpose of having the exchanges and the credit of the two countries in his imperial power. It is now said that all this gold is merely to avoid the old mistake of Charles the Fifth, who left himself at St. Just at the mercy of his son and successor, and was left penniless and provisionless by him.

As the czar sighs for the south, Isabella of Spain sighs for the north. She is weary of that continual intermeddling of public interest with her private happiness. The genius of politics, Louis Philippe, began by sacrificing her to a Cretin husband, and the same genius now excites this same husband to render his wife as uncomfortable as possible; so that the girl-queen is driven to say "Take my throne if you desire it, but leave me at peace."

The pope is at times in similar doubts as to the happiness of wearing a crown. His, to be sure, is a triple one, and proportionately heavy. Poor Pius! his delight is in being liberal and doing good. But this amiable taste has thrown him into a sea of troubles. He has Austria, France, and his own cardinals plotting against him-his people impatient and hard to satisfy. The good father is frequently perplexed between them, and his instant thought at such moments is resignation.

Examples of such a feeling and such a purpose, were rare in the olden time, and betokened a very philosophic or pious spirit-a desire similar to the prevalent one of quitting the world for a cloister. But now it is not love of asceticism, or a wish to exchange the excitement of courts for the excitement of ultra-devotion. It is simply that the comparison between public and private life becomes yearly and daily more and more in favor of the latter. More people forswear ambition than used to do so; and the freer the country, the more general is this disgust. In America a man of refined intellect or mind would scorn to enter upon public life. In England we have not gone so far. În despotic countries the great public personage is the sover

46 THE QUEEN'S VOYAGE AND CHILDREN-THE DISEASE OF FRANCE AND ITS SPECIFIC.

eign. And we see instances multiplied of the wish to escape from it.

QUEEN VICTORIA has set herself down in her Highland lodging at Ardverikie, among the MacPrivate life is certainly becoming too comfortable phersons. She was welcomed by Cluny Macpher-too secure-too much unmixed with doubt and son and his kilted clansmen, a host of mountaineers, care; whilst the means of amusement, of exerting and a Scotch mist. The district is not only remote, the mind, and even illustrating one's name, inde- but wild the very house she lives in, compared pendent of public life, have increased in a degree even to her abode at Blair Atholl, seems to be unknown and inconceivable to those who lived two simple to the degree of almost Spartan bareness. centuries back. And we are coming to the day when It is as if she had sought the wildest and remotest thrones will want occupants--when ministerial port-spot, in order to get, not only the most robust deerfolios will go a begging-when our chief anxiety stalking for the prince, but for her majesty absolute about a king will be how to catch one-when people seclusion, beyond the reach of tourists and "genwill run away from cabinet office as if it were a tlemen connected with the press." No hope of it: conscription, and eschew parliament as if it were the newspaper reporters are there, describing might the plague. We are certainly not so far gone as the and main; and Ardverikie will probably become a Americans. But there were strange symptoms on cockney jaunt. our hustings, as there are singular ones in the courts of Europe.-Examiner, 28 Aug.

But civilization was already struggling with the wildness, vigorously as that survives. The aborigines, it appears, have not yet coined a name for

66

queen," whom they can only designate by the THE QUEEN'S VOYAGE AND Children. inappropriate periphrasis of "the king's wife." NEVER certainly were the habitual life and dis- How can they compass the designation of the prince position of a sovereign exhibited to a nation in more consort? must they call him the king's wife's favorable guise than those of Queen Victoria during husband?"-But they are awakening to modern her sea-voyages. The history of the cruise to sentiments. Although the district is one in which Scotland, in our present number, is like those which stronger traces of Jacobite loyalty remain than anyhave preceded it. It displays the chief traveller in where perhaps in the uplands of Scotland, the the most engaging light. We see her, the ruler of mountain rigor unbends to the youthful sovereign; a maritime people, recurring for her holyday pleas- and the Highlanders think it necessary to signify ures to the enjoyment of the sea; riding the waves that they waive obtruding the exclusive claims of with a fearless familiarity that yet has in it nothing the pretender: they notify this in an inscription of unfeminine. The sovereign is pleased to gratify "Two in one"-signifying that in Queen Victoria's her people by going among them and reciprocating person they obligingly recognize the house of Stuart courtesies. Less reserved than some of her prede- as well as that of Brunswick. Another sign of the cessors, Queen Victoria, surrounded by her family, times was a copious admixture, among claymores still seems attended by a thoroughly English spirit of domesticity the manner in which the children accompany their parents, share the walks of their father on shore, and enter into the whole spirit of voyage, is simply a model of the national manners according to their best type. And while her husband and the children are "stretching their legs" on shore, the accomplished lady is seen with her! pencil exercising her talents by sketching the

the

scenery around.

:

These sea-voyages and progresses have their practical uses. They make the sovereign and country mutually acquainted. While they familiarize the sovereign with the aspect of naval life, they set to the people a good example of trust in the native element. Whereas too many crowned personages, forgetting alike the responsibilities of royalty and of paternity, have wasted their time and health in forbidden pleasures, the Queen of England, mother of a line of kings, seeks her pleasures from the gracious hand of Nature; borrowing renewed vigor for the imperial life-blood of her race from the elements in which they are to maintain the glory of the nation.

and shields, of cotton umbrellas. In London the fashion of carrying the umbrella has visibly declined: the effeminate convenience has passed to the hardy Lochaber men. It will next come to the navy, and no sailor will go aloft in a shower without his "four-and-sixpenny cotton."-Spect., 28 Aug.

From the Spectator, 28 Aug.

THE DISEASE OF FRANCE AND ITS SPEcific. THE morbid state of France is too apparent and too serious not to indicate an approaching crisis; and the root of the disease is to us scarcely less apparent, in the want of a truly national policy-a vocation for the people-something worthy to concentrate their desires, their convictions, and their energies. It is true that in England, by a dull kind of coxcombry, which it is to be hoped we are outgrowing, we are prone to regard as disease all that is not natural to our own state when healthy, and that we have a silly habit of using the word "French" as an epithet indicating certain kinds of vicious frivolities; as though there were but one standard of manners, and we had monopolized social perfection. But the symptoms of the disease in It is the same with the children, now of an age France are not confined to the ordinary national to share their parents' healthful excursions. The characteristics which we so readily set down as Prince of Wales for the first time joined the tour"morbid ;" the sweeping extent of official corrupto the lands whence he derives two of his titles, as tion, the alienation of the royal family from the afDuke of Rothsay and Baron of Renfrew. It is fections of the people, the criminal tendencies among hundreds of years since Scotland saw an infant the high-born and wealthy, of which the world has Duke of Rothsay; such a phenomenon is perhaps just had so flagrant an example, are evidences of totally unprecedented in some of the wilder regions the social disorder. Still more unmistakable proof visited. The young prince and his sister the is the manner in which the people treat those overt princess royal are made to learn the enjoyments of acts. Princes are assailed with scandalous reports natural beauty; such enjoyments forming a most which the whole people circulate with a relish; the valuable part of moral education. The excellent reverses and disappointments of royal persons are training, begun by that estimable woman the Duchess of Kent, is worthily continued by her daughter in the third generation.-Spectator, 21 Aug.

noted with glee; to be a minister is to be hailed in the streets with cries of "Stop thief!" a murder committed by a peer is denounced as no more than

the turpitude generally characteristic of his class. | defect in the political theory of the philosophical And if there were a doubt as to the gravity of these historian who rules France. His main object is to popular manifestations, it is removed by the bearing preserve; to improve if forced, but less as a means of the government; the "laws of September," a of preserving institutions than as a means of conglaring infraction of the compact of July, are en- tenting the restless. What the king desires for forced with the lavish frequency of reckless desper- family purposes, is the same thing as the principle ation. If the people have lost confidence in the of M. Guizot's administration-quiet, mere passive institutions under which they live, the administra- quiet. The last session was a triumph of his policy; tors of those institutions have lost confidence in the nothing was done all was neutralized, hushed, public opinion by which they exist. It is well said postponed, shelved, set at rest. Algeria is a mere by the Morning Chronicle, that the cement of the vent for the vulgar restlessness; too paltry for a social fabric is gone. truly national object, it makes a place for one of the We believe that the primary cause of this disor- king's sons, a subject for the annual speech, patronder in society has been for some time at work, and age for the ministers, and a road for those loose fish that it is the absence of any settled purpose for the who like to "go to the devil" their own way, and national activity. Nations, as well as individuals, who would make a noise if prevented. M. Guizot demand a purpose to keep them in a safe and healthy hates a noise. His policy seemed excellent, and so state of moral activity. The man who lives with- far was excellent, while war was the shape of danout an object for the exercise of his tastes, energy, ger which most threatened France and Europe. and ambition, is not only useless, but is ever open The war that was threatened in 1840 was a contest to temptation, and is almost certain to take to mis- between the powers which must lead Europe in all chief for " something to do." With nations, the peaceful advancement, and would have been nothing temptations are still more manifold and vast; the but calamitous. The danger to France now is the energies that must be turned to some action, to mis- internal corruption incident to political inertia. chief in default of anything else, are proportionately France has no vocation; her king is thinking only gigantic-the need for action commensurate. Ac- of family interests; her minister wants only quiet; cordingly, all nations, so long as they were great, her statesmen are bribed and corrupted; great inhave had some determined work chalked out for terests are compromised to purchase silence; paltry them. To Greece fell the task of developing intel- interests and corrupt intrigues supersede political lectual civilization in the early days of history; self- activity; her writers cannot speak, for they are development, philosophy, and art, were national silenced by "the laws of September." The phiobjects, the more vast and glorious for the rudeness losophical historian understands the people among and imperfection of the means at hand. Rome set whom he was born less than the mongrel advenherself the task of conquering the world, and began turer from Corsica; when Napoleon planted the to decay when her work was done. From mythic standard of France on the Po, on the Rhine, amid ages, India and Egypt have handed down to us im- the snows of the Alps or of Moscow, and told his mense monuments, the product of some vocation, people to march, he proved himself more of a which, dark and rude though it may have been, Frenchman than M. Guizot. He too might say must have been national in its scope and influence."L'état, c'est moi"-until in personal objects he The propagation of creeds and conquest of territory forgot the national objects, and left the nation withhave been common objects which have excited the out a purpose that engaged its own affections. M. nations, Christian and Mussulman; have exalted great powers like that of Christian Rome in Europe, of Islam in Turkey, of the Moors in Spain, of the Normans in England, of the Spanish and English races in America. Even under the corrupt monarchy of France, a national worship of "la gloire" maintained a certain unity of action, which enabled the dominant classes to continue that incredible oppression of the bond classes until the day of its ceasing was regarded as the thing incredible, and the master sneered at the threat that his extravagant refinement of tyranny would make the slave rise. When the fact did come, he would not have believed his senses under evidence less than that of the horrible revolution.

Guizot's very aim is to keep the country without an active purpose. And he has been so far helped by circumstances by the inferiority of his opponents, the levity and triviality which prevail among the statesmen of the day-that public opinion itself is effectually unsettled and distracted. It is not that the favorite purpose of France is thwarted by her rulers; she has no great and determined purpose. Hence political scepticism, official corruption, and popular revolution-for that is what it amounts to.

Nor is it that there is no great work in Europe worthy of the enlightened active intellect of France and her vigorous energies. To mention one alone, there is the emancipation of Italy. Were a Napoleon to arise-still better, were a statesman aniBut the monarch is no longer the state; and cir- mated by the love of his race, instead of mere milicumstances have combined to debar France from tary ambition, to declare that France would once having any recognized national purpose. The pres- more gather her faculties and strength to assert and ent monarch, appointed as the representative of a vindicate the opinions of Western Europe beyond national policy, as the deputy of a distinct popular the Alps-were France to help in establishing once opinion, has forgotten the duty which he undertook more a "regno d'Italia," but not as a French provin the presence of the people, to maintain that policy ince, to guarantee the monarch of Rome not in the and opinion, and has at last compelled his most sin- person of its emperor's son, but in that of the great cere admirers to confess that the business of his old man who is so popular with the people of France, age has shrunk to purely family objects and interests. to give support wherever the Italians claim it, in a Nodding with the drowsiness of the tomb, the old spirit worthy of the July of 1830, for Italian objects man thinks now of nothing but keeping quiet in his-France would again recover her healthy activity, palace and settling his sons. her generous loyalty. Corruption would once more be left to the base alone; and revolution would be forgotten.

As to the minister, the progress of time, the very success of his own policy, has developed a serious