The opening of the campaign on the Rhine in 1797 restored the positions of the French. On the lower part of the river, Hoche, who now commanded them, defeated General Kray; on the upper Rhine Moreau retook the fortress of Kehl,[459] opposite to Strasburg; and such was the alarm of Austria that she began to make overtures of peace. The fortunes of her army in Italy made these overtures more zealous; Alvinzi was defeated at Rivoli on the 14th of January, and Provera soon after surrendered with four thousand men, and Wurmser capitulated at Mantua. The Archduke Charles was now sent into Italy with another army, but it was an army composed of the ruins of those of Beaulieu, Alvinzi, Wurmser, and Davidowich, whilst it was opposed by the victorious troops of Buonaparte, now supported by a reinforcement of twenty thousand men under Bernadotte. The archduke, hampered by the orders of the Aulic Council in Vienna, suffered some severe defeats on the Tagliamento in March, and retreated into Styria, whither he was followed by Buonaparte. But the danger of a rising in his rear, where the Austrian General Laudon was again collecting numerous forces, induced Buonaparte to listen to the Austrian terms for peace. The preliminaries were signed on the 18th of April at Leoben, and Buonaparte, to bind the Emperor to the French cause, and completely to break his alliance with Britain, proposed to hand over to the Austrians the territory of Venice. This being effected, Buonaparte hurried back to seize and bind the promised victim. He took a severe vengeance on the people of Verona, who had risen against the French in his absence, and then marched to Genoa, where, under pretence of supporting the people in their demands for a Republic, he put down the Doge and Senate, set up a democratical provisional government, seized on all the ships, docks, arsenal, and storesin fact, took full possession. All further pretence of regard for the neutrality of Genoa was abandoned.Whilst these elements of a new convulsion were in active operation, the Allies had settled to some extent the affairs of Europe, and had returned home. On the 30th of May a treaty had been signed at Paris, between Britain, Russia, Austria, and Prussia, with France. The boundaries of France were settled as they existed in 1792; it was decreed that Holland and Belgium should be united to form a strong barrier against France; the independence of Switzerland was restored; the north of Italy was again made over to Austria, including[86] Venice, but not including Sardinia, which was enlarged by the addition of Genoa, out of which Lord William Bentinck, with a British army, had driven the French. Murat had assisted the Austrians to conquer Eugene Beauharnais, and hoped to be allowed to retain Naples, yet having many fears of his new allies, the Austrians, and of the Allies generally. The Pope was again in peaceful possession of his States; the arms and the money of Great Britain had triumphed over Buonaparte, and had restored the monarchs of Europe to their thrones; but it was not to be denied that in restoring them they had restored so many detestable despotisms.
ONE:Burke proceeded amidst constant interruption to review the many scenes and debates in which Fox and himself had acted, as well as those on which they had differed, especially their difference of opinion on the Royal Marriage Act; but no difference of opinion had ever before affected their friendship. He alluded to his own long services and his grey hairs, and said that it was certainly an indiscretion, at his time of life, to provoke enemies, or induce his friends to desert him; but that, if his firm and steady adherence to the British Constitution placed him in that dilemma, he would risk all, and, as public duty required, with his last breath exclaim, "Fly from the French Constitution!" Here Fox whispered that there was no loss of friends; that there could be no loss of friendship between them; but Burke said"Yes, there was a loss of friends: he knew the penalty of his conduct; he had done his duty at the price of his friendsthere was an end of their friendship." It was some time before Fox could answer; he was completely overcome by his emotion; and it was only after a free flow of tears that he could proceed. He then said: "Painful as it was to listen to such sentiments as those just delivered by one to whom he owed so many obligations, he could never forget that, when little more than a boy, he had been in the habit of receiving instructions and favours from his right honourable friend. Their friendship had grown with their life; it had continued for upwards of five-and-twenty years; and he hoped, notwithstanding what had happened that day, that his right honourable friend would think on past times, and would give him credit for not intending anything unkind. It was quite true that they had before now differed on many subjects, without lessening their friendship, and why should they not now differ on the French Revolution without a severance of friendship? He could not help feeling that the conduct of his right honourable friend tended to fix upon him the charge of Republican principles, whereas he was far from entertaining such principles. His friend had heaped very ignominious terms upon him that day." Here Burke said aloud, he did not recollect having used such terms; and Fox promptly observed that "if his friend did not recollect those epithetsif they are out of his mind, then they were for ever out of his mind, too; they were obliterated and forgotten." He then denied that there was any marshalling of a party on this subject; that not one gentleman who had risen to call his right honourable friend to order had done it by his desire; on the contrary, he had entreated his friends not to interrupt him. After again dwelling for some time on the merits of the French Revolution, he once more lamented the breach in the unanimity of his friend and[380] himself, and said he would keep out of the way of his right honourable friend till he had time to reflect and think differently, and that their common friends might bring them together again; that he would endeavour to discuss the question on some future day, with all calmness, if his friend wished, but for the present he had said all that he desired to say.
ONE:Orders soon came from the Government for the liberation of the prisoners. After some consultation with their friends, it was resolved that there should be a public procession from the prison in the morning. Mr. O'Connell, however, left that evening, and proceeded on foot to his house in Merrion Square. Before he had reached the square, the tidings spread abroad that he was out, and crowds rapidly assembled from all directions. The people leaped and danced about him, while their acclamations rent the air. When he placed his foot upon the step to ascend to his own door, the exulting shouts of some 10,000 or 15,000 people were almost deafening. Appearing on the balcony of his house, where he had often stood before, to address his followers, they could scarcely be got to keep silence while he spoke. The procession next day was, in point of magnitude, quite in keeping with the other "monster" proceedings. Twelve o'clock was the time appointed to start from the prison, and at that hour the first part of the procession arrived. Its length may be inferred from the fact that it was not until two o'clock that the triumphal car reached the prison gate. During those two hours thousands upon thousands defiled before it in one unbroken line of men, perfect order being kept, without the aid of a single policeman, and the marching mass being broken into sections only by the bands of music, preceding the flags or carriages of the different trades, which numbered about thirty. The bands were all dressed in fancy uniforms, bearing bright coloursblue, pink, and greenwith banners of the most gorgeous description. There was such a demand for carriages and vehicles of all sorts, that Dublin alone could not meet it, and carriages were obtained from Bray, and various other places around the metropolis. The procession was composed of Repeal wardens, members of the Repeal Association, the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and town council, personal friends and political admirers of O'Connell.The marquis answered that he had received his letter, informing him of the king's intention to release him from the Government of Ireland, and that he held himself in readiness to obey his Majesty's commands the moment he received them. He did receive them, on the 10th of January, in a formal letter of recall from the Home Secretary.
TWO:"Such modification to include the admission, at a nominal duty, of Indian corn and of British colonial corn."THE AGENTS OF BRITAIN AND SWEDEN SIGNING THE TREATY AGAINST NAPOLEON. (See p. 7.)
TWO:On the 10th of January the army came in sight of Corunna and the sea, but no transports could be seen in the bay. They were detained by contrary winds at Vigo, and the last hope of safety seemed cut off. Sir John, however, quartered his troops in Corunna, and determined to defend it manfully till the transports could get up. But great was his chagrin at the proofs of the miserable management of the Commissariat Department. On a hill above the town were four thousand barrels of gunpowder, which had been sent from England, and had been lying there many months, and the town was a great magazine of arms. Sir John replaced the weather-worn muskets of his troops with new ones, supplied them with fresh, good powder, and, after removing as many barrels of powder into the town as the time would allow, he blew up the rest, producing a concussion that shook the place like an earthquake.
TWO:On the 15th of April a message was sent down to both Houses from the king, in conformity with his pledge to the new Ministry, with regard to Mr. Burke's plan of economical reform, which it proposed should be a measure of effectual retrenchment, and to include his Majesty's own Civil List. Lord Shelburne, in communicating it to the Lords, assured the House that this was no mere ministerial message, but was the genuine language of the king himself, proceeding from the heart. Burke, in the Commons, used more exuberant terms of eulogy, declaring that "it was the best of messages to the best of people from the best of kings!" Early in May he moved for leave to bring in his Bill on the subject, and then most of the promised wonders of reform and retrenchment vanished. The duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster and the principality of Wales were at once cut out of his scheme of reform. The plan of supplying the Royal Household by contract was abandoned; the Ordnance Office, in the hands of the Duke of Richmond, was not to be touched, nor the Treasurer of the Household's office; and some[291] other of the royal establishments, which were mere sinecures, were left. But he succeeded in lopping off the third Secretaryship of State, which had been created for the American colonies, and was useless now they were gone; the Lords of Trade and Plantations; the Lords of Police in Scotland; the principal officers of the Great Wardrobe, Jewel Office, Treasurer of the Chamber, Cofferer of the Household, six Clerks of the Board of Green Clothin all, about a dozen offices were swept away. The Pension List was vigorously revised. No pension was to exceed three hundred pounds a year, and not more than six hundred pounds was to be granted in pensions in any one year; the names of the persons to whom they were granted were to be laid before Parliament within twenty days after the beginning of each session, until the amount in the Pension List should reach ninety thousand pounds. The Secret Service money was, at the same time, limited; and a solemn oath was to be administered to the Secretaries of State regarding its proper employment. It may be imagined what were the consternation and the disgust of the large class which had been revelling on these misappropriated funds of the nation. Burke, in a letter, describes feelingly the gauntlet he had to run in proceeding with his reform. "I was loaded," he says, "with hatred for everything withheld, and with obloquy for everything given." What, however, brought unjust odium on him, but just reproach on the Cabinet, was, that Lord Rockingham made haste, before the Bill was passed, to grant enormous pensions to his supporters and colleagues, Lord Ashburton and Colonel Barr. The latter ardent patriot, who, whilst Burke's Bill was in consideration, said it did not go far enough in reform, now willingly pocketed three thousand two hundred pounds a year, as a pension, besides the salary of his office. In the House of Lords, Thurlow again attacked the Bill, supported by Lords Mansfield and Loughborough; but it passed, and Burke immediately gave an illustrious proof of his disinterestedness, by bringing in a Bill for regulating and reducing the enormous emoluments of his own office, the Paymastership of the Forces.For a few weeks the cottiers and small farmers managed to eke out a subsistence by the sale of their pigs, and any little effects they had. But pigs, fowls, furniture, and clothing soon went, one after another, to satisfy the cravings of hunger. The better class of farmers lived upon their corn and cattle; but they were obliged to dismiss their servants, and this numerous class became the first victims of starvation; for when they were turned off, they were refused admission by their relations, who had not the means of feeding them. Tailors, shoemakers, and other artisans who worked for the lower classes, lost their employment and became destitute also. While the means of support failed upon every side, and food rose to such enormous prices that everything that could possibly be eaten was economised, so that the starving dogs were drowned from compassion, the famine steadily advanced from the west and south to the east and north, till it involved the whole population in its crushing grasp. It was painfully interesting to mark the progress of the visitation, even in those parts of the country where its ravages were least felt. The small farmer had only his corn, designed for rent and seed. He was obliged to take it to the mill, to ward off starvation. The children of the poor, placed on short allowance, were suffering fearfully from hunger. Mothers, heart-broken and worn down to skeletons, were seen on certain days proceeding in groups to some distant dep?t, where Indian meal was to be had at reduced prices, but still double that of the ordinary market. As they returned to their children with their little bags on their heads, a faint joy lit up their famine-stricken features. Those children, who had lived for two days and two nights on a dole of raw turnips, would now be relieved by a morsel of nourishing food. The fathers, who had absented themselves from home in order to avoid the agony of listening to their heart-piercing cries, might now sit down and look their little ones in the face. But, if the mother failed to obtain the relief for which she had travelled so far, what then? Yesterday no breakfast, no dinner, no supper; the same to-day; no prospect of better to-morrow. The destitute rushed to the workhouses, which soon became crowded to excess by those who had been able-bodied men and women, while the aged, the sickly, and the children were left to starve. Overpowered by hunger, they lay down helpless, the ready victims of the pestilence that walked close upon the footsteps of famine, and died in thousands. Let us consider the state of a population such as has been described. Scattered over remote districts, with no gentry resident within many miles, none to whom a complaint could be made but the clergyman, whose energies were overtaxed, how utterly helpless must have been the condition of those doomed people!
THREE:Fox was very indignant, and made no scruple of attributing the conduct of the king, not to mere report, but to fact. "There is," he said, "a written record to be produced. This letter is not to be put in the balance with the lie of the day;" whereupon he pulled from his pocket a copy of the note said to have been written by the king to Lord Temple. When he sat down, Mr. Grenville rose and stated that he had taken down the words read as the king's note, and had shown them to his relative, Lord Temple, who had authorised him to say that such words had never been made use of by him. But Fox demanded whether Lord Temple had not used words to that effect, and Grenville was silent. Fox continued in a very fierce strain, denouncing back-stairs lords and bedchamber politicians, and declared that the best-meant and best-concerted plans of Ministers were subject to the blasting influence of a villainous whisper. He added that he could not continue in office any longer consistently either with his own honour or the interests of the nation. He felt that he was goaded to it, and upbraided for not resigning instantly; but a very honourable majority of that House stood pledged to a great measure, and Ministers were equally bound not to abandon the affairs of State in the midst of so much anarchy. These last words, and the division, which was nearly two to one in favour of Ministers, left it doubtful, after all, whether Fox and his colleagues would resign. As such language, however, could not be used by Ministers with impunity, and a dissolution of the Cabinet was probable, Erskine moved a resolution, pledging the House to persevere in the endeavour to remedy the abuses in the government of India, and declaring "that this House will consider as an enemy to this country any person who shall presume to advise his Majesty to prevent, or in any manner interrupt, the discharge of this important duty." All strangers were excluded, but it was ascertained that the motion was severely censured as an invasion of the king's prerogative; yet the resolution was carried by one hundred and forty-seven votes against seventy-three.
