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FRASER'S
MAGAZINE
FOR
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
VOL. XXXIII.
JANUAliY TO JUNE, 1846.
LONDON:
O. W. NICKISSON, 215 REGENt StREET. (Successor to the late James Fraser);
AND SOLD 8T ALL BOOKSELLERS AND NEWSMEN IN TOWN AND COUNTRY.
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
FOR
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
Vol. XXXIII. JANUARY, 1846. No. CXCIU.
CONTENTS.
PAOl
OUR CHIMES FOR THE NEW YEAR 1
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CRlBiE, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM FABilLIAR HIS- TORY.
NO. I. WILLIAM BOSVB .' 7
PRINCIPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE " FALL OF NAPOLEON."
NO. I. THS ITALIAN CAMPAIQNS ^
ON THE HISTORY OF PANTOMIMES. IN A LETTER TO OLIVER YORKE, ESQ. 43 THE PRIDE OF A SPOILED BEAUTY.
CBAPTIBI 46
PUBLIC PATRONAGE OF MEN OF LETTERS 58
THE FIRST FLOWER-PAINTER. A LEGEND OF SIC YON 72
CONTEMPORARY ORATORS. NO. VI. THE RIGHT HON. T. B. MACAULAY •• 77
TITMARSH'S TOUR THROUGH TURKEYDOM 85
OF RAILWAYS. BY MORGAN RATTLER, ESQ. M.A., AN APPRENTICE OF THE
LAW 97
THE LADY OF ELM- WOOD.
CHAPTNB I t 113
CBAPTSmil •*•• IIB
RONSARD TO HIS MISTRESS. BY MICHAEL ANGELO TITMARSH 120
MYSTERIES OF THE CABINET •'••• 121
LONDON:
G. W. NICKISSON, 215 REGENT STREEt, (Successor to the late James Eraser)*
IIJKGC.XLTI.
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
FOR
TOWN AND COUNTRY,
Vol. XXXIV. FEBRUARY, 1846. No. CXCIII.
CONTENTS.
PA«S
AN ILLUSTRATIVE CHAPTER ON STRAWS. BEING THE FIRST SPECIMEN
. OF A NEW DICTIONARY 1»7
CONTEMPORARY ORATORS. NO. VIL THE RIGHT HON. SIR JAMES GRAHAM 136
THE LEGEND OF GELNUAU8EN. FROM THE HISTORY OF THE TWELFTH
CENTURY ; 143
PRINCIPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE " FALL OF NAPOLEON."
HO.fI. THB ITAUAX CA»AlQKt 157
THE PRIDE OF A SPOILED BEAUTY.
CBAPm II. AKD CONCLUfllOlV ISO
LATIN PAMPHLETEERS. SALLUST 194
A LETTER FROM RIPPOLDSAU 211
LOVE, PRESENT AND PAST 226
A DINNER IN ANCIENT EGYPT 299
A FALSE ALARM. A TRUE STORY 232
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CRIME, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM FAMILL/Ul HIS- TORY,
KO.II. TBAKCtS DAttO ITiaM 835
POSITION OF MINISTERS , 246
LONDON:
G. W. NICKISSON, 215 REGENT Sf ft.fiET, {Successor to the late James FRASfiR).*
MJ>CCC.XLyX.
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
FOR
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
Vol. XXXIIL MARCH, 1846. No. CXCV.
CONTENTS.
PAOB
MR. NEWMAN; HIS THEORIES AND CHARACTER 253
LE JEU DE NOEL. FROM THE NOTES OF AN OLD TRAVELLER 269
TO ONE WHO WAS MOYSD TO TEARS AT SIGHT OF IMHOFF'S STATUE OF
HAGAR AT ROBfE 276
PRINCIPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON. BT THE AUTHOR OF THE •• FALL OF NAPOLEON."
NO. ni. THE ITALIAN CAMPAIGNS 276
COUNSEL MAL-A-PROPOS 288
MARGARRT LUCAS,. DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE 292
MILLINERS* APPRENTICES 308
CONTEAIPORARY ORATORS. NO. VIU. LORD PALMERSTON 317
THE VILLAGE OF LORETTE, AND THE NEW SETTLEMENT OF VALE CARTIER.
THX TILLAOB OF LOBSTTS 323
THB NXW BETTLBIIBNT OF TALB CABTIBB 326
A BROTHER OF THE PRESS.— ON THE HISTORY OF A LITERARY MAN, [LAMAN BLANCHARD,] AND THE CHANCES OF THE LITERARY PRO- FESSION. IN A LETTER TO THE REVEREND FRANCIS SYLVESTER AT ROME. FROM MICHAEL ANGELO TITMARSH, ESQ 332
THE COMMON LODGING-HOUSE 342
MODERN PAINTERS, Ac 868
WHAT IS THE POSITION OF SIR ROBERT PEEL AND HIS CABINET ? 369
LONDON:
G. W. NICKISSON, 215 REGENT STREET, {Successor to the late James Eraser).
M.DCCC.XLYI.
speedily ^^ ^0 Published, A BOOK OF HIGHLAND MIN8TRELS7.
Poem* and Ballads, with Prose Introductions, descriptire of the Uanners and Superstitions of the Scottisb Highlander.
ByMrs.D.OGILVY.
Handsomel/ printed m One Volnmei Foolscap 4to., profusely lUuitrated from Drawings by R. R. M'Isn, Esq.
O. W. NICKII80M, 918 RIOSMT STRUT.
\
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
FOR
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
Vol. XXXIII. APRIL, 1846. No. CXCVL
CONTENTS.
PAOl
OF THE SFAIN8 AND THE SPANIARDS. BT MORGAN RATTLER 380
MILLYL . A TALE OF FACT IN HUBfBLE LIFE 3»5
PRINCIPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE " FALL OF NAPOLEON."
NO. rv. THB ITALIAN ClKPAIOm ;• ^13
AN ANECDOTE ABOUT AN OLD HOUSE ^^
MUS.SUS 437
DINING OUT 445
VELASCO; OR, MEMOIRS OF A PAGE 456
FEMALE AUTHORSHIP 4G0
CONTEMPORARY ORATORS. NO. IX. EARL GREY AND LORD MORPETH.
I. SAKLOKKT 466
II. LOKDXOEPITB • 474
THE 8IKHB-. THEIR RISE AND PROGRESS 478
MURILLO ; OR, THE PAINTER WITHOUT AMBITION , 488
ON SOME ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN'S BOOKS. BY MICHAEL ANGELO TIT- MARSH 496
ANNETTE , 603
LONDON :
G. W. NICKISSON, 215 REGENT STR;EET, {Successor to the late James Eraser).
MJ>CCC.XLyi.
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
POR
TOWN AND COUNTRY,
Vol. XXXIII. MAY, 1846. No. CXCVIL
CONTENTS.
THE OLD JUDOB ; OB, LIFE IN A COLONY. THE LOME HOUSE. BT THE
AUTHOR OF «'8AM SLICK THE CLOCKMAKER,** "THE ATTAeH^,** ETC. 506
80METHINO MORE ABOUT VICTOR HUGO A13
THE CHAMBER OF THE BELL HO
PRINCIPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON. BT THE AUTHOR OF THE ** FALL OF NAPOLEON.'*
HO. V. THX OAXTAIOH or ICABmOO •• MS
ELEPHANT-SHOOTING IN CETLON Ml
PAST AND PRESENT CONDITION OF BRITISH POETRY «77
THE FIGHT WITH THE DRAGON. FROM THE GERMAN OF SCHILLER 691
ARNOLD'S LECTURES ON MODERN HISTORY 696
THE SIRHS AND THE LATE CAMPAIGN 606
ON A LATE FRENCH TRIAL 691
LONDON:
G. W, NICKISSON, 215 REGENT STRfiET, {Successor to the late James Fraser).
MJ>CCC.ZLtl.
^
FRASER*S MAGAZINE
roE
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
Vol. XXXIII. JUNE, 1846. No. CXCVIII.
CONTENTS.
MAHREM TftA]>tn01l8» AUD BUFUBTITIOKS OV TUI ItllTLANtlMIIII .... Ml
PBJHCIPAL CAMFAiaJXB Of THE RUI OF M APOLIOW. BY TMK AVTHMH 0¥ THE ** FALL OF N APOLBOM."
■OuTL Xn CAMT AMM or AOnaUBI •••«.iitf««t««Mt*fiti MtiMi. If Mil MV
01IBBOGAB8 «....,.. m .. n .. tHKl
A LETTER TO OUVBS TOBKB OM FRBlfOn MBWIPArMM AMU IIMWN- FAFBB WEITSRfl* FSEHCH FABCBUKfl AMD FBUILLETOMIiTi, yMlOMtm DUELLISTS. FBBNCH ACTRESSES, ETC. BY BBBJAMIN UI^VBT, FON* MERLT A BENeHERMAH AMD TREMOHERMAN IM TUN IMMMH TBMFUO, BOW A RENTIER OF THE RUE RIVOU IB PARIS • «M
ERBEST WALKnnrOBirs OPIBION OF SEVILLE. IB A LETTER TO MR. GRUBLET * Mi
RBUOIOUS MOTEMEBT IB OBRMABT 9H
PAST ABD PRESEBT COBDITIOB OF BRITISH POETRY.
VAST u. Ain» oovcLonov - •••••••..••***.•• TW
EDUCATIOB IB THE ARMT • Vt^
OOBTBMPORART ORATORS.
THE CAOEDLARK TM
THE B. O. ABD THE B. O. A FEW WORDS OB THE OAUOE DISPUTE Ttt
IBDEZ M..M ».«.M*.M.« 'it
LONDON J
O. W, NICK18S0N, 216 REOENT STREET, (Succesiof (if ih^ taie Jamm Fraskr)*
ll.lrOO«.Rttl«
FRASER'S MAGAZINE
FOB
TOWN AND COUNTRY.
No. CXCIII. JANUARY, 1846. Vol. XXXIII.
OUR CHIMES POE THE NEW YEAR.
" How soft the muiio of those TiUaee.
bells. Falling at intervals upon the ear In cadence sweet, now dying all away. Now pealing loud again, and louder still. Clear and sonorous as the gale comes on ! With easy force it opens all the cells Where mem'ry slept. WhercTer I have
heard A kindred melody, tlie scene recurs. And with it all its pleasures and its
pains. Such comprehensive views the spirit
takes. That in a few short moments I retrace (As in a map the voyager his conrse) The winding of my way."
^ Cowper had heard the chimes ringing in more than forty new years, when he wrote these beautiful verses, and had experienced the mekncholy truth of Pope's remark, that every year carries something dear away with it ; yet not destroying or defac- ing, but only removing it into a softer and .more soothing twilicrht. Pons- sin^s charming picture of a Tomb in Arcadia, is only the past year put into an allegory. And if so, this is the hour to read it in ; when, in the happy words of a late naturalist, the repose of wearied nature seems to mark the decline and termination of existence in many things that ani- mated the green and joyous months of summer. The rare note of a bird is feeble and melancholy, andno insect hums in the field ; the breeze passes
TOL. aXXXU. HO. CXCIII.
by us like a sigh ; we hear it, and it is gone for ever.
JProm this solemn steeple of time to which we have ascended by three hun- dred and sixty-five steps, what a vast and diversified landscape is open to our eyes I A rich and woody scene ! That elm-tree, which waved its dark branches before iEueas in his sub- terranean pilffrimage, might have been planted nere, with its change- fulness, its shadows, and its dreams :
" Quam sedem somnia vulgo Vana tenere ferunt, foliisque sab omnibus bsrent."
How much hoped for, and how little won ; what copious sowing, and what a blight upon the fruit ! What tremendous leaps of ambition that lifted us to nothing, but only ex- hibited us, like Swift*s landlord, al- ways climbing, and always in the same place ; and vet when the cold and frosty lisht oi reasoning memory plays over tnese visions and dreams of the past, they seem to sparkle with a certain beauty. The winter tree of the poet might be taken for their image: —
" The erystal drops That trickle down the branches, fast con«
geal'd. Shoot into pillars of pellucid length, And prop the pile they but adorn*d be*,
fore. Here grotto within grotto safe de£es
B
Our Chimes for the New Year.
[January,
Th« Bunbeam ; there emboss*d and fretted
wild. The growing wonder takes a thouaand
ahapea. Capricious, ia which faocj seeks in yain The likeness of some object seen before."
We said that Poussin's picture of a Tomb in Arcadia is omy the past ^ear put into an allegoiy ; and It is in the very nature of bells to bring out this tone of sorrow. Every chime has its connecting toll. Even in the festival and enjoyment of life the sound is audible to the heart. The voluptuary hears it. *M feel a something which makes me think that) if I ever reach near to old age, like Swift, I shall die at top first. This was the apprehension of Lord Bvron. He tried to sneer it away. He did not fear idiotcy or madness ; he even supposed that some quieter stages of both might be preferable to much of what men think the pos- session of their senses. In the gar- den of his fancy he had a sepulchre, and this spectral tomb of intellect cast a dreary shade over the bloom of Arcadia. The past year put into an allegory! — ^j^es, but everv year in- creases the size of that tomb. At first, flowers overhang and conceal it, but it gradually grows and lours upon the eye. Conscience is served by industrious, though invisible genu, who are perp^ually labouring. Swift saw it durmg many vears ; one might say that he watched it build- ing. He was, indeed, the most awful illustration of it. His death was a show in the literal sense. During the two dreadfhl vears of the malady, his servants exnibited him. The father of one of Walter Scott's most intimate friends might have gratified his curiosity in this manner.
We are standing on this steeple of time, and reflection clears the air, and memory rings her bells all to no purpose and in vain, if we do not review the path we have been tread- ing, and mark out a directer as well as a safer one for the next journey. We shall derive no benefit firom climbing to the top, if we carry with us no increase of knowledge when we go down. Even while Gray was complaining that his own hours glided uselessly ^, he umd Mason to activity, ana dedsred his admintiott of those travellers who leave some
traces of their foot«tepei hehi&d tbem.
" Do not sit making verses that never will be written," was the lively re- monstrance of Mrs. Thrale to her stout fHend the philosopher, when he had exchanged the indolence of swinging upon gates for the idleness of meaning to write. We cannot help growmg older, but the great thing is to grow wiser. Each suc- cessive week locks the gate of its pre- decessor; but though it closes the gate, it keeps the key. Thus every week is a monument guarded and shewn by the week that follows it ; and, when studded with the rich jewels of wise hours and holy minutes. It not only diffuses a light into the distance, but attracts and cheers other pilgrims as well as ourselves. Of all the graves that ought to be visited, those of departed years have ihe strongest interest for ourselves.
Crusader of eastern lands, or martyr of our own, may be more dazzling to our hxkcy, or more eloquent to our hearts ; but neither speaks such so- lemn lessons. The dust of our own creations — our hopes, our thoughts, our virtues, and our sins — are to us the most costly deposit in the great burial-ground of the universe. It would be a wild and a terrible spec- tacle if all the millions who Ml be- neath the Koman eagle were sud- denlv to start from the depths of the eartn ; if the fierce Briton were to spring up with his shield and bow under our forest oaks, or the Cartha- ginian fleet 8p^^ its sails to the Italian sun. We might tremble at the vision, and the cheek might grow pale. But how much more appfuling would be the instantaneous resur- rection of the last year, with the history of every man In his hand I Adam Clarke has recorded the be- ' wildering epitome of life that rushed upon him in the very moment and catastrophe of drownmg ; but this resurrection would give some things vet vivider and awfuller. It has been said of those by whom the blood of humanity was shed, that the sound of their own footstep startles them, as if it were the crv of an accuser, while the rustling of the tree and the murmur of the stream sound like a clamorous demand for punishment; that they ftel as if they nad arra^ against themselves the whole visible creation-— sun, moon, stars, and fo- mtsjpnblialuiig their orime. Surely
1846.)
Owr Chimis/or the New Year,
i
this i0 a firightibl visitatioQ ; but stabs of our own ooofcknoe speak ia fiercer accents, and the apparitkm of our past days would be the most thrilling tale that could be uttered
'* By the chimney's edge, That in oor ancient, uncouth, country
Btyle, With huge and thick projection, or^r-
brows Large space beneath."
It is a very happy thing for us when the chimes of the new year hare called us up into the steeple before many of them have been rung in. It is always a delightful reflec- tion to feel that we may shape our future conduct by our past. When, at all eyents, we are eiuibled to start with some capital, an occasional run by temptation or folly will not break us. We have still something to fall back on— still possess some specie in the cellar. '* All my amusements are reduced to the idle business of nnr little garden, and to the reading of idle books, where the mind is sel* dom called on." . This was the con* dition of Chesterfield, old, anery, and deaf, in his hermitage at Blackneath. He had gold, inde^ in the cellar, but it was of a base currency, and without the legal superscription. Bacon had not one good coin m his pocket when he made the despicable and desperate appeal to James I., Si tu dueris^ peritmu. How much happier the education giren by Henry Sidney to his son I *' Bless you, my sweet boy I Perge,, verge, my Bobin, in the filial fear or God, and in the meanest imagination of* yourself." And surely it would be a noble and an inspiring sight to behold the Grecian story of piety and afiection thus transfemd to a different coun- try, and fulfilled in a different ob- ject; to see the time that is gone continually brought baek to cherish, to strengthen, and to support the time tiiat is oome ( to feel tne wasted virtue of our manhood invigorated by the life-giving current of our youth, the decrepitude and exhaustion of the parent refreshed by the glowing bosom of the child. Thus, in a higher sense than even the poetic eye foresaw in its raptute and pro-
r, may the child become the
kther of theman.
But let us not be mistaken. We have ndther recommendation nor panegyric for all the languages and none of the absurdities at ten years ^d. We remember the description ci a larch ;* brittle, thin, perking, premature, upstart, monotonous, wiw no massiveness of limb, no variety of outline, no prominences and recesses for the lights and shadows to play in $ and we recollect, also, the moral of the deseripti(m; — when you have seen one larch, you have seen all. Not BO with any child of whom the man is the son. When you have seen one specimen of the scholastical patent, you have seen all. We want a fruitfuUer soil of learning to send up richer juices to the trunk and the branches. Then the rich gleams of imagination may shine in the ver- dant depths; the solemn shade of philosophy may subdue and bar- monise the glare ; and the youthftil scholar may resemble the charming friend of Steele, who was never be- held but with deliffht by her visitors, and never admired but with pain to herself. Of all common education we say, in the exquisite simile of Webster, —
'* 1'is e'en like one, that on a winter*8
night Takes a long slumber o'er a dying fire, An loath to part from 't ; yet parts thence
more cold Than when he first sat down."
In looking to ourselves, we are, in the truest sense of the word, pro- tecting our country. The decline and fall of an empire begin in a family. National ^ilt is only the multiplication of individual vices. Commerce interdicted, laws violated, population thinned, kingdoms vanish- ing, the fabric of society crumbling — who has not read that tempestuous page in European history, and who does not know its authors? Who shall remove every apprehension of that paffe being again set up in type, which the hastiest eye may be able to read? But though it never be reprinted, there are signs in the sky that may well induce us to look to our moral as well as to our physical
* Gatssss at Tnitb*
Our Chimes for the New Year.
[January,
•trength. There are other defences of a country beside those of her coasts.
It has been asserted of every im- perial state, that it must be con- stantly in movement, advancing or retiring, never stationary. Aggres- sion is the condition of its existence. Conquest thus becomes the animating principle of its frame, the source of Its motion and its grandeur. What- ever interferes with the action of this principle, affecta also the energy and nerve of the state itself. An impeded circulation is shewn in the torpor of the members. And as, when the heart ceases to beat, the body ceases to move ; so, when the state ceases to conquer, it ceases to be.
We may read this truth upon the monuments of the nast, but he must be blind, indeed, wno does not per- ceive it in the history of the present. We recognise at this hour the action of the same tremendous tide of em- pire, which, during so many centu- ries, has been setting into the shores of barbarism or civilisation; at one time sweeping from Greece into Per- sia, and at another, from Rome into Britain ; which now thunders in the ears of Morocco, startles the Circas- sian chief in his mountain solitude, and dies away with a sullen murmur in the recesses of the Punjaub. The stormy echo in India is, indeed, only the roar of our own assault. She, so far as foreign enemies are con- cerned, still wears
" Her plumed And jeireird turban with a smile of peace."
With regard to ourselves, the tide of advancing and impatient empire beats upon distant countries. The defiles of the Caucasus are beyond our fears, while the wave of French ambition breaks over the burning eands of Algeria. But our da^r of terror and of trial may be advancing. Of everv tide there is a receding swell. Kepelled, or triumphant in one direction, it turns in another. Retiring fVom Africa, it may roll tipon Europe. That principle of ag- gression, which is the pnnciple of imperial existence, will manifest its presence by the restless energy it communicates ; and we may yet be- hold the foam of the breakers, of
which we have hitherto heard only the remote thunder.
And if that tide shall ever dash upon England, may we not expect it to set in with storm and fury from the opposite coast of France ? From the wise, the generous, the brave of that nation— from the men who love their country, and cherish her re- nown,— we have no unprovoked hos- tilities to anticipate or to fear. They will feel that France can give ample room to the swelling spirit of her im- perial heart in the glorious labours of peace and colonisation. But what nation is composed of patriots ? In France the revolutionary temper still lives ; repressed, it was not suodued ; its languor may be quickened at any hour by popular stimulants into fe- rocitv and hatred. In the altered words of Montesquieu, the tyranny was struck, but not the tyrant. The despotism of the masses continues, if not asserted ; the electrical flame wants only a conductor ; the first flash will kindle an atmosphere charged with fire ; and a future Mi- rabeau might hurry a Joinville to Brest, or a Bugeaud to Boulogne.
It is not that we fear the threat^ or the invader. The insulted ma- jesty of the nation would speedily rise in its collected might, to rebuke and demolish the assailants. But warfare has an awful method of con- centrating the sufferings and the losses of years. Moreover, every crisis teaches desperation ; this most of all. An English fleet behind; an enthusiastic army before ; a na- tional insurrection around, — crops blasted, cities burning — the meanest soldier in the enemv*s camp would feel that the scabbard had been thrown away. And if any sen- tence were borrowed from the fiery lips of Catiline to quicken the droop- ing valour of the invading legions, it would surely be this, ^*Animm^ aitUy vir^ vestra hortaniur ; pbje-
TEBBA NBCESSITUDO QUA BTIAM TI- MIOOS FOBTBS FACrr."
These are terrors which we have no intention of quieting by any ar- rangement of Sir Willoughby Gror- don, excellent as that would assur- edly be. The War-Office can raise regiments, but not men. The highest kind of drill cannot be taught by the Serjeant Heroes of Marathon are never enlisted. But they can be
1846.]
Our, Chimes for the New Year.
created; and the great instrument in the work is the moral discipline of a religious education. 'Everj pa- triot is a soldier; and the Greek poet shewed himself a statesman, when he affirmed a living fortifica- tion to be of all ramparts the most impregnable. We think that a warn- ing cry comes from this steeple of 1845 years; and that a mournful recollection of national opportunities of improvement neglected and lost, may be heard intermingled with the joyous chimes that welcome the stranger. It is never too late to im- prove. Let the exhortation of Chal- mers be remembered. Let the streets, and lanes, and those deep intricacies that teem with human life, be ex- plored and cleansed ; let that *' mass which is so dense of mind, and there- fore so dense of immortality, be penetrated in the length and breadth of it.** fiolin^broke remarked, in reference to his plan for a general history of Europe, that every man ought to feel himself bound to give an account even of his leisure ; and in the midst of solitude, to be of some use to society. We hope that the lesson will not be forgotten by any of our readers. The slightest effort in a good cause will not be without some profit. The spare minutes of a year are sure labourers, if they be kept to their work. They can throw down and build up; they can di^, or they can empty. Despise not their stature or their strengtn. There is a tradition in Barbary, that the sea was once entirely absorbed and swal- lowed by ants.
A determination to do good wher- ever, whenever, and however wc can, will be an excellent step in the right direction. It will be one of the most harmonious chimes for the new year ; nay, it will help to make the steeple of time musical in our praise ; thus celebrating the sacred marriage of meditation and activity, of theory and practice. Wordsworth has sung with truth, if not with his usual eloquence : —
" Farewell, fsrewell the heart that lires alone, Housed in a dream, at distance from the kind ! Sach happiness, wherever it be known. Is to be pitied, for 't is surely blind."
The absolute abstraction of thought
from ourselves, which the noble and misguided Algernon Sidney admired and cherished, is one of the rare achievements of valorous discipline and triumphant self-denial. The multitude shut out their brethren by a high wall of partition, and enjoy themselves leisurely upon the sunn^ side; others, on the contrary, sit shiverinff on the shady side, and re- fuse, with all the indignation of mar* tjnrdom, a glimpse of the sun. And here we have the voluptuary, and there the ascetic. Cannot the wall be broken down, so as to admit the air and the heat at the same time ? so as to make men what Coleridge says St. Paul was — Christians and
Gentlemen P The father of Philip idney thought so, when he ad- monisned him : *' Give yourself to be merry, for you degenerate from your father, if you find not your- self most able in wit and body to do any thing when you be most merry.** And aeain, ** Study, and en- deavour yourself to be virtuously oc- cupied.** There is only one method of achieving this object, according to the last publication of Mr. Newman, '* It is in vain to look out for mis- sionaries for China or Africa, or evangelists for our great towns, or Christian attendants on the sick, or teachers of the ignorant, on such a scale of numbers as the need requires, without the doctrine of Purgatory; for thus the sins of youth are turned to account by the profitable penance of manhood ; and terrors, which the philosopher scorns in the individual, become the benefactors and earn the ffratitude of nations.** This is a com- fortable encouragement to the Na- tional Society and the Bishop of Lon- don's lay -readers. They will ac- complish nothing without a fhiud; and all their offices and institutions will be of no avail without a Fire- assurance 1 Alas! no chimes, we hone, from Time's venerable tower, will welcome this pestilent doctrine into the fair domains of the year that is coming. At least if chimes there be, they shall not be ours. The dis- mal howl of a false tradition shall never terrify us from its twilight cave of antiquity. We listen to ita voice as to the melancholy roar of the Virgilian eate-keeper. We know where to gaUier the eolden bough that shall ensure a sue and happy
6
Our CkimeifoT ik€ New Year.
[Janaaiy,
pttflMce. Thii onoe fixed upon the thrmold of darkness, the gloom and terror of the pilgrimage are oyer and past. A serener landscape dawns Defbre us : —
" Locos latos ot touBiis TireU ^ortnaatomm nemoran* sedosooa be* atM."
These, then^ are some of our chimes ibr the new year. Other hells may ling a livelier peal, but, we think, not a truer x>ne. In all chiming there is sadness, but sadness that only sweetens the joy. The wind and Uie rain endear the fireside, and May herself looks loyelier for the winter cloak she throws off. ** Still I lire here,** wrote Johnson, ^ by my own self, and have had of late yery had nights ; but then, I have had a pig to dinner, which Mr. Perkins gave me. Thus life is chequered.** Let it be so with ours.
We have led our readers into the steeple of time, that they may behold toe country behind and be- fore them. The road has taken a new turn, but it will lead through scenery yery similar to the former. It may be a wise rule to keep as much as possible in the middle of it, for it will not be forgotten that two roads run nearly parallel, and seem occasionally to mtersect each other. Experience, however, has set up suf- ficient hand-posts to guide the tra- veller. But a cautious ^e is neces«
sury. ''Tlieswerrnigofastcnpmay be so slight as to w scarcely ob- served, yet a wide ai^le may at length result from sueoessive ineon- siderable flexions.** For some of us there may be more than one sepul- chre in the Arcadia that is opening upon the eye. Perhaps, even the beaten path may be obliterated by some descending water-flood of diffi[- culty or trial. And if the land be- come a stormy sea, it matters nothing.
"Ob, bliodness to tbe fittore! kindly
giveo* Tbat eacb may fill the eirclo mark*d by
Hmtml"
Whatever may be the eold and hun* ger of the disoonsolate heart, it shall be satisfied and warmed. We read of those who had toiled all nighty that " as soon as they were eome to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread.** It was a lonely shore ; yet an unex- pected fire cneered, and a strange Visitor illuminated it. If there be any truth in the chimes of ages, it shall be so with us. The night of the present may be toilsome, and dark, and unprofitable ; but a clear fire bums, ana a rich repast is spread upon the tranquil diore of the future. Happy for us if we leave behind us this brief epitaph, —
" Proved by (bo euds of bsioff, to bsve boon/'
1846.] The Philosophy of Crime, wiik Illustrations, ^c.
THE PHII.OSOPHT OF CRIME, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM
FAMILIAR HISTORY.
No. I.
WILUAM HOBNB.
*>
Wb »re inclined to believe that at- tention has never yet been turned, as it might be, to one of the most imj^rtant questions which can ex- ercise the mind of a thinking man. Crime prevails on all sides of us: and the circumstances attending its commission and its consequences, as they affect both the ^pilty and the innocent, are set forth m every news- paper that comes into our hands ; but to trace back each offence to its remote causes, to follow the trail from step to step, till we reach the first laint out- lines of the path, by pursuing which the individual has won for himself a frightful notoriety, no one worthy to be accounted a philosopher has ever, as far as we are aware^ attempted. The Christian moralist, it is true, finds a direct and easy solution to all difficulties. He quotes the words of Holy Writ; and, assuring us that " the heart of man is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked," he flatters himself that in the beset- ting corruption of human nature the source of all the outrages upon right and decency that shock our mml sense is to be found. We have no desire to enter into controversv with him. Believing, as firmly as hedoes, that the Bible is the word of God, we believe also that there is no living man who can assert with truth that he is free from manv movements to evil. But erime and moral evil are very dif- ferent things; and though the one may be shewn to be in many instances the excess of the other, it is a lame order of reasoning which would, therefbre, lead to the conclusion that both are, through the operation of the same causes, to be accounted for. Again, there are persms in the worm, acute and clever men in their way, who tell us that vice and virtue are mere accidents, because, in point of fiKt, they are the results of physicail orgaAisaition. Dr. Combe will manipulate a head, and pro- nounce, when he is done with it^ that tiie wearer cannot, unless restrained by an ii^nenee that is hnesistible,
escape from the commission of soxne hideous crime. And here agam, though ourselves no behevers in phrenology, we should be slow tp pronounce that Dr. Combe is absQ- lutely in error. The heads of somie of tne most remarkable criminals which the last half century has pro* duced have undergone, if we are not mistaken, phrenological examination ; and the results were, in every in- stance, such as to confirm, to a cer- tain extent, Dr. Combe*s theory. But Dr. Combe's theory no more touches the root of the difficulty, than it is laid bare by the more com- prehensive assumption of the Christ- ian reasoner. It may be that men*s passions, when indulged to excess, work upon the surface of their skulls as the nabitual exercise of the amr or the leg enlarges the muscles of the limb. But the question still re- mains, '* What in the beginning led to such excessive indulgence?" and how came the man, seeking his own ffratification throughout, to brace nimself up to the perpetration of some deed, the discovery of which must, as he feels all along, lead to his irretriev- able ruin ? We confess that, be the doctrine of the phrenologist in other respectB as rational as it mav, in this it fails to sup^y the inmrmation that we seek. It deals with effects, whereas we desire to become ac- quainted with causes ; lor it is only by laying these bare to the percep- tion and the right understanding of mankind, that we can hope to put society upon the way of training its members so that crime, if it do not absolutely cease, shall at least become less frequent than it has heretofore beai in the world. Of course our reasoniiM? is not to be understood as applicabfo to men in a mere state of nature. The sava^ has no right perception of the difference between good and evil. An arbitrary code of his own he every where possesses, of which the particular enactments not unfirequently contradict the pre- judhcs €^)us ippre. dvilisied brolner.
6
The Philosophy of Crime,
[January,
But of him we do not desire to take an^ account. If we deal with him at all, it ou^ht lo be entertaining a constant detiKtoieclaimhimj to teach him our arts, toeommunicate to him our fcel- inp, and to lead him forward to per- ceive and rightly to appreciate what is in itself ffood. Till we shall have done this, he is no fit subject for our study ; and as neither the means nor the opportunity of accomplishing so great an end happen at this moment to be accessible to us, we will, with our reader's leave, pass him by, and look exclusively to the condition of persons who, beiuff bom in a Christ- ian land, have, at least in theory, the wisest of all moral rules to guide them — we mean the volume of the New Testament.
And here it may be necessary to explain at the outset what we mean by the term crime, as contradis- tinguished from moral evil ; for it is a great mistake to suppose that the one is necessary to, and in all cases the consummation and perfection of the other. Crime, accoraing to our present theory, is an offence, not so much against the eternal law of right, as asainst society; the maintenance of which, to any useful purpose, de- pends upon the exemption which is secured to each of its members sepa- rately against a certain class of out- rages. To take away the life of our feflow man, for example, except in defence of our own, is crime. To appropriate to our own use goods or money that belong to another, is crime also. Perjury in a court of law is likewise crime ; for it impedes, and may render impracticable, the due administration of justice. For- gery, swindling, and the whole cate- fory of fhinds come under the same ead; they are attacks upon pro- perty. In like manner we must include adultery in our list of crimes, at least in cases where a married wo- man is concerned; because its con- sequences may be, and often are, that a spurious offspring is imposed upon a mmily, to the manifest violation of the rights of those who are by such means deprived of the whole or a portion of the fortune which would nave otherwise come to them. On the other hand^ we do not account either the pronuscuous intercourse of the sexes, or habits of untruth, or 4r«nkemie8B, or dusolate tdk, as
crimes. The moral guilt of all of them is great; indeed it sometimes happens that, when tried by a higher standard than that of society's re- quirements, the guilt of the mere sinner will prove to be greater than that of a criminal of the first class ; but, for obvious reasons, there would be neither wisdom nor justice in awarding to such offences the sort of
Punishment that waits upon crime, 'ake a case which has often occurred, and may be expected often to occur again. A man, upright in his trans- actions with his fellow men, who has heretofore enjoyed an irreproachable reputation, discovers that his wife or daughter has been seduced. He broods over the wronff perhaps many- days, and at last fslls in with the scoundrel who has blighted his do- mestic peace, and kills him. He is arrested, thrown into prison, tried, and, it may be, hanged for murder ; whereas the miscreant to whom is owing the desolate and degraded con- dition of a whole family would have escaped scot free, had not the criminal taken the law into his own hands. Which of the two was morally the more guilty ?
Crime and moral evil may be cognate the one to the other, but there is no necessary connexion be- tween them. The former may origi- nate in the pressure of absolute want, or in the mere lack of self-control under sudden and violent excite- ment ; in either of which cases its reality is compatible with a very slight amount of moral depravity. The latter is invariably the result of an ill-regulated education; which, though it may have stored the me- mory with knowledge, and stimulated both the imagination and the reason- ing faculty, has failed to teach that, in order to form the character, self- control in matters of small as well as of great importance, and the habit of repressing and thwarting our own wishes, even when the object desired may in itself be innocent, are absolutely necessary. The criminal is often as much entitled to our pity as to our censure. The sinner (for we must borrow a word from the theologian, though we desire to be understood as treating our subject more as a matter of moral science than of religion^ deserves at all times our unmitiAtea abboifenoe. His one
1846.]
with Illuiirations from Familiar History,
9
moving principle is lelfishness. At the same time we believe it will be found upon inquiry, that the darkest crimes which stain the annals of guilt have all come out of habitual surrender of the will to the entice- ments of moral evil; and that one offence in particular has in every age been more prolific in these than all other offences put together.
We are no ascetics ; neither do we profess to be of the number of those who charge it as an imperfection against Nature's laws, that she has implanted in the breasts of the op- posite sexes a strong desire to come together. The sentunent or passion to which we allude, and which leads to marriage and the propagation of the species, is not only mnocent in itself, but praiseworthv. Out of it arise some of the noblest traits that adorn the human character; — dis- interestedness, self-denial, the de- votion of one will to another ; and it is the undoubted source of all those pure and holy affections on the com- parative 8tren|;th or weakness of which civilisation may, in a great measure, be said to depend. But it must, to produce these nappy results, be guided and controlled by an in- fluence more potent than itself; for if it once establish an ascendancy over the mind — particularly in youth, which is most open to its insidious advances — the whole moral being of the man becomes vitiated. No mat- ter with what quickness of parts the sensualist is gifted. He may or may not exercise his intellectual faculties as he grows up, but it will never be in the prosecution of a noble or righteous purpose ; and should he chance to be of a dull capacity, then is it difficult to put a limit to the degree of degradation to which he may ultimately fall; for there is positively no crime of which the un- imaginative slave of lust may not be led into the commission, not hur- riedly but deliberately, and, as it would seem, in perfect freedom from the checks of remorse.
A remarkable instance of this sort was brought to light in this countiy something less than a hundred years ago, of which, because it seems fully to Ulnstrate the theory that we are now broaching, we shall proceed to give an account.
Butteriy Manor— ao old^fashicixed
house, beset with gable -ends and surmounted by high stacks of chim- neys— stands, or rather stood, a cen- tury ago, in the parish of Partridge, Derbyshire. It was one of a class of mansions which have well-nigh disappeared from this country; not very large, yet having a certain air of respectaisilitv about them, of which the dates might be taken any time between the eighth Henry and the accession of the first Charles, and of which we are accustomed, somewhat inaccurately, to speak as Elizabethan. The mansions in question all bear, where they yet survive, a remarkable family likeness one to another. You find in each a rather long front, with a porch about the nrincipal entrance ; gables at either nank which face in three separate directions; two rows of leaded windows, all opening as casements ; and on the show or ptarlour side of the house, con- siderablv ornamented; while the materials out of which the whole structure arise never vary. Red brick and oak timber are exclusively employed in the construction of sucn houses, and they are roofed over with tiles, and almost always stand either at the end of a grass court which divides them from a villaee, or within a small paddock, which lies cbiefiy in front, and is cut off from the x^ublic road by a thorn hedge.
Butterly Manor, like all other mansions of its class, was long the residence of a family, the head of which holding a place in society distinct from that of the yeoman, scarcely aspired to take his seat on the bench beside the magistrates or sc^uirearchy of the county. Together with the moderate estate that ap- pertained to it, it had been in pos- session of the Homes for longer time than can with truth be given to the pedigree of many a famify of higher pretensions ; and, till the occurrence of events of which it will be our business in the course of the following narrative to speak,'there was not one of all its owners but had established for himself a right to the respect of his neighbours by the character for honesty and good conduct, and of liberal hospitality, that appertained to him. But with them we are not now concerned.
It wa3 tQwards the evening oC a
10
The Philoiapky 0/ Crime,
[January,
doll September day, that in a large wainscoted apartment — an upper chamber in the house of which we are now speaking — an old man lay dying. Stirivelled and shrunk he was, for the weiffht of a hundred years was upon nim, and his dull grey eye stood wide open, moving neither to the right nor to the lef^ but abiding fixed — ^fixed as the hand of death could render it on the an- tique canopy which surmounted the antique bed on which he was lying. The hangings of the couch — heavy chintz of a faded yellow, interspersed with faded flowers of red and blue — were in part drawn back ; and on a rush - bottomed arm - chair, beside which stood a chamber-table sur- mounted with phials, a cup, a glass, and other sad f\imiture of a sick chamber, a middle-aged woman sat near him. She seemed to have had her powers of watchfulness a good deal taxed of late ; that is to say, her eye-lids went together, as it would appear, involuntarily, and she nodded from time to time as those are apt to do who fight against the advances of sleep and are worsted. Her sleep, however, was neither deep nor re- freshing, for the movement of her own head downwards broke it ; and the faintest murmur, the slight- est stir of the patient, caused her to rouse up ana observe him. At last he spoke ; and though it was in a tone so feeble as hardly to nve to his words an articulate sound, she was up and leaning over him, and eager, as it seemea, to catch and comprehend his meaning in a mo- ment.
** Martha,** whispered the dying man, ^* my hour is at hand. I am going! Kaise me a little upon the pUlow, and moisten my lips. I must speak to the boys once more. There, tnat will do. Now a drink^a drink of the cordial, and then go and send them both hither.**
The woman lifted the feeble old man as a nurse raises an infant, ar- ranged some pillows under his head and shoulders so as to place him in a half-recumbent position, put a little ett^er to his lips which he swallowed greedily, and quitted the apartment. In a few minutes the tramp of heavy feet sounded on the dark staircase; and Uie chamber-door being opened, by no means softly, two men, well
advanced in years, approached the bed-side.
** Ton are come at last,** said the old man, speakine in a move audible tone than ne had been able to com- mand while his nurse was near him. " I have looked for you all day, knowing that I should not see an- other ; out you did not so much as look in to satisfy yourselves whether I was alive or dead.**
" WeU,** replied the elder of the two, ** now that we are here, what do you want ?**
" Very little with you. Will,** was the answer. " You were always very dear to me— very — very — too dear, I am afraid — too dear by far ; and I love you still, my son; oh, He knoweth how tenderly ! You have not alwavs been a sood boy to others ; that is, I am afraid not ; in- deed I am sure you have not ; but to me you have never given an hour*s
Eain, except once, you know when ! ut that is all over now-*-and — and **
" Now do hold your bother !" re- plied the amiable youth of sixty-two, to whom this maudlin rhapsody was addressed ; " we*ve heara all that before; a hundred times, at least. Let*s know what you desire besides ; and be quick with it, will yon, for I don*t think you*ve much time to waste, and Tm sure I have none I**
" Veiy true, Will — very true! yon were always a sensible bcnr. Charles, come hither,** continued the old man, with difficulty raisinff his skinny hand fVom the coverlm on which it lay ; ** Tve a word to sty to you !*'
*' Well, father,** answered the in- dividual thus addressed, *^ what is it about ?•'
** About ikaif you know!** ex- claimed the &Uier. ^^It*s always in my mind — always. It has never been out of it since first yon told it.**
'' The beast!** muttered the elder brother, though scarcely in a tone to be overheard.
** You*ll keep your promise, won*t you f Yon*U never let it go further ? You*ll swear this now — now that I am dying, and Til hear it the last thing before I go P**
""I don*t like swearing, fiiither,** answered Charies.
'^ But you*ll promiae, Chnlesf— y«a*D promiiei won't yonf"
1846.]
with Illustrations frmn Familiar History,
11
ging» But,
^ Mayhap I may ; that is, if youWe not Dlayed any tnck in your will."
" No, no, Tve played, no trick — not at aJl — ^not at all I You are well provided for — handsomely provided for. You'll want for nothing — no- thing as long as you live !
**The devil he is!** demanded William ; " and so all your fine doincs with me go for nothing! Well done, old Hunks, that's just like you !'•
'' Hush, Will, hush ! don*t speak so loud. Put your ear down to me, and ril whisper something to you."
William Home pushed his bro- ther aside, and leaned his ear to his father*s lips. The latter said some- thing at which the former smiled. Whereupon William drew back again, and Charles» at his father's desire, took his place.
"Well, are you ready to swear ?** demanded the old man.
" No," replied Charles.
"To promise, then — solemnly to promise before God and your dying father?"
" I don't know. You're humbug-
j, I perceive — chousing, diddling, lut, never mind, I'll behave better to you than you intend to behave to me ; so here goes. I do promise."
"That you will never breathe to living soiu a syllable about ^ai f*
" Never."
"Nor write a line, nor drop a hint, nor give a sign whereby the ikcts might be brougnt to light ?"
" Pm no great fist at writmg," was the answer; "so you needirt tor- ment yourself on that head. No, nor on any other ; for, unless it be forced out of me by his aggravating ways, or I speaK in my sleep, or something else that's unnatural happen. Til never be the means of bnnging the matter to light. So die in peace, old man."
" I will," replied the ancient owner of Butterly Manor ; and, as if death and life had been equally at his con- trol, he expired without a jproan. The words were yet upon his lips when the eve became fixea and glassy, thejaw fell, and he was a corpse.
The amiable sons of the deceased cast each a careless fflance at their dead father, and, vrithout so much as removing the pillows or laying him fiat on his bed, turned away. Bis breeches hung oyer a sort of
clothes-horse hard by, and both made a spring at them. William's was the lucky clutch, and swinsing them round, so as to prevent his bro- ther from catching hold, he brought one of the large buttons of the waist- band in contact with Charles's eye, and for the moment blinded hmi. Never was opportunity more instan- taneously or eagerly embraced. While the hurt man stooped and rubbed his eye, and twisted round his back in his agony, his brother had thrust his hand into the pocket of the vestment and abstracted its con- tents. There were eleven golden gfuineas, with a little loose silver, which he forthwith transferred to his own pouch, and then casting the breeches on the floor, he demanded, with a sneer, what Charles wanted with them.
" You've robbed both your father and me," exclaimed the latter, bit- terly. "You'd take his very skin if you thought you could make a shil- ling by it; but don't come it too strone, or too often. I've promised to hold my tongue ; but remember, that it's only if I a'nt aggravated."
" You be blessed !" cried William, laughing contemptuously; "I don't care that for you. And he snapped his fingers. " You daren't spcEik for your own sake, and you know it."
" Give me the gumeas any how," replied Charles. " They're mine, I know they are, for I have seen his will, and he left the whole of his cash to me. So don't come to rob me, as you've robbed him often enouffh."
All this and more passed in the very presence of the dead. Both men were exasperated, both coarse, and results more hideous than a verbal dispute might have followed, had not their wrangling been inter- rupted by the sudden entrance of the same fbmiale who had made way for them when their father called them into his presence. We have not yet described her, and it is right that we should,
She might be forty-five years of a^e, or more or less, ior the time of lue is not always correctly delineated by the wrinkles that are marked on the human countenance. She was thin, weU-nigh to emaciation, with erizzled hair, and an expression of face that seemed to iodicttte » com-
12
The Philoiophy of Crime,
[January,
plete prostration of spirit. Grief, perhaps some darker passion, was manifestly gnawing at her heart, and the very tone of her voice told of bitterness. On the present occasion, however, she came as a messenger of peace. She had heard the loud speaking of the disputants, and know- ing them well, perhaps suspecting the cause, she hastened to interpose be- tween them. Her presence nad the effect of stopping the wrangle^ whereupon, turning her gaze to- wards the bed, she saw that it con- tained only a corpse. A loud and percing cry escaped her. She threw herself upon her knees, and taking up the cold hand in hers covered it with kisses and with tears.
" Oh, my father ! my father !*' ex- claimed the broken-hearted woman, "why have you gone before me? why have you leu me alone in a world like this to carry the load of my shame and my sorrow ?"
We have no power of lanj^uage in which to describe the look of wither- ing scorn which the elder of the two coarse men cast upon the woman. It spoke not only of contempt, but of abhorrence — of loathing such as men involuntarilv feel when they are brought suddenly into contact with a dead body that is in a state of de- composition. One word, however, and only one, which we need not pollute our pages by transcribing, escai>ed him ; having uttered which, he walked with a firm step out of the chamber. His brother Charles was not so bad. He spoke kindly to the prostrate woman, and would have raised her up if she had permitted him ; but she shrank from him as if there had been contamination in his touch. Whereupon, he also retired. What passed afterwards it is not necessary to detail at length. The old man s body was laid dccenUy out and deposited in a plain cofiin as soon as the latter could be got ready; and on the third day after his death four labouring men car- ried him on their shoulders to the villaffe churchyard, in a vault be- neath which, not far from the prin- cipal entrance to the church, his sons deposited him. Not a soul ex- cept themselves attended the funeral ; azid yet old Mr. Home had been much respected in his day, and at one time desenredly so, both by rich and poor.
The reading of a will is seldom an edifying scene to be present at. Strong and true must have been the love of the survivors for the de- ceased if at that moment their mean- est passions fail to break forth ; and if it so happen that Self was the god of their idolatry throughout, then are the exhibitions which they make of their own baseness revolting. Very few persons collected in the parlour at Butterly to hear the last will of its late owner explained. The attorney who wrote it, though he had either not been invited or failed to attend the funeral, was there; so were the bailiff and the parish clerk, they having signed as witnesses, and being requested by the attorney to verify their own signatures. But, except these, none appeared, save the two brothers William and Charles, for even Martha, their sister, stayed away — whether because she had l>een desired to do so, or that grief inca- pacitated her from retaining any ap- pearance of composure, is not known.
The little group assembled in the parlour. The brothers were dressed m deep mourning, and sat on oppo- site sides of the fire-place. The bailiff and parish clerk, the former in a clean smock-frock, the latter in his ordinary week-da^ attire, took possession of two chairs at the lower end of the room, while the attorney, Mr. John Cooke, of Derby, placed himself beside a table which stood in the middle of the floor. He scarcely looked in the direction of the brothers, otherwise he could have hardly avoided to observe that the countenances of both were full of meaning, which was not curi- osity, much less anxiety, but a sort of ill-suppressed glee, as if each felt satisfied that he was about to achieve a signal triumph over the other.
" I ou are aware, gentlemen," ob- served Mr. Cooke, as he drew a folded paper from his pocket, " that your late father, after making his will, directed me, in your hearing, to take charge of it; and that you may be convinced that while in my keeping no liberty has been taken with it, I have considered it right to bring these good men here to-day in order that, after the deed has been read, they may vouch as well for the accuracy of their own signatures as for thQ unaltered state of the docu-
1846.]
with lUustraiioM from Familiar Histpry.
13
ment in regard to erasures, or blot- tii^ or BO forth."
Neither William nor Charles made any reply, except hy a nod and a half-uttered ejaculation. And they likewise abstained, not, as it seemed, without an effort, from casting more than a furtiye glance one upon the other. Mr. Cooke, accordingly, pro- ceeded to read the will. It was, in every respect, a just and a wise one. William, the elder son, was declared heir to the whole of his father's landed property, as well as to the mansion-house, the furniture, plate, cellar, and all things thereunto be- longing. To Charles the testator be- queathed an inn, or public-house, in tne village, two or three messuages in the town of Derby, and a thousand pounds wherewith to set himself up in business, should he desire to follow any honourable calling ; while Mar- tha, their sister, received a portion of two thousand pounds sterling, with which she was advised to withdraw into some distant part of the country, and to cease, after her father should be laid in his grave, from holding any further correspondence with her brothers. Over and above these, a few trifling legacies were added, such as ten pounds to the bailiff, as much to an old groom, and one hundred to Mr. Cooke, as a mark of the testa- tor*s esteem, as well as an acknow- led^ent of his kindness in nnder- takmg to act with the elder of the two brothers as executor. Finally, William Home was declared to be his father's residuary legatee. *' And," observed Mr. Cooke, laying the deed upon the table and looking up, " as the will is of some standing, and your excellent father was never a man of much expense, I dare say you will find when the accounts come to be settled, that this last clause is not, as far as you are concerned, the least important.**
There was a brief pause, which the two brothers at length interrupted by requesting, almost simultaneously, that Mr. Cooke would read aloud the date of the will. He did so, by re« peating the words '^done and exe- cuted l>y me, this sixteenth day of July, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and thirty- five.**
'* That*s not the last will of my father/' exclaimed Chiurl^ riring;
'^Tve a later deed here, which I shall request you, Mr. Cooke, to ex- amine ; and if you find it all correct, to read aloud.**
So saying, he advanced to the table and handed to the attorney a will bearing date some day in the month of August, 1745, which Mr. Cooke, after having carefully scruti- nised it, pronounc^ to be perfectly regular in every respect. It differed from the will of eleven years earlier only in these respects, that while the land and house were bequeathed to William, Charles was made heir to the whole of his father's movables, not excepting even the plate, and wine, and furniture of Butterly; while, after the payment of lOOOZ. to Martha, every shilling of the de- ceased's personal property became his. Moreover, tnis will, like the deed of 1735, was witnessed by the deceased's bailiff and the parish clerk, and both, having the docu- ment submitted to them, declared that the signatures were authentic.
" Now ru trouble you, Mr. Cooke, to say, as a lawyer, whether my bro- ther William nas any right to the money which he took out of my fa- ther's pocket the day of his death ? I don*t know how much there was of it, for he never shewed me, and I knew it was no use asking. But as Pm the residuary legatee, and am entitled to the whole of his personal
Property, Tm not going to be choused y him, nor by any one.** Mr. Cooke, in spite of the surprise and mortification with which the
Eroduction of this second will affected im, was still master of himself, and replied, that undoubtedly all the monies found in the house would be- come the mo^Tty of the younger, son after the just debts of the de- ceased should be paid; and that Charles, as the sole executor, was the proper party to be entrusted with the keeping of them.
Loud and scornful was the lauffh with which William received the legal judgment of the attorney. He did not, however, rise from his chair, nor exhibit any other sjrmptom of annoyance; but, stretching out his legs and thrusting both hands into his pockets, he caused the coins which lay at the bottom of each to jingle, and looking contemptuously at his brother, said,—
14
The Philosophy of Crime,
[January,
" Do you hear 'em P"
**Yei,** was the answer, fiercely vetumed, ** and Fll see them, too, ere lonff ."
**(mi I wish you may get it. Look ye, Mr. Cooke,*' continued William, after a brief pause, during which the amiable relatives had eyed each other with looks of deadly hate, ** I know a trick worth two of that. YouVe brought your will, Charles has produced his, and now it's my turn. But I won't do as he did. I dou't get my father to make a surreptitious will, and for fear any body should find it out, carry it in my pocket wherever I ^. My father knew his own intentions bet- ter than any body else, and I dare say his real will — his bond JIde last testament — will be found in the bureau up-stairs, where he keeps the rest of his valuable papers, his title-deeds and so forth. And, there- fore, Mr. Cooke, I deliver to you this key, requesting that you will have the goodness to make search yourself, and to bring down the deed, should such be in existence, to us, who will abide your return here pa- tiently. Go you, however. Brown," addressing himself to the bailiff, " go you with Mr. Cooke, and help him, and see that he examines the proper pigeon-hole, and does so careAilly.'*
It is impossible to describe the effect which this proceeding on the part of William Home produced upon the whole of the individuals that witnessed it. The attorney, as if a spell were upon him, rose, took the key which was offered, and, fol- lowed by Browne the bailiff, pro- ceeded up-stairs. The narish-clerk seemed stupified, while Cnarles could only gaze, with open mouth and out- stretched eyes, upon his brother. Not a word escaped him. He did not so much as change a muscle of his body, but stood beside the table to which he had advanced, facing Wil- liam, who met his gaze with a look of cool and cruel triumph. By and by the parties who had proceeded on their search returned, and brought with them, sure enough, a third will. It was of much later date than either of those yet produced, and, like them, was regular in all its details, even to the signatures of the same identical witnesses. But here the similarity ended. The true last will constituted
William Hocne his fiither*s sole heir, residuary legatee, and executor. It bequeathed to him lands, mansion, messuages, money — every thing, in short, except the public-house at the bottom of the laue, and the sum of one himdred pounds, wherewith his brother Charles was recommended to b^n business. Of Martha no men- tion whatever was made, further than that the old man commended her to the protection of his heir, and ad- visea that he would find a comfort- able boarding-house for her some- where at a distance. As to memoriids of kindness to old servants or others, none such were here; and yet the document was perfect, and .the de- ceased's signature thereto firm and legible. And so it was manifest to all who listened that flaw in the deed there could be none.
" You've done it well, that's cer- tain," exclaimed Charles. ** You've kept up the game to the last. Well, look to yourself, for, by the sun above our heads, I'll have my rights, too, otherwise every thing will come out, and then
" Do your worst," replied William, sternly. *^ And in the meanwhile, as YOU have no fhrther business in this house, make yourself scarce ; and go either to the Three Bells or to the devil, and one hundred pounds shall be paid to you whenever you choose to send for them."
It were long to tell in detail how the members of this singular family deported themselves subsequentlyto these remarkable transactions. The heir to Butterly Manor took possession of his inheritance ; and without a moment's delay, or the manifestation of the slightest compunction, thrust forth his sister Martna to the world. It came out, indeed, upon a subse- quent investigation into the matter, that she did not wait to receive a formal dismission ; but making up a bundle of a few of her clothes, and leaving the remainder to be sent after her by Brown the bailiff, she quitted the house on the evening of her father's funeral ; and travelled on foot to Derby. There she found for herself an obscure lodging, where by husbanding her small resources she managed, durine some months, to keep soul and body together. But her small stock of money was at lengtii exhausted; and her apparel
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with Illustrations from Familiar History.
U
went morsel b^ morsel, and at last her health, which had been miser- able fVom the first, failed her quite, and her sufferings were extreme. In this emergency she sent for Mr. Cooke, who ministered to her wants as far as he was able ; and in the end, baring, without consulting her, made repeated applications, but all to no purpose, spoke to her of the workhouse. It was a terrible an- nouncement— it was a word of &ar- flil omen. She was, indeed, so broken down on the occasion of his referring to it, that, eyen without such a pro- spect before her, the medical man who ^tuitousljr prescribed for her gave it as his opinion, that she could not last many days. As it was, she went to her miserable bed immedi- ately Mr. Cooke left her ; and when ihe woman, a poor neighbour, that used to light her fire, and help to get her up, came next morning to perform her accustomed offices of charity, Martha Home was dead. Poor wretch, it was a happy release fbr her ; and if she did receive but a pauper's foneral, and was laid in a churchyard apart from that where the ashes of her kindred reposed, what was she the worse for it, or what cal'ed either of those on whom nature had ^ven her adaim for more P
Meanwhile, Charles finding that nothing better was to be done, fol- lowed the adyioe of his amiable re- latiye, and established hhnself in the Three Bells. Whether he did well or ill there, the record has not been preseryed ; but it is certain that he became as abject to William, as we fbund him on previous occasions to be pugnacious ; and that he derived the same benefits from the assump- tion of this new manner that he did from the old. Though he stood hat in hand to open the gate for his brother as he rode through, William never condescended to notice him; and as to assistance, pecuniary or otherwise, none such was ever ten- dered. They were a very singular pair these bad men ; and both were regarded by the neighbourhood with dimvour.
While Charles thus conducted himself in the public-house, Wil- liam, always mean, and selfish, and nndeighboarlv, fell more and more into habitfli of penuriousness and fe- rocity. H« Bumied, indeed, imd,
strange to say, found a woman of some property to link her fate with his; but neither his wedding, nor the accession which the bride brought to his means, operated an^ change for the better on his disposition. He never had a good wora to say of any one, nor any one a good word to say of him. The poor he opprened and persecuted whenever a conve- nient opportunity presented itself. Never shooting, nor even coursing himself, he suea for penalties against all those round about him, who, not being duly (qualified, kept dogs, or were seen with guns across their shoulders. The orphans* curse and the widows* ban attended him whi- thersoever he went; and he paid both back by driving them away from bis door if by mj mistake, or through the pressure of want, they betook themselves thither for reliei. In like manner his domestic affairs, as well as the mani^ment of the farm, were conducted on the most niggardly principle. He dismissed allnis domestic servants except one old housekeeper, and his stable -men and out-door helpers were brought down to the same scale of unity, lie never gave employment to husband- men or reapers, unless at seed-time and harvest. He kept one team of wagon-horses, with a wagoner and his mate to work his acres ; though they numbered full a hundred. Of course, all things within and without the mansion fell into decay. The fences got out of repair, and were not mended. Great ^ps might be seen in the hedge, which cut off the ]^dock from the parish-road. The gnarled oaks which adorned the broken and picturesque space of grass-land that fronted the house, cast branches to the ground every gale of wind that blew ; and nobody took the trouble to gather them up. Rank weeds defiled the avenue flrom one extremity to another, and grew, and withered, and put forth a pesti- lential atmosphere, up to the very stone slab that lay before the porch. You never by any accident saw a substantial volume of smoke ascend from one of the chinmeys ; and if you wandered round to the back premises, decay and neglect were visible in every thing; firom the stable doors, that for la(^ of fasten-* ings shook and banged in erery
16
The Philosophy qf Crime^
breeie» to the posts and rails that surrounded the barn-yard, and rot- ted where they stood, throuj^h the absence of a little fresh paint. Never, in short, did human habitation, or the aspect of the things wherewith it was surrounded, bear clearer testi- mony to the penurious habits of an owner, and his total disregard to comfort, and even to his own inter- ests; for the very corn-stacks took damafl;e as often as the rain fell heavily; because the thatch where- with they had been covered proved insufficient, and therefore melted away.
A man addicted to such tastes and pursuits as these soon makes ene- mies; and William llorne proved no exception to the general rule. Indeed, nobody seemed to recollect the time when it was otherwise ; for their earliest reminiscences described him as a profligate and selfish crea- ture, to whom more maidens in the district, and especially among his mo- therms domestics, owed their shame, than they could now enumerate. His father, it was said, had been ever indulgent to him. An elegant scholar himself— accounted, indeed, one of the best classics in the county — old Mr. Home had professed an anxietv to cultivate similar tastes in his eldest son ; but being, as not un- frequently happens with elegant clas- sical scholars, weak of purpose, and guided more by the heart than bjr the ead, he set about the business in a manner which could not fail of en- suring a defeat. While he advised and entreated William to studv Ta« citus, and spoke to him of the beau- ties of Horace or of Pindar, he set him up ere he had attained his ninth year with a ponjr ; and could never say No, when his darling cried for permission to ride. Now riding is a far more pleasant exercise to a child of eight years old, than learning the rules of Latin syntax ; and so Wil- liam and his pony became such true and constant companions, that no room was left in the boy*s affections for the classic muse.
It was marvellous to witness the ascendancv which that coarse and wilful child acquired over his father. Every demand that he made was ac- oeded to ; and every scrape into which he got, or fault which he C9mmitted, was explained away or ex*
tenuated. By and by vice made ita appearance ; and the father, while he lamented, had hardly courage enough to reprove it. Thus the bov grew to manhood, in the habitual mdul^- ence of the most debasing of the ani- mal propensities; and gn^ually los- ing under its influence the small redeeming quality which is not un- frequentlv to be met in persons pro- fligite only in a d^ree, we mean, in- difference to the cost of a coveted good, and lavish expenditure on the ministers of their pleasures, it was said of this man that he was never known to do a generous action in all his life. But though the tide of pub- lic oninion ran strong against him, and nis name was never uttered except with some accompaniment of reproach or condemnation, it was not till some little time subsequently to the old man's decease that deeper and darker whispers concerning him began to grow current.
It happened once upon a time, about three months after the burial of Martha, that Charles Home was taken ill. His malady was a dan- gerous one, and he became exceed- mgly alarmed; and desired one day, amid a paroxysm of fear and terror, that Mr. Ck>oke the attorney mi^ht be sent for. Mr. Cooke, anticipating that some testamentary arrangements were to be made, obeyed the sum- mons; and at the sick man's desire sent the attendant out of the cham- ber, and closed the door. They were a good while there closeted together, though what passed between them did not transpire, only Mr. Cooke, when goinff away asain, vras over- heard, as he hem the door of the apartment, i^ar to say, ^* I tell you it is too serious a thmg to be con- cealed. You are bound to state all that you have stated to me to a ma« gbtrate.** What that all was, how- ever, nobody found an opportunity of ascertaining, for Charles Home recovered, and did not go before the magistrate; and as to the mj'stery, whatever it might be, it continued as dark and impenetrable as ever.
No, not quite so impenetrable. Strange and norrible tales bespm to be circulated, which men could not trace to any better authority than the statements of their neighbours, but which every body seemed to be- lieve. The few that had heretofore
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17
greeted Mr. William Home at pa- rish meetings or market, now seemed as if it were their wish to shun him. No more heggars came to his door, and his groom at a short notice left him. Mr. William Home was not so blind but that he noticed this change in the general manner to- wards him, and he deeply resented it. If he had been harsh before, he was tenfold more harsh now; and entered, as it were, upon a crusade against all poachers. So passed se- veral years, till Christmas 1758, when one James Roe, a tenant-farmer in the neighbourhood of Butterly, commit- ted a slight trespass by following a hare, of which his greyhounds were in chase, across the march-line, and killing her on Hornets land. He was in the act of packing up the game when Home, who had been watch- ing behind a hedge, advanced to the spot. Hoe was not alone. A good many of his friends were spending the day with him ; and the weather being open, they had got up a sort of match with the greyhounds ; but Home cared little for that. They had trespassed on his land, at least Hoe had, for all the rest were halted just beyond his land-mark ; and he attacked the delinquent with such a volley of abuse as he was in the habit of pouring upon all who might be so unfortunate as to incur his dis- pleasure. A violent altercation en- sued, during which Koe let fall the expression, that ** he had better keep a quiet tongue, for he was weu known to be an incestuous old black- guard."
The face of the old man became livid, but he did not quail an inch. On the contrary, he doubled his fist, shook it in Roe's face, and told him that he should repent it.
William Home was as sood as his word. He caused proceecungs to be instituted in the ecclesiastic^ court of Exeter against James Roe for defamation ; and the latter being un- able either to deny what he had spoken, or to bring evidence as to tne truth of the charge, was . cast in damages and costs, ana obliged to do penance in public.
Meanwhile, Charles Home, whe- ther yielding to the remonstrance of Mr. Cooke, or becoming himself alarmed at certain hints which were dropped in his presence, by many VOL. xxzm. HO. czcm.
who frequented his house, had gone to a magistrate. That gentleman, as it came out in course of time, cautioned the defendant to say no- thing farther, representing that the occurrence had long passed, that it was of a very serious nature, and that no good could arise out of a public disclosure to any one. Charles was accordingly silenced for a time. But no sooner did he become ac- quainted with the particulars of the quarrel between his brother and Mr. Roe, than he went before a second ma- gistrate, to whom he made the same statement which he had done to the first, and who, as it afterwards appear- ed, proved to be, like his brother-func- tionary, very reluctant to move in the matter. This ^ntleman was not, however, so cautious as the other; for in the course of conversation somewhere, he made disclosures which soon took wind, and were car- ried, as might have been expected, to the very man to whom the avowal was likely to be acceptable. James Roe still writhed under the infliction of a fresh wound ; and believing that the opportunity was presented of setting his revenge, he hastened to taxe ad- vantage of it.
Roe went first to the house of Mr. Cooke, who told him all that Charles Home had communicated to him five years previously. They then pro- ceeded together to the residence of Mr. AYhite, the last of the magis- trates before whom Charles had de- sired to make a deposition ; and hav- ing extracted from him a full avowal of all that had occurred between him and the younger of the two Homes, they took their measures accordingly. It was evident to Mr. Cooke, that, be the cause what it might, the magis- trates of Derbyshire were reluctant to interfere in the matter. He there- fore advised Mr. Roe, if he were determined to pursue the case, to go and make his deposition before some magistrate for the countv of Not- tingham, and to get from him a w^ar- rant for the apprehension of Charles Home, which none of the justices could refiise to back, and which must lead to the apprehension, and conse- quent examination in full, of the man on whose testimony the ques- tion assumed to be at issue depended. This was done accordingly; and Charles Home being arrested, was
G
1846.}
with IlluM^Hcm frwm FtmiKar History.
19
old robe'tU^hamhre* He did nol wait to be intenogsted; he made no demand as to the cause of the in- trusion ; but cried, in a bitter, tone,—
" It*8 a sad thing to hang me ; for my brother Charles is as bad as I, and he can*t hang me without hang* ing himself!'*
To secure the prisoner and carry him before the magistrate, and to convey him thence to the gaol of Nottingham, in order that he mi^ht take his trial at the apnroachmg assizes, was the work of a lew hours. He did his best to be admitted to bail, and, obtaining a judge's war* rant, was removed to London, where the nature of his ofienee, or sunposed offence, was strictly investigated; but no bail was granted, neither was he permitted to traverse. When the next gaol delivery came round, he was placed at the bar on a most hidecms charge, namely, the murder of his own cmld, the child being the fruit of an incestuous intercourse between him and his sister.
The particulars of the trial may be ascertained by all who will take the trouble to examine the records of the criminal court in the town of Nottingham ; but we cannot pretend to give them. Our purpose is suffi* eiently served when we state, that the birth of the child took place at a period so remote as 1724 ; that Wil- liam Home was then forty-one years of age, his wretched sister barely nineteen; and that the living evi- dence of their guilt was dispMcd of in a manner to which the mother was no party, and of which she knew nodiing till some time afterwards. On the third day from the birth — ' which took place in Butterly, where his daughter and both his sons resided with old Mr. Home, their mother having been for several years dead— Williun sought out Charles, and told him that, at ten o'clock that night, it waa absolutely necessary that they should take a ride togetiier. Ac- cording to Charles's statement, he did not entertain the most remote idea of the purpose that was intended, till his brother came to him in the stable, bearing an itafant in his arms, well and warmly clad, which he thmst into a long Hnen bag ; that William then saddled two horses and led them out, and that, carrying the sack by turns, they rode five good miles to Annesley in Nottinghmshirc. YThen they
drew near theplaee, William alighted ; and asking Charles whether the brat were still alive, and receiving an an* swer in the affirmative, he took it out of his brother's arms, enclosed in the bag as it was, and walked away with it. Charles waited some time, according to the instmctions of the other, and, at last, William nnoined him ; but there was neither chud nor bag in his hand. Being questioned as to what he had done with them, he said that he had made a present of both to Mr. Chaworth of Annes- 1^, and that the servants of that gentleman would find more than they bargained for snug under a hay- stack, when they came in the morn- ing to fodder tne cattle. No more piused between the brothers at that time. They rode home, put up the horses without attracting attention, went to bed, and heard, next day, that a dead child had been discovered, enclosed in a linen bag, exactly where William had stated that Mr. Cha- worth's people would find one. It would appear that the coroners of those days had little of the spirit of Mr. WaiLley among them, for there is no record that any inquest waa held upon the babe, or that inquiries oonoeming it were pushed with dili- gence. H^theoontrary been the case. It seems next to impossible that the trath should not have come to light at the moment. Nevertheless, as if the tmth of the saying which affirms that murder vM out nmst, even in so curious an instance, be confirmed, the people who made the discovery in 1734 were all alive to tell about it in 1759; and they corroborated the statement of the principal witness, in v^azd to the tune of finding the body, and its dress and condition, in eveiT i^rticttlar. On this evidence, Wflnam ■ Home was fbund guilty, and condnnned to be hanged.
It was the custom in those days to carry the sentence of death into ex- ecution against murderers on the day after that on which it had been pro- nounced; and, through a humane desire of allowing the criminal as much time as possible to make his peace with Heaven, the judges usually contrived to bring on sucn cases on a Saturday, so tiiat Sunday, which, in the eye of the law, is a dies nan, might be granted to the condemned as a season of preparation. In pur- suance of this ^Btom, Home, having
20
The Philosophy of Crime,
[January,
been tried on Saturday tbe 10th, was doomed to die on Monday the 12th. But, bemg an old man— seventv-four years of age — and descended n*om a respectable family, and his case being a peculiarly horrible one, certain humane persons of weight in the neighbourhood exerted themselves to procure for bim a reprieye, and they succeeded. " It was too short a time," so ran their petition, *^ for such an old sinner to search his heart;" and the judge, agreeing with them in the opinion, a respite of the sentence for a month was granted. The old sinner used his reprieve, not in any endeavour to make his peace witn God or man, but to weary the go- vernment with applications for par- don. He exhibited, in making these efforts, the same selfish and dastardly spirit which had animated him throughout his career of crime. He complained of the hardship of suffer- ing for an offence committed so long ago, and accused his brother of being not only a participator in the offence, but the party by whom its com- mission had been suggested. Strange to say, his petitions, unworthily ex- pressed as they were, prevailed so far, that a second reprieve during pleasure reached him ; but the sen- tence was not commuted. On the contrary, Justice appeared, at last, to awake from a trance, and tbe order for his execution reached Notting- ham. He was overwhelmed with despair. He complained that griev- ous wrong had been done him ; yet, during the night previous to his ex- ecution, he acknowledged that the blood of other poor victims besides that of the infant lay upon his head : one, a young woman, whom he had mur- dered becaiiae she was with child by him; the other, a labouring man, whose arm he had broken with a blow of a hedge -stake, and who, being in delicate health, never re- coyered the injury.
Such was the man and his career. The fate of the frail partner in the most heinous of his moral offences was very different. Slowly she re- covered after her confinement, for though they concealed from her that her cnild was dead, she yearned with a mother*s instinctive fondness to have the babe near her, and pined and fretted when assured that this was impossible. Strange to say, like- uripe, tne &ct of her couftnement
never reached her father's ears till some time afterwards, nor got bruited about the neighbourhood, except as some horrid suspicion is taken up and circulated. The woman who had nursed her when an infant was still in the family, and the wretched cul- prit, having opened her griefs to her, found a generous and a true heart to lean upon. That old and attached menial contrived matters with such exceeding skill, that for several months Martha kept her chamber, under the plea of some ordinary ill- ness, and received, in her hour of trial, the assistance of a midwife, who, being brought from a distance, and intrmluced mto the house blindfolded and at night, was never afterwards able to say on whom she had at- tended. The same faithful creature agreed to intrust the infant to the brothers, on the assurance that they would carry it to a place of safety ; and when, on the following day, the rumour of what had actually occurred reached her, she retained self-posses- sion enough not to betray the feelings which it called up. From that time forth, however, sue could never bear to look upon the doubly-unnatural father ; and so, after abiding by her charge till she was able to go abroad a^ain, she quitted Mr. Homers ser- vice, and was never heard of in that part of the country again.
Unhappy Martha! For her all peace, all self-respect were forfeited ror ever. She did not go mad, but she moved about the house like a broken-hearted thing, nor ever ex- hibited the slightest sign of reviving interest in any thing, till her father sent for her one day into his stud v, and informed her that he knew all. Nothing could exceed the old man's gentleness. He laid his guilty daugh- ter's head upon his uioulder and wept like a child; and when she mustered courage to ask him how he effected the discovery, he told her that Charles luid, in consequence of some quarrel with his brother, made him aware of all the circumstances. '' But what can I do, Martha P W^e cannot recall the past, and to expose it would only bring disgrace and ruin upon us all ; so I have exacted a promise from both of them that they will dismiss the subject from their memories, and you, my poor child, must endeavour to do the same.** Oh, who can tell what that
1846.]
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21
ffuilty and heart-broken woman may nave felt, when these words of mercy and of a parentis love fell upon her ears I She did not promise to forcet, that she could never undertake to do ; but she pledged her word to make no inquuy after the child; and frightful as the struggle often was to keep it, she made it triumphantly, and the promise was kept.
From that time forth all the mem- bers of the Home family, the father alone excepted, hated one another with a deadly hatred. The feeling of Martha towards her brothers was, to be sure, loathing and terror rather than hatred ; but William hated her, and took every opportunity of shew- ing it, whilst Charles, treating her with neglect, but seldom with un- kindness, turned all his rancour against William. And so, for a space or three-and-twenty years, their days were passed^ in a sort of companion- ship which we can liken to nothing more nearly than that of doomed spirits in the place of their torment ; for they either could not or did not fall upon the obvious expedient of a separation, but dwelt together under the same roof, perpetual blisters and thorns one to another. At last, the patriarch, after far passing the age of man, died; and Martha, who had nursed him through a long illness, and was ever ready to lick the dust from his shoes, was thrown, through the imbecile deceit of a three-fold will, penniless upon the world.
The history of the progress of this man in guilt seems to bear out in a very remarkable degree the theory which, in the opening of the present paper, we ventured to propound, namely, that though crime be some- thing quite distinct from moral evil, and in itself not unfrequently less deserving of reprobation, it is the sure result, in every instance, of the absence of those powers of self-con- trol, which are not to be acquired except from long practice, ana the negation by the individual to him- self of many an object, in itself harm- less, of which he may experience the desire to become possessed. Crimes — and great crimes, too— are some- times committed without premedita- tion; and when they so befal, we pity the criminals — who, indeed, are just objects of our compassion — to the fuU as much as we blame them. Yet, even in such oases, the careful
inquirer will never fail of tracing back the particular act to some habit of self-indulgence, which, though overlooked by the world, has long existed, and given a bias to the whole character of the criminal. Amon^ these, moreover, there is none which so surely extinguishes, in the end, all perception of moral risht as the sur- render of the will to tne impulses of one, not unnatural, propensity. And if this debasing passion be suffered in early life to gain the ascendancy, there is an end to both the power and the will in its victim to cultivate either the intellectual or the moral faculties which Nature may have be- stowed upon him. William Home, for example, appears to have been a child of slow parts, coarse tastes, and of a disposition, contradictory and wilful. A weak, though learned father, in- stead of observing this, and adapting the manner of the boy^s culture to the soil on which he had to work, devoted a great deal of time and at- tention to the calling into existence of tastes which had neither seed nor germ in his son*s constitution. The task was, of course, difficult, and the labour to both parties great, which the injudicious father endeavoured to lighten by over-indulgence out of the school-room ; and the conse- quence was, that his pleasures be- came the business of the youth's life, his studies a penance, from which he seized every opportunity of escaping. Suppose, however, that a different course had been pursued, and that the father, seeing whither the na- tural temperament of the son tended, had encouraged him to devote his mind to out-of-door pursuits; the young man would have probably been what is called wild, in any event, but the good farmer and keen sportsman never could have com- mitted such crimes as those for which, on his seventy-fourth birth- day, William Home suffered. For lil)ertinism, though it vitiate the tastes and unfit its victim for the ap- preciation of the good and the beau- tiful, rarely, till it outruns all bounds^ associates itself with cmelty and a disregard of human life. Wbcn it becomes the great master-passion in the man, however, there is no telling into what atrocities it will lead him, and this the case of William Home has, we conceive, yery sufficiently attested.
22
Principal Ctampaigiu in the Rise of NapoleM. [Januiiry,
I»RIKCXPAL CAMPAIGNS IN THE RISE OF NAPOLEON.
No. I.
THB ITAUAN CAMPAIGNS.
We believe that public attention in England is gradually turning to military affairs. Time is wearing away tne fatal prejudices which led to so many disasters, and made even unconquered soldiers purchase ulti- mate triumphs at so vast an expense of blood and treasure. We are be- ginning to perceive the folly of term- ing ourselves a naval and commercial people independent of military forces ; and are, by degrees, rather ashamed of the fantastic apprehension, which even in modern times made us jea- lous of a British army, and made us look upon sons, brothers, country- men, as constitutionally dangerous the moment they were arrayed in their sovereign's uniform : a reputa- tion for exalted patriotism and en- lightened philanthropy is no longer acquired by simply libelling the army. The progress of science has nar- rowed the Channel, reduced mighty oceans to comparatively small di- mensions, brought our shores within the reach of hostile arms, and exposed our colonies, scattered over the wide surface of the globe, to attacks, against which naval forces can prove no per- manent security. And though the power of steam, which is effecting these great changes, augments the naval advantages we already possess, by adding to our superiority as sol- diers and seamen, the superior skill and energy our people have evinced as enffineers; yet it seems now ad- mitted, that no coast can be pro- tected against armaments conveyed by steam-vessels, unless by land forces ready to meet the assailants on shore. Tms important truth is gra- dually making itfl way in public con- viction, and calling attention to mili- tary affairs.
The perfect working of the govern- ment machinery, which in civilised states permits the rulers of nations to bring the whole force of empires into the field, together with the im- proved system of military discipline and organisation, which renders armies more compact and moremov- \ble than in former times, hay^ ren-
dered the operations of offensive warfare infinitely more fbrmidable than the mere unsupported inroads of former periods could be consi- dered. Against the dangers resulting from such a state of Uiings we are naturally bound to be prej^red ; we owe this to our own security, and to the high station we hold at tne head of civilisation. We entertain no hostile feelings against other nations, we seek for no additional possession. The sun never sets upon our empire ; . a hundred and fifty millions of peo- ple live beneath our sway; and what acquisition made by war could possibly equal the additional power, glory, and force, certain to be gained by every step of progress and im- provement made m peacefld times uy an empire of such boundless extent and resources? Our conduct in peace and in war — and it cannot be too oflen repeated in opposition to so many libels foreign and domestic — ^faas ever been fair, firank, generous, and upright, an example to the na- tions of the earth. The enlightened and the dispassionate in both hemi- spheres will, we have no doubt, give us full credit for such conduct, out nations are not always ruled by ab- solute wisdom; and great as the sacrifices we have made, to live upon friendly terms with France and America, it would be utter folly to disguise from ourselves the enmity entertained against us by the low democracy of both countries; and which can hardly fail to break into open hostility the moment those par- ties acquire ascendancy either at Washington or in Paris.
As the zealous advocates of peace, we recommend readiness for war; for the most violent agjpressors will pause before they assad the bold and the well prepared. On the other hand, nothing so much en- courages an enemy as the efforts of domestic parties striving to crush the martiid spirit of a people, and weaken the military efforts of the state under the plea of economy; at the same time ti^t they vilify the conduct of
18464
The /to/uM Cati^taiffiU.
23
0ovemment towards oUier nations; thus givinff hostile powers, though treated witn the greatest fairness and generosity, a plea to excite animosity against us even on the strength of our own words. History has suffi- ciently shewn how greatly the efforts of domestic factions aided the cause of rancorous foes in our late French and American wars.
We have at present no intention of lecturing on patriotism or on tac- tics, thougn we may occasionally introduce some of our futiure papers with a few remarks on the latter subject. Our only object here is to avail ourselves of what we believe to be the augmenting taste of the pub- lic for military reading, in order to sketch some of the sanguinary campaigns which placed Napoleon on a throne of never equalled power. As military history, wnen the causes of success and defeat are properly developed, tends not only to interest the r^er, but to enlarge and dear the views, enrich the ideas he may already have formed on the subject it cannot be too much recommended to nations liable at all hours to be called into the field ; for it is only a wide-spread national knowledge of the theory of war, which can ensure the most efficient training and suc- cessful employment of Uie forces. We use the word theorjf here, in its just and real meaning — the bright source of every great improvement made in human knowledge : the dull martinet tactician believes it to be some monster of darkness, that ought to be consigned to the flames with all possible speed. Brave soldiers and gallant officers we can always com- mand, for they are the produce of our soil; but these alone cannot command success. We had brave troops at the commencement of the Seven Years' War, and were yet un- successful in all our early undertak- ings; the gallantry of our men could not avert the failures of the American contest, and the ultimate success of
the great war against republican and imperial France was only purchased by fifteen years of mismanagement and disaster. Reasons enough it may be supposed for now devotmg some attention to militanr affairs.
Feebly as the mllowing sketches may be drawn, we can safely say, that we believe them — ^the Itidian campaign more especially — to be founded on the best and most au- thentic documents on which military history was ever composed ; and we shall, in due time, lay our authori- ties at length before the reader. It will no doubt be said, as it has been said already, that the views taken in these papers are highly unjust to Napoleon, that they are mere ^* crotchets" in fact. The reader need not be told, that every novel doctrine advanced against widely spread and deeply rooted opinion is invariably so termed; every new idea in science, philosophy, history, has been assailed ; and the practice will probably continue as long aa human knowledge- shall continue to advance. We may, no doubt, be mistaken, as well as our critics, in the views taken in these sketches ; but we have, owing to our authorities, the advantage of stating the facts more accurately, we believe, than they have yet been stated ; and having done so, we leave it to the reader to follow us in our inferences, or to draw his own, if it must be so, more lo^cal conclu- sions. But military critics, it is said, differ so widely on these points as to render it doubtful who is to be be- lieved. This should not, we suspect, offer any real difficulty; for the reader wno comes with an unbiassed mind to the investigation of any sub- ject will necessarily follow the writer who brines the points whence truth is to be derived, in the clearest and most intelligible manner home to his understanding. No person of ordinary ability is likely to be im- posed upon by mere terms of extra- vagant praise or censure.
Chaptjsb I.
Napoleon appointed to the Command of the Army of Itii]r..i«Siiaatioii of the Country at the period. — French and Austrian Armies and tneir Commanders-^Combats of Montenotte, I>ego, Milleaiimo, and Mondovi. <— Atmiatice of Checasco end Tetmioation of the war wilh Sardinia.
Napoleon Buonaparte commenoed his eztraozdinary career under eir- cmnstaiifies the most &.7aiiEahle to
an adventurous rise. The tempest of the BcTolution had leveled the tmrrieia that in ordinary times ex*
24
Principal Campaigns in the Rise of Napoleon* [January,
elude all but nobles and the posses- Eors of high rank from the direction of public affairs ; lawyers, adventu- rers, and rene^ado priests, ruled the republic hy aid of the terror which the guillotine inspired. Armies were often commanded by individuals who before the commencement of the troubles had followed the most peace- ful occupations ; and many of those who had been non-commissioned officers in the royal regiments, were already colonels and generals of division in the second year of the *' Republic One and Indivisible."
Napoleon had received a good military education at the best semi- naries in France. The revolution found him a lieutenant of artillery, and the emigration of the superior officer raised him to the rank of colonel ; and this was already stand* ing very high at such a time, and when his country was at war with the principal powers of Europe.
But thougn circumstances thus placed him in a favourable position, he was not at first very successful. By the indisnosition of nis superior, the commana of the artillery at the siege of Toulon had devolved upon him ; but his conduct seems to have attracted no particular notice; for his name is not mentioned in the despatches announcing the capture of the fortress; he received no tmm«- diate promotion; and his next ser- vice was of very secondary import- ance. In the summer of 1794, we find him, however, commanding the artillery of the army of Italy ; but he did not long continue to hold the appointment, for in the following year we already see him at Paris, soliciting employment from the mi- nister-at-war, and actually placed for a time on the retired list.
His fortunes appear, at this period, to have been very low indeed : he seems to have been in pecuniary diffi- culties, and actually sought the hand of Mademoiselle de Montansier, a lady of great wealth, but far advanced in 3rears. Failing in this pursuit, he projected a voyage to Constantinople for the purpose of seeking service in Turkey, when the revolution of the 13th Vend^miaire opened brighter prospects to him.
When on that occasion, Barras, the victor of .the 9th Thermidore, was plac^ fX th« b«ad of the troops
destined to oppose the insurants, he gave the command of the artillery to Napoleon, whom he had known at the siege of Toulon. The result is well known; the National Guard fled at the fii^t fire ; but it is a mis- take, as generally asserted, that any- particular merit was ascribed to Na- poleon: all the honour, such as it was, devolved upon Barras, who really commanded the troops. This officer, having on the formation of the new government been named one of the Directors, resigned the command of the i^rmy of the interior, which was given to Napoleon, whose star now rose rapidly above the horizon.
Among the ladies most distin- guished at this time in the Parisian circles of fashion for figure and elegance of manners, was Josephine Beauhamois, widow of the Marquis de Beauhamois, guillotined during the revolution. She had great in- fluence with the Director Barras, some say more than legitimate in- fluence ; and when Napoleon sought her hand, she obtained for her future husband the promise of the com- mand of the army of Italy. Cape- figue, who has seen manuscript Me- moirs of Barras, relates, on their authority, that the future empress attended constantly as a petitioner in his antechamber, till she secured the fulfilment of the promise. The parties were married on the 9th of March, and on the 27th of the same month, we already find Napoleon at the head of the troops destined to place him on the highest pinnacle of power and fortune.
The youthful commander found head-quarters at Nice, where for three years they seemed to have taken root ; his five predecessors in command having always fallen back to that station after every successful campaign. Like the other French armies of the period, the army of Italy had fought with success against the enemy; they had closed the previous campaign by the victories of Lroano and St. Bernardo, but the^ had not hitherto derived from their triumphs any advantage that could place them on a level with the con- querors of Holland, Belgium, and tne Rhenish provinces : they had only subdued Savoy, the county of Nice, and the BiTiera. They wer«
1846.]
The Italian Campaigns.
25
now about to enter upon a more brilliant career; the description of which obliges us to say a few words of the situation of the country in which the war was to be carried on. Though the French troops occupied the territory of Genoa, tne city still maintained a precarious neutrality, supported only by aid of its strong fortifications.
The governments of Parma, Mo- dena, Lucca, Tuscany, and Venice, were all well affectea towards Aus- tria ; but they took no part in the contest; fancied themselves neutral, though certain, as the result proved, that the French, if victorious, would not respect their independence.
The sovereign pontiff was at peace with the republic ; but there existed an unsettled cause of quarrel between them. The French agent Baseville had been murdered by the Roman populace in 1793, and no sufficient reparation had yet been made. At one time the French] government intended to send an army by sea from Toulon to the mouth of the Tiber; but the presence of the English fleet rendered this expedi- tion rather too precarious. The attack on Rome was therefore de- layed till it could be made by land.
The king of Naples was openly at war with france, and had a corps of 1500 cavalxT in the Austrian army : enough to draw down upon himself the vengeance of the enemy, but not enough to arrest their progress. All the Italian governments dreaded the republicans, but none, except the king of Sardinia, had the couraffe to face them in the field; the otners trusted to foreign arms and efforts which they dared not even aid, and when that trust iailed, they bent before the storm, hopinc to escape by mean subserviency the well-de- served fate which they had not ven- tured to oppose sword in hand. In iron times, the only times, perhaps, that history has made us acquainted with, it is on the sword alone that nations can rest with safety, — a truth that every page of the world*s annals proves to demonstration ; for justice and forbearance never yet arrested the progress of the spoiler.
But though the Italian sovem- ments were all, and the noUes and the clergy generally, hostile to the
FitQcb, tW middle ^Imes and the
citizens of towns were in their favour ; or rather in favour of the doctrines which they preached. Books of liberal import had been circulated with singular freedom in Italy ; and the works of Filangieri and Beccaria were in the hands of all well-edu- cated persons during the years that preceded the revolution. New ideas, aspirations for liberty and natural independence, had spread among the educated classes, and in some cases the nobles and the clergy also were advocates for change, and now the liberators were at hand. These sentiments, the existence of which was well known, helped no doubt to paralyse instead of redoub- ling the efforts of the governments, and were so far of ^at advantage to the French ; but in the field the invaders derived little direct aid from their new allies, who soon tired of the pressure of the vrar-taxes and of the mean and grasping avarice for which the republican authorities were so generally distinguished.
The marked division existing be- tween the different classes of Italian society, dso favoured the republican arms by weakening the means of combined resistance. The nobles, without any attachment to the middle classes, feel their depressed and powerless situation, and entertain no affection for governments that hold them in such subjection. All the middle classes, the citizens of towns, and the lawyers, as a body, are libe- rals, we may almost say republicans; and many dream, even now, of the re-establishment of a Roman repub- lic. The peasantry and the lower orders, in general, have but little respect for their superiors, unl^
Sernaps, for the clergy. They dis- ke all those who possess or exer- cise authority over tnem ; all gover- nors, magistrates, and provincial authorities, and very generally look upon the nobles and landlords as strangers and intruders in the coun- try. Against their governments they entertain no hostility, as they live " remote from power," and feel its pressure only through the means of intermediate agents, on whom all their indignation is vented: their
1>rinces they generally regard with oyal attachment, and this feeling was much stronger at the period of "which w^ ftre speaking, than at pre«
26 Principal Campaigns in the jRise of Napoleon, [January,
6ent. The govermneiits, howev^er, wanted ability to avail themselves of this advantage ; ignorance, falsehood, and venality, pervaded every public department of the different states ; and it was as impossible to depend on the truth of an official report, as to calculate on the just execution of an official GtAer. The Italian govern- ments were so many powerless des- potisms already fallmg to pieces by the weight of their own worthless- ness. Not a single man of any ability rose to auUiority from the Alps to the gulf of Tarentum ; and Italy beheld foreign armies contend- ing for the supremacy of the land, while her own sons remained inglo- rious spectators of the long and san- guinary stru^le.
The French army, of which Na- poleon came to assume the command, was stationed in the Riviera, a nar- row stripe of coast-land about ninety miles in length, and from ten to twentj in breadth, that forms a semicircle round the head of the bay of Grenoa. This district is separated ibom the Kst of Italy by a lofty screen of mountains, the north- western part of which is formed by the Maritime Alps, the south-eastern by the Apennines; these mighty mountain-ranges join near the sources of the Tanaro, where their elevation is at its lowest. Tlie French had for two years been in possession of the higher ridges of this range, many points of which they had fortified, and were thus, to a certain extent, masters of the outlets into the lower country. Their right wing was at Voltri,* near Genoa; then- left, not including a few de- tached corps that mamtained the communication with General Keller- mann and the army of the Alps, was in the valleys at the head of the Tanaro; the cavalry was cantoned in rear of the infantry along the sea- coast.
The effective strength of this army at the opening of the campaign was 43,000 men, 4000 of whom were cavalry; and th^ had sixty pieces of artillery. Their nominal, or ** return** strength, has been ridi- culouslv exaggerated, in order to make the effective appear small by the contrast; but however exagge-
rated it was in this case, there always was a great disparity in the French republican armies between the no- minal and effective strength of corps. Brave, gallant, and distmguished as these troops were, their excdlence was in their fire-steeled edge, so to express ourselves, in the very front of battle : whatever was in the rear, all that was connected with the civil admi- nistration, up to the very heads of the miUtary departments of the government, was vile and worthless m the extreme; and thousands of men were borne on the official states who never saw their corps.
Besides the army of Italy, the French had an army of 20,000 men called the army of the Alps, which under General Kellermann threat- ened Piedmont from the north. There was another corps of 10,000 men, stationed as a reserve at Toulon. Napoleon had no direct authority over these troops ; but the presence of Kellermann*s army on the northern frontier lent him most essential aid, as it obliged the Sar- dinian government to detach 20,000 men under the Prince of Carignano, to watch the motions of this Uireat- ening force.
The nominal strength of the Austro-Sardinian army, including 1500 Neapolitans, was 57,000 men; but they nad 7000 sick at the com- mencement of the campaign, which with other casualties, left tnem only 46,000 effective men ; of these 5000 were cavalry, and they had 148 pieces of arUllery. The position of this army, having diverging lines of retreat, was precarious m use ex- treme. General Colli, with the Sar- dinian troops and 5000 Austrian auxiliaries, stood . as a sort of ad* vanced guard in the mountains near Ceva. General Argenteau, with the right wing of the main Austrian army, which was only half assembled when hostilities commenced, had also been thrown into the moun* tains. Ab the spring advanced, he joined the left of Ckuli, and extend- ing his jKMts from Oviedo to Cairo, and cov^ed with his 7000 men about thirty miles of wild and intersected mountain country; travened by the deep ravines through which the countless tributaries of the Po force
* By mistake enfptvnA Votri on the wood-ikstcb*
1846.]
the Italian Campaigns,
27
thdr downward eounie. How this small fence most have been splin- tered ont into battalions and com- paoies, nuBY therefore be ouiljcon- ceiTed. The left wing of the arm^ was assembling at Poazolo, Formi- garo, and occupied Campo Freddo and Bochetta with some detached battalions. One half of the army was thus in siffht of the enemy, while the other naif was still on the march from the winter-ouartersthey had occupied in Lombardy and along the banks of the Po. The obiect <h this long line of posts was rat ner to prevent the Frencli from making ex- cursions into the low country than to maintain any of its points as actual positions ; and the arrangement be- came so very faulty only from the drcumstance of there being no place of general assembl v indicated for the troops to fall bacK vrpon in case of reverse, and at a sumdent distance to the rear to admit of the move- ment being safely executed.
We must still, before entering on the events of the field, say a wora of the generals and their respective armies.
There is no subject on whidi the idolators of Napoleon display more vapid eloquence than in contrasting the wretchedness of the French, with what they call the splendid condi- tion of the rilied army at the com- mencement of this campiugn. The Bepublican general, they tell us, found himself on assuming the com- mand, at ^ head of a half-starved force, cooped up in a barren comer of Piedmont, destitute of every thing, and vastly inferior to the enemy, who are described as not only superior in numbers, but perfectly equipped, abundantly supplied with all the necessaries of war, and commanded by the most experienced officers in Europe.
There is enough of truth in these statements to deceive the unguarded reader; though the whole truth, when stated, must lead to diametri- cally opposite conclusions to those which the advocates of Napoleon would have us infer.
The return strength of the allied army, composed of Austriana, Sardi- nians, and Neapolitans, amounted to 57,000 men : tney were thus supe- rior to the Frendb, who had only
43,600; tmterentliaaiioniBuilffupe*
riority consisted diiefly in cavalry and artillery, the least useful arms in a mountainous countiy. They were also better supplied than the French; but these brasted supplies were not of the nature that produce any favourable effect on the health, strength, and spirits of the troops. It was not at tnat time the custom for Continental governments to re- lease their soldiers from the constant state of half famine to which they were regularly condemned, so that these vaunted supplies consisted of nothine more than the useless stores ¥rith wnich the armies of the period so constantly encimibered themselves, but which contributed nothinff to the well-being of the men. On the con- trary, we know from many a well- authenticated statement, that the troops suffered severely from want and privation, stationed, as they were, along the high and barren ridges of the Apennines. Sickness had made great ravages in the ranks, and the morale of the army was, in conse- ouence of their situation and previous defeats, at a very low ebb. A few months, indeed, before the opening of the campaign. Marshal Colli, the commander of the Piedmontese army, actually declared his troops to be to- tally unfit to meet the enemy.
I'he French were hungry and in rags ; but they were the enthusiastio soldiers of the revolution, drawn from among the best men of France. Many were still honest believers in the dream of freedom ; a far greater num- ber were animated by accounts of the spoil and fame acquired by the re- publican conquerors of Holland and Belgium, and all were eager to share in tnc flesh-pots of Italy. Is it not evident to common understandinff, that far more was to be efiected wiUi such a fiery multitude, than with the mere drilled soldiers of Austria, paux)ers in uniform, drawn from the refuse of the German population, trained under an iron, soul-and-limb- crushinff system of discipline, who saw nowin^ in the past, present, or future, to stimulate them to exertion f
In regard to generals, the advan- tage was idso on the side of the French, ii»dependently even of the superior talents claimed for Napo- leon. The latter was in the twenty- seventh, Beanlieu in the sevenly- aeeond year of his age. A new and
28
Principal Campaigns in the Rise of Napoleon. [January,
splendid career, in which crowns and oictatorships were to be gained by daring and enterprise, was opening to the former ; the career of the latter had almost attained to its natural close. Napoleon had received a good military eaucation, which the world- shaking events of the Revolution had developed ; while his mind had also, we may suppose, been inflated by the extravagant, unprincipled, and im- pellinff spirit which distinguished the republican doctrines of the period. Beaulieu was the disciple of the pipe- day and button-stick school, which, for upwards of fifty years, had so successfully exerted itself to cramp the minds, and crush the energies of all ranks of military men. Napo- leon was, at least, the equal of the rulers of France, who were besides partly indebted to him for their very power, which his sword had assisted to uphold on the 13th Vendemiaire (5th October), 1795, against the revolted sections. Beaulieu, on the other hand, was the servant of an ancient and venerated imperial dynasty, and the unhappy toot of a deaf and blind Aulic Council, claiming implicit obe- dience while attempting to command armies at hundreds of miles from the scene of action.
Napoleon, again, was, by birth, knowledge, and education, tne supe- rior of the officers he came to com- mand ; for Massena, Augereau, Jou- bert, Serrurier, though brave and daring leaders, were only roush, ignorant, and illiterate men, and tne new general had gained the hearts of his soldiers by his very first address, worded in the real French style of the period. It promised spoil and glory, and could not possibly fail of success. It ran as follows : — '' Sol- diers ! you are naked and ill-fed; the government owes you much, and has nothing to give you. The patience and courage which you display in the midst of tnese rocks are admirable ; but they obtain for you no glory. I will lead vou into the most fertile plains of the world. Rich provinces and large cities shall be in your power: their possession will confer honour, glory, and wealth upon you. Soldiers of Italy I can you want cou- rage or constancy?** Under these circumstances, nine chances out of ten were in favour of the French ; and
the measures of thei^ advevsari^
which we have now to describe, aug« mented almost to a certainty these favourable prospects of success. ^
Beaulieu arrived at Alessandria on the 27 th of March, the same day that Napoleon reached Nice. Both gene- rals had orders to attack, but the nature of these orders were probably very different in other respects. Na- poleon was directed to force the King of Sardinia into a peace, and to drive the Austrians out of Lombardy — direct and intelligent objects that were not to be effected by half mea- sures. Those who still look upon Camot as a great strategist will re- gret that he entered into the details of the operations by which this bold and simple plan was to be executed ; for few documents can possibly fur- nish greater proof of tne total ab- sence of all clear perceptions of the power of armies, and the influence of time, circumstance, and situation. Fortune, however, assumed the chief command to herself, and left gene- rals and ministers to divide the ho- nour of the result. The new system of tactics which Napoleon is said to have put in practice during these campai^;n8, never had any existence except m theimamnation of his eulo- gists and biograpners, for it is a sin- gular fact, that he never, during the whole of his career, made the slightest improvement or alteration in the system of tactics which he found established ; for the tactical JUglemetU of 1791 remained unaltered in the French service down to the year 1825. The method of fighting which he followed to the last, together vdth his mode of supporting armies, were exactly those wnich tne Revolution had introduced from the first. The gallantry and intelligence of the French troops redeemed and cast a halo of splendour over the blood- wasting manner in which the incapa- city of their principal leaders hurled them on to slaughter : while the altered situation of the world, the humanity and good feeling for which, as a people, the French are naturally distin^ished, prevented the system of living by requisition and at free quarters, from being exactly what it had been under the Huns and the Vandals. It came, on some occasions, far too near to its barbaric origin to leave any doubts as to the real source
from yrh«Q9« it bad be^ deriyecl*
1846.]
The Italian Campaigns,
29
Beauliea*s orders do not appear, so that we must judge him hy his measures. The French had advanced a hrigade under General Cervoni as far as Yoltri, in order to ^ve effect to some money n^^tiation which they were carrying on with the go- vernment of Gfenoa. This alarmed the Austrians, who knew that there was a strong republican party within the vralls, and that the government was feeble and irresolute. Beaulieu determined, therefore, to cover the city, to put himself in communication with the English fleet, which was on the coast, and then, no doubt, to fol- low up whatever success fortune might throw in his way. On the 9th of April he advanced by the Bo- chetta, against Voltri, with ten bat- talions and four squadrons, making in all about 7000 men. Greneral Argenteau, with 3000 more^ directed his march on Montenotte, to cover the right of the main column, to keep up the communication with the extreme right of the army, and to co-operate in the attack on the right of the French. While these 10,000 men were thus occupied, Ge- neral Colli was to make a demonstra-
tion to his front, so as to engage the attention of whatever troops might be before him. This general had proposed, that, instead of this half- measure, the whole of the allied army should fall on the left wing of the f^rench ; a measure which, if suc- cessful, would probably have led to their ruin, as it must have cut them off from their only line of communi- cation with France, and thrown them completely back upon the coast, which was closely watched by the English squadron. Beaulieu declined this judicious plan, saying, that he did not wish to bring on decisive operations at the moment ; forgetting how difficult it is in war, when the most trifling events may lead to the greatest consequences, to draw a line between what is important and un- important. Colli, therefore, sent Gre- neral Frovera with 2000 men, to make a demonstration towards Cos- sario.
Napoleon had not been idle while Beauueu was making these arrange- ments. He had assembled three divi- sions of his army near Savona, and intended to break into Fiedmont, by the heads of the Bormida, at the
J$[ TURIN
VOCHERA
same time that General Sermrier should threaten Ceva, and keep Colli in check. Both comnumders were
ready with their preparations at the same time ; but the half-measures of the one, and the fUU measures of the
30
Principal CamfoApiM in the Rite of Napoleon. [January,
o<^er, dedded the rerolt before a Bingle blow had been struck. From three different and unconnected points, 12,000 Anstrians were thus marching down, not on the extreme right, but on what proved to be the concentrated mass of the French army; while 30,000 more were as- sembling at Acqui and other points in the rear : and never, since wars have been carried on by men, had hostile Fortune delivered brave troops over to their adversaries in this unhappy manner. Beaulieu arrived before Voltri on the evening of the 11th April, intending to attack the Ke«
¥ubHcans on the fbllowing morning, 'he li^ht troops, however, not satis- fied with driving in the French out- posts, followed them up farther than was intended, attacked the town it- self in the darkness, and induced General Ccrvoni to fall back on the main body of La Harpe*s division, leaving a few hundred wounded and prisoners in the hands of the Aus- trians. The premature success of this onset tended of itself to foil one of the main objects of the enterprise ; for the French escaped without seri- ous injury, instead of being over- whelmed as proposed by B^ulieu*s front and Argenteau*s flank attack.
While the Austrian commander was halting at Voltri, and holding a conference with Commodore Nelson, General Argenteau was driving the French picquets from Upper and Lower Montenotte. This march had been slow, for it was evening before he reached Monte Legino, which the French had fortified, and where Co- lonel Bampon was stationed with two battalions. This gallant officer, when at^ked, made nis soldiers swear, under the very fire of the enemy, to perish rather than to yield their post : nor was it likely that such men could be driven from behind eood field- works by adversaries who were so little superior, and who, owing to the mountamous nature of the ground, were without artillery. The Aus- trians made the attempt however, but failing in their efiforts, and night setting in, they retired to Upper Montenotte, intending to renew the action in the morning.
Napoleon was near Savona with three diviaiona of his army, when this action was fought close to his front : w Beaulieu bad not followed up the
foeble blow struck at Voltri^ and was Btm at a distanoe on the eveninff of the 11th of April, it was natnnu to advance upon the nearest enemy, who was evidently not in force, hav- ing already been arrested by a field- redoubt defended by a eouple of bat- talions. He immediately marched upon Monte L^^o, and while (ge- neral La Harpe's division took post behind the redoubt to assbt Colonel liampon in its defonoe ; the divisioiur of Augereau and Massena, turned the right of the Austrians under cover of a heavy fog, which conti- nued to hang over the hills for some hours after day-break. Objects were no sooner visible on the morning of the 12th of April, than Argenteau re- turned to the attack of the redoubt ; but the superiority of the entmy soon decided the combat against hun ; having lost 400 men in killed, wounded, and prisoners, he fell back in all haste, and though out- flanked by two divisions, he was yet enabled to efiect his retreat ; a proof that no particular energy was dis- played by his adversaries. French accounts estimate the loss of the van- quished at 4000 men in this combat, and history has too readily followed these extravagancies.
The retreat of the Austrian com- manders was as singular as their ad- vance had been. Argenteau, when driven from Montenotte, instead of falling back on Sassello, where he had left four battalions on his ad- vance, or upon Dego, which was one of his main posts, and where he had four battalions stationed, passed between the two points, and hur- ried back all the way to Perotto, eight or nine miles farther to the rear I Beaulieu, hearing what had happened, sent Colonel Wukas- sowitch with three battalions to assist the defeated troops, and then set out for Acqui, to meet the corps that were still on their advance out of Lombardy ; while the whole line of advanced posts that were almost under the enemy's guns were thus left to send reports far to the rear, and to receive orders from an equal distance, — a step by which all unity of action was completely broken.
The French, pursuing their vic- tory, now threw themselves into a dis- trict of country, of which Cairo maybe considered the centre, and round
1846.]
The Italian
31
which the advanced posts of the allies formed a sort of half-circle, extend- ing from Sassello by Dego to Mil- lessimo. Thus situated, they were enabled to strike, with concentrated force, against the allied posts ; while, on the other hand, the nature of the ground and the good works thrown up at Dego, Sassello, and Ceva, gave the defenders great advantages had the action of the different corps been properly combined : the reverse, how- ever, was the case. On the morning of the 13th the Kepublicans drove in Colli*s advanced posts at Millessimo, a movement by which General Pro- yera most unaccountably allowed himself to be cut off with part of his troops. Unable to effect a junction with the rest of the army, he threw himself into the old castle of Cossario, which, though only a romantic ruin of a feudal fortress, still affords an excellent post for temporary defence. Here he foiled all Bonaparte's efforts to dislodge him, thougn Augereau's division repeatedly renewed the at- tack in most gallant style; but on the other hand, the French repulsed Colirs feeble attempts to relieve the besieged.
Massena, with his own and General La Harpe's division, had been or- dered to attack Dego, while Napoleon was engaged against Colli ; but one of the brigades destined to assist the operation having been withdrawn, Massena thought himself too weak to assail so strong a post, and content- ing himself with a general recoH' naissance, fell back for the night, a circumstance that helped more than could well have been fore- seen to secure the success of the French arms. The numerous errors and singular feebleness that marked so many trifling operations which were ultimately attended with such vast results, are in the highest degree singular. While Massena was paus' ing with the entire divisions before Dego, there were only four battalions, together with a few hundred fugitives from Montenotte, Avithin the posi- tion; but if there were no troops present, there were plenty withm reach, had ordinaiy precaution been used in collecting them. At Sassello, within twelve miles of Dego, was Wukassowitch, with seven batta- lions— ^three which he had brought from Voltri, and four which Argwi-
tean had left there on his advance lo Montenotte; at Moglia, wilJiin the same distance, were two which the same general had left in his retreat, and at Ferotto were two more, which he had taken thus far to the rear, but were still within an easy march of the threatened post; three batti^ lions were at Spigno, also on the march to Dego. Eighteen batta- lions, havinff the whole day of the 13th of April at their disposal, were thus withm reach of the place : the mismanagement by which their de- feat was occasioned has hardly ever perhaps been equalled in war. Ge- neral Argenteau received the most urgent commands to defend Dego, at least for a day, a measure in which Colli was directed to assist with all his means. Of the proceedings of the latter we know nothing, and must, therefore, content ourselves with shewing the manner in which the former went to work with the forces already enumerated. First we have an order dated one o^ clock on the mom* in^ of the 14th, directing Wukasso- witch to proceed ¥rith five battalions to Dego, "to-morrow morning,'* which Uie latter naturally concluded, to mean the morning of the 15 th, so that he remained mim quarters in- stead of marching ; next we have news arriving that Massena, whose reconnaissance we have mentioned, had retired, and Argenteau, a subor- dinate |;eneral, acts on this vague in- formation, and remains stationary, instead of obeying the orders of his superior ; eleven battalions were thus
Paralysed, and only the three iVom pigno, having the longest march to perform, reach the ground in time to share in the action of whieh we have now to speak.
Genei4l Provera, who had beeii blocked up all night in the eastle of Cossario without water or provisions, surrendered to .General Augereau on the morning of the 14th : the French reports say that 2000 men laid down their arms, we now know that the total did not amount to half that number, and truth may probably lie between the two. Napoleon had joined Massena, and was preparing to attack De^o, when these glad tidmgB reached him. The information natu- rally tended to inspire the troops with additional ardour, and the Ans-
trian redoaMs were »tt{idc«d' with
32
Principal Campaigns in the Rise of Napoleon. [January,
great spirit. As already stated, four battalions, with a few hundred fugi- tives, collected after the route of ^ontenotte, constituted the whole allied force ; but the post was fortified by field-works armed with eighteen pieces of cannon, and the defence was gallantly maintained. As the day advanced, the three battalions from Spigno arrived ; they helped to pro- long the contest, but could not re- trieve the fate of battle against such odds, and the whole were ultimately driven from the field, and nearly de- stroyed; few escaped, and the guns were of course abandoned in the works. Argenteau having heard the firing, collected his four battalions from Perotto and Moglia, and com- menced his march about two o*clock ; he came in time to collect the fugi- tives and retrace his steps unmo- lested.
Colonel Wukassowitch also heard the firing, and though his orders only directed him to set out on the morn- ing of the 15th^ he thought it right to march at once towards the scene of action. But the mountain- paths were steep and difficult, in most places the men could advance by single files only ; night overtook him, and some prisoners having reported that there were 20,000 Frcncli in Dego, he halted to wait the return of dawn. Besuming his march in the grey of the morning, he came upon the French outposts, who, thinking they had the wnole of Beaulieu*s army before them, ficd in dismay. The Austrians followed, and amved be- fore the works along with the fugi- tives, and though received with a smart fire that told alike against friends and foes, the troops them- selves demanded with loud shouts to be led against the entrenchments. Wukassowitch had probably learned by this time that Massena's divisions only remained at Dego ; he therefore avuled himself of tne spirit of the moment, assailed the works and de- feated with his five gallant battalions the whole of the enemy*s division, retaking not only all the Austrian
fins lost the day before, but several rench ones along with them. Mas- sena, finding himself unpursued, ral- lied his troops, and enoeavoured to recover the post ; but his efforts were vain, the victors maintained the ground th^y had so bravely won.
Napoleon had left Dego imme- diately after the action of the 14th, and was already on his return to Millessimo, with the divisions of Vic- tor and La Harpe, when the news of this unexpected blow reached him. Thinking that he had the whole of Beaulieirs army to contend with, he instantly countermarched the divi- sions, and joined Massena about one o'clock. An hour afterwards the third action of Dego commenced. The Austrians defended themselves with great bravery, but finding that there was not a single battalion, or company, within ten or twelve nules of tnem, that they were engaeed, without support, against a whole army, they retired from the post, losing half their number, and again leaving all the captured guns behind them. Eighteen nattalions had been put in motion for the defence of this post, while four only sustained the real shock of battle on the first and five on the second day !
And now was an opportunity of- fered to Napoleon for striking a bril- liant and decisive blow at the remains of Bcaulieu's army, which was still the principal force he had to contend with. They were assembling at Acqui ; falling back, in broken frag- ments, from Montenotte and Dego on one side, and hurrying up, from their winter quarters, on the other. Ilad the French, in pursuit of Wu- kassowitch*s corp, come upon this dispirited and half-organised mass on the 16th, there is little doubt that the whole would have been routed or dispersed. The victors turned, however, upon the feebler foe, and gave the stronger time to rally ; an error from which able adversaries might have derived the most im- portant advantages.
The Sardinians were not formi- dable. They could do little more than defend their fortresses for a few days ; but even that defence, if gal- lantly maintained, might have oe- come ruinous to the French, by giving the Austrians time to collect, advance to the rescue, and take the invaders in reverse. If, on the other hand, the Austrians had been completely beaten in the first in- stance, the Sardinians would have yielded as a matter of course. Thia early campaign seems always to have floated in confused and indistinct
1846.1
The Italian Campaigns*
33
forms before the mind of Napoleon ; he did not perceive that success was due entirely to the weakness of the enemy, and tried a repetition of the same manceuyres till they led to the fail- ures of 1813, the defeats of 181 4, and total destruction in 1815. It is, per- haps, right to observe, that too many historians and biographers, wishing to conceal Napoleon's oversight, or enhance his glory, make him defeat Beaulieu and the whole Austrian army at Dego and Montenotte, where that general never was, and where only a few battalions of his army had ever been assembled.
It is not always by the magnitude of the forces vanquished, or the number of the slain, that the im- portance of victories can be decided ; results form the proper criterion in such cases; and though the minor actions here described led ultimately to greater consequences than tn- umphs achieved over large armies often have done, the circumstance cannot justify historians in magnify- ing combats fought against single bngades into victories gained over whole armies. These constant ef- forts to write, not history, but pane- gyrics, has led them to follow, with- out examination, the exaggerated statements of Napoleon and his bio- graphers, and to augment the loss sustained by the allies in these four actions, fVom 6000 men to no less than 26,000, besides a proportionate number of guns and standards.
The surrender of Provera had no sooner given Augereau free hands, than he began to press back the troops of General Colli, who retired to Ceva^ where he took post on the 16th, with about 12,000 men. Na- poleon halted on that and the follow- ing day, to give his soldiers some rest, and, leavmg General La Harpc to watch the Austrians, proceeded on the 18th with the divisions of Mas- sena and Victor to join Augereau, at the same time that General Ser- mrier, advancing by the banks of the Tanaro, also effected his junc- tion. On the 19th, the Sardinians were attacked in their redoubts. The defence was, at first, successfully maintained; but Colli perceiving that his position was about to be turned, broke ofp the action, and fell back to a new and very strong posi- tion behind the Corsaglia, a stream*
yoxn xxznx. vo, czcnz.
let with steep and rocky banks, that falls into the Bormida. His having been allowed to effect this movement proves that he was not very vigo- rously pressed.
Napoleon no sooner found the enemy halted, than' he ordered them to be attacked on all points on the morning of the 20th of April. The French, greatly superior in numbers, advanced to the onset with their usual gallantry ; but so little judg- ment had been displayed in the dis- positions for the assault, that they were foiled in every effort, and driven back with a loss so severe, that it already produced some depressing influence on the spirits of the sol- diers.
This check placed the general and his army in a precarious situation. Five days had already elapsed since the action of Dego ; a period of time, which, if well employed, would have enabled Beaulieu to collect and re- form his troops, and arrive to the aid of his ally. General La Tour, indeed, the Austrian commissioner at the court of Turin, already promised his immediate appearance on the right of the French army, which, by such a movement, would have been placed between two fires, as they afterwards were at Waterloo. Napo- leon acted in 1815 as he had acted in 1796, but the same conduct, which at Mondovi placed him on the ^rst steps of his future throne, sent him afterwards a captive exile to St. He- lena. The generalship which was successful against feeble foes, and. filled astonished Europe with the fame of the youthful conqueror, led, ultimately, when tried against the valiant and the strong, to the most signal overthrow that modern times had ever witnessed.
Napoleon was not, however, so much blinded by self-exaggeration at this period as he was afterwards; he saw, at once, the critical situation in which the repulse had placed him, and on the 21st, assembled a council of war at Lesegno. It is a general saying that such a council never fights; but as an illustration of the spirit of the French republican ar- mies, it must be told that their coun- cils always recommended battle, which seemed their sovereign and only re- medy for every difficulty. On the present occasioQ the assembled gene*
34 Prindpat Campaigns in the Hise of Napole<nu [January,
raid were so impressed vrith the dan- 0er in which the^ were placed, that Uiey deemed their ruin certain, if not saved by a victory. A new at- tack on Colli's position was ordered for the following morning.
The Sardinian commander took evidently a just view of his situation ; he perceived that ultimate success could only be achieved by the as- Instance of Beaulieu, and therefore determined to gain time, and not to risk every thing on the issue of an- other action on the banks of the Corsaglia. He, therefore, left his ground on the morning of the 22d of April, intending to retire upon another, and a stronger position, in front of Mondovi, where he could cither wait the arrival of Beaulieu, or fall back upon the advancing Austrians, if necessary. It was weU intended, but thousrh he had only a six miles* march beiore him, he could not make his ill-disciplined Italians perform it in a soldier-like manner. The French, on ascending the dreaded position, from which their previous attack had been repulsed with so much loss, were delighted to find it evacuated, and immediately followed in pursuit. Semirier*s division led the van, and as the soldiers had not shared in the previous victories, they were eager to signalise themselves, and hurried with great spirit after the retiring foes. The Sardinians had left their ground later than or- dered, and marched, as southern ar- mies too often march, as many of us have seen the best Spanish and Por- tuguese troops march, in straggling parties along the road, without re- taining their proper formation or readiness for action. The conse- quence was, that the rear divisions were overtaken, found in a perfect state of confusion, and totally dis- persed. Some battalions that Colli formed, and opposed to the pursuers, misbehaved altogether, so that the French arrived Song with the fugi- tives in the new position ; which, after a short strum;le, had to be evacuated with all speed: the Sardinians having lost almost 1000 men and eight guns, retired through Mondovi towards Fossana. A check experienced by the French cavalry, who, in a charge, were repulsed with the loss of ^eir general, saved the vanquished firom a more signal overthrow.
Alarmed at the result of this ac- tion, and trusting little, perhaps, to the ud of Beaulieu, the court of Turin determined to solicit an armis- tice in order to negotiate a peace with the Bepublic. On the 23d, General Colli already wrote to Na- poleon on the subject, and as his position rendered such an arrange- ment highly desirable, he met tne proposal in the most friendly style. He expressed himself anxious for peace — felt confident that it would be concluded, but very naturally de- clined to suspend his victorious march unless the Sardinian government surrendered the citadel of Ceva, and placed as guarantees in his hands two out of tne three fortresses, Ales- sandria, Tortona, and Coni. These terms were not very harsh, and Na- poleon was far from assuming, during this negotiation, any of that vulgar arrogance for which the republican generals of the period were so un- favourably disting^hed. Not, how- ever, to be altogether wanting in such conduct, he demanded that the Austrian aiuuliarv corps should be delivered up to him. Of this de- mand the Sardinian government took no notice, and he was himself wise enough not to renew the subject. The army still advanced as the nego- tiation proceeded ; on the 25th, there was a cannonade at Fossano, on the 26th the French reached Alba, with- in two marches of Turin, and cut off the direct communication between Colli and Beaulieu, a circumstance that probably caused the immediate conclusion of the armistice, which was si^ed at Cherasco on the 28th of April.
Thus ended the three weeks* cam- paign of Piedmont, the first and shortest of all Napoleon's campaigns, except the last, wnich, in three davsy tore from his brows the laurels oi a hundred fights.
The French had achieved many gallant actions during the operations we have so briefly recorded. They had defeated enemies numerically superior, and gained great and deci- sive advantages for the cause of the new Repubbc; but the glory to which these actions entitle them, falla far short of the extrava^mt acoount which fiune has awardS. The ad* vantages gained in war cannot always serve as t£e standard by which glory
184^.]
The Italian Campaigns.
35
should be dealt out to the conque- rors; for it has happened that im- portant success has been achieved without striking a blow, and by the mere timely appearance of military forces. It is only where great dangers and difficulties have been vanquished by wisdom, valour, and fortitude, that glory can be justly claimed; and in the Piedmont cam- paign, the French had neither danger nor difficulties of magnitude to over- come. Their adversaries were feeble from mismanagement; and though this cannot lessen the actual merit of the troo^, it rendered their task comparatively easy, and the per- formance of an easy task gives but a moderate clahn to mUitary renown. It is usual for the idolaters of Napo- leon to assert that the French army made prisoners and put hors de combat 25,000 enemies, and captured eighty pieces of artillery, during these snort operations. Besides Jominrs calcu- lation, we now know, from authentic documents, that the total loss of the allies was 9000 men and twenty- six guns — a heavy loss, considering how small these armies were when
compared to the countless hosts brought into the field at later periods of the war.
Biographers further tell us that Napoleon, when assembling his co- lumns on some height whence the vast plains of Lombaray could be disco- vered, pointed to the Alps, proudly exclaimmg, ^ Hannibal forced his way across these mountains, but we have turned them.** Every author who has repeated this speech, has, of course, thought it necessary to exhibit some splendid manceuvre, by which the Alps were so turn- ed; and it must be confessed that the collection is curious, particularly as they all forget the simple fact, that the Alps were turned by the position which the French army had occupied for two years in the Ri- viera; a position acquired, not by any giillant feat of arms, but by the seizure of an independent tract of neutral territory. The whole story is probably nothing more than a pue- rile imitation of the passage of Polv- bius, in whidi, from the top of the Alps, Hannibal points out Italy to the astonished Carthaginians.
Chaptba n.
The French effect the Passage of the Po.-.^ctioii of Fombio— Combat of the
Bridge of Ledi.
The peace which soon followed on the armistice of Cherasco left the king of Sardinia littk more than a shadow of power. Victor Amadeus signed it reluctantly, and did not long survive his humiliation. He was father-in-law to both the bro- thers of Louis XYI., and the ruin of his house is supposed to have broken his heart, as ne died a few days afler the conclusion of the treaty, which reduced the descendant of a long line of warlike princes to a dependent vassal of the regicide republic of France.
It would far exceed our limits to enter into a minute examination of the conduct of the court of Turin in oonsenting to the armistice of Che- rasco. Takmg only a military view of the subject, we should say that they displayed the most reprehen- sible pusillanimity, as nothing had occurred in the field to renoer so ruinous a step necessary. The allied armies, though defeated, were not dispened ; B^ulien was already on
the march to assist Colli ; the French were advancing towards Turin, a iilaoe of great strength, and were roroed to mask and blockade the fortresses of Coni and Ceva, which were immediately on their left. Vic<' tory had, no donbt, raised the spirits and confidence of the Republicans; but success had not been achieved without loss; and' the surprise of Dego, the defence of the redoubts of Ceva, and the action on the Cor- saglia, were feats of arms that threw some weight into the balance in fa- vour of the allies. All these circum- stances called on men of courage to try the fate of arms before submit- ting to a peace that could hardly fail of being aestructive. But it now ap- pears that the court of Sardinia was pioie influenced by other motives; a strong republican party ^vas sup- posed to exist even at Turin, and it was feared that the loyalty of the army could no longer be relied upon. The cession of Sardinia from the alliance gave the French the most
36 Principal Campaigns in the Rise of Napoleon. [January,
decided preponderance in the field. The whole of Colli*8 forces, as well as the Sardinian troops that confronted the French army of the Alps, were taken out of the balance on one side, while the whole of this last-men- tioned army was thrown into the scale on the other : the loss of Lom- bardy seemed thus inevitable. That a young and ambitious general should feel elated by these important advan- tages need not surprise us; but it may be doubted how far a man of knowledge, genius, and quick powers of perception and calculation, could be so far blinded by the victories gained as Napoleon was on this occa- Mon. As the modesty of his report to the Directory has been praised, we have given an extract from the document, not merely to shew the credit due to his biographers, but to exhibit his powers of judgment by the light of his own statement. On the 28th April he thus writes to the Directory: —
" If yoa do not come to an arrange- meat with the king of Sardinia, I shall inarch upon Turin. In the meantime I inarch against Beauliea ; I oblige him to recross the Po ; I pass the river im- mediately after him ; 1 take possession of all Lombardy, and in less than a month I expect to be on the mountains of the Tyrol, to join the army of the Rhine, and to carry the war into Bavaria.
*' Order 15,000 men of the army of the Alps to join me, this will give me a force of 45,000 men, and it is possible that I may send a part of it against Rome."
Napoleon here shews himself per- fectly ignorant of the obstacles he was certain to encounter, and which, notwithstanding the most extraor- dinary and unexampled career of victory and good fortune, retarded hia appearance in Grermany for a year insteaa of a month. Even the Di- rectory, though not distinguished for any great ability, treated this extra- yaffant flight of fancy with the slight it deserved ; nor did Napoleon him- self again revert to it. JJis zealous recommendation of the oflicers who had fought under him was in far better taste than this announcement of future exploits.
Beaulieu having, after the armis- tice of Cherasco, no fortresses that gave him any hold in the north- western portions of Italy, formed the
bold resolution of surprising Tor- tona, Alessandria, and Yalenza, by means of his cavalry. He obtained possession of the last-named place, but gave it up again, as it was useless without the other two, a^nst which the attempt had failed. It is a ques- tion, whether, with his diminished and dispirited army, the Austrian general should not, at once, have £Edlen back behind the Mincio, in- stead of disputing the ground, step by step, against the advancing French . Decisive success seemed no longer within his reach, and every reverse, however trifling, was sure to aug- ment the moral force of the invaders, and to fan the spirit of republi- canism which their appearance had excited in Italy. By giving up a country he could not defend, he pre- served his army, fell back on rein- forcements and tenable positions, and obliged the French to leave, at least, some troops to cuard the country through which Uiey advanced, and watch the southern states of Italy, who might always become formida- ble so long as the Austrians remained unbroken. Beaulieu chose the bolder and more soldierlike resolution ; and though it certainly appears to have been a wrong one, we are loth to blame any display of gallant spirit, the absence of which was so often fatal to the allied cause. It may also be a question, how far an Austrian
Senend could then venture to aban- on an Austrian province, though certain of its being no longer defea- sible.
If Napoleon's letter above quoted evinces no profound judgment or power of calculation, it shews at least a restless spirit of enterprise, which, at the head of brave troops, is always formidable in war. The self-exag- geration which distinguished him during his whole career, had been awakened by his first victories, and naturally hurried him from one un- dertaking to another; every fresh effort deriving additional stren^h from the success of the one by which it had been preceded. Beaulieu had retired behmd the Po; and it was now resolved to force the passage of the river, and to effect the conquest of Lombardy.
Owing to the great number of failures, it has amost become an axiom in war, that the passage of a
1846.]
The Italian Campaigns*
37
river having a long assailable course^ can seldom be opposed with success ; the attacking party having generally the choice of tne place at which they intend to cross, and beinff in most cases able to steal a marcn on their adversaries, and effect their object on some unguarded point, before the defenders can assemble in sufficient strength for effectual resistance. These vague modes of treating mi- litary questions can, however, prove nothinff, and the passage of a river must, fike every other operation of war, depend upon localities, the strength and the conduct of the con- tending parties. A river of the magnitude of the Po, though flowing in an open country and accessible on all points, offers a barrier that should have been successfully defended by an army of 25,000 Austrians against 30,000 French. Scattered detach- ments along the banks of the stream are liable to be destroyed in detail, and all who know an^rthing of war know how uncertain it is to bring de- tached bodies together at the moment when they are wanted. It is only b^ having a central position, or po- sitions, as much as possible within resucti of the points liable to attack,
that success can be anticipated, and in a country like Lombardy, an army receiving rair intelligence from the opposite bank, should at least be able to watch sixty miles of stream. Sup- posing the assailants to have gained thirtv miles from the central position of the defenders, and twentv say, from the nearest wing ; and then to give evidence, by their force and proceedings, that they are in earnest ; fourteen hours should bring at least a third, and twenty hours, two thirds of the defending army to the point assailed. We are, by this cal- culation, giving cavalry patroles four hours for conveying intelligence the distance of only twenty miles, thoueh in such cases full speed should be used ; we allow two hours for assem- bling and ^tting the troops under arms, and eight hours for the march of the nearest corps, the others follow- ing in succession. And in fourteen hours no great number of troops will have effected the passage of a river like the Po, which, among European streams, must be looked upon as one of first-rate magnitude.
Let us now see how Beaulieu and Napoleon managed their operations.
The French army extended from
K) MILES
h
Yalenza to Voghera, and thus threatened the Ime of the Po be- tween these two places; the Aus- trians were at Yal^o, a post well chosen for confronting an enemy so situated. By the treaty of Cherasco Napoleon had reserved to himself the right of crossing the Po at Ya- lenza, a fortress within the Sardinian line of demarcation, and he pretends that he did so merely for the pur- pose of deoeiying Beaulieu, who fell
into the snare accordingly. His- torians and biographers have ezult- ingly repeated tnis puerility, though it might be supposed that no com- mander, free from mental infirmity, would be guided by an adversary's word on such a subject; though every additional point of passage, placed at the disposal of an enemy, would have to be attentively watched by the defenders. On the 4th of May, the French
Principal Campaipmt m ike XiH iff NapoUtm. [Jamnry,
maekvf tomrdi Cm-
toggio, ItaiM poiittuig Blnadr to- wvda their ligiA. On the 6tta fia- p^eon Kt out with 3000 ^enadien, 1(00 csTali7, and twenty-nx [ueeefl (rfartilkrv, and by a forced march reached Piacenza on the fi>lh>wing daj. He immediately began to throw hit tioopa bctom hj meana of boati collected along the banka of the rirer ; two •qnadroiM of Ani- trian hnisan fonnd on the 0)qKwite ride were soon obliged to retire. The reit of the French aimy fol- lowed thia advanced guard with great rapidi^ ; bnt a* thaj bad no pon- toona, aod aa iite Bwani of paaaage were iimited, it required the whole «f the 7lh, 8th, and Mh of Ma; before the ttoopt had croned the
The Aiutrian general had not been deceived by the idle tale of the intended peaeoge at Valenia, and oo aooncr learned that the French bad extended their right towardv Caatcggio thaji he despatched General Liptai with eif^t batulion* and eight ■qnadroni to Belgioioia, with direC' tionB to proceed itill further to the left^ aa circumatancea mi^ht require, while he himself moved in the same direction. He did lo indeed, bnt not with an army, for on the 6th he detached fonr battalions and two ■qnadroTU to Buffalona, near Milan, wnere they could be of no poMible service ; and on the 7th, he left eix battalion! and six squadrons more at Favia, while he himself reached Bel- giojosa with nine battalions and twelve sqnadroiu. On the eve of battle hu troops were thus dispersed over forty miles of cottntiy.
The two squadrons of nuasara the French had fallen in with in cross' ing the river were the advanced guard of GcneGal Liptu'a division, which wa« following. The adverse partiei encountered at Gnarda Miglia about fonr miles from the landing place : in sharp and continued combat the Austriana drove the invaders back to the water's edge. Their com- mander fearing, however, to fall upon greatly superior numbers during the night, retired to Fombb, and Uiere took post, in order to await the arrival of more troops. Thia was a great error, for if his eight battalions and eight squadrons really amounted to 5000 men, m the AoRtriw returns
aaaort, be moat hftve ban a tiMtnh fi)r thie Fitaidi who had eroaaed tlw rhr^ and aboold certainly have fol- lowed ap hia Uow.
At one o'clock oo the aflemooD of the Stb, S^oleon attacked Fontbw with about 10 or 12,000 mtai, and after a sharp action drove the defenders &tnn their post, with the loss of 600 in kiUed and wounded i the vanqoiahed r^ired behind the Adda. And where waa Beanlien while this decisve action waa in progreaa? He had arrived at Belgiojoea, twenty roitea from the scene of combat, on the evening of the 7th, and could easily therdbre have reached Fombio by one o'clodk on the 6th; bnt it waa only in the forenoon, and while the boops were cooking their dinners, that he received the tidings of the action of the previous day, so that he only commenced his march at the very time when be abould already have been on the ground. Hia arrange- ments, however, are too eoriooa to be paaeed over unnotioed. He very properly directed his march on Orio and Aspedaletto ; but not to be out- flanked, as the official reporta say, and to be certain of falling in with Liptai's division, he again divided hii small corps in the following un- heard-of manner. One battalion took the road to Seune, another to Somaglio, two marched on Fombio, two others, accompanied by foar squadrons to Cordogno, so that the mun body of the Austrian army, which arrived at Aspedaletto under the field-marshal's own command consisted of three battalions and eight squadrons I Since wars have been carried on, there is probably
,bly no : been
aefficiency by the exertions o own chieftain. As Liptai waa not fallen in with, it was soon perceived that nine battalions scatttxed over the country as here described coold effect nothinff ; the whole were, therefore, withdrawn nest day be- hind the Adda. A gallant blow that General Schubert struck during the night at Cordogno led to no- thing. With his two battalions and four squadrons he surprised and de- feated the division of La Harpe, and took six guns from them, the com- mander being killed in the actiOD ;
18460
Th0 Ifalian Campaigns.
39
but a partial advantage of this kind could not retrieve the errors already committed. On the 5th of May, we find General Beaulieu preparing to defend the passage of the Fo, with twenty-seven battalions and twenty- eight squadrons, which he had in hand at Valegio. With this force he might easify, but for his extra- ordinary disposition to detach entirie corps, and the strange circumstance of his not receiving information of the action of the 7th, have been at Fombio on the morning of the 8th; and the chances are that such a force would not only have defeated the 10,000 or 12,000 men with which Napoleon attacked Liptai^ but that such a victory would have turned the fate of the campaign ; instead of this, the deci- sive action is fought by eight bat- talions and eight squadrons.
Were we to judge the passage of the Fo by the French as a mere military measure, it would certainly be exposed to considerable censure ; for, though all operations of war are attended with risk and danger, it is only in proportion to the pressure of necessity, that they should be under- taken when the chances of defeat out-balance those of success. On the present occasion there was no imme- diate necessity of forcing the passa^ of the river; 17,000 men of tne army of the Alps were already on the march to join Napoleon; and their arrival would have rendered the operation comparatively easy: while, as we have seen, the causes that prevented Beaulieu from being present with a sufficient force to drive back the republicans on the first morning after their passage, were of a nature peculiar to himsdf, and not such as can be fairly calculated upon in war. Napoleon acted here as on every subsequent occasion of his life ; he placed every thins upon the ha- zara of the die, and those who may question the great military qualities ascribed to him are forced to allow that he was a bold player and long remained a successfiit gambler.
But here we have an important question to ask of the admirers of his military genius. Why did not the French general cross the Fo at Cremona instead of Fiacenza ? The former place is only a fe^ miles }ow^r down the stream than the
latter; the breadth of the river is the same ; but by effecting the passage at Cremona the French woula have turned the Adda and cut off the Austrians fi*om the direct road to Mantua, advantages of the highest consequence. Had any par- ticular obstacles rendered the passage more difficult at the latter tnan at the former place, Napoleon would have mentioned them in his memoirs ; but he takes no notice of the subject, from which it is probable that he was anxious to prevent attention from bein^ drawn to the great mili- tary oversight.
The victor remsuned at Fiacenza on the 9th, and while his cavalry and artillery were passing the river, took the opportunity of imposing a con- tribution of two millions of mncs on the Grand Duke of Farma, forcing him at the same time to surrender twenty of his finest pictures. Seven million francs and twenty pictures were soon afterwards demanded of Hercules HI. duke of Modena. Both princes were at peace with France : fear had prevented them from join- ing the allies, and they had now to pay for their pusillanimity. The practice of seizing works of art, as trophies of war, had been usual with the Romans, during their long career of plunder and aggression. In the middle ages the same system was occasionally resorted to, and the Venetians, when lords of the Archi- pelago, carried away the last spoils of unhappy Greece. As late even as the Thirty Years* War, Maximilian of Bavaria sent the celebrated Hei- delbeig library to Rome, as a pre- sent to the Fope; while the Swedes, not to be behmd their enemies, en- riched the libraries and galleries of Upsola and Stockholm at the ex- pense of the Catholic princes of Germanv. In latter times the prac- tice had, however, been altogether discontinued. Frederick II. though a real lover of the arts, respected the gallery of Dresden; and the Austrian and Russian commanders, who during the same war took pos- session of Berlin, did not remove any of the treasures of art which it contained. The French republicans acted a different, if not a nobler part. The government, composed of men without character, were suffi- ciently coi^scious that they had little
40 Principal Campaigns in the Rise of Napolem. [Jaonary,
guard; tbeir error conEisted in not being prepared to destroy the bridge tbe moroent their troops nad passed.
General SebottendoriTs orders were to hold the Adda for tnentj-four hours, to give the army time to rett«i some secure position in which they could rest from their late exertions. The force at his disposal consisted of twelve battaliong, sixteen squadrons, and fourteen guns; three battalions he placed at the ford of Credo, two miles below the town ; so that he had only 7000 men left for the de- fence of his post. SeauUeu with the remainder of the troops was already on his march towuds tbe Oglio.
The French entered Lodi o
hold on the affections of the people ; tbey strove, therefore, to augment their influence, bj calling national vanity to their aid ; and, well con- vinced that the French would be flattered by imilsting the Romans, and by seeing tbe masterpieces of art brought as trophies of war to adorn the capital of their country, they ordered, or sanctioned, the revival of this antiquated system of
C' Jidcr. That they equalled the t of their predecessors is not to be denied ; how far the treasures so gathered prospered in the hands of tbe spoilers, we shall have occasion to shew hereafter.
We now come to the combat of Jjodi, one of the most celebrated actions of the war. The extravagant tales to which it bas given rise call upon us for a more detailed account of the transaction than would otherwise be required.
Lodi is situated on the Adda, a
river that issues from the lake of
Como, and falls into Ibc Fo a little
below the small fortified town of
Fizzighetone. la ordinary seasons
it hu few practicable fords, and
though too insignificant to arrest
the progress of a victorious array,
offers, wncn its bridges arc guarded
or destroyed, a deicnsiblc barrier,
behind which troops may find some
momenta!^ shelter from the pursuit
of superior adversaries. When
Beaulieu abandoned the defence of
the Po, he retired behind the
Adda by the bridge of Lodi ; the
troops near Milan were onlered to
leave ISOO men in the citadel of that
city and to cross the same river st
Cassano; while Scbottendorf and
Wucassowitch, who remained about
Favia, were directed to march on
ring to Kapoleon's halt on
.11 these detached parties
e left bank of the stream ;
guard of Wucassowitch's
mg before Lodi from the
at the same time that the
guard of the French
Dm the south. Sebotten-
ery properly left a couple
IS in the town to take up
guard, who after a short
'cre brought safely across
The Austriaus have
3d for not destroying the
ut tbey could not do so
xttiug off tbeir «wa ku
morning of the 10th of May, along with the rear guard of Wucassowitch iS corps ; but the Austrian gun»» posted on the opposite side of the river, prevented tbem from crossing the bridge. Xapoleon, Sushed with success, la the full career of victory, instantly resolved to dislodge this rear guard ; nor was the difficulty so great as is generally represented. The whole of the French artillery were brought into action, some of the gvns were placed to great advantage on the old ramparts of the town; and a fierce cannonade opened upon the Au.itrians, who wore not slow in replying to the fiery salutations ; hut the superior number of the French guns, the protection aflbrded them by the waifs of the town, aiid the greater elevation of the western over the eastern bank of the river, made every chance of combat incline to tlic side of the invaders, and caused considerable loss to the Aostriaa artillery.
While the cannonade was thinning the ranks of the Germans, Napoleon placed 3500 grenadiers, formed in close column, behind the rampart of the Ixidi, the head of the column being close to the bridge, ready to wheel to the left and rush across at tbe first signal. To fadlitalc the intended attack, be despatched Ge- neral Beauinon witli the cavalry to a ford about three miles up the stream, where he was to cross, and fall upon tbe right flank of the enemy, the onset of the cavalry was to be the signal for the advance of tbe in- fantry : Napoleon, indeed, pretends thU it was so, but this is not the
1846.]
The Italian Campaigns,
41
case, as the cavalry never came into action.
A five hours' cannonade had not driven the Austrians from their position ; hut had a good deal slack- ened the fire of their guns. The signal for the advance of the column was therefore given, and the gallant grenadiers instantly rushed fonvard to the loud shouts of Vive la R6pub' liqtie. Met hy a shower of grape and musketry that struck down the lead- ing ranks, the mass halted before they reached the hostile bank. ** A mo- ment's hesitation," says Napoleon, ^ would have been ruin, but General Berthier, Massena, Cervoni, Lannes, and Dallemagne, pushed to the front and turned the still uncertain scales of fate." How these officers made their way through a close column of men, crowded together upon a narrow bridge, the front men pressing back while the rear were pressing for- ward, is not easily understood, and should have been explained by those who were satisfied with repeating the idle tale. The fact is this. The bed of the Adda is about two hun- dred yards wide at Lodi; but the deep channel is comparatively nar- row and runs close to the walls of the town; towards the eastern side the water is, in general, so shallow as to leave two sand-banks under the bridge completely dry; and as the country is flat, the bridge has no great elevation above the level of the stream. When the advance of the column was checked, the soldiers, not to remain exposed to the Aus- trian fire, descended by the beams of the bridge to these sand-banks and formed themselves, as usual, into bands of tirailleurs and advanced upon the enemy, when those who had remained on the bridse also rushed forward. The wild and gallant swarm once across, pushed on as they were reinforced; some buildings near the bank, from which the Austrians had been driven by the fire of the French artillery, gave them good shelter ; and having thus obtained a firm footing, superior numbers soon decided the action in their favour. The Austrians lost all their guns, and nearly 2000 men in killed, wounded, and prisoners; but they were allowed to retire un- pursued to Crema.
That no military^ perhaps we
should say, no strategical, object was gained, or sought for, by this extra- ordinary feat of arms is evident from the fact, that Napoleon immediately desisted from the further pursuit of the vanquished, and facing to the right about marched upon Milan and Favia. In his memoirs, he at- tempts to shew, that the action of Lodi was not a mere scene of slaughter entered upon without ob- ject ; for he intended, he says, to cut off the retreat of General Colli, who with 10,000 men was retiring by Cassano. But dates and distances shew very plainly that this is one of the many strategical plans that result from after-thoughts; for Colli had crossed the bridge of Cassano, which is twenty-five miles, a good day's march from Lodi, he/are Napoleon had forced the passage of the Adda !
Colli had, besides, less than 2000 men with him; and the chance of cutting them off was not worth the risk that might have been sustained in what is called the " terrible storm of the Bridge of Lodi." Nor does it seem that he was very clear how the victory had really l>een gained, for he not only gives an inconsistent but evidently evasive account of the passage of the bridge ; and adds, also, that tlie enemy were defeated by les feux redoutables de ccUe invincible colonne, though every military man will know that the fire of such a column would hardly be equal to the fire of an ordinary platoon, or to that of fifty or sixty men p^aps. Ilere, as every where else. Napoleon hurled brave men forward, leaving the result to fortune and the gal- lantry of the troops.
But if no strategical advantages were gained by the victory of L^, it augmented, m a very high degree, the moral force of the conquerors. No feat of arms ever caused so much astonishment in Europe as the pass- age of the Adda. It excited the most boundless enthusiasm in favour of the French and their general. The pai'tisans of the new order of things were delighted, and thought that nothing would be impossible for such a man to achieve with such soldiers. The renublicans began, indeed, to fancy tnemselves invin- cible, and such a belief is already a ffreat step towards victory ; particu- brly when, as in the present case^
42
Principal Campaigni in the Rise of Napoleon. [January,
the spirits of the yanqnished were depressed in the same proportion in which those of the conqueror*s were devated. If this was the advantage for which Napoleon stormed the bridge of Lodi, he ^ined his object completely ; but this is hardly to be supposed, as the view taken of the action could never have been antici- pated, because the assault of any breach in the rampart of a re^ar fortress of ordinary strecu^ is in reality infinitely more difficult and dangerous than was this boasted passage of the Adda. In the attack of a breach the assailants have to advance fully exposed to the fire of well-sheltered foes; they have to effect a difficult descent into the ditch at the very muzzles of hostile guns, and they have then to force their way over the ruined frag- ments of rampart, over loaded shells of grenades, and over the maneled bodies of their comrades, falling thick and fast under the fiery mis- siles hurled from above, or burst- ing in treachery beneath their feet. Such were the obstacles encountered in the breaches of Roderigo and Bad^joz, but at Lodi there was only a rush across a straight and level bridge of 200 yards in length, and in the face of foes who had for five hours been exposed, without shelter, to the tellinjz fire of the French artillery. The trining loss sustained by the assailants is also a proof that the difficulties of this exploit have
been most shamefully exa^sierated. French accounts say that ISey had only 200 men killed and wounded; and though we may well suppoee that the number was in realitv much greater, it could not weu have been ten times greater, which the successful attack of a well- defended breach would probably have made it.
Napoleon was no doubt impelled to this attack by the snirit of victorv which then animatea the French army, and by the thirsting for suc- cess and battles which lent them so much enerey and resolution. And if he struck the blow to intimidate his adversaries, and to keep high the brilliant reputation his troops had acquired, he might deserve praise for the action ; but this view neither himself nor his biographers have been able to take ; they nave rested the merits of the victory on strate- gical grounds and have failed com- pletely.
For a just understanding of the snirit in which Napoleon and his idolaters have written, it is rijzht to add that, not satisfied with defeating Sebottendorf and his 7000 men at Lodi, they generally defeat Beaulieu and his whole army there, even as they had before defeated him at Deffo and Monte- Notte, though that untortunate commander was already a dav*s march in advance towards the Oglio.
1846.]
On the Hiit&ry of Pm^cimim^i*
43
Olf THE HISTORY OF PAKT0tfIM£8.
IN A I«£TTSB TO OIIYSB TOBKB, S&i^.
BsspscTED OuYSB, — You know many things, and know them well ; but confess frankly that you share the eommon ignorance respecting the rise, progress, and decline of glorious pantomime. Did you ever, m your most recondite researches, venture into that obscure subject — a subject not less important than obscure? You did not. You have relished many a performance in the halcyon days of Doyhood ; but did you ever, in the soberer studies of mannood, ask yourself whence came this species of dramatic entertainment? Ino, such a thought never crossed vour mind ; or, crossing it, was instantly dismissed. Now, O worthy Oliver! I have asked this question of many a learned man, and many a dusty volume, but without satisfactory result. All my researches only eive me brief and scattered facts. These facts I en- deavoured to interpret. I formed a theory on the matter, and, as
<• Ta solebas Mesa esse eliquid putare nugas/'
— to speak with that rare fellow Ca- tullus,— will transmit you both my data and theory.
The Christmas pantomimes have confessedly been getting worse and worse for some years. Ask any re- spectable play-goer, and he wiU tell you, with a sigh, that pantomimes are not what they used to be. Now tohai used they to be? and when? Here at once is the historic question raised. People usually content them- selves with referring to the French stage, where pantomime was trans- planted from the Italian ; the Italians again borrowed it from the Romans and Greeks. A sequent tradition is thus given, or supposed to be. But look a little closer; don*t be satisfied with mere verbal resemblances, and then say what resemblance has the entertainment we call pantomime with the attellanse of Home or the pantomimes of Greece ? Not to ffo BO far, what resemblance has it to tne pantomime of Italy and France ?
Simply that of nami^ aud dresses.
These, indeed, are traditional. I will rapidly trace the history of the prin- cipal pantomimic personages, and then come to the thmg itself. Har- lequin is certainly the Italian ArleC' chino, which was also the Boman Sannio (he is also called Zcaun in Italian). The Sofinio, as his name imports, was a buffoon (f^om sarma^ a grimace) ; his dress was very simi- lar to that of our harlequin, onlv it was mean and miserable, instead of beinff spansled and splendid. He has his head shaved (rasis capiHbxu\ and his face begrimed with soot (Ju' ligine fadem) ; these are represented by a short black mask and skull-cap in the modem dress. His feet were unshod (planipedes) ; the feet of the modern are cased in delicate pumps. His dress was a thing of shreds and patches, formed of various colours and various materials, so that Aristo- phanes would have recommended him to Euripides (you, Oliver, re- member the o«t fM* f»»t»9 Ti T*v waXmw
lf»fAar6t, don't you ?) ; but this mi- serable dress is in the modem ele- vated to the splendour of spangles and variegated colours.
Pantaloon is of Venetian origin. Pardaleone 19 pianta leone (he planted the lion), and therefore the desi^a- tion of a standard-bearer, the Vene- tian standard being a lion. Such is the common etymology, though there is absolutely nothing to be made out of it. Why should a standard-bearer be chosen as the type of old men — the ^ heavy fkthers^ in the drama ? True it is that the tight red hose and yeUow slippers of Pantaloon are also those of the standard-bearer ; but the question remains unanswered. Why was the standard-bearer chosen ? 1 have a suggestion to offer. The tight red hose and yellow slippers became the costume of the "Venetian merchants. When these were su- perseded by the full flowing garment, the change was of course at first only adopted by the yoiins. The old men continued to wear tne old costume, and thus the red hose became a mark of an old Venetian in the same way as the jpigtail wns a fewye«rs ago the
44
On the History of Pantomimes.
[January,
mark of an old Englishman. " Pig- tail** might represent a ** heavy fa- ther** in a modem farce, so Panta- leone, i. e. the costume of Pantaleone, represented the old man in Venetian farce; for Pantaloon is always the old man who cries up the wisdom of the bygone times and deplores the folly of the present— always the old man to be duped and laughed at. Such is my explanation. The princi- pal fact, however, to be noticed here 18 that the modem Pantaloon has substantially the same dress and name as his prototype.
Clown is, we know, the Pierrot of the French and the Scaramuccia of the Italian stage. The dress is, how- ever, somewhat different, and in the opinion of one learned in such mat- ters, it is the invention of the im- mortal Joey Grimaldi, who to the white flowing habit of Pierrot added
blue and r^ ^^1^?^) ^^^ ^^^ ^^^ trousers short. Ine wondrous po- pularity of this prince of clowns made every other clown adopt his dress, and thus those of the amphi- theatre and those who perfoimed their antics on the 1st of May thought right to copy Grimaldi*s dress.
But it is m the characters that we must look for the greatest changes. Pantaloon continues much the same ; but Harlequin used to be a heavy, lumbering lout, whose stupidities were a set-off to the adroitness of Brighella, or Clown. Now he is a fairy -worker, and carries a fairy wand. His dress has undergone changes in keeping with the chaise in his character — ^it is fairy -like. In the Italian drama he had to bear the penalties of all the larceny and Knavery of his fellow-servant, Brigh- ella ; the kicks fell upon him as they now fall upon Pantaloon, who has inherited that portion of the ** busi- ness.** Our Harlequin has an ele- ment in his composition which is quite foreign to his prototype, — fo- reign, indeM, to the whole Italian and French entertainments. None of the Italian characters have any thing more than their adroitness and au- dacity to assist them in their tricks, but Harleauin has a magic power. He is the lover favoured by fairies. He whirls about in the giddy mazes of the dance with his beloved Colum- bine ; and whenever the clever, mis- chieyous Olown, or the dull, mis*
chievous Pantaloon, attempt to disturb their felicity, the magic wand per- forms its magic wonders.
Now here in this one element we see something altogether different from the Boman, Italian, or French pantomimes. Whence the origin of this element ? How came Harlequin by his wand? How, in short, did pantomime become what it now is, a mixture of magic and buffoonery ? Whoso talks about our getting our pantomime from France or Italy should also tell us whence came the magic, and whence the mixture ; be- cause a pantomime — such as Mother Ooose, loT example — is altogether a different entertainment firom those of the Italian stage.
Let us rummage amongst old play- bills and forgotten books. There we shall find certain distinct facts worth collecting. In 1 704, we find recorded that a party of French tumblers per- formed at Drury Lane with immense success. This success produced Eng- lish imitations. This is one fact In 1718, CoUey Cibber tells us that the affairs of Drury Lane were des- perate. The Italian Opera had car- ried away the town. The "legiti- mate dnuna** seemed as hopeless a case then as it does now. Then, as now, " confounded foreigners ** were the objects of that bitter hatred which tracks the heels of success ; and " na- tive talent,** with empty pockets, had to console itself with the vastness of its pretensions. The " legitimate drama** drawing no money to the treasury, an attempt was made wor- thy of the "Poet Bunn;** that at- tempt was the pantomime entitled Mars and Venus, So much play- bills and records tell us. But this thing called a pantomime, what was it? Was it a thing like our pan- tomimes ? Not in the least. It was what we should call a serious ballet. Clown and Pantaloon, tumbling and magic, were absent. Our next clue is as follows : — Rich produced some little harlequinades, in the style of the Italian Night Scenes. In 1723 these had a new direction g^ven to them. Thurmond, a dancing-master, having brought out his pantomime of Harlemdn Dr. Faustus at Drury Lane, Rich produced his Necromancer^ or Dr. Faustusj at Covent Grarden. The success was prodigious. Pope alludes to the rivaliy in tneie lines :«*
«
ft
f
I I c
I. f I
1846.]
On the History of Pantomimes.
A&
" Wlien, lo ! to dark encounten in mid air.
New wisairds riae, here Booth, and Gib- ber there.
Booth in hia cloudjr tabernacle ahrined ;
On grinning^ dragons Gibber mounts the wind !"
The nature of these pieces may be pretty well guessed from this pass- age. They were obnously very much the same as what we dow call the introduction to the pantomime. The success of this species was so great that the prices of admission were doubled. At first the boxes were two and sixpence : for the pan- tomimes, they were raised to fiye shillings ; and the "run was so great that adyanced prices became, not the exception, but the rule, and formed the ordinary prices."
Out of these facts what do we gather ? We gather, that serious ballet and necromantic spectacle had been introduced with success; but as yet no hint of what we call pan- tomime. The mixture of tumbling and buffoonery with necromancy, was not yet accomplished! yet this mixture ibrms the yery essence of our species. Neyertheless, although not yet conjoined, these elements ex- isted. I noticed before, the fact of the success of the French tumblers ; and this fact I couple with the suc- cess of the spectacle, and deduce the following conclusion : —
Mana^rs, it is notorious, seize with ayidity on any novelty liiat will attract] audiences. Bunn s offer to Murphy, the weather prophet, to deliver a course of lectures at Drury
Lane on meteorology, though co- mical enough, was but an instance of the managerial anxiety to fill his house by any means, x ates made Gface Darlinff an offer in the same spirit. Tamed animals and wonder- ful posture-masters are found to at- tract the public, as well as leading tragedians or low comedians. What does the manager care about con- gruity ? His care is for pence. This being premised, I say, that managers in these da3rs, finding French tum- blers attractive, and spectacle also attractive, bethought them of unit- ing the two in one entertainment. Thus the necromancy was Joined to the posturing. Clown and Fantaloon were not only types of adroit and studied knavery ; they were also posture-masters. Harlequin was not only the lover, but he was also pro- tected by fairies, and gifted with a magic wand.
The idea once started, various mo- difications soon suggested themselves. Thus the magic wand suggested transformations ; and these trans- formations soon became politiod " hits," and popular bubbles. Thus, also, as scenery was lavishly em- ployed when dioramas were invented and succeeded, they were quickly transplanted to the pantomune, of which they now form an inseparable constituent.
I need not dwell on this matter ; you have my theory, and the facts on which it is based ; of the profundity of the one, and the recondity of the other, you alone can judge. I remain, &c.
ViviAii Latouche.
46
The Pride of a Spoiled Beauty.
[January,
THE PRIDE OF A SPOILED BEAUTY. ADAPTED FBOM THE FBENCH OF H. DS BALZAC.
Chapter I.
The Comte de Fontaine, the head of one of the most ancient families of Foitou, had gallantly served the cause of the Bourhons during the war which the Yendeans waged against the republic Although ruined by confiscations, the faithful Yendean constantly refused the lucrative places which ^poleon offered him. Un- varying in his aristocratic creed, he blindly followed its maxims in his choice of a wife. Notwithstanding the seductions of a rich revolutionary parvenu who very much desired the alliance, he marned a Demoiselle de Kergarouet, with no other dowry than that of belonging to one of the oldest families of Brittany.
The Restoration found Monsieur de Fontaine burdened with a numer- ous family. Although to solicit fa- vours never entered his plans, he nevertheless acceded to his wi£e*8 wishes, left his estate in the countrv, the moderate income of which barely sufficed for his children's wants, and came to Faris.
Disgusted by the avidity with which his former comrades sought for places and constitutional dignities, he was about to return to his estate when he received a ministerial letter, announcing to him his nomination to the rank of field-marshal, in virtue of the order which permitted the ofiicers of the Catholic armies to reckon as years of service the first twenty unacknowledged years of Louis the Eighteenth's reign. A few days afterwards the Yendean received ofiicially and without so- licitation the cross of the Order of the Legion of Honour and that of Saint Louis. Shaken in his resolu- tion by these successive favours,, which he believed he owed to the monarch's remembrance, he was no longer satisfied with taking his family, as he had done every Sun&y, to shout Vive le JRoi inthe Salle des Marechaux in the Tuileries when the princes went to chapel, but demanded a private au- dience. This audience, very promptly ? -anted, had nothing private in it. here the oouat found anoient com*
panions who received him rather