CHAPTER VI.

If in these brief sentences I have indicated the misery of Franz’s condition—the depth of the shadows which accompanied the lustre of his success—if I have truly presented the main outlines of his domestic history, the reader will imagine Franz’s feelings when a hand as friendly as that of death did interfere to set him free.

Clara ran away with the low comedian of the troop!

She had worn away in tears and fretfulness all the affection she once had felt for Franz, and having inspired a sort of passion in the breast of this comedian, lent a willing ear to his romantic proposal of an elopement. To a woman of her age an elopement was irresistible!

She fled, and left Franz at liberty.

The very day on which Franz received this intelligence he had to perform in Kotzebue’s _Menschenhass und Reue_ (our “Stranger.”) He went to the theatre extremely agitated. Great as was his delight at being released from his wife, and released by no act of his own—he could not think without a shudder upon the probable fate which awaited her; and a remembrance of his former love and happiness with her returned to make him sad.

It happened that old Schoenlein had that night been seized with a sudden impulse to see his son act, and had gone privately into the _parterre_. It was the first time he saw his son acting—for on that Dresden night he _saw_ nothing—a mist was before his eyes. He was now sufficiently calm to be critical.

Franz played the wronged husband with such intense feeling, such depth of passion, such thrilling intonation of voice, that the old man shared the rapture of the audience, and wept tears of joy and of pride as he confessed that his son was really a great actor.

The curtain had no sooner descended than Schoenlein, hurrying out of the house, went round to the stage-door, knocked at his son’s dressing-room, and in another instant had fallen on his shoulders, sobbing—“My boy! my dear, dear Franz! you have conquered me!”

“My dear father!” exclaimed Franz, pressing him convulsively to his heart.

“Franz, I retract all that I have said. I forgive you. You have a real vocation for the stage!”

This happy reconciliation was soon followed by the betrothal of Franz Schoenlein to Matilda Röckel; and the old man had not only the delight of seeing his son wedded to a woman worthy of him, but also to hear him announce his intention of retiring for ever from the stage. He had realised an independence, and the stage was connected with too many disagreeable associations for him not to quit it on this opening of a new era in his life.

THE MOSCOW RETREAT.

“It is scarcely necessary,” says Mr Rellstab, in the preface to an early edition of his romance of “1812,” “for the author to confess how largely he has availed himself of Ségur’s narrative of the Russian campaign. It will be evident to all readers that he has followed, at times almost word for word, the descriptions of that skilful historian.” Without taxing Mr Rellstab with exceeding the romance-writer’s legitimate privilege in thus largely helping himself from the pages of General Count Ségur, we may congratulate him on having had as a guide, in the historical portions of his book, so admirable a work as the _Histoire de Napoleon et de la Grande Armée_. As interesting as any romance, it at the same time conveys the conviction that the author has determined to merit the character of historian, and to avoid that of the retailer of campaigning gossip and anecdotes. Indeed one often feels disappointed and almost vexed at the extreme brevity with which the Count refers to all matters not strictly essential to the history of the grand army and great chief whose history, during the brief existence of the former and the first reverses of the latter, he undertakes to portray. He dismisses in three lines many an incident of strange romance or thrilling horror, whose details one would gladly see extended over as many pages. Mr Rellstab has cleverly availed himself of this dignified and military conciseness, improving upon hints, and filling up blanks. With a few bold dashes of his graphic pen, Count Ségur furnishes the rough sketch; this his German follower seizes, adds figures, tints, and names, and expands it into a picture. The account in “1812” of the retreat from Moscow to Wilna is, in fact, a poetical paraphrase of that given in Ségur’s history; and this paraphrase Mr Rellstab, seduced by the excellence of his text, allows somewhat to impede the progress of his plot; or rather it protracts the book after the plot has, in all essential respects, been wound up. Nevertheless, as we have already said, this paraphrase, which may be considered in some degree supplementary or parenthetical, is the best part of the work; and Mr Rellstab displays great power of pen, and artistical skill, in his handling and adaptation of the materials furnished by his French leader. The last strictly original chapters of the romance are those composing the eleventh book, commencing immediately after Ludwig is rescued by hostile peasants from death at the hands of his own friends. Here for a while we lose sight of the fugitive army, and abide amongst the Russians.

The chief ground of apprehension with the Russian nobles, upon Napoleon’s invasion of their country, was lest he should proclaim the emancipation of the serfs, and thus enlist in his behalf millions of oppressed peasants. The plan occurred, and was suggested to the French Emperor, but various considerations deterred him from attempting its realisation. He apprehended a frightful amount of license and excess amongst a barbarous people thus suddenly released from bondage. Tremendous destruction of property, and frightful massacres of the higher classes, were the almost certain results. He might succeed in raising the storm, but he could never hope to guide it. Moreover, although the child of revolution, his sympathies were not with the masses. The Russian landholders, however, did not reckon upon his forbearance, and took every means in their power to counteract any propagandist projects he might have in view. “In the first place,” says Ségur, “they worked upon the minds of their unfortunate serfs, brutalised by every kind of servitude. Their priests, in whom they are accustomed to confide, misled them by deceitful discourse, persuading these peasants that we were legions of demons, commanded by Antichrist,—infernal spirits, whose aspect excited horror, and whose contact polluted. Our prisoners perceived that when they had used a dish or vessel, their captors would not touch it again, but kept it for the most unclean animals. As we advanced into the country, however, it was natural that the clumsy fables of the priests should lose credit with their dupes. But, on our approach, the nobles recede with their serfs into the interior of the land, as from the advance of some mighty contagion. Riches, habitations, all that could delay them or serve us, are sacrificed. They place hunger, fire, the desert, between us and them; for it is as much against their serfs as against Napoleon that this great resolution is executed. It is not a mere war of kings, but a war of classes and of parties, a religious war, a national war, every kind of war united in one.” Stimulated to hatred of the intruding foreigners by those they most feared and respected—by their owners, namely, and their priests—the peasant-slaves of Russia perpetrated frightful cruelties upon those unfortunate Frenchmen who fell into their hands; cruelties admitted and abundantly illustrated by Mr Rellstab, although his predilections are upon the whole rather Russian than French. It is only justice to say, however, that in all the historical portions of his romance he displays great impartiality, and puts himself above national antipathies, taking a cosmopolitan view of the causes, conduct, and progress of the great struggle.

Led away by his captors to a bivouac of armed peasants in the glades of a vast forest, Ludwig at first almost regrets having escaped the volley of the French firing-party. A colossal Russian stretches out his hand to appropriate his prisoner’s foraging-cap, and, upon the imprudent resistance of the latter, raises a club to dash out his brains. Ludwig deems himself no better than a dead man, when suddenly a woman’s scream is heard, and a figure clad in costly furs rescues him from the fierce savage. A veil is thrown back, and Ludwig beholds Bianca, who possesses a castle in the neighbourhood, the same which the Polish lancers had surprised upon her wedding-night. It is not quite clear what has brought her into the forest among beastly Cossacks and bloodthirsty peasants, unless it were to meet Ludwig. The sights she there meets are not all of the most agreeable kind. Whilst the enraptured Ludwig kneels before her, kissing her hand and weeping, a horseman, whose noble steed and rich dress bespeaks the man of rank, dashes into the circle, and sternly inquires the reason of this strange scene between the lady and the captive dragoon. It is Count Dolgorow, who interrupts Bianca’s explanation by suddenly springing from his horse, and seizing the scoundrel Beaucaire, his former secretary, whom his quick eye has distinguished in the group of prisoners. By a strange fatality, his betrayer and his rescuer are together delivered into his hands. He gratifies revenge before showing gratitude, and has the traitor precipitated into one of the huge bivouac fires that blaze around. Before this we have met with a French grenadier impaled alive in a wood, and with a party of Russians setting up their captives as targets. There is no scarcity of the horrible in Mr Rellstab’s pages, but without it the retreat from Moscow could not be faithfully described. After Beaucaire has been roasted, Bianca recovered from her swoon, and Ludwig presented to the Count—who admits, but with no very good grace, his claims to gratitude and consideration—the other prisoners are sorted. The able-bodied are sent to the Count’s hunting-seat, thence to be forwarded to the mines. To those unfit to work, Russia, says Dolgorow, can afford no other nourishment than two ounces of lead. One man only is put aside as too old for labour. This is St Luces, Beaucaire’s employer and Ludwig’s persecutor.

“St Luces, not having understood the Count’s words, fancied that, from his appearance and fine linen, and from his clothes (of which, however, he was by this time pretty well stripped,) his captors had discovered him to belong to the higher classes. The pallid horror which had spread over his features since the terrible fate of Beaucaire, was replaced by a faint gleam of hope. He ventured to address the Count in French.

“‘I trust, sir,’ he said, ‘I shall be treated in conformity with those laws of war which all civilised nations respect. I am not a military man, but belong to the civil service; my rank—’

“‘You are a Frenchman,’ sternly interrupted Dolgorow—‘one of those vampires who have sucked the blood and marrow out of half the nations of Europe; more contemptible and odious than the soldier, for he, at least, fights with fair and open weapons.’

“‘They would willingly,’ persisted St Luces, again trembling with apprehension, ‘exchange me against Russian prisoners!’

“‘Prisoners! what prisoners have you?’ cried Dolgorow with bitter scorn. ‘Thousands, certainly are set down in your bulletins, but where can you show them? You do wrong to remind me of that. Think you we know not how your ruthless assassin bands have treated the few who fell into their hands? Think you we have not found them, lying with shattered skulls upon the roads in rear of your flying columns? Did we not meet with them shut up in churches, barns, and stables, dead in the pangs of famine? Away with ye! We shall find enough to exchange, when exchange we _will_.’”[9]

Discoveries and surprises now tread rapidly on each other’s heels. A German in the service of Count Dolgorow recognises Ludwig as the son, and St Luces as the murderer of his former master; whereupon Ludwig generously intercedes for the Frenchman’s life, but is sternly repulsed by the Count, and St Luces is forthwith shot. Then, upon their way to Bianca’s castle, Ludwig and his mistress stumble upon Bernard, lying senseless in the road. They pick him up and take him with them, in spite of danger from wolves and of the anger of Countess Dolgorow, impatient to proceed. At the castle Bernard and Bianca discover, by the somewhat hackneyed contrivance of identical rings, that they are brother and sister, and soon afterwards the Count becomes aware of the good understanding between them, and that Bianca knows she is not his daughter. These meetings and recognitions thwarting certain deep-laid plans, he resolves to forward Ludwig and Bernard to Siberia; but before he can do so, the two young men, with Bianca and Willhofen the German servant, make their escape by the aid of some French prisoners, and take the road to Smolensko, with the intention of joining the French army and seeking refuge in Germany.

Meanwhile Rasinski, with the shattered remnant of his gallant regiment, now reduced to a feeble squadron of sixty horses, forms part of the rear-guard under the hero Ney. We will give a specimen of Mr Rellstab’s adaptation of Ségur.

“‘Rasinski!’ suddenly exclaimed Jaromir, ‘do you see yonder on the rising ground?’

“‘Cossacks! And I wager my head they are not alone!’ replied Rasinski.

“Upon the heights appeared three horsemen, seemingly thrown forward to reconnoitre. They were soon remarked by all; and there occurred in the French ranks that restless stir and low murmur, betokening the expectation of an important event.

“‘Jump on your horse, Jaromir,’ said Rasinski, ‘and ride to the corner of the forest; thence you will see far over the country.’

“Jaromir, now the best mounted in the regiment, sped swiftly across the snow, in obedience to the order. But he returned even more rapidly, to announce that the entire heights were covered with Cossacks, and that infantry columns were debouching from the depths of the forest.

“Just then Colonel Regnard, who by the marshal’s order had also been out to reconnoitre, rode by. ‘This looks like work, Rasinski,’ he cried in passing; ‘the ball opens just like the day before yesterday. The wood is as full of Russians as an anthill of ants.’ The drums beat. The troops stood to their arms. The disorderly groups of weaponless stragglers and invalids formed themselves into a dense mass.

“‘For us the fight is a pleasure,’ exclaimed Rasinski; ‘but it is hard upon Boleslaw and the other wounded. We must do our best to shield them from harm. But who comes here?’

“A Russian officer was seen descending the hill, waving a white handkerchief.

“‘Useless trouble, sir,’ said Rasinski proudly to himself, as he distinguished the Russian’s object. ‘We shall not treat for peace so long as we can handle our arms.’

“The marshal was busy placing and ordering his troops. He galloped through the ranks, showing himself every where, directing and encouraging all. Rasinski sent an orderly to report to him the approach of a flag of truce. But before the message reached him, the Russian officer reached the outposts, and, on distinguishing the Polish uniform, summoned them in their own language to surrender to overpowering forces. Rasinski sprang forward like an incensed lion. ‘What!’ he shouted, ‘you would seduce our men, incite them to desert! That is not the duty of a flag of truce. You are my prisoner!’

“The alarmed officer would have turned his horse, but Rasinski already held the bridle, and his soldiers surrounded the Russian so quickly that resistance and flight were alike impossible.

“‘You will surely respect the sacred rights of a flag of truce!’ cried the Russian.

“‘You should have waited at proper distance, till you knew if it pleased us to receive you,’ replied Rasinski. ‘It is against all usage of war to approach an enemy’s army as you have done.’

“‘Take me to your commander,’ said the officer, ‘he will listen to my well-intended offers. The bravest must yield to impossibility. You have no alternative but capitulation.’

“‘We shall see that,’ answered Rasinski, well assured beforehand of the marshal’s decision. ‘Here comes our commander, Marshal Ney. That name may suffice to convince you that you will waste your words.’

“The marshal came; Rasinski rode to meet him and reported what had passed.

“‘You have done your duty as an officer and man of honour,’ replied Ney; ‘I should take shame to myself did I hesitate to confirm your words.’ And he rode forward and inquired the Russian’s pleasure.

“‘Marshal Kutusow sends me,’ began the officer. ‘He would not offend so renowned a warrior and general by asking him to lay down his arms, if any alternative remained open. Upon the surrounding heights stand eighty thousand men, and one hundred pieces of cannon. If you doubt my words, you are at liberty to send an officer, whom I will conduct through our ranks that he may count our strength.’

“‘I hope to get near enough to your army to count them myself,’ replied the marshal with flashing eyes. ‘Tell Prince Kutusow that Marshal Ney has never yet surrendered, and that the world’s history shall never record his having done so. Yonder is the goal which duty and honour assign me; I will break a road through your ranks, though your forests became armies.’

“‘They _will_ do so,’ replied the Russian. The words had scarce left his lips, when the thunder of artillery echoed from the heights in front and on the left flank, and an iron hail crashed and rattled upon the icy surface of the plain.

“‘This is treachery!’ cried the marshal sternly, as he looked up and beheld the hills crowned on all sides with levelled guns, and dark masses of troops. ‘There is no parleying under fire! You are my prisoner!’

“The officer, confounded at being thus sacrificed by the imprudence or recklessness of his friends, gave up his sword.

“‘Take him to the rear!’ commanded the marshal. ‘General Ricard, forward! Attack the enemy with the bayonet. You shall have the honour of opening the road.’

“The general, at the head of fifteen hundred men, pressed resolutely forward.”

Everybody who has read Ségur, and those who have not had better begin immediately, knows how these fifteen hundred men were swept away by Kutusow’s artillery; how Ney in person headed the next charge; and how, after losing more than half his division, he retreated towards Smolensko, made a flank movement, again returned southwards, and at last struck the Dnieper, and crossed it with the remnant of his force, without a bridge, and on blocks of floating ice, to find, upon the further bank, Platoff and his Cossacks, with their Scythian tactics and sledge-mounted artillery, to which he had no cannon to oppose,—the six guns wherewith he had audaciously returned the fire of Kutusow’s tremendous batteries having been left, of course, on the north bank of the river. But, after braving and escaping from the whole Russian army, Ney was not to be intimidated by a horde of ill-disciplined savages; and he forced his way, fighting incessantly, to the neighbourhood of Orcha, where Eugene received him with open arms. There are only five short days’ marches from Smolensko to Orcha; but in that little section of the long and terrible retreat, Ney, whilst losing thousands of men daily, gathered enough laurels to shade the brows of half a dozen heroes. We do not envy the feelings of those, be they Russians, English, or of what country they may, who can read, without profound emotion and admiration, the history of Marshal Ney during the Russian campaign, and especially during its latter and most disastrous portion. When those who previously ranked as the bravest gave in—when pride and thirst for glory were obliterated by extremity of suffering, and by the instinct of self-preservation—when the soldier’s most powerful incentives, discipline, honour, and gain, were forgotten and lost sight of, and even the iron veterans of the Old Guard, no longer sustained by their Emperor’s presence, renounced the contest and lay down to die—when his fellow-marshals, with rare exceptions, showed weariness and discouragement, and even the stern Davoust complained that the limits of human suffering were exceeded,—where was Ney, what was his aspect, what his words and actions? In rear of the army, a musket in his hand, a smile of confidence on his lips, the fire of his great soul and of his own glory flashing from his eyes, he exposed his life each minute in the day, as freely as ever he had done when he had but life to lose, before his valour had given him riches and rank, family and fame. Surely, so long as valour is appreciated, the name of NEY will be borne in glorious remembrance. And surely those men who subsequently pronounced his sentence of death, must since have sometimes felt remorse at their share in the untimely fate of so great a warrior. “I have saved my eagles!” joyously exclaimed Napoleon, when he learned, at two leagues from Orcha, that Ney was safe, although he brought with him but the ghost of his fine division. “I would have given three hundred millions to avoid the loss of such a man.” Although Napoleon, in some things the most magnificent charlatan upon record, dealt largely in speeches of this sort, we may believe that in this instance the cry came from the heart. What would the Emperor have said, had he then been told that three years later, on the 7th December 1815, the anniversary of one of those days when Ney so bravely breasted the Muscovite torrent, an execution would take place in an alley of the Luxemburg gardens, and that there, by sentence of a French chamber and the bullets of French soldiers, a premature end would be put to the glorious career of him he had surnamed the Bravest of the Brave!

Previously to the junction of Ney and Eugene, Colonel Rasinski, whilst reconnoitring in the gray of the morning, falls in with a sledge containing three persons muffled in furs, whom he at first takes for Russians, but who prove to be Ludwig and his two companions. Upon the occasion of so happy a meeting, M. Rellstab is of course profuse in tears and embraces; Jaromir and Boleslaw are summoned to assist at the jubilee, and thenceforward the three Poles, the two Germans, Bianca, her waiting-maid Jeannette, and the faithful Willhofen, keep together as far as Wilna, save and except those amongst them whom death snatches by the way. The party is soon increased by an infant, the daughter of Colonel Regnard, and of a French actress, of which Bianca takes charge. Here again the author of “1812” has made good and effective use of an incident thus briefly recorded by Ségur.

“At the gates of the town (Smolensko) an infamous act struck all witnesses with a horror that still survives. A mother abandoned her son, a child of five years old; in spite of his cries and tears she repulsed him from her overloaded sledge, wildly exclaiming that ‘he had not seen France! he would not regret it! But as to her, she knew France! she must see her country again!’ Twice did Ney have the poor child replaced in its mother’s arms, thrice she threw it upon the frozen snow. But amongst a thousand instances of sublime and tender devotedness, this solitary crime was not left unpunished. This unnatural parent was herself abandoned upon the snow, whence her victim was raised and confided to another mother. At the Beresina, at Wilna, and Kowno, the orphan was seen, and he finally escaped all the horrors of the retreat.”

In the romance the child is first fostered by a wounded veteran, and a compassionate canteen woman, but is separated from them when traversing the Dnieper, and receives the tenderest care from Bianca. On the northern bank of the Beresina we find the principal personages of the tale assembled, at the moment when the Russian cannon pour their murderous contents into the dense mass of fugitives, and these, crowding to the bridge, fall by hundreds into the water. A round-shot suddenly shatters the front of the vehicle in which Bianca, her maid, and the child are seated. The scene that ensues is spiritedly and naturally told.

“The frightened horses reared furiously, and would have upset the carriage had not the pole and fore-axle been in splinters. Willhofen sprang forward to hold them; Ludwig and Bernard hurried to his assistance. With streaming hair, Jeannette had already leaped from the cart, and Bianca, unconscious of what she did, followed her example, still closely clasping the infant.

“‘Is it alive?’ cried a voice, and at the same moment she felt herself seized from behind. She turned, and Regnard stood before her, his right arm in a sling: he had just made his way through the crowd of carts. ‘Oh! I have you then at last,’ he tenderly exclaimed, kissing and caressing his child as she lay in the arms of Bianca, who, stunned with terror and the recent shock, scarce thought of wondering at his unexpected appearance.

“‘You here, colonel?’ cried Bernard. ‘How and whence came you?’

“‘From the fight up yonder,’ replied Regnard. ‘’Tis awful work; our fellows stand like the walls of Troy, but all must soon be overthrown, for the Russians bury us under their bullets.’

“‘Did you see Rasinski? Is he alive? And Boleslaw and Jaromir?’

“‘They fight like lions, like devils, those Poles; but it’s all in vain, we cannot hold out another hour. And this defile over the bridge looks about as tempting as the jaws of hell.’

“‘You are wounded, colonel?’

“‘My right arm shattered. My horse was knocked over by a shell; I dragged myself as far as Studianka to seek a doctor, and found ashes and corpses, no longer of use in the fight. I thought I would have a trial to cross the bridge. I saw these carriages from above; I knew you had driven up here yesterday. If I could only find you, I thought, and get a last look at my little daughter! Laugh at me, if you like, but the thought came like a whisper from heaven. ‘Perhaps it is the last wish you will see fulfilled,’ said I to myself. And as if some invisible guide had led me, I made my way to your very carriage, just as the twelve-pounder played you the trick. Only see now how hearty the child is; it grows like its mother! Ah! if I only had something for you, poor darling! Were we but in Paris, that I might give you a pocketful of bonbons!’

“And in fondling and chattering with the infant, he forgot both his crushed arm and the destruction that raged so actively around. The storm of shot had no terrors for him; twenty battles had accustomed him to it. But the sweet emotions of paternal love were new to him, and a secret voice seemed to warn him that he would not long enjoy them.

“Ludwig now came up and greeted the colonel. Bianca gave the child to Jeannette, for Regnard, with only one arm, could not hold it, and she felt that her strength was giving way amidst this complication of horrors. She leaned against the wheel of the carriage. Bernard observed her faltering, and encircling her tenderly with his arm, he kissed her pale cheek.

“‘See yonder woman,’ he said; ‘take pattern by her; see, dearest sister! how calm she is amidst the ravages of death.’

About twenty paces off, a tall female figure sat upon a horse, a child of three years old in her arms, and gazed steadily at the tumult. A black veil was twined round her head, but left her noble and striking countenance exposed. She could but just have arrived, otherwise her appearance was too remarkable not to have attracted attention, even in that hour of confusion when few thought of any thing but their danger.

“‘Calm?’ said Bianca, after a long look, ‘calm, say you? Petrified, you _should_ say. See you not the tears that roll over her rigid countenance, and the despairing gaze she directs to heaven? Alas, poor woman!’

“‘She is the widow of Colonel Lavagnac,’ said Regnard; ‘her husband fell three weeks ago at Wiazma; the child in her lap is her daughter.’

“All eyes were fixed in pity on the mourning figure, when a cannon-ball boomed through the air, and struck her and her horse to the ground. A cry of horror escaped the bystanders. The unhappy woman had disappeared. One could not see her for the throng. Bernard, Ludwig, and Regnard forced a passage through the mob of men and horses, but with all their efforts their progress was slow. Bianca followed them, led partly by pity and partly by fear of separation from her protectors.

“Silent and uncomplaining, the lady sat upon the ensanguined snow, her tall, dignified form supported against an overturned cart, her child clasped in her arms. The shot had shattered both her feet, but her infant appeared unhurt, and anxiously clasped its mother’s neck with its little hands. None thought of succouring the poor creatures; all were too engrossed with their own selfish misery, and few vouchsafed her more than a passing glance as they struggled onwards. She would hardly have escaped being trampled under foot, had not her wounded horse, lashing out convulsively in the agonies of death, cleared a space around her. Whilst Bernard supported his trembling sister, Ludwig and Regnard attempted to climb over the cart which intervened between them and the wounded lady. But at that moment the noble sufferer took a strong hair-chain from her neck, twisted it, before any could stay her hand, around her infant’s throat, and with a sudden exertion of strength drew it tight. The little creature drooped its head and fell strangled on its mother’s knees. In a last frantic convulsion, the unhappy parent clasped her child to her bosom, gave an agonised sigh, a glance to heaven, and fell back, dead. At that moment Ludwig and Regnard reached her, but it was too late. Bianca hid her face in her brother’s bosom.”

A fragment of a shell knocks over the faithful Willhofen. The fire from the Russian batteries becomes more terrible than ever, the crowd more agitated and frantic.

“‘Let us keep together!’ cried Regnard—‘once separated, we shall never meet again.’ And he stretched out his hand to grasp that of Ludwig, when a ball passed between them, overthrowing the colonel.

“‘Regnard!’ cried Ludwig, springing to his assistance, ‘are you badly hit?’

“Bernard raised the wounded man by the shoulders, and bent over him.

“‘I have got my allowance,’ said Regnard, faintly. ‘Where is my little daughter?’

“Shuddering, but with resolute step, Bianca came forward, the child in her arms. She kneeled beside the dying soldier and held it out to him. Regnard looked mournfully at the little creature so soon to be an orphan.

“‘Farewell!’ he said, kissing it for the last time. ‘You have no longer a father—but a mother—has she not?’ added he, imploringly to Bianca. ‘Greetings to Rasinski, if he still lives to receive them. Long live the Emperor!’

“Upon this last exclamation, uttered in a hoarse soldier-like tone, the final breath of the dying man was expended. The next instant his soul had fled.”

From the heights of Studianka the beaten French now pour down, and Bianca loses her female attendant, who perishes miserably, crushed by a gun-carriage. It will be seen that there is a considerable accumulation of horrors at this part of the romance; but tender-hearted persons, whom narratives of human suffering too painfully affect, will naturally avoid a book founded on such a campaign as that of 1812. The passage of the Beresina has been too often described to be worth dwelling upon here; and the more so as Mr Rellstab very judiciously has not attempted to alter or improve upon the reality, of itself sufficiently extraordinary and harrowing. He makes Rasinski execute the famous feat of Jacqueminot, Oudinot’s aide-de-camp, who, after swimming the Beresina in spite of the piercing cold and of the floating blocks of ice that bruised and cut his horse’s chest and flanks, galloped after the stragglers from Tchaplitz’s retreating column, caught one, disarmed him, put him before him on his horse and swam back with him to Napoleon, who had expressed a wish for a prisoner from whom to get information.

Hopeless of crossing the crowded bridge, where a fearful struggle for precedence now goes on amongst the mob of desperate fugitives, Bianca and her two companions take their course up stream, still bearing with them Regnard’s orphan daughter, and hoping to find rest and shelter by passing themselves off as Russians. At last, seeing no signs of house or village, they sit down in despair upon the snow and await their fate; when, in accordance with Mr Rellstab’s practice of bringing about opportune meetings, Rasinski and his handful of lancers ride up to them, and after the due amount of kisses and tears, a Lithuanian peasant guides them to a ford, and they get through the river in safety. At Zembin they procure a small sledge, and Bernard and Ludwig urge Bianca to hurry forward to Wilna. Neither of them offer to accompany her, which they might with great propriety have done, seeing that they are dismounted and useless, but propose confiding her to a wounded dragoon, a proposal which she naturally enough declines, and declares she will stick to the ship—in other words to the regiment—and rough it with the rest. After which plucky decision there is no more talk of parting company till they reach Wilna. Before getting there, however, there is much to be gone through. For winter sets in, and the tortures of cutting cold are added to those previously endured, slaying the sick and wounded by hundreds of a night. Overpowered by the fatigues of the day, they lie down to sleep beside their watchfires, and in the morning are stiff and cold. The north-west wind suddenly surrounds the harassed Frenchmen with the terrible atmosphere of the north pole, the air is filled with an icy dust, lips and cheeks crack and blister, the eyes are inflamed by the glittering whiteness of the snow. The horses die from extreme cold, and it is just as well for their riders, who would otherwise be frozen in their saddles. Thus Rasinski and his comrades find themselves dismounted, and Bianca’s sledge becomes useless. They pursue their way on foot, amidst scenes of inconceivable suffering and woe. Few of those around them show fortitude in this extremity of misery. In some instances despair and madness lead to violence and shameful excesses. Bianca, whose courage rises with the necessity for exertion, is walking supported by Ludwig’s arm, and Bernard follows at a short distance, carrying the infant, who, unconscious of the danger, smiles cheerily in his face, when the following incident occurs.

“At this moment a hoarse firm voice was heard in rear of Bernard.

“‘Stop, dog!’ it exclaimed. ‘Your cloak, or I shoot you dead!’

“Bernard stopped and looked round. A soldier, scantily attired in wretched rags, his features distorted, his beard long and tangled, his face black with earth and smoke, his eyes, frightfully inflamed, rolling wildly in their orbits, stood before him and covered him with his musket.

“‘What would you, wretched man?’ cried Bernard, horror-struck and stepping backwards. The child screamed with terror, clasped its arms around him, and hid its little head in his breast.

“‘Your warm cloak, or I shoot you down!’ shouted the frantic soldier. ‘No more comrades here; I’ve as good a right to save myself as you.’

“Bernard saw himself almost alone with the assassin; although thousands were within hail, the bullet would be quicker than their aid, supposing even that one amongst them had sufficient pity for another’s peril to turn aside for a moment, and thus lengthen his journey and sufferings by a few painful paces. There was nothing for it but to yield to the menace and give up his warm wrapper, although he well knew that with it he gave up his life.

“‘You would murder a comrade to prolong your own life?’ said Bernard, in a tone of dignified determination; ‘be it so, but you will profit little by the deed. Your hour will overtake you the sooner.’

“‘Quick, death gripes me already!’ cried the madman, his musket still levelled and his bloodshot eyes wildly rolling.

“Bernard stooped to put down the child, which impeded him in pulling off his coat; as he did so, he heard a loud cry, and turning, he beheld Bianca, who threw herself weeping at the feet of the furious soldier.

“‘Take this gold, these jewels!’ she exclaimed; ‘this warm cloak is yours, but let my brother live!’ And, with the quickness of thought, she tore the rich chain from her neck and the furs from her shoulders, leaving her arms and delicate frame exposed with slight covering to the rigour of that horrible climate. The soldier gazed at her for a moment with fixed and straining eyes, then his arms slowly sank; letting the musket fall to the ground, he pressed both hands to his face, and broke out in loud weeping and whimpering. By this time Ludwig came up, and he and Bernard lifted up Bianca, who was still kneeling on the frozen ground, and extending her arms with the proffered gifts.

“‘Wild beast that I am!’ suddenly exclaimed the stranger; ‘no, I cannot survive this shame. Forgive me; you knew me once a better man, before suffering drove me mad! But no matter; I know my duty.’

“He stooped to pick up his musket. Bernard kept his eyes fixed upon him, and racked his memory for the features, which, wild and distorted though they now were, still seemed familiar to him.

“‘Where have I known you?’ he asked, as the man resumed his erect position.

“‘I don’t wonder you’ve forgotten me,’ was the gloomy reply; ‘I have forgotten myself. Alive, I am no longer worthy of the Order!’ cried he wildly, tearing from his rags the ribbon of the Legion of Honour and throwing it upon the snow. ‘I will try to earn it again, that you may lay it upon my body. I am my own judge, and I show no favour.’

“Setting the butt of his musket firmly on the earth, he pressed his breast against the muzzle and touched the trigger with his foot. The piece went off, and its unfortunate owner fell heavily to the ground.

“‘Gracious God!’ exclaimed Bianca, sinking senseless into Ludwig’s arms.

“Bernard was at the side of the fallen man, supporting his head. A last spark of life still remained. ‘If you get to France,’ gasped the suicide, ‘a word to my wife and children—Sergeant Ferrand—of Laon,’ and the spirit departed. As he closed his eyes, Bernard remembered him. It was the same Sergeant Ferrand whose humanity saved him and Ludwig from perishing during their imprisonment at Smolensko. Military honour was the condition of the veteran’s existence; he thought himself degraded beyond redemption by the murderous aggression to which misery, pain, and despair, had driven him; a woman had surpassed him in courage, and that was more than he could bear. A rigorous judge, he had pronounced his own doom, and executed it with his own hand.

“Deeply moved, Bernard knelt beside the body; he gathered up the scrap of tarnished ribbon which the departed soldier had prized above all earthly goods, and laid it upon the breast of the corpse.

“‘Who shall deprive you of it?’ he said. ‘May it adorn you beyond the grave, amidst the throng of the valiant who have preceded you!’

“And they continued their journey, for the times admitted not of delay.”

That night they have to fight for their quarters in the village of Malodeczno, and use their artillery for the last time, being compelled to abandon it for the want of horses. Boleslaw is killed in the action. Soon afterwards, the Emperor leaves the army, and his departure dispirits even those who admit its propriety. Things get worse and worse. Often, after a fatiguing day’s march, no shelter is obtainable, and Bianca and her tender charge are fain to brave the inclemency of the bivouac, whilst the men watch by turns to keep off wolves and marauders. One night, when performing this duty, Jaromir is startled by a loud laugh, sounding strangely horrible in that scene of misery and desolation.

“From out of the surrounding darkness a grim figure stalked into the circle of fire-light. It was a gigantic cuirassier, wrapped in a tattered cloak, a bloody cloth bound round his head beneath his helmet. In his hand he carried a young fir tree, as a staff to support his steps.

“‘Good evening,’ he said, in a hollow voice to Jaromir. ‘Good evening, comrade. You seem merry here.’

“‘What seek you?’ demanded Jaromir, amazed at this hideous apparition! ‘There is no place for you here. Begone!’

“The cuirassier stared at him with his hollow eyes, twisted his mouth into a frightful grin, and gnashed his teeth like some infuriated beast.

“‘Ha, ha, ha!’ he laughed, or rather yelled; ‘Sleep you then so sound, ye idlers?’ And as he spoke he stamped with his foot on a frozen corpse upon which he stood. ‘Awake, awake!’ he cried, ‘and come with me!’

“For a moment he stood as if listening to some distant sound, then tottered painfully forward to the fire.

“‘Back!’ cried Jaromir, ‘Back, or I shoot you on the spot!’ And he drew a pistol; but his hand, trembling with fever, had not strength to level it.

“The lunatic stared at him with stupified indifference, his sunken features varying in their expression from a ghastly smile to the deepest misery. Jaromir gazed at him in silent horror. The huge figure stretched its lean arms out from under the cloak, and made strange and unintelligible gestures.

“‘Ho! I am frozen!’ howled the human spectre at last, and shook himself. Then he clutched at the flames with his fingers, like an infant, and staggered nearer and nearer till he stood close to the circle of sleepers, far within which he extended his arms. For the first time he now seemed to feel the warmth of the fire. A low whining noise escaped him, then he suddenly exclaimed, in tones between laughing and crying, ‘To bed! to my warm bed!’ tossed his fir-tree staff far from him, stumbled forwards over the sleeping soldiers, and threw himself, in his raging madness, into the centre of the glowing pile.

“‘Help, help!’ cried Jaromir, his hair erect with horror, and seizing Rasinski, he shook him with all his remaining strength.

“‘What is it?’ cried Rasinski, raising himself.

“‘There, there!’ stammered his friend, pointing to the flames, in which the unhappy cuirassier lay writhing and bellowing with agony. Rather conjecturing than comprehending what had occurred, Rasinski started up to rescue the sufferer. But it was too late. The heat had already stifled him; he lay motionless, the flame licking greedily round his limbs, and a thick nauseous smoke ascending in clouds from his funeral faggots. Rasinski stepped shudderingly backward, and turned away his face to conceal his emotion; then he observed that all around him lay buried in a deathlike sleep. Not one had been aroused by the terrible catastrophe that had occurred in the midst of so many living men.”

After those long days of hunger and fatigue, the bonds of slumber were of iron strength, and difficult to loosen. And it was even more dangerous than difficult to rob the survivors of the Grand Army of that brief repose, often their sole solace and refreshment during the twenty-four hours. In his turn overtaken by delirium, Jaromir’s cries and complaints at last awoke the whole party round the fire. A low murmur arose amongst the soldiers, and rapidly increased. Soon they cast ominous and threatening glances at the young Pole, and at last their discontent found a voice.

“‘Who is the madman, and what ails him?’ savagely exclaimed a bearded grenadier. ‘He robs us of our precious sleep! Thrust him from the fire—let him freeze if he cannot be still!’

“‘Ay, thrust him out!’ was the universal cry; and several sprang to accomplish the barbarous deed. Bianca uttered a cry of terror; Ludwig caught her in his right arm, and with his left kept off the assailants. Rasinski, who at once saw the greatness of the peril, left Jaromir in Bernard’s care, and leaped with flashing eyes into the midst of the circle. Ever prompt and decided, he snatched a half consumed branch from the fire, waved it above his head, and shouted with that lion’s voice so often heard above the thunder of the battle, ‘Back, knaves! The first step forward costs one of you his life.’

“The angry soldiers hesitated and hung back, yielding to Rasinski’s moral ascendency as much as to his threat of punishment. But then the grenadier drew his sabre and furiously exclaimed:—

“‘What, dastards, are ye all afraid of one man? Forward! Down with the Polish dogs!’

“‘Down thyself, inhuman ruffian!’ thundered Rasinski, and sprang to meet his foe. Adroitly seizing the soldier by the wrist of his uplifted arm, so that he could not use his weapon, he struck him over the head with the burning branch so violently, that the charred wood shivered, and a cloud of sparks flew out. But the blow, heavy as it was, was deadened by the thick bearskin cap, and served only to convert the angry determination of the grenadier into foaming fury. Of herculean build, and at least half the head taller than his opponent, he let his sabre fall, and grappled Rasinski with the intention of throwing him into the flames. The struggle lasted but for a moment before Rasinski tottered and fell upon his knees. To all appearance his doom was sealed, the hero succumbed before the overpowering strength of the brute, when Ludwig flew to his assistance, dragged the soldier backwards, and fell with him to the ground. Rasinski picked up the sabre, with his left hand dashed the bearskin from the head of the fallen grenadier, and with the right dealt him a blow that clove his skull in twain. Then, erecting his princely form, he advanced, with the calm dignity that characterised him, into the midst of the astounded bystanders. ‘Throw the corpse into the snow,’ commanded he: ‘lie down again and sleep. It matters no more than if I knocked a wolf upon the head.’

“As if he had no longer occasion for it, he threw the sabre contemptuously from him. None dared to murmur, but two soldiers obediently raised the bloody corpse of the fallen man, carried it a few paces, and threw it upon the snow-covered ground.”

The following evening the little band of friends reached Wilna, but without Jaromir, who had expired on the road. Wilna, the first inhabited town the French army had seen since their entrance into Russia, had been looked forward to by the fugitives who escaped from the terrible passage of the Beresina, as a refuge and a resting-place. There they fondly expected shelter from the cold, food for the famishing, bandages and medicine for the wounded and the sick. But their arrival took the Lithuanian capital by surprise. The inhabitants were still without any certain accounts of the disasters of the French, when suddenly they beheld their streets invaded by forty thousand ragged wretches, in whom it was impossible to recognise the remains of those magnificent troops which had passed through with Napoleon in the previous month of July. The very impatience of the men to get into the comfortable quarters they had promised themselves (but which few of them found, for the inhabitants shut their doors, and the commissaries, although their stores were crammed with bread and meat, refused to serve out those much needed provisions without a host of formalities rendered impossible by the general disorganisation) was the destruction of thousands. They all rushed in at one entrance,—the narrow suburb became blocked up with men, horses, and vehicles, and numbers perished of cold and of suffocation. When the survivors got through, their despair was terrible on finding themselves every where repulsed, from hospital and barracks, from the provision-store and the private dwelling. The hospitals and barracks, where there were neither beds or straw, were converted into charnel-houses, heaped with human bodies. “At last,” says Ségur, “the exertions of certain chiefs, such as Eugene and Davoust, the pity of the Lithuanians and the avarice of the Jews, opened places of refuge. Then it was strange to behold the astonishment of these unfortunates on finding themselves at last in inhabited houses. What delicious food a loaf of bread appeared, what inexpressible pleasure did they find in eating it seated, and with what admiration were they struck by the sight of a single weak battalion, still armed and uniformly clothed. They seemed to return from the extremity of the world, so completely had the violence and duration of their sufferings detached them from all their former habits.”

Bianca, her brother and friends, skirt the town to avoid the throng, and get in by an unencumbered entrance. In the streets, however, Rasinski is separated from his three companions, who find shelter in the house of a former servant of Bianca, and there meet with Ludwig’s sister Marie, and the Countess Micielska, a widowed sister of Rasinski, whom we have not had occasion previously to mention, although she is a fine enthusiastic character, and plays no unimportant part in the earlier scenes of the book. On learning, by letters from their brothers, the burning of Moscow and probability of retreat, the two ladies braved the severity of a Lithuanian winter, and left Warsaw for Wilna, where their arrival coincides with that of Napoleon’s disordered cohorts. Their joy at meeting Ludwig and Bernard is greatly overcast by the loss of Jaromir and Boleslaw, and by the absence of Rasinski, whom the two young Germans vainly seek in the crowded town, until at last, overcome with weariness, they retire to rest, dissembling, for his sister’s sake, their uneasiness touching his fate. Scarcely in bed, however, they are aroused by Paul, their host, who calls their attention to groans and lamentations in the street without. Arming themselves, they hurry forth to investigate the cause.

“Paul, bearing a lantern, preceded them to the spot whence the piteous sounds proceeded. It was a narrow lane, running parallel to the city wall, and inhabited entirely by Jews. Just as they turned into it they were challenged by a manly and well-known voice in their rear. ‘Who goes there? What is this disturbance?’

“‘Rasinski!’ exclaimed Ludwig. Paul turned, and, as the light fell upon the face of the new comer, the features of the noble Pole were revealed to his friends.

“‘Rasinski! you here, and alive!’ cried Ludwig, throwing himself into the Count’s arms.”

Here follows, of course, _more Rellstab_, half a page of tender embraces and gratulations. Then, the groans and lamentations continuing, the friends again move forward.

“The lane was narrow and crooked, so that they could not see far before them. On passing an abrupt bend, they distinguished several figures, which fled noiselessly before them, like night-birds frightened by the sudden light, keeping close in the shadow of the wall.

“‘Who goes there?’ cried Rasinski in Russian. ‘Stand, or I fire!’

“But the shadows flew onwards, grazing the wall, and gliding over the snow. Rasinski rushed after them, stumbled over an object in his path, fell, and, in his fall, his pistol went off. Ludwig and Bernard, close at his heels, would have stopped to help him up—

“‘Forward, forward!’ he cried: ‘follow and catch them.’

“They hurried on, but only one figure was now visible. They called to him to stop; he heeded them not. A shot fired by Bernard missed its mark, but the whistle of the bullet discomposed the fugitive, who, in stooping his head, slipped and fell. Ludwig was upon him in an instant, inquiring who he was, and why he fled. The stranger, who wore a sort of long black caftan, replied in piteous and terrified tones.

“‘God of my fathers!’ he cried: ‘have compassion, gracious sir! Why persecute the poor Jew, who does harm to no one?’

“‘Paul, a light!’ cried Bernard, who just then came up. ‘Let us see who it is that is in such haste to crave mercy. His conscience seems none of the best.’

“Paul lifted the lantern, casting the light full on the Jew’s visage.

“‘The devil!’ cried Bernard. ‘I should know that face. Where have I seen the accursed mask? To be sure, those red-bearded Lithuanians are all as like each other as bullets. But I greatly err, Jew, or you are the spy with whom we have an account to settle, that has stood over for the last five months.’

“A shout from Rasinski interrupted the speaker.

“‘Hither, friends!’ he cried; ‘your help here!’ The three hastily obeyed the summons, dragging the Jew with them in spite of his struggles and cries.

“‘Here has been the most villanous crime the world ever witnessed!’ exclaimed Rasinski, pale with horror and indignation, as his friends joined him. ‘Behold our comrades, driven out naked in this deadly cold, plundered, strangled, hurled from the windows! Inhuman monster!’ he cried in a terrible voice to the trembling Jew, ‘if you have shared in this work, I will have you torn by dogs. See! here they lie. Horrible, horrible!’

“In a nook formed by the recession of a house from the line of street, lay eight human bodies, half naked, some with only a shirt or a few miserable rags to cover them. Over one of these unfortunates, who was still alive, Rasinski had thrown his furred cloak, to protect him from the piercing cold. Ludwig and Bernard shuddered at this lamentable spectacle.

“‘God of Abraham!’ cried the Jew, ‘to thee I lift up my right hand, and swear that I am innocent of this deed. May I be accursed with my children and my grandchildren if I know aught of it! May the ravens pick out my eyes, and the flesh of my hand wither, if I speak not the truth.’

“‘He was amongst the murderers,’ the wounded man faintly gasped out: ‘he was about to cut my throat, when the fall from the window did not kill me, and because I called for help. Only your arrival saved me.’

“‘Fiend, inhuman fiend! the unspeakable misery that might draw tears from a demon could not touch you.’ Thus spoke Rasinski between his set teeth, and raised his sabre to split the skull of the Jew. In convulsions of terror the miserable wretch embraced his knees, and prayed for pity.

“‘God—Jehovah—mercy, noble Count, mercy!’

“Ludwig held back Rasinski’s arm. ‘Sully not your good blade with the monster’s blood,’ he said, earnestly and solemnly. ‘Leave him to the justice of an omnipotent Avenger.’

“‘You are right,’ replied Rasinski, quickly resuming his habitual composure. ‘Think you I have forgotten?’ said he, with an expression of the deepest loathing, to the Jew, who still clasped his feet in agony of fear. ‘I know you well for the base and double traitor who once already escaped well-merited death. Nothing could save you now, were it not that even a villain like yourself may be made useful. Begone, and warn your fellow-assassins, that if to-morrow I find a single dead body, a single mark of violence in one of their houses, I lay the whole quarter in ashes,—men, women, and habitations; and I myself will be the first to hurl the sucking-babe into the devouring flames! Away, dog! Yet will I mark thee, that thou mayest not escape.’

“And raising his foot, he stamped thrice upon the face of the prostrate Jew, who bellowed like a wild beast, whilst his blood reddened the snow. Nevertheless, the murderer managed to scramble to his feet, and reach an adjacent house door, where he stood knocking and calling upon his fellow Israelites for help and compassion.”

Count Ségur tells us, that the Jews enticed the unfortunate wounded into their houses to despoil them, and afterwards, in sight of the Russians, threw them, naked and dying, out of the doors and windows, leaving them to perish of cold.

We approach the final chapters of Mr Rellstab’s romance. Bianca, whose quality of a Russian noble suffices to protect her and her attendants, remains with Ludwig, Marie, and her brother at Wilna, after the French leave it. They then post to Germany without further adventure. Their last sight of Rasinski is when, mounted on a Cossack horse, by the side of Marshal Ney, he heads a scanty but determined band, covering the retreat of the French. He subsequently falls at Leipzig, fighting with his wonted gallantry under the orders of his countryman Poniatowski.

From the glimpses of the plot and numerous extracts we have given, the reader will have small difficulty in forming his own estimate of the faults and merits of “1812.” We have already commented upon both: upon the spirit and power often conspicuous in the dialogue and description, as well as upon the excess of forced coincidences, and upon the occasional long-windedness and super-sentimentality. However the interest may here and there, by reason of prolixity, be found to flag, the book, when once begun, is not likely to be laid aside unfinished. This alone is saying much for a historical romance in four very long volumes. There are not many German writers, in that style, of whose works we would venture the like prediction. And just at present Mr Rellstab need not apprehend fresh rivals. The year 1848 is unfavourable to German literature. The country is far too busy revolutionising to care about belles-lettres. Fictions are ousted by realities, novels by newspapers, trim octavos by uncouth twopenny pamphlets, polemical and satirical, attacking and defending, supporting and tearing to pieces, the numerous schemes afoot for the regeneration of Fatherland. In due time it will be seen whether the literature of the country is to share the general improvement so sanguinely anticipated from the recent changes in a system, under which Germany undeniably has long enjoyed a very large share of tranquillity and happiness.

WHAT WOULD REVOLUTIONISING GERMANY BE AT?

Many a confirmed wanderer upon Continental highways and byways may have been long since wearied by the conceitedly-vulgar airs in which old Father Rhine has indulged himself in latter years, and heartily tired of his bald vineyards, his melodramatic old ruins, and the make-believe majesty of his so-called mountains. But still there remained a sort of spurious halo about his very name; some kindly reminiscence of the time when, as an enthusiastic youth just escaped from the supposed commonplace of England, one gazed for the first time upon this famed show-stream of the Continent, and wondered, and admired, and poetised in spite of one’s-self, may have cast a charm of early memory upon its overrated allurements; and, of a surety, there must have been brought a comfortable glow of pleasure to the heart of any one, except that nearly-exploded animal, the exclusive exquisite, either male or female, in witnessing the happy gaping faces of the touristic hordes, who paddled up and down the well-known old banks—a feeling of ease, comfort, and even homeishness, in the modern luxuries of the hundred palace-hotels of the Rhenish towns and villages, in the contented aspect of the thriving landlord, welcoming the guests who brought him wealth, and in the ready alertness of the active and obsequious waiters. Well, Germany has taken into its head to follow in the lead which distracted France gave, when it madly beckoned with frantic finger to all the Continent to follow in its wild dance. Germany has caught the St Vitus of revolution, and danced off, if not as distractedly, at all events in less connected step, and less defined figure, than its neighbour: and in this revolutionary frenzy Germany has assumed so ungenial an aspect—a manner so doubtful, so unpromising, so uncertain, as regards the next step it may be inclined to take in the jerkings of its abrupt and unregulated dance—that the gentle tourist-seekers of ease and pleasure have turned away in disgust from this heavy Meg Merrilees, who has forgotten even her scraps of song, and her long-pretended spirit of romance, and declined to visit her until she shall have somewhat recovered from her drunken fit of revolution, and become more decently behaved. The Rhine, then, has lost the last charm of foreign bustle and movement, with which he decked his old head, as with a crown of wild flowers, not unbecoming his gray hairs. He looks sad, sober, discontented, disappointed, mourning his lost old joys, and his lost glories, of which young Germany, in its revolutionary excitement, has despoiled him. His hotels are empty; landlords, too, have a forlorn air, and take to rattling their last _groschen_ in their pockets; and unhappy waiters get fat upon their inactivity, but, at the same time, pale with ill-humour at their diminished _trinkgelder_, and apprehension of losing their places altogether. Travellers’ visits have grown, like those of angels, “few and far between;” and as angels do the poor scanty tourists appear to be regarded—as munificent beings, in fact, from whom too much cannot be demanded and expected; for the Rhenish hotel-keepers, in pursuance of the system adopted by Parisian shopkeepers, in these days of revolutionary scarcity and destitution, seem determined to make those unhappy beings, who fall into their clutches, redeem the debt they appear to consider due to them from those absent tourists, who have not come to enjoy all the splendours prepared for them. Since Germany, with its newborn cry for imperial unity, has appeared inclined to turn back again, in new revolutionary spirit, to old feudal times, the Rhenish hotel-keepers seem to think that they ought to appear in the characters of the old robber-knights. This consideration, perfectly personal to a poor tourist, who has lately paid his _löse-geld_ at many a modern robber’s stronghold on the Rhine, brings him round, however, to the question which he has been putting to himself, at every step he has been taking in Germany—“What would revolutionising Germany be at?”

What would revolutionising Germany be at? It is a question easily put, but very difficult to answer. The old joke, lately “freshed-up” to be applied to the French—namely, that “they don’t know what they want, and won’t be easy till they get it,” may, with still deeper truth, be applied to the Germans. In spite of much inquiring conversation with all men of all ranks, and in all positions of life, it has been quite impossible for an unimaginative English understanding to discover exactly, in the midst of all the vague rhapsody, florid discourse, and poetical politics with which it has been assailed, “what they want.” To judge by the fermenting spirit every where prevalent, the bombastic and unpractical dreams—for plans they are not—formed as regards the future, it would be difficult also not to suppose that “they won’t be easy till they get it.”

What would revolutionising Germany be at? In spite of all one sees and hears, or rather does not hear, it is impossible not to recur to the question again and again; for, after all, in Germany we are among thinking men, and, children as they may be in political life, _thinking men_ they _are_; and, surely, thinking men must have some definite end and aim to which their thoughts, their hopes, their aspirations, and their efforts are directed. All the Utopian schemes, all the unpractical theories of all parties, who put themselves forward in the revolutionary movement, be their tendencies monarchic, constitutional, or republican, aspire, then, to the setting up of the ill-defined idol of modern German political fancies—“German unity”—“One great and powerful united Germany”—“One great united German Empire”—or whatever name, designation, or varied shade of name the idol, whose pedestal is “Union,” may bear. This was the great fancied panacea for all evils, for which men clamoured, when, in imitation of that distracted city of Paris—so worthy of imitation, forsooth!—they got up revolutions, and tried their hands at building barricades. This has been, in truth, long since the watchword of the German student, when, in the recesses of his beer-cellar at the university, he collected a set of fellow _fancied_ enthusiasts around the beer-jugs, imagined this species of club to be a wonderful conspiracy, because he designated it by the forbidden name of “_Burschenschaft_,” and deemed himself a notable and formidable conspirator, because he drank off his _krug_ of beer to the cry of “Perish all Princes—_es lebe hoch das Deutsche Vaterland_!” The princes, by the way, were highly complimentary to such conspirators, in considering them dangerous, and forbidding the existence of the _Burschenschaften_, which were pretty safety-valves enough to let off the exuberance of studentic steam. Whether the cry for a “United Germany” first proceeded again from the mouths of these fantastic enthusiasts, who, when they found out, to their surprise, that the parts they had been acting in their mimic dramas of the beer-cellars might be acted to the life and under the open sky of heaven, became in most parts of Germany the leaders of the mobs, or the heroes of the barricades, matters but little; nothing is more like a flock of sheep—although the term of “a pack of wolves” might often appear more applicable—than the general herd of men in moments of revolutionary excitement; whatever conclusion, however far-fetched and fantastic, any old revolutionary bell-wether may jump at, the flock is sure to follow and jump after him. It matters, then, but little how or by whom the cry of “United Germany” was first raised—the whole revolutionary flock immediately set up the same “baa!” and in each convulsion of each German State, great or small, in which a revolution may be said to have taken place, among the grievances which mobs, deputations, or delegates laid before German princes, as necessary to be forthwith amended and rectified, was the immediate and indispensable want of a “United Germany.” A somewhat more decided and definite step towards the possible realisation of this tolerably vague and indefinite _desideratum_, in the amendment of people’s wrongs, was taken by the call for the meeting of one united German parliament, for the purpose of considering and regulating the affairs of all Germany in this revolutionary crisis; but more especially of effecting that union in one empire, under one head, or under one form of government, which appeared to be the great desire of those who now put themselves forward as the expression of the will of all the German nation, either as a whole, or in its parts; and which seemed to be considered as the great unknown remedy for all evils, real or imaginary. The meeting of the first illegal and self-constituted body, which, in its impatience to be ruling the destinies of the nation, assembled at Frankfort under the name of a _Vor-Parlement_, or preliminary parliament, and, although originally only emanating from a club of revolutionary spirits at Heidelberg, contrived to impose itself upon Germany and its princes, and sway the destinies of the land, in opposition to the old German Diet assembled in the same place—the proceedings of the _Ausschuss_, or select committee, which the members of this _Vor-Parlement_ left behind them, to follow up their assumed authority, when they themselves dispersed,—the constitution of the present National Assembly, sanctioned by most of the German princes, and acknowledged as fully legal and supreme in its authority, its members being elected by universal suffrage,—and its meeting in time to put a stop to the wild democratic tendencies and reckless proceedings of the _Ausschuss_, are all matters of newspaper history, and need here no further detail; they are mentioned only to show what revolutionising Germany fancies and pretends it would be at, as far as any idea can be formed from its actions—and the means it would employ to arrive at its ends. We have got thus far, then, in the solution of our question. Revolutionising Germany desires, above all things, one great and powerful union of all its several parts,—the how, when, where, &c., being as yet very indefinite and unintelligible; and the General National Assembly is there to settle those important preliminaries. Let us content ourselves awhile with this very vague and uncertain answer, and return to old Father Rhine and his neighbourhood, to have some further idea of the physiognomy of the country under the present revolutionary auspices, and with the soothing hopes of the realisation of the grand desideratum of union before the country’s eyes. After taking this superficial survey of the “outward man,” and judging as far as we can of his character and temper therefrom, we may then speculate, perhaps, a little upon his tendencies in his present course; and even go so far as to attempt to take his hand, and try a trick or two of palmistry in fortune-telling—not pretending, however, in true gipsy spirit, to infallibility in foretelling the future, however knowingly and mysteriously we may shake our heads in so doing.

Although the Germans cannot be said to have the capabilities of acting any new part, that they may pretend to take upon themselves, to the life—and even to the death—with all that reality and energy for which the French have such an inborn talent, yet they may be looked up to as a still more symbol-loving people than the latter; and although perhaps not quite so much “up to” correctness of costume, at least quite as fond of parading the dress of the new part upon all occasions. The first thing, consequently, that strikes the tourist, on entering the Germany of 1848, is the ostentatious display of the new-old imperial, so-called national cockade, the red, black, and gold colours of the old German empire. It is not only upon the caps of vapouring students, who begin to consider themselves more or less the masters of the world, or upon the hats of hot-headed, _soi-disant_-enthusiastic, poetico-political young men that the new cockade is now to be seen; it stares you in the face from the head and breast of almost every man you meet—gray-beard, middle-aged, or youngster. It is generally from the centre of the cap or hat, and thus just upon the forehead, that it glares upon you, like the dark, red, gleaming eye of a new race of Cyclops: almost every male individual looks like a political Polyphemus. The soldiers are, one and all, adorned with two cockades, the one of the colours of the individual country they serve, the other of those of Imperial United Germany. They have thus two staring, distorted, and unmatched eyes, one over the other, in the centre of their foreheads. With their two eyes they ought, one would suppose, to see farther in the mist of the political storm than other people. The military, however, influenced perhaps by the example of their aristocratic young officers, have shown themselves, generally speaking, and markedly so in Prussia, where the revolutionary movement has been the most decided, recalcitrant towards the so-called progress of the day, anti-popular in their sympathies, attached only to the king and individual country they serve, disdainful of the new central power, the authority of which they do not and will not comprehend, and of its representatives, whom they regard as a herd of insolent _schwätzer_, or chatterers—in fact, anti-revolutionary, or, as it is called in the pet political phrases of the day, which the Germans have, now more than ever, shown themselves so foolishly eager to borrow of the French—_retrograd_ and _reactionär_.

This position of the military, which appears, generally speaking, to be the same all over the country, is, to say the best, a very ticklish and equivocal one, and promises but little for the future internal peace of United Germany. Orders, however, have been given by such authorities as still are,—and in the first instance by weak, uncertain, vacillating, and now disappointed Prussia,—that the military should do their homage to the ideas of the day, by wearing the imperial cockade, if not in lieu of, at all events in addition to, that which they had heretofore considered as their national symbol: and the double Polyphemus eye of the soldier is one of the most striking and startling evidences of the unsteady and contending spirit of the times, that meet the eye of the tourist in Germany of to-day. Even more than the students—who are still, however, sufficiently remarkable both in costume and manner in these days of unrestricted movement and opinion—you will find a certain set of men, whose physiognomy of race is so strongly marked by some indescribable peculiarity of type, whatever be their colour or form of feature, as to render them unmistakeable, and who make the most flaring display of the imperial national colours, now so strangely converted into the symbol of a revolutionary spirit, be it in cockade, or band, or button-hole decoration. These are the Jews. They are positively lavish in their display of ribbon. Ever since the revolution has begun its dubious and unsteady course throughout Germany, it has been, invariably and everywhere, the Jews who have displayed the strongest revolutionary spirit, the most decided republican tendencies, the most acrimonious hatred against the “powers that be,” and the most virulent efforts towards the subversion of the existing state of things. What may have been the cause of the outburst of this spirit in an essentially trading and money-getting people, whose commercial advantages, in whatever branch they may lie, must be so completely compromised, if not altogether ruined, by revolutionary movements and their consequences, it would be difficult in a superficial sketch to say: it may be conjectured to have arisen simply from a spirit of revenge against the exclusive upper classes of Germany, who have so long treated their sect, proud of its wealth, and seeking influence from its power, with cutting repulsion and contempt. The fact, however, is as stated; the most active revolutionary spirits engaged in the task of pulling down and destroying, as far as was possible, have been every where the Jews; the avowed republicans may chiefly be found among men of their persuasion; the clamour, the attack, and the denunciation, chiefly still proceed from Jewish mouths and Jewish pens. Those who now march forward, then, the most boldly, hand in hand in strange conjunction, along the precipitous path of revolutionary movement, are the students and the Jews. If you unwisely allow one of the latter to lay hold of an unlucky button of your coat in a steamboat, he will be sure to endeavour, with his peculiar twang, to insinuate into you all the wildest ultra-revolutionary doctrines: the former will keep more apart from you, and herd in knots; but, when they get drunk, instead of vapouring vague, incomprehensible, _soi-disant_ Kantian philosophy, as of yore, they will bellow still more vague and incomprehensible political theories about United Germany. It is these two classes of beings, then, who make the most ostentatious parade of the national cockades that flash across our eyesight.

The fate of this cockade has been a very strange one, by the way, in latter years. The red, black, and gold combination was long formally proscribed in universities, as deleterious and dangerous, and typical of the forbidden _Burschenschaften_: it was worn only in secret and by stealth, by recalcitrant would-be revolutionary students. All on a sudden it has been raised on high in flag and banner, waving not only in revolutionary procession, but from palace walls, and tops of public buildings. The cockade has not only been authorised, but enjoined; and in a late reactionary movement in Berlin,—when, out of jealousy and spite towards a central power, that had chosen its executive head from southern and not northern Germany, a considerable public feeling was exhibited against the imperial national flag, and in favour of the Prussian colours exclusively—the government, or rather the king himself, was obliged, for fear of an outbreak of the students, to command the resumption of those colours in flag and cockade, which, but a little while ago, he himself had proscribed. The pride of the young _soi-disant_ heroes at being openly able to parade that symbol which they cherished only heretofore as fancied conspirators, may be easily conceived: and, now these boy-men find that they can dictate to the princes of the earth, not only upon the matter of flags and cockades, but upon matters of far graver note, there is no knowing to what height of presumption this pride may not still further lead them.

If, now, we look around us to note the general physiognomy of the people, we shall find many other little traits, that mark these revolutionary times in Germany. The common people, more especially upon the Rhine, and in many parts of the duchy of Baden—the common people, formerly so smiling, so ready, so civil, perhaps only too obsequious in their signs of respect, have grown insolent and rude: ask them a question, and they will scarcely deign to bestow upon you an answer: in many instances they will shrug their shoulders, laugh in your face, and then turn their back upon you. On the contrary the public officials, the government _beamten_, have considerably lowered that arrogance of tone for which they formerly possessed a not unmerited evil repute, and will answer your inquiries with civil words and smiling faces. Such, however, is the natural see-saw movement of manners in revolutionary times, in the lower and lower-middle classes; and as far as regards the latter effect of revolutionary movement, no tourist in Germany will be disposed to complain of the change.

Over the middle and upper classes, at the same time, there has fallen a very visible gloom. That uncertainty of the future, which is proverbially far more difficult for moral strength to bear than any certain evil, has had the very evident effect, to the least observant eye, of depressing the spirits of “all manner of men.” The _hope_ appears to exist only in the theoretical fancies of the excited liberal politician,—the _enthusiasm_ only in the wild dreams of the declaiming student. The prevailing impression is one of all the dulness of doubt and the stupor of apprehension. Talk to people of the state of the country, and they will either shake their heads with a grunt, or openly express their fears about the future: and those fears are none the less active because they are so vague—none the less depressing because they wear the mysterious, visionary, and consequently awful form which the dim distance of complete uncertainty imparts.

Another change, again, in the manners of the people, is in the politicising spirit, so uncongenial in times gone by to the Germans, which, in most great towns, seems now to have so completely absorbed them. It is to be found not only in the low clubs, and in the insensate pothouse debates, but in the eagerness to crowd round the revolutionary addresses, which are posted by ultra-liberals at street corners, in the anxiety to read the last revolutionary disquisition of the new radical journal, in all its glory of large sheet and full columns, which has taken the place of the innocent and patriarchal little _Volks-blatt_, that was before the study and delight of the humble burgher; and in the malicious enjoyment with which the political caricature, railing at prince or men in power, is studied at the shop window, and the feverish importance that is attached to it.

All these characteristic signs and changes will meet the eye of the tourist if he even go no farther than the confines of the Rhine, and the old city of Cologne. There at once is that depression visible to which allusion has already been made. It is visible in the aspect of the fallen half-ruined shopkeeper, of the disconsolate master of the hotel, and, above all, of the anxious labourer upon the progress of that mighty work, the completion of which evil times seem again to render an impossible task—the Cologne cathedral. Funds for the further progress of the great undertaking already begin to fail; and these are not times to seek them from the munificence either of states or private individuals. The _Baumeister_, who has spent the greater part of a life upon the wonderful task of working out the completion of this miracle of Gothic art,—whose whole soul has been concentrated upon this one object,—the breath of whose very existence seems to depend upon the growth of this foster-child of his fancy, for which alone he has lived,—now shakes his head, like the consumptive man whose presentiments tell him that his last hour is nigh, and who despairs of escaping his doom. The revolutionary wind has blown like the plague-blast over the land: he feels that his hand must soon fall powerless before the neglect, or even ill-will of the newborn age of revolutionary liberty, and that he must disperse abroad that band of artist-workmen whom he has fashioned and educated to the noble work, and whom, in their completeness of artistic intelligence, none perhaps, in future years, may be able again to collect together. The cathedral, however, has proceeded to a certain point, at which the whole interior may be enclosed; and there, in all probability, the progress of the works will be checked for the present. The consecration of the new part of the building, in this state, has already taken place; but, even in these ceremonies, the revolutionary modern spirit of Germany has not forgotten to assert its influence: the deputation sent to them by the Prussian Assembly refused to join to itself a Catholic ecclesiastic; and yet it was seriously proposed at the same time, by the arrangers of the ceremonial _programme_, that the monarchs who were expected to be present upon the occasion should mount upon the roof of the cathedral, and there take an oath to preserve the unity of Germany, which oath was to be blessed and ratified by the Pope, who was to be invited to come over to Cologne for the purpose. The Pope has had other deeds and other revolutionary tendencies to bless or to ban in his own dominions; but this little trait, culled from the first _programme_ of the consecration of the Cologne cathedral, may be taken, at the same time, as a slight specimen of the wild poetico-political freaks of theoretically revolutionising Germany.

Let us wend our way a little farther. Without attempting to take any precise survey of Prussia and Austria, the continued fermenting and agitated state of which countries is the topic of every-day newspaper notice, and consequently without venturing upon any description of the poisonous and ulcerating sores continually breaking out upon the face of the fair and once healthy cities of Berlin and Vienna, the ignorant tumult of the parliamentary meetings assembled in them, the noisy fermentation of the ultra-revolutionary and republican clubs, the symbolical but dangerous demonstrations of hot-headed students and other unripe and unquiet spirits, the continual struggle and clash of parties accusing each other reciprocally of utterly subversive or counter-revolutionary and reactionary tendencies, and the constantly threatened danger of fresh convulsions, with further ruin to trade, and consequently to the well-being of the country at large—without, then, painting to ourselves a well-known and notorious picture, let us cast our eyes over the outward aspect of some of the smaller states.

Nothing, in the first place, can be more uneasy and disquieting than the appearance of the Duchy of Baden. In Heidelberg, ultra-revolutionary students have come to a total schism with their moderately and vaguely revolutionary professors; and it is at present difficult to see how any understanding is to be effected between teacher and scholar, so as to render the university a seat of learning of any other kind than that of subversive principles. In this part of Germany the revolutionary fermentation appears far more active, and is far more visible in the manner, attitude, and language of the lower classes, than even in those hotbeds of revolutionary movement, Austria and Prussia. To this state of things the confinity with agitated France, and consequently a more active affinity with its ideas, caught like a fever from a next-door neighbour’s house, the agency of the emissaries from the ultra-republican Parisian clubs, who find an easier access across the frontiers—not without the cognisance, and, it would now seem, as was long suspected, with the aid also of certain influential members of the Provisional Government of France—and the fact also that the unhappy duchy has been, if not the native country, at least the scene of action of the republican insurgents Hecker and Struve—have all combined to contribute. It is impossible to enter the duchy and converse with the peasant population, formerly and proverbially so peacefully disposed in patriarchal Germany, without finding the poison of these various influences gathering and festering in all their ideas, words, and actions. The prostration of spirit, generally speaking, among the middle and trading classes, the discouragement, the uncertain fear, are even still more apparent here than on the lower Rhine; and the gloom appears the greater, from all we see and hear, the higher we mount upon the social ladder. The proud and exclusive German nobility, who have so long slept cradled in the pride and exclusiveness of their courtly prerogatives and privileges, now waken to see an abyss before and behind them, a precipice at every step. How far they may have merited the terrors of utter ruin to their fortunes as well as their position, by their long contemptuous exclusion from their intercourse and society of all who had not the magic key to secure admission to them, in the shape of the privileged particle denoting nobility, whatever was the talent and the worth of the despised unprivileged—and to this state of things, even up to the present day, there have been very few exceptions at German courts, and much less in German high society—how far they have themselves prepared the way for their present position, by their wilful blindness to the progress of ideas in the world, are not questions to be discussed here. Their present apprehension and consternation are very apparent in every word and action, however much the younger generation, and especially those of it who may be military men, may bluster and talk big, and defy: they fly away to their country houses, if they have them, economise, retrench, and pinch, in preparation for that change in circumstances and position which seems to be approaching them like a spectre. The little capitals of Carlsruhe and Stuttgardt, with their small ducal and royal courts, certainly never exhibited any picture of great animation or bustle even in their most flourishing times; but the gloom that now hangs over them is assuredly very different from the peaceful, although somewhat torpid quietude in which they heretofore reposed: their dulness has become utter dreariness; their lady-like old-maidish decent listlessness a sort of melancholy bordering upon despair. Princes and people look askance at one another: people suffer; and princes think right to retrench. The theatres of these little capitals are about to be closed, because they are considered to be too expensive popular luxuries in the present state of things, and onerous appendages to court charges. Sovereigns cut down their households and their studs; and queens shut themselves close up in their summer residences, declaring themselves too poor to visit German watering-places, and support the expenses of regal _toilette_. In Stuttgardt these symptoms are all peculiarly visible. Spite of the long-acquired popularity of the King of Wurtemberg, as a liberal, well-judging, and rightly-minded monarch towards his subjects, the wind of revolution, that has blown in such heavy gusts in other parts of Germany, has not wholly spared that kingdom; and before accomplishing the intention attributed to him of retiring, in order to avoid those revolutionary demands which, in spite of his best intentions, he declares himself unable conscientiously to meet, the present king puts in practice those measures of retrenching economy, which add to the gloom of his capital and the disconsolate look of the court-attached and commercial portion of his subjects. It is scarcely possible, however, to suppose that the King of Wurtemberg can seriously think of abdicating in favour of a son whose youthful actions have always rendered him highly unpopular, all the more so as he is married to a Russian archduchess, whose birth must render her _suspecte_ to the liberals of the day. Another cause, which contributes to the melancholy and deserted air of these capitals of the smaller German courts, is the retirement of the ambassadors and diplomatic agents of the other German courts, who, if not already recalled from their posts, will probably shortly be so, to meet the views of German unity, which needs but one representative in common. This unhappy look of the little German capitals is one of the most melancholy signs of the times in these smaller states. In Hanover and Brunswick the apparent resolution of their present rulers, to resist the power of the new Central Government of would-be united Germany, occasions agitation, uncertainty, and fear, which make themselves as fully apparent in outward symptoms as elsewhere. Bavaria alone appears to preserve an exceptional position. Bavaria also has had her revolution, to be sure; but, strange to say, the revolution was occasioned by the manœuvres of the anti-liberal, or, in that country, Jesuitical party, against the liberal tendencies of a wild woman’s influence over the mind of the king; and, singular as was the nature and cause of this revolution, singular has remained the situation of Bavaria, quiet, unagitated, and seemingly contented, in the midst of the convulsive hurly-burly passing every where around it.

After this cursory survey of the outward aspect of a great part of Germany, let us turn our eyes to Frankfort, the present central point of all interest and attention; for there sits the General National Assembly; there is to be brewed, by whatever recipe, or in whatever manner it may be, that fancied panacea for all evils, the Union of Germany: there, then, we may probably best learn what revolutionising Germany would be at, or, at all events, best see the means employed to arrive at something like a consummation. Let us first look at the cooks at their work; and then taste the nature of the brew, as far as their political culinary efforts have gone to “make the medley slab and good.”

Let us enter, then, that plain, dry, and harsh-looking circular building, which is the Lutheran Church of St Paul; it is there the Assembly holds its sittings. The interior arrangement has been fashioned entirely upon the plan of the French Chambers. The President’s tribune, the lower tribune of the orator before it, the gradually rising and diverging amphitheatre of seats for the members, are all entirely French in their plan. Completely French also, and with similar designation, is the political shading of the members according to their seats; the _Droit_, the _Centre_ in its variety of progressing _nuances_, and the _Gauche_ and _Extreme Gauche_ have the same signification in the German Assembly as in the French. Nor does the resemblance cease here; the constitution of the Assembly, in its various elements, has a strong affinity to that of the present French National Assembly. The majority of the members are evidently concentrated in the different shades of the _Centre_. The old conservatives of the right have but little influence, except as a make-weight against the ultra-liberals. The centre consists chiefly of the old liberals, and opposition leaders in the different chambers of such of the German states as possessed constitutions of one modification or another—men who have now, in turn, in their position towards the ultra-revolutionary spirits, that tendency which may be called liberal conservative: they are the men of progress, who, in the present hurricane of revolutionary ideas, endeavour to guide the helm so as to avoid the very rocks they have had so great a hand in raising, and to restrain the very waves which their own breath has so greatly contributed to lash into fury! They are the Odillon Barrots, and suchlike old liberals of Germany. They find that the task before them is one of far ruder difficulty than in their theoretical fancies they had first imagined; and many of them there may be, who cannot but acknowledge to themselves, however little they may be inclined to acknowledge it to the world, that the business of a vast nation is not to be conducted by inexperienced heads, however talented, however well they may have conducted the business of a counting-house, or taught theories from a professor’s chair—in fact, that theory and practice will not walk hand in hand without a long process of amalgamating experience. The left is occupied by the men of revolutionary utopics and crude subversive opinions; and in its extreme by the ardent republicans and tribunes of the people, whom the revolution has caused to spring out of the political soil like mushrooms. These are the men who complain, in speech or in journal, that the Assembly is wasting its time in vain vapid disputations—an accusation, by the way, by no means unfounded—and yet themselves, when ever they mount into the tribune, indulge, more than any others, in declamatory would-be poetical phrases, “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing,” and containing not one practical idea, or feasible proposal. They seem to think that, by ringing the changes upon certain pet words, such as “patriotism” and “nationality,” they have said great things and done great deeds for the good of the country; and, as far as such clap-trap efforts to gain popular applause go, they may fairly be said to obtain their ends. In this again they have a strong “cousin-german” resemblance with the French ultras in a similar position—and no less so in their endeavours to overawe and browbeat the majority of the Assembly by noisy exclamations, and even uproarious riot. The German ultras, however, have succeeded, to a great extent, in a manœuvre in which their French brethren have failed, although supported in it, at first, by a certain reckless member of the Provisional Government—that is to say, in packing the public galleries with acolytes, said to be paid, who, while they applaud all ultra-revolutionary speeches “to the echo,” endeavour to put down the conservative orators by tumult, or violent hissings, and are of course vaunted forth in the ultra-liberal journals as “the expression of the will of the nation.” Be it said, at the same time, _en passant_, that this manner of applauding by the clapping of hands, and expressing disapproval by hissing, has been borrowed from a habit of the members of the Assembly themselves, which has certainly a very unparliamentary appearance and sound to English eyes and ears. This use of the public galleries, which, in spite of the regulations of the Assembly, it has been found impossible altogether to put down, has assuredly a certain influence in overawing and intimidating some of the members of the majority. Two causes, however, have contributed to preserve the Assembly from utter anarchy and confusion. The first of these, a negative one, consists in the fact that Frankfort is not a great noisy stirring capital of a great country, where a mob is always at hand to be used as a tyrannical influence by the leaders of the people, and that there are no suburbs filled with a working population, whence, as in Paris, an insurgent army may be suddenly recruited to work mischief, when it may have no other work to do. The second, a direct and active one, arises from the personality of the President of the Assembly; and certainly it is in the personal qualities and physical advantages of the Herr von Gagern, as much as in his position, and from the esteem in which he is held, that his power to dominate, control, and will to order, very greatly consists.

The President Gagern, long known as the most talented and leading opposition member of the Darmstadt Chamber, has passed his life in his energetic attempts to further those constitutional liberties, which he would now check with powerful hand, that they may not go too far. Disappointed and disgusted with his fruitless efforts to promote what he considered the interests of his country, the Herr von Gagern had retired, for some time past, into private life, when, upon the breaking forth of the revolutionary storm, he was called upon by his prince to take the helm of affairs, and, as minister, to steer the bark along the current by which he might avoid the Scylla of ultra-democracy as much as the Charybdis of resistance to the progress of the age. In this new character he again appeared upon the stage of the political world; and he has only retired from his post, as he has since refused to accept office as minister of the new central executive power of all Germany, in order to maintain the position, to which he was raised by acclamation, as the controlling head of that Assembly which was to decide the destinies of the country, and from the councils of which he himself had fondly hoped to see emanate the welfare of united Germany.

Tall and stout, with a face which possesses a decision and firmness of character, much aided by a pair of very broad black brows, Herr von Gagern has, at the same time, a bold dignity of manner and gesture, which is well calculated to rule an Assembly, and a powerful voice, which knows how to make itself heard in a storm: a ready and simple eloquence, and a clear good sense, which fastens upon the right point at the right moment, are combined with these advantages of exterior appearance; and as he rises, in cases of emergency, to display a vigour of energy, rather than that system of conciliation so fatally used in France, and so impracticable amidst all the clashing party opinions of a revolutionary Assembly, he shows himself to be the man of the moment, and of the place. He may be said to be the saviour of the German National Assembly, inasmuch as his personal influence may be considered to have rescued it from that state of anarchy and confusion which now disgraces the French chamber, and into which the German Assembly, with its conflicting elements, and its still greater inexperience, seemed at first about to fall.

As it is, the German National Assembly can by no means be looked upon as a model of parliamentary order: it is still noisy, ill-regulated, and uncertain in its movements. It cannot be denied, at the same time, that sufficient individual talent may be found among its members. Among the rising men of the day, the orators of Prussia and the smaller northern states, (for Southern Germany has as yet produced but little striking talent,)—along with those young, ardent, and energetic men who, the conspirators and insurgents of a few months ago, have gone over to the liberal conservative majority, and the people’s orators, who aim at being the O’Connells of Germany, as their phraseology goes, and who, in spite of the impracticable nature of their tenets, and the frequently vapid nature of their declamation, have a certain, rude ready eloquence, that strives to be poetical—there are also a few practised statesmen, a few wary old men of action, and several well-known authors and poets, such as old Uhland, whose democratic ardour still keeps, him upon the benches of the left, and the Count Auersperg, well known under the name of Anastatius Grün, whom disappointments in his position, in society are supposed also to have driven into the ultra-democratic ranks. But there seems to be an utter want of purpose in most of the speeches which emanate from the lips of these men of talent. Proverbially vague in their philosophical theories, even when they make most pretensions to clearness, the Germans show themselves still more so in their political views. The speeches not only of the ultra-liberals, but of the would-be statesmen of the centre, appear mere compilations of “words, words, words,” without any tangible argument or practical proposal: it is rarely that it is possible to sift from the readily flowing, but generally most muddy stream, a sand of gold, that may be used as one of sterling worth in the crown of unity which the hands of the Assembly would be forging. In all that emanates from the Assembly, either in debate or in decree, there is generally a lamentable want of correctly defined purpose: and, in fact, to return to the point from which we have started, it is as difficult to discover from the vague, wavering, boggling proceedings of the Assembly, as from any other quarter, or from any other movement, precisely what revolutionising Germany would be at. Up to the present time, like the Provisional Government of France, it has rather attempted to rule aristocratically itself, than to prepare the way, as was its object, for the future definitive constitution of Germany. The only definite step it has yet taken towards that vague _desideratum_, a “United Germany,” has been in the appointment of a Provisional Executive Head, and of a cabinet of ministers at its direction.

Except in as far as regards the jealousy of Prussia, disappointed in its hopes of itself giving the head to the Imperial government, and inclined in consequence to quarrel with the dictates of that central power, for which it clamoured, and which it at least accepted not ungraciously, as long as it thought, with true Prussian conceit, that the head must necessarily emanate from itself—a jealousy to which reference will be made further on—the choice of the Austrian Archduke John, as Administrator or Protector of the Government of United Germany, whatever his charge may be called, (for the German term “Reichs Verweser” expresses in itself both these attributive designations,) cannot be looked upon as one of any political weight. As a prince, enjoying for many years past a certain popularity, more perhaps from a feeling of opposition, because he was considered as living upon ill terms with the Imperial court of Austria, than from any personal attachment to himself, the Archduke John may be considered to be well selected as a popular and generally accepted head of Germany: whether he possesses either the talent or the energy to fill so strange and awfully responsible a post in the present disturbed state of Germany is another question, which only those who have known him in the retirement of private life can answer. The political writer who designated him as the Duke of Sussex of Austria, made a happy hit in thus classifying him. The Archduke John has rendered himself popular by his patronage and furtherance of scientific institutions: but he has been too little known, otherwise than as the discarded and disgraced of the Imperial family, to be called in any way “the man of the people.” The marriage, which was the cause of his disgrace, was thus, likewise, the cause of his popularity, such as it was: the union of an Imperial prince with a girl of comparatively humble birth—a union about the origin of which so many absurdly fabulous tales have been told—flattered the instincts of the middle and lower classes. The Archduchess, however, who now finds herself elevated still more, to a pinnacle to which her wildest dreams could scarcely have led her, and who is now flattered, caressed, and done homage to, as she was before set aside, is said to reveal nothing of any humble origin, and to be as lady-like as sensible in manner. Upon the whole, then, it is not in the wholly provisional and most unstable appointment of the Archduke John as “Reichs Verweser” that we shall find any solution to the inquiry as to the more certain revolutionary tendencies of Germany.

Assuredly more ought to be gathered from the appointment of the new central cabinet, and more especially of its Minister for Foreign Affairs and leading member, Prince Leiningen: and naturally we look to the recent manifesto of the prince as a document from which we may best learn “what revolutionising Germany would be at.” Sensible and clear, or at all events as little confused as is possible in the present confused state of all theories, plans, and reasonings in Germany, the manifesto, in doing no more than pointing out two methods towards effecting the reconstruction of Germany, leaves every thing as regards the future in as vague and uncertain a state as before. It only states a dilemma—it does not attempt to resolve it. It puts Germany in a cleft stick, or rather, at the division of two paths, the greater merit or practicability of either of which it does not attempt to show very decisively, by its concluding words, “_Entweder, Oder!_ choose!” In fact, it does no more than ask with ourselves, “What would revolutionising Germany be at?”

It may be surmised, certainly, from the manifesto of Prince Leiningen, that he himself is really inclined towards the going forward in the uncertain course of doing _something_ towards the effectuation of the desired union, although he by no means pretends to recommend _how_ this is to be done. He seems—and his acceptation of office would in itself appear to confirm the fact—a partisan of what he defines somewhat confusedly as “an actual union of all the component parts of the whole, in such a manner as to avert the possibility of any dispute between the whole and the parts;” for he adds, “If any other course be pursued, not singleness or unity, but discord and separation will be established.” But in the alternative which he places before Germany, of either returning to the past, or of realising the uncertain and as yet undefined desideratum of a great union for the future, it would seem, whatever be the prince’s own meaning, or whatever may be supposed to be the means used by the Assembly to produce a united whole, that he only places before it at the same time the alternative of a civil war, at which he himself hints, or a republican constitution, which must appear to be the result of the progress in its present sense, of revolutionising Germany.

When we hear that “to retrograde to a confederation of states, or to establish a weak federal state, by a powerfully impressed independence of the individual states, would only be to create a mournful period of transition to fresh catastrophes and new revolutions;” that from such a course of proceeding would result the danger “of harbouring in Germany revolutionary movements, or perchance civil war, for a series of years;” that the nation would arrive at “the most undesirable consummation of rendering itself ridiculous for ever by trumpeting to the world German unity and German power, and presenting in reality a spectacle the very reverse”—when we hear that “no dynastic interests can be taken into consideration if the nation wills unity;” that “to construct a new empire, and at the same time to permit an organisation tending to an inevitable contest for the supreme sovereignty between the individual states, would be to sow disunion instead of unity, to create weakness instead of power;” and that, consequently, “the imperial power must, in a degree, absorb in itself the sovereignty of the individual states, abolish the diplomatic intercourse of the individual states at home and abroad, and concentrate it in its own hands, appropriate to itself the unconditional disposal of the national forces, and not allow governments or their constituent State Assemblies to occupy themselves with affairs appertaining to the National Assembly alone, since a perfectly established central state, in which other perfectly established states are encased, would be virtually a monstrosity,”—when we hear all these things, and weigh the tendency of their views, we can see in them no other result than the abasement of the individual sovereigns, an absorption of their power, which would leave them no more than useless and ridiculous puppets, and, consequently, their inevitable overthrow in the course of time, and the establishment of republican institutions, whatever the name given to the new form of republic, whatever the title bestowed upon its head, be it even Emperor, or _Reichs Verweser_, Regent, Protector, Administrator, or President.

On the other hand, when we are told—although “jealousies between individual states, and revilings of the northern by the southern parts of the empire” are stigmatised as “criminal absurdities”—that, “if the many collateral and coexistent interests are too preponderant to be sacrificed to German unity, if the old spirit of discord and separation is still too powerfully at work, if the jealousy between race and race, between north and south, is still too strongly felt, the nation must convince itself of the fact, and return to the old federal system,” already hinted at as _impossible_ without fresh revolutions or long civil wars; and when we know, at the same time, that these jealousies between state and state not only _do_ exist, but continue to increase and ferment still more in the present state of things,—that in fact, the old spirit of discord and separation is still more powerfully at work than ever,—what can we look forward to? Only the other alternative to which we have alluded—those civil wars which the manifesto of Prince Leiningen itself hints at so cautiously.

Since, from the very first commencement of the revolution in Germany, the jealous spirit between the northern and southern states broke out in a decided form, it has only increased instead of diminishing. When the vacillating but ambitious King of Prussia, desirous of coming forward as the “man of Germany” of the day, but “infirm of purpose,” attempted to direct the revolutionary movement in his own states by accepting the call for a United German Empire, and by placing himself, although unavowedly, at its head, the Austrian _Official_ Gazette immediately fulminated a severe, damning, and, under the circumstances, almost cruel manifesto against the ambitious Prussian monarch; in Bavaria, the young men of the upper classes burnt his majesty in effigy in the public market-place of Munich; at Stuttgardt, the picture of the offending sovereign was as publicly hung by the neck to a gallows. Southern Germany was indignant at the thought that an upstart King of Prussia should attempt to lead the movement for a new United Empire of Germany, and presume even to dream of being its future emperor. But when, in the course of events, the provisional head of the newly constituted central power was chosen by the assembly from among the princes of Southern Germany, it was the turn of Prussia to exhibit its spite and anger: its jealousy was not to be concealed. The result of the disappointed ambition of Prussia was exhibited, as already alluded to, in a reactionary feeling against that central power, which it would have accepted probably with acclamation, and been the first to applaud and support, had it emanated from its own country. The exhibition of this feeling in some violent outbreak was so much dreaded upon the occasion of the military homage appointed to be shown to the _Reichs Verweser_ at Berlin, that the ceremony, as is well known, was obliged to be countermanded. The feeling is now still continuing to be shown in a constant exhibition of mistrust on the part of Prussia towards the National Assembly, and as well as in the counter-accusation of that new and vaguely defined political crime “reaction,” laid by the journals of the moderate party, as well as by the ultra-liberals, to the charge of Prussia. With all these conflicting elements at work between the various parts of Germany, and again between these various parts and the central power, placed in the hands of the Assembly, it is very difficult to look clearly as yet towards any possible constitution of that unity which would appear to be the most vague end and aim of the revolution in Germany. To those who attempt to look into the mist of the future, and see visions, and dream dreams—for, in the present state of the cloudy and wavering political horizon, it would seem that all political foresight can pretend to no better name than that—the nearer of the two alternatives to be deduced from Prince Leiningen’s manifesto, would appear to be the disunion, the total rupture, the civil war.

The other alternative, however, seems not without its chances; for, although the old liberals of republican tendencies, the suspected and imprisoned, have now been brought round, for the most part, into the ranks of the moderately progressive party, in the natural course of revolutionary changes, or even been called to the councils of the kings and princes who rejected and persecuted them; yet, on the other hand, the exertions of the moderate party, in spite of the clog that they would now put upon the too rapid course of ultra-democracy, appear to tend, in the efforts made, and the views entertained respecting the unity of Germany, towards the very republican institutions which they disavow, and suppose themselves endeavouring to avoid. The real republicans, at the same time, although without any present weight among the political spirits of the day, are yet composed, as elsewhere, of the young, hot-headed, reckless, active, stirring elements of the time, and are always ready to make up, by violence and headlong precipitation, for what they want in importance and experience. They are aided also in their views by a certain party of the liberal press, which is always preaching the imitation of French institutions and the conduct of the present leading men in France,—as if France and the French did not hold up a lesson and a warning instead of models for imitation—and consoling Germany with the idea, that although it does not possess such enviable men or measures, the men must shortly rise upon the political surface, and that the measures will follow behind them. By a great portion of the press, even that of the moderate party also, a continual irritation of suspicion and mistrust is being kept up against the still reigning sovereigns of Germany; and the cry of that very vague accusation “reaction,” the name of which alone, however, is considered sufficiently damning, is constantly raised upon every movement, of whatever nature it may be, which those sovereigns may make. The moderate party may be acquitted of republican tendencies in their hearts; but they seem to ignore the old proverb, “give a dog a bad name,” and the consequences; and they will make “sad dogs” out of the sovereigns, until at last the consequences will threaten more and more nearly.

Between these two alternatives, however, Germany seems to think that it may find a middle course, and establish its theoretical and vaunted unity without exciting civil dissension, or plunging into the depths of republicanism. May it prove right in its as yet uncertain hopes; but certainly the means by which this desired consummation is to be arrived at, are not in the least degree visible: it remains as yet the vaguest of vague fancies—the how, the where, the when, and even the why, are as yet matters of doubt: not only deeds but principles, not only principles but plans, to this intent, are as yet utterly absent. In fact our question, after all, remains unanswered; and, beyond the main point of “unity,” to be effected somehow or other, revolutionising Germany seems utterly unable to tell us, as we vainly endeavour to find out definitively, “what it would be at?”

_Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh._

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Footnote 1:

See our No. for March 1848.

Footnote 2:

Hide—from _cacher_.

Footnote 3:

Carrion.

Footnote 4:

In Frémont’s expedition to California, on a somewhat similar occasion, two mountaineers, one the celebrated Kit Carson, the other a St Louis Frenchman named Godey, and both old trappers, performed a feat surpassing the one described above, inasmuch as they were but two, who charged into an Indian village to rescue some stolen horses, and avenge the slaughter of two New Mexicans who had been butchered by the Indians; both which objects they effected, returning to camp with the lost animals and a couple of propitiatory scalps.

Footnote 5:

The Mexicans call the Indians living near the Missions and engaged in agriculture, _mansos_, or _mansitos_, tame.

Footnote 6:

From a manuscript obtained in Santa Fé of New Mexico, describing the labours of the missionaries Fray Augustin Ruiz, Venabides, and Macos, in the year 1585.

Footnote 7:

“Some were so barbarous as to eat their own species.” The sentence refers to the Scythians, and is in Strabo. I mention the authority, for Strabo is not an author that any man engaged on a less work than the History of Human Error is expected to have by heart.

Footnote 8:

_Memoirs of the Reign of George II., from his Accession to the Death of Queen Caroline._ By JOHN LORD HERVEY. Edited, from the original MSS. at Ickworth, by the Right Hon. J. W. CROKER. 2 vols. Murray, London: 1848.

Footnote 9:

“Upon the evening of this long day’s march, the imperial column approaching Gjatz was surprised to find upon the road the bodies of Russians quite recently slain, all with their heads cloven in the same manner, and with their brains scattered around. It was known that two thousand prisoners preceded the column, escorted by Spaniards, Portuguese, and Poles. Various opinions were emitted; some were indignant, others approved or remained indifferent, according to the character of each. Around the Emperor these different impressions found no voice, until Caulaincourt burst out and exclaimed, ‘that it was an atrocious cruelty. This, then, is the civilisation we bring to Russia! What effect would this barbarity have upon the enemy? Did we not leave him our wounded and a host of prisoners? Would he lack the opportunity of horrible reprisals?’ Napoleon maintained a gloomy silence, but upon the morrow these murders had ceased. The unfortunate prisoners were allowed to die of hunger in the enclosures into which, at night, they were huddled like cattle. Doubtless it was still a barbarity; but what could be done? Exchange them? The enemy refused. Set them free? They would have hastened to proclaim our destitution, and soon they would have returned with their companions to harass our march. In this unsparing war, to have given them life would have been to sacrifice ourselves. We were cruel from necessity. The fault was, to have ever placed ourselves in so terrible an alternative.

“On the other hand, during our march into the interior of Russia, our captive soldiers were not treated more humanely, although the Russians had not imperious necessity for an excuse.”—SÉGUR, vol. ii. p. 149.

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