The rest had been reform'd, replaced, or sunk, orofa A
And spoke more of the baron than the monk.
Huge halls, long galleries, spacious chambers, join'd
By no quite lawful marriage of the Arts,

Might shock a Connoisseur; but when combined,
Form'd a whole which, irregular in parts,
Yet left a grand impression on the mind,

At least of those whose eyes are in their hearts.
We gaze upon a Giant for his stature,
Nor judge at first if all be true to Nature.

Steel Barons, molten the next generation
To silken rows of gay and garter'd Earls,
Glanced from the walls in goodly preservation;
And Lady Marys blooming into girls,
With fair long locks, had also kept their station:
And Countesses mature in robes and pearls:
Also some beauties of Sir Peter Lely,

Whose drapery hints we may admire them freely:

Judges in very formidable ermine

Were there, with brows that did not much invite
The accused to think their Lordships would determine
His cause by leaning much from might to right:
Bishops, who had not left a single sermon;
Attornies-General, awful to the sight,

As hinting more (unless our judgments warp us) A.
Of the" Star Chamber" than of" Habeas Corpus:"
Generals, some all in armour, of the old

two edT
I

And iron time, ere Lead had ta'en the lead;
Others in wigs of Marlborough's martial fold,
Huger than twelve of our degenerate breed
Lordlings, with staves of white or keys of gold:
Nimrods, whose canvas scarce contain'd the steed;
And here and there some stern high Patriot stood,♫
Who could not get the place for which he sued, on E
But ever and anon, to soothe your vision,
Fatigued with these hereditary glories,
There rose a Carlo Dolce or a Titian,

Or wilder groupe of savage Salvatore's:

Here danced Albano's boys, and there the sea shone
In Vernet's ocean lights; and there the stories

Of martyrs awed, as Spagnoletto tainted

His brush with all the blood of all the sainted.

Here sweetly spread a landscape of Loraine:

There Rembrandt made his darkness equal light,

Or gloomy Caravaggio's gloomier stain

Bronzed o'er some lean and stoic Anchorite:

But lo! a Teniers woos, and not in vain,

Your eyes to revel in a livelier sight;

His bell-mouthed goblet makes me feel quite Danish~~~
Or Dutch with thirst-What ho! a flask of Rhenish.

But, reader, thou hast patient been of late,

While I, without remorse of rhyme, or fear,
Have built and laid out ground at such a rate,
Dan Phoebus takes me for an auctioneer.
That Poets were so from their earliest date,

By Homer's" Catalogue of Ships" is clear;

But a mere modern must be moderate

I spare you, then the furniture and plate.

3

It will be our business, next week, to give some particulars of the individuals composing this lofty party.

Memoirs of the History of France during the reign of Napoleon. Dictated by the Emperor at St. Helena to the Count de Montholon. Vol. III.

t

THIS volume or rather volumes, for it is duplex, consists, first, of a summary of the state of parties in France in 1793; of the subsequent establishment of the Directory, but still more of the military operations under Napoleon in Italy; and, in the second place, of a continuation of the Historical Miscellanies. In respect to the former division, it is only necessary to observe generally, that it retains the characteristic distinction of the volumes preceding it, with additional perspicuity and method in the arrangement. As documents for military history and soldierly study, we apprehend that the Italian campaigns are invaluable; nor, while it forms a part of the policy of Great Britain to affect any sort of concern in the affairs of the Continent, can they be of very subordinate interest to the practical statesman. With the more general reader, the attraction of these volumes will consist in the vivid and distinctive traits they supply of the extraordinary individual who dictated them, and in the curiosity of a variety of sketches and portraits by so masterly a judge of character. In the way of extract, therefore, we must confine ourselves to one or two instances.

In a sketch of the five members of the celebrated Directory, we find the following character of Carnot, to whom we cannot be brought to believe that it does justice; but his recent decease, and the controversy which it has produced, will render it interesting, even setting aside the author: "Carnot entered the service at a very early age, in the engineers. He maintained Montalembert's system in his corps, and passed for an original amongst his comrades. He was a Chevalier de Saint-Louis at the time of the Revolution, in which he engaged with ardour. He was deputed to the Convention, and became a member of the Committee of Public Safety along with Robespierre, Barrere, Couthon, SaintJust, Billaud Varennes, and Collot d'Herbois. He constantly evinced a violent animosity against the nobles, which occasioned several singular quarrels between him and Robespierre, who latterly protected a great number of them. He was industrious, sincere in all his dealings, guiltless of intrigue, and easy to deceive. He attended Jourdan, as commissioner from the Convention, at the deblockading of Maubeuge, where he rendered important services. When on the Committee of Public Safety, he directed the operations of the war: he was useful in this capacity, without meriting all the praises that were lavished upon him. He had no experience in war; his ideas on every part of the military art were erroneous, not excepting those relating to the attack and defence of fortified places, and the principles of fortification which he had studied from infancy. He printed works on these subjects which could only be acknowledged by a man destitute of all practical experience in war. He proved himself possessed of moral courage. After Thermidor, when the Convention placed all the members of the Committee of Public Safety under arrest, except him, he wished to share their fate. This conduct was the more noble, because public opinion was violently hostile to the committee; and because Collot d'Herbois and Billaud Varennes, with whom he wished to be associated, were in fact dreadful characters. He was named a member of the Directory after Vendemiaire; but ever since the 9th of Thermidor, his mind had been agonized by the accusations of public opinion, which attributed to the committee the shedding of all the blood which had flowed on the scaffolds; he felt a desire to please; he suffered himself to be misled by the leaders of the foreign party. He was then exalted to the clouds, but he did not deserve the praises of the enemies of France. He found himself placed in a deceitful position, and was overpowered on the 18th of Fructidor. After the 18th of Brumaire he was recalled and placed in the administration of the war department by the First Consul, in which situation he displayed but moderate talents, and had many disputes with the minister of Finance, and Dufresne, the director of the Treasury, in which he was generally wrong. At length he quit

.

sted the ministry, convinced that it could go on no longer for want of money. As a member of the tribunate, he voted and spoke against the empire; but his conduct, uniformly upright, gave the government no umbrage. The Emperor granted him a pension of 20,000 francs. As long as affairs prospered, he remained silent, and confined himself to his closet; but after the campaign of Russia, at the time of the misfortunes of France, he solicited employment. The city of Antwerp was intrusted to him, where he conducted himself well.

The comprehensive, if impracticable, schemes which floated in the perspicacious mind of Napoleon, will be very tolerably illustrated by the following sketch of the maritime capacity of Italy:

"No part of Europe is so advantageously situated as this peninsula for becoming a great maritime power. Its coasts extend from the mouths of the Var to the straits of Sicily, two hundred and thirty leagues; from the straits of Sicily to the capelof Otranto on the Ionian sea, one hundred and thirty leagues; from the cape of Otranto to the mouth of the Isonzo in the Adriatic, two hundred and thirty leagues; and the extent of the coasts of the three islands of Sicily, Corsica, and Sardinia, is five hunIdred and thirty leagues. Italy has, therefore, including its great and small islands, twelve hundred leagues of coast; without taking into this calculation those of Dalmatia, Istria, the months of the Cattaro, or the fonian Isles, which, under the empire, were dependent on Italy. France has a hundred and thirty leagues of coast in the 'Mediterranean, and four hundred and seventy on the Atlantic, in all six hundred Jeagues; Spain, including her islands, has five hundred leagues of coast in the Méditerranean, and, three hundred on the Atlantic; thus Italy has half as much coast again as Spain, and twice as much as France. France has three ports, the towns of which contain a population of 100,000 persons'; Italy has Genoa. Naples, Palermo, and Venice, whose population is superior; Naples contains 400,000 inhabitants. The opposite coasts of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic being at a short distance from each other, almost the whole population of Italy is within reach of the coasts, Lucca, Pisa, Rome, and Ravenna, distant from three to four hundred league -from the sea, are capable of enjoying all the advantages of maritime towns, and of -supplying great numbers of seamen her three great military ports for armament and building are, la Spezia for the Ligurian seas, Tarento for the Jonian, and Venice for the Adriatic. Italy has all kinds of resources in timber, hemp, and, in general, everything necessary for ship-building; la Spezia is the finest port in the world, its roads are even superior to those of Toulon; its defence by land and sea is easy; the plans drawn up under the empire, and the execution of which was commenced, proved that, at a moderate expense, the naval establishments might be placed in security, and inclosed in a place capable of making the greatest resistance, Its docks would be convenient for receiving the timber of Corsica, Liguria, and Tuscany; and iron from the isle of Elba, the Alps, and the whole of the Apennines. Its squadrons would command the seas of Corsica and Sardinia, and would be able, in case of need, to put into the ports of Porto Ferrajo, San Fiorenzo, Ajaccio, Porto. Vecchio, San Pietro in Sardinia, Vado, and Villa Franca. Tarento is wonderfully well situated for commanding Sicily, Greece, the Levant, and the coasts of Egypt and Syria; under the empire there were plans drawn up for its land fortifications and naval establishments; the greatest fleets may lie in this port sheltered from the winds and secure from the attack of any superior hostile force. Finally, at Venice, there is already every thing needful. The Venetians had no ships that drew above eighteen feet water; but under the Empire a great number of ships were built on the French plan, and, by means of the works constructed at the canal of Malamoko, and by the -aid of floating butts, ships completely armed, built on the model of French seventyfours, have come out of this canal, and fought with glory a few minutes after their launch. A commission of the engineers of the bridges and roads, of which Proni was president, had drawn up a plan, which at the expense of a few millions aud some years labour would have enabled the vessels to come out completely armed without the aid of butts. Sicily, Malta, Corfu, Istria, Dalmatia, and especially Ragusa, afford ports and shelter for the largest fleets. The ports of Genoa, Castelmare, Bari, and Aucona, which first-rate ships can enter, would be four secondary ports, either for building or for equipping, repairing, and re-victualling small squadrons. Italy can raise and maintain for the naval service, even in her actual declining state, 120,000 seamen; the sailors of Genoa, Pisa, and Venice, have been celebrated for ages. Italy might keep up three or four hundred ships of war, of which 100 or 120 might be ships of the line of seventy-four guns; her flag might

contend with success against those of France, Spain, Constantinople, and the four Barbary powers."

It is impossible to read of the French proceedings in Italy, without being struck at the extraordinary contrast between its existing fate and the destiny which would have followed the established ascendancy of Bonaparte, no matter whether it would have become a portion of the French empire, or a separate dominion. In either case, it is evident that its energies and capabilities would have been developed, instead of being pressed down almost to mental suffocation by the barbarous and worse than Irish policy of Austria. We affect no prophesy in these cursory observations, but we cannot think that the Italian chapter on the history of Europe is finally closed, or that monarchical France will eternally shut her eyes to what republican and imperial France once effected in Italy. For the present, indeed, the Italians must satisfy themselves with operas, maccaroni, German canes, an utterly enslaved press, Austrian conscription and taxation for the support of their own enthralment, the depopulation of their chief towns, and a systematic annihilation of their natural and acquired advantages, lest they should be exalted into a notion that they ought to be any thing but slaves in their native land; or that said native land aught but a lasting monument of political baseness and powerful oppression.

The Historical Miscellanies will, we apprehend, form a portion of the military reading of all who are educated for the soldierly profession throughout Europe, containing, as they do, the commentaries of so great a Captain upon a portion of the kindred greatness which has preceded him. In the present instance, the wars of Turenne and of Frederick of Prussia form the subject of observation, the events being briefly and succinctly narrated, and closed by the remarks of Napoleon upon each battle or campaign. We supply, as an example, a few short extracts from his strictures on the celebrated seven years' war:

"If the King of Prussia really made head against France, Austria, and Russia, in the seven years' war, it would surely be a miraculous circumstance. A prince who had but four millions of subjects, to struggle for seven years against the three greatest powers in Europe, who possessed eighty millions! But if we examine the events of this war attentively, we shall lose sight of the marvellous, without abating any part of the admiration inspired by the talents of this great captain.

"1st, France ought not to be counted amongst the powers which Frederic had to fight against, because the French armies were, throughout this war, kept in check on the Rhine by the army of the ten Princes in the pay of England, composed of English, Hanoverians, Hessians, and Brunswickers. 2ndly, Russia did not wish to overwhelm Prussia; she only did as much as was necessary to satisfy that ambitious instinct which induced her to try her armies against armies practised in manoeuvres, to enable her, at a subsequent period, to accomplish the destinies of which she already had a presentiment. 3dly, Austria had but a very weak military establishment, whilst Prussia, having long been organized like a camp, had numerous armies experienced in tactics,"

Napoleon then proceeds to remark on the operations of each year, multum in parvo, concluding with the following paragraph, which commences with the description of an interference, of the nature of which this great military genius always appeared duly sensible feel

"The large subsidies which Frederick received from England, afforded him the means of raising soldiers and officers throughout Germany: this alone did more for the cause of Prussia than the five incursions of the Russian army did for that of Austria.

1st, This great Captain has been censured for not having profited as he should have done, by having the lead in 1756; 2dly, for not having struck some grand blow in the Spring

one

were

remote from the field of action; Sdly, for the errors which produced the disasters of

Hokenkirch, Maxen, and Landshut, and 4thly, for the injudicious conduct of his invasions of Bohemia and Moravia. But these errors are eclipsed by the great actions, the fine manoeuvres, and the daring resolutions by which he was enabled to

terminate so disproportionate a contest ontest triumphantly. He was eminently great at

the most critical moments; which

noblest eulogium that can be bestowed upon him. But every thing tends to prove that he could not have resistèd France, Austria, and Russia, for one campaign, if these powers had acted in earnest ; and that he could not have sustained two campaigns against Austria and Russia, if the Cabinet of St. Petersburg had allowed its army to winter on the theatre of operations. Thus the marvellous part of the history of the Seven Years' War disappears. But the truth which remains is sufficient to justify the high reputation which the Prussian army enjoyed during the last fifty years of the past century; and rather establishes than shakes the great military reputation of Frederick.

18

Bonaparte denies the invention of any new order of tactics to Frederiek 10 11oqque sa to ORAN

"The success obtained by the King in this war has been attributed to a new order of tactics, in battle, said to have been invented by him, and called the oblique order. In the course of the seven years' war Frederick fought ten battles in person and six by his lieutenant, including the affairs of Maxen and Landshut. Of the former he won seven and lost three; and of the latter he gained one and lost five. Thus out of sixteen battles Prussia won eight and lost eight. In none of these battles did the King ever make use of any new tactics; he did nothing but what has been practised by other generals, ancient and modern, in all ages,

The commentator then proceeds to analyse and pull to pieces the pretended oblique order of tactic, the invention of which was attributed to Frederick, and shows, that when successful, it is merely a surprise; and: as an open movement, both unmilitary and dangerous. We of Bourse feel little disposition to enter into the merits of these strictures which exhibit the contempt of Napoleon for much of the elaborate theoretical and parade manoeuvre, the cultivation of which, at the commencement of the revolutionary war, led to so much unmerited dependence on Prussia. The following is a smart hit at the General Macks, and similar futile precisianists, who were created by the pretended school of Frederick:

ידי

Old Frederick laughed in his sleeve at the parades of Potsdam, when he perceived young officers, French, English, and Austrian, so infatuated with the manœuvre of the oblique order, which was fit for nothing but to gain a few adjutantmajors a reputation. A profound examination of the manœuvres of this war ought to have enlightened these officers; and what should have completely dispelled their illusion is, that Frederick never manoeuvred but by lines and by the flank; never by deployments." Hold tonitenk

So much for the double volume that has just made its appearance, which supplies another proof of the extraordinary and distinctive cha racter of its dictator. From one end to the other we find a total absence of what, somewhat unprofessionally, has obtained the name of special pleading; but, on the contrary, a severe simplicity of manner, directly opposed to selfish display. That Napoleon should wish his Italian campaigns in particular to appear to advantage in history, is natural enough; but so much does the soldier prevail, we apprehend they are narrated more in the indulgence of his military predilection, than with a view to the promotion of his general glory as a conqueror. As to the Historical Miscellanies, they are the unmixed offspring of this professional attachment; for what else could lead him into such