Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

*

which began in England and swept over Scotland, is now proceeding in Ireland: that it tells more against the aristocracy than the democracy is true, and, therefore, is it here mentioned. We formerly stated, that, "bating what is effected by fashion, the tendency of which is at present decidedly hostile to all manly and patriotic feeling, the aristocracy of England contain within themselves more of the elements of real greatness, than are to be found in any other class of equal numbers in any country in the world," and though we still adhere to that opinion, we neverthless think that their general conduct has greatly tended to bring about the present crisis. They, too, were influenced by the spirit of commercial times, bent the knee to mammon, set an example of subserviency to power and riches, that was so promptly imitated by all ranks, that no man could in the end stand upright in the presence of his superior in fortune, and the relative wealth of the community might almost have been ascertained by angular measurement. Instead of upholding national manners and feelings, they became Liberals, resided and spent vast sums in France and Italy; trained up their sons and daughters in the anti-British ideas, so carefully instilled into all youthful minds in the virtuous convents and seminaries of those moral countries. Not only affable, but often cringing abroad to the most despicable of foreigners, they were at home cold, haughty, and distant, to their countrymen, seeking in exclusiveness the most wretched of all distinctions, because the easiest to be attained, and never sought by those who have other means of attaining honest celebrity. The matrons of England too, whose fame once stood so high, that fifteen years of peace and slander have not been altogether able to shake it, might every night be seen at Roman conversazioni, associating on the most friendly terms with the married women of Italy, whose conduct is not attempted to be disguised: whilst the young ladies of England studied gallantry in those French and Italian coteries, in which the young and the unmarried native women are very properly never allowed to appear. As it is not given to all to grasp the full grandeur of British institutions, and to understand the manners naturally resulting from them, many of our travellers-for in all these matters the aristocracy of wealth were but the paltry imitators of the aristocracy of birth-captivated by the fripperies of foreign manners, as more congenial to little minds, tried to import and naturalise such exotics amongst us; and thus broke the last link that still connected them with the lower orders, who unwillingly granted even a constitutional power to those who no longer shared in the national feelings of the people for whom they attempted to legislate.

That for such conduct the aristocracy can make no better claim than the mercantile interest for an extra-constitutional share of power, is sufficiently evident; and if they have acquired any such power, beyond what the time-serving spirit of the age will always enable wealth to command, let restitution be demanded in a tone that shall ensure compliance; but let us not, on that account, overthrow the balance of the constitution; let us not rush into wild democracy in order to escape from aristocratic influence. Let us have reform, not founded, indeed, on the theories of Radicals, who would make us believe that kings,

* P. 302, No. 28, March 1831.

lords, and laws, are the only bars to the perfectibility of man, and the immediate arrival of the millennium, but a reform that shall leave us the constitution of King, Lords, and Commons, unimpaired. And a very slight alteration in the representation will be sufficient to effect this; for the last election has triumphantly proved that self-reform is, after all, the reform principally wanted. The opposition press even carried hollow every point it took up against the Wellington Administration, and some of those points were verily not of the wisest.

We have taken up this subject with regret, and in sorrow and with bitter forebodings do we close it; for, speaking from professional feelings, perhaps, we must say, that nothing has struck us as so sad a sign of these evil times, as the lamentable facility with which public men have been driven from the discharge of their duty by mob clamour and newspaper abuse.

Ὦ πέπονες, τάχα δή τι κακὸν ποιήσετε μεῖζον

Τῇδε μεθημοσύνῃ· ἀλλ ̓ ἐν φρεσὶ θέσθε ἕκαστος

Αἰδῶ καὶ νέμεσιν· δὴ γὰρ μέγα νεῖκος ὄρωρεν.—Iliad Lib. xiii.

A conscientious change of opinions we can easily understand, but to retain opinions honestly formed, and yet to retire, brow-beaten, from a contest on which the fate of England depends, is to us a fearful and incomprehensible novelty in the character of Britons. In such a cause as the present, it is the duty of all who fight from conviction, to fight to the last, for submission but emboldens the foe,-and to yield, because the battle seems hopeless, is a craven weakness that has lost many a fair field that firmness might have retrieved. It is the last fight for the proudest mental fabric that ever adorned the earth, or helped to enlighten mankind. The eyes of the world are on the combatants, and as the defenders of our time-honoured institutions neglect or perform their duty, so will the present and the future scorn or laud their names. There was no want of despondency in the army towards the evening of the battle-day of Waterloo. The Dutch and Belgians had been scattered "like chaff before the wind of heaven;" masses of hostile infantry, like dark and overcharged clouds, seemed ready to burst in thunder over the remnant of the British band, who, forced into squares by the overwhelming superiority of the French cavalry that everywhere swept the plain, presented almost infallible marks to the iron hail that hundreds of pieces of artillery were pouring in upon them: if in such extremity, when hope seemed none, and when death had for hours strode triumphantly through their thinned and bleeding ranks, not a single soldier, of the humblest name and station, left his post; shall it be said that the high and the noble of the land shrunk from their duty, when the constitution of their country was to be upheld; shall those who carried their heads so high on the mere strength of the physical courage displayed by sailors and soldiers, be in the hour of trial found totally wanting in the higher quality of moral courage? Perish the thought! and if we too must fall; if the constitution of these realms is to sink in the universal tempest that is now sweeping over Europe, let its sworn defenders behave at least in a manner worthy the cause confided to them, and go down with the flag of duty and of honour nailed to the mast-head.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]

precautionary sacrifice was made. Some time after, the monks of a convent in Syria were infected, and the Pasha of Acre interdicted in a similar way any communication with them; some of the brethren died, but the distemper did not appear beyond the walls of the monastery.

These and similar occurrences induced the Turks to entertain serious notions of adopting the precautions of other nations, with a view to disarm the most dreadful and destructive enemy by which they have ever been attacked. A short time ago, application was made by the Turkish Government, to the British minister here, for a plan of a Lazaretto to be established at Constantinople on the European principle, with a view to prevent the introduction of the disease from abroad, and extinguish it at home. This application was forwarded to England, and orders were sent to Malta, that a plan of the Lazazetto of that place should be sent as a model. But the superintendent, Mr. Greig, having examined it, found that there were many objections to it. It had been erected by the Knights at a time when the island had no commerce, and there was no provision made for the depuration of suspected goods, besides it was an establishment formed when every thing of the kind was imperfectly understood, and it was necessary to make sundry alterations and additions to the original establishment; it was, therefore, decided to draw up a plan of an entirely new edifice, in which all the improvements made by time and experience in the old one should be embodied.

The direction of this was given to Capt. Schemloi, an active and intelligent native of Malta. He had been employed by the local government during the plague which visited the island in 1813, in directing and paying those who removed the infected bodies, and executed his hazardous duty so effectually, that he was requested to continue a Superintendent of the Quarantine, and was appointed Captain of the Marsa Musceit, or Lazaretto Harbour, which he had held ever since; and it was supposed that his experience, for nearly twenty years, would render him the most efficient person for such a duty.

On the 1st of May 1831, Capt. Schemloi arrived in Constantinople, with his plan for the approbation of the Turkish Government, the adoption of which will form a new and extraordinary era in the annals of Ishmaelism. The following are its principal features.

To form a Board of Health, consisting of a President, five native Members, two foreign Consuls, two European Merchants, one Physician, and the Captain of the Port, who will meet once a week at least, to regulate all matters connected with their department. Their first care will be to procure a firman from the Sultan, addressed to the population of Constantinople, and to every other part of the Turkish empire, apprising the public of the beneficial objects of the intended regulations as connected with the safety of the people at home, and their commerce with other nations. They will then fix on a convenient place for the erection of a Lazaretto, and a Quarantine office on the newest and most approved plan. They will take into consideration what places are liable to quarantine, and fix the period for vessels arriving with susceptible goods from such places according to the nature of their bills of health, which must be issued by the proper authorities at the places where they depart from and touched at during their

voyage. As most part of the vessels anchor at Cosple en Relache, going to or returning from the Black Sea, and are obliged often by calms or contrary winds to lie at different places in the channel, the Board of Health will appoint certain parts of the Bosphorus as quarantine grounds, where such vessels only will be allowed to anchor, in which will be a quarantine house, with proper officers to watch over their conduct. Three others of a similar kind will be established at the Dardanelles, at the Castle of Asia, and at Galipoli; and quarantine offices and lazarettoes in all the maritime towns of the coast, in order that all vessels arriving there shall be subject to regulations similar to those of the capital, and no vessel shall be allowed to communicate with the coast, if she shall not have previously performed her quarantine in the port whose jurisdiction such part of the coast is under. And, finally, the Board will keep up a frequent correspondence with the European Lazarettoes abroad; and at home apply to the Government to issue the necessary orders to all the Pashas of towns and chief villages within the Ottoman empire, to establish a proper sanitary police, and transmit to the Board faithful reports of the state of health of the respective inhabitants under their jurisdiction, and most particularly if any suspicion or accident of plague occur, in order that the necessary precautions may be immediately taken to prevent the progress of it in the district, or its importation to the capital.

These regulations combine two objects: to prevent the introduction of the disease, and then, if the precautions do not succeed, to attack and endeavour to extirpate it when or wherever it appears. To effect this latter purpose, the infected are to be separated from those who are sound, and those who are compromised removed to some place of surveillance; every article of furniture or apparel is either to be destroyed by fire, or purified by water if too valuable to destroy, and the houses are to be washed and whitewashed, and finally fumigated with a mixture of sulphur and bran.

The Lazaretto to be built will be a noble establishment; it will consist of an edifice 700 feet in length, and of a proportionate breadth, situated as near the port as possible. It will present a façade of two stories, and be entered by a side passage, with the Governor's apartments in the second story, so as to overlook both the front and the interior of the establishment. On one side of the entrance will be an office for regulating the affairs of the establishment, on the other a guard-room for a certain number of soldiers; passing this will be a covered shed, under which is the place where those in pratique converse with their friends who are in quarantine, separated from each other by bars and a railing eight or nine feet asunder. Behind this will be an open court-yard communicating with apartments on each side, neatly fitted up for the accommodation of persons detained; this court will communicate with a large space behind, extending the length of the breadth of the building, planted with trees and shrubs, as a place of recreation to walk and take exercise in. Fronting the entrance will be the stores for depurating goods, of an extent commensurate with the great and increasing trade of Constantinople, and a door in the rear for removing them when the necessary time is expired. In the centre of the court will be a large fountain, with a continued play of pure water,

« ПредишнаНапред »