pray. Even supposing that the re- guards, who still had their arms? They publican tendency of the Liberal party had collected eleven thousand men, of was unchangeable, and that their lead-whom only one-half were Guards, upers would have dethroned the King on whom reliance could be placed, by acts of Parliament as effectually as twelve guns, and four rounds of grapethey did by the erection of barricades, shot for each gun! Magazines of prostill it was to the last degree unwise visions, carriages for the wounded, for Government to take its stand on stores of any kind, there were none. a doubtful ground, and still more to Not a loaf of bread was to be had by maintain it by unlawful means. Every- men who had been eighteen hours unthing in such a conflict depends on ex- der arms; not a drop of water to asternal appearances and the first acts; suage the thirst produced by the sun the vast majority of men are entirely of the dog-days, then darting his rays governed by them. It is of the ut- with unwonted intensity. Prince Pomost importance to let the first illegal | lignac, calm and serene, not because he step be taken by your adversaries. had provided against danger, but beThe clearest knowledge obtained of an cause he shut his eyes to it, flattered intention on the part of a body of men himself that he had forty thousand to commit high treason, will not jus- men at his disposal, because there were tify the arrest of their leaders before that number quartered within a cirsome overt act demonstrating that in-cuit of twenty-five miles round Paris; tent has been committed: a party will always deny illegal intentions till they have been irrevocably manifested by deeds, and they will be believed by all who sympathise with them in opinion, till the contrary is forced upon them by incontrovertible evidence. forgetting the rapidity with which events succeed each other when the conflict once begins in the streets of a city, and that it was of little moment what number of men were at Versailles, St Cloud, or Courbevoie, if the insurgents were in possession of the Hôtel de Ville, the Tuileries, and the telegraph. When Marshal Soult sup 104. Still more deserving of reprobation was the conduct of the Polignac Administration in the prepara-pressed the insurrection at the cloister tions which they made to support the of St Meri, in the following year, he Crown when the conflict was once en- assembled eighty thousand men and gaged. They were well aware that a hundred pieces of cannon-a force the ordonnances would provoke resist- as great as that which fought at Ausance; it was not to be supposed that terlitz. With truth did Metternich a party which had been conspiring for say, when the proceedings at Paris fifteen years to overthrow them would were reported to him, "I would be abandon the contest without a strug-less alarmed if Polignac was more so. gle, especially when they had gained Talleyrand was well aware of the vital the immense advantage of beginning importance of maintaining the Tuilthe conflict on legal grounds, with a eries, on the part of any who would great majority in the Legislature, and retain the government of France. to resist what was in appearance at least When informed, on the 29th, that an invasion of the constitution. The they had been evacuated, he walked Ministers had themselves been the to the timepiece on the mantelpiece, first to draw the sword, and must have and observing the hour, said, "Mark made up their minds to abide its issue. it well for future time, that to-day, What preparations, then, had they at ten minutes past twelve, the elder made to meet a conflict on which the branch of the Bourbons ceased to reign salvation of the dynasty, and with it in France." the liberty of France, depended, in a city which could turn out a hundred thousand combatants, of whom nearly a half were old soldiers or national VOL. III. 105. Equally characterised by incapacity was the conduct of Government in not at once, when the insurrection began, arresting its known L leaders, and all those who, from their | disposable force, which ruined everyposition in the Chambers or in society, thing. At the decisive moment, it were likely to be at its head. During was the treachery of the two regiments the whole time it continued, those of the line stationed in the Place Venleaders were in consultation at the dôme, which, by rendering the removal hôtel of M. Lafitte, without any es- of the battalion of Swiss from the facort; Louis Philippe, who supplant-çade of the Louvre necessary, occaed Charles X. on the throne, was at sioned the loss of that important post, Neuilly, without guard or protection and with it the fall of the monarchy. of any sort. A squadron of gendarmes When it is recollected that the whole could have arrested all who, when the weight of the contest, during the three crisis was at its height, either disposed days, fell on the Royal Guard, not five of or accepted the crown. Yet nothing thousand strong, which with heroic of the kind was thought of until the fidelity performed its duty, while the morning of the 29th, when a warrant regiments of the line were worse than to arrest the Liberal leaders was put useless, because they betrayed imporinto the hands of Marmont, who re- tant posts confided to them, it is evifused to execute it. Such infatuation dent that the conflict might have had appears almost inconceivable; but its a very different issue had the whole ruinous consequences are put in the garrison of Paris, small as it was, reclearest light by the decisive effects mained faithful to its oaths. Here, which, on a similar crisis, attended as in the commencement of the first the opposite course pursued by Prince French Revolution, and afterwards in Louis Napoleon. On the night of 1st that of Spain, it was the shameful deDecember 1852, on the eve of his coup fection of the troops of the line which d'état, the whole chiefs of the Liberal rendered the insurrection in the first party and two-thirds of the National instance successful, and in the end utAssembly in Paris were arrested, and terly subversive of the cause of freequietly lodged in Vincennes, or the dom, for which its disgrace was inother forts adjacent. The consequence curred. was, that next day, when the insurrection broke out, it speedily died away from want of leaders; and the astonished Parisians, who never fail to range themselves on the side of success when it is once decisive, instead of attempting to avenge the insult on the majesty of the legislature, amused themselves with anecdotes of the consternation evinced by some of its members when roused from their slumbers at midnight by the gendarmes. 106. Notwithstanding, however, these immense faults in preparations and conduct, which sufficiently proved that the Royalist Ministry were wholly unequal to the crisis which they themselves had induced, it is more than probable that, if the troops had all remained steady, and done their duty, the insurrection would have been suppressed, and the monarchy, and with it the liberties of France, preserved. It was the defection of the troops of the line, who constituted the half of the whole 107. What has been the final result to the liberties of France, and with them the cause of freedom throughout the whole world, of this desertion by the French soldiers of the first of military duties, that of fidelity to their King? Has it been to confirm those liberties, and extend that freedom? Has it not, on the contrary, been to destroy the first and check the growth of the last? Historians of all parties now refer to the fifteen years of the Restoration as the only period in which real freedom prevailed in France; in which individual liberty was safe, public discussion unrestrained, the authority of the Crown tempered by the weight of the legislature, general prosperity established on the firm basis of universal security. Is there any one who will refer to the reign of Louis Philippe, the National Assembly, or Louis Napoleon, as exhibiting similar features? What is to be expected from the insurrection of soldiers-or, what is the same thing, the desertion of their duty in presence of insurrection | guard the avenues to the capital en—but the establishment of the empire tirely out of sight, but with orders to of the sword?—and was the fair super- turn out and act with the utmost vistructure of freedom ever erected on gour the moment they were directed such a foundation? Which proved to do so. The troops during the three most difficult for the Republicans to days that the contest lasted in Paris, deal with-Prince Polignac and his were kept constantly standing in the priests, or Marshal Soult and his cui- open street close to the insurgents, gerassiers? Who induced the iron rule nerally in conversation, and often proof the last, instead of the feeble ad- vided with food and water by them. ministration of the first? Who but It was thus that they heard the words the soldiers who forgot their oaths which soon circulated with fatal raamidst the cheers of the multitude, pidity through their ranks : "The and for ever ruined the cause of free- nation promises a marshal's baton to dom in their country by establishing the first colonel who joins the cause of it on the basis of treachery and trea- the people." son? There was no danger to liberty from the ordonnances of July, even had they been carried into full execution; Polignac and his feeble Cabinet could never have withstood the united resistance, exerted in a legal channel, of a whole nation. But the case was very different with Louis Philippe and Louis Napoleon, who were supported by the bayonets of four hundred thousand men, directed by the vigour and capacity of the empire. A nation may well despair of freedom which, after half a century of conflicts, in which victory has always remained to the strongest, finds itself in presence of such an armed multitude. 108. In justice to the soldiers who were guilty of this disgraceful tergiversation, however, it must be observed that the Government and military authorities committed a signal mistake in leaving the troops as they did, for days together, in presence of the mob, without either food to support their strength or action to invigorate their spirits. Marshal Victor had long ago pointed out the danger of such measures. "Soldiers," said he, in a Cabinet Council, "are easily seduced from their duty, when long kept in presence of the multitude in a state of inactivity; when in action or movement the military spirit revives, and they may be fully relied on." The Duke of Wellington evinced his thorough appreciation of this important truth, when on the memorable 10th April 1848 he kept the powerful array of troops which he had collected to 109. The treachery of the troops, however, which beyond all question was the immediate cause of the fall of the monarchy, though in some degree owing to this imprudent disposition, must in the last resort be ascribed to a different and more powerful cause. It is in the composition of the army, and especially of the officers, that the real origin of the disaster is to be found. Louis XVIII. meant well, but he signed the death-warrant of the monarchy when he affixed his name to the regulations, at the time so popular, which provided for the progressive rise of the privates to the rank of officers. The effect of this system, coupled with the general destruction of the class of gentry in the country by the first Revolution, was that, as already mentioned, the Minister at War assured Charles X. that there were not three hundred officers in the whole army who had 1000 francs (£40) a-year independent of their "pay." The great majority of the officers had originally been privates; they still associated, even messed with them; were little superior either in station or circumstances to their former comrades, and were thoroughly imbued with their ideas and wishes. The class was entirely awanting, so well known in Britain, of gentlemen for the most part connected with the landed aristocracy, whose younger sons generally, from choice or necessity, entered the army as a profession, and who, when there, still were influenced by the feelings and guided by the honourable habits of their ancestors. The French | tary men on similar crises in future, army, until the fatal era of the Revo- that with the limited means at his dislution, when the nobility were so posal his dispositions were eminently largely imbued with the Liberal delu-hazardous. To send three columns of sions of the times, and in many cases troops, not mustering more than eightook the lead in revolt, was perfectly teen hundred combatants each, into faithful through all changes to their the heart of a city in a state of insuroaths. The uniform steadiness and rection, and when fifty thousand old fidelity of the English army to its soldiers or national guards were to be duty under all circumstances, to which encountered, was to expose them to cerunder Providence our happy exemp-tain destruction. The long columns aption from the horrors of revolution is mainly to be ascribed, is beyond all question the result of its officers being drawn from a superior class of men. When that class is changed, its fidelity will no longer be beyond the risk of temptation. The purchase of commissions is the great security for the continued fidelity of those intrusted with the sword, for it confines their acquisition to the class which is influenced by the sentiments of honour. Let us hope that this inestimable advantage will not be lost by the adoption of the Chinese system of competitive examination for the appointment of officers. 110 Experience, on occasion of the Revolution of July, had not as yet taught military men the mode of combating an urban insurrection, or enabled discipline and skill to assert their superiority in street fighting and the storming of barricades, as it has since done. The force, too, at the disposal of Marmont, was, after the defection of the troops of the line, so utterly inadequate to the defence of the principal posts in the capital, especially from the small amount of artillery, that it would be unfair to ascribe any fault to that gallant but ill-fated commander on that account. Napoleon with five thousand regular troops and fifty guns defended the position of the Carrousel in 1795, against the assault of thirty thousand national guards; and if Marmont had possessed an equal number of guns, he would probably have done the same. But with twelve pieces of cannon, and four rounds of grape-shot to each gun, the thing was impossible. Still, without ascribing any fault to him, it must be observed, for the instruction of mili proaching through the narrow streets were exposed as they advanced to an incessant dropping fire from the houses; and when they halted in a square or open place, every avenue to it was of course closed with barricades, and the troops, isolated from each other and from the general-in-chief, were besieged in the position they had won. Dreadful loss, discouragement, and disaster were inevitable under such circumstances. What Marmont should have done with his little force was what Napoleon did in 1795viz., concentrated all his troops in the Place of the Carrousel and around the Tuileries, and not attempted offensive operations in the heart of the city till the arrival of reinforcements from the adjacent towns had quadrupled his tiny array. 111. The way of combating an urban insurrection, as now ascertained by experience, is this: If the general in command has only a small and inadequate force at his disposal, let him concentrate it in the strongest position he can get, and defend himself there till reinforcements enable him to resume the offensive. When he is in a condition to do so, he should make no attempt to storm the barricades at first, but advance with two 'guns and a howitzer in front towards the nearest, and fire as rapidly as possible at the barricade with round shot, while the howitzer, with small charges of powder, throws shells over it among the crowd behind. In nine cases out of ten a few rounds of this sort will shake the barricade, unless it is of stone and great strength, so as to render it passable, and disperse its defenders. Meanwhile foot-soldiers in file should advance before the guns, on each side of the street, close to the | render them so valuable. They regard wall, with orders to fire instantly into the furthering of the tenets of their every window from which a shot issues. faith, and the extension of their poliAs each of these files can only be ex- tical influence, as a matter of conposed to the fire from the windows science-a sacred duty, which at all opposite, or from the barricade, they hazards must be fulfilled. Thus they will sustain much less loss than if acquire the habit of looking only to they moved forward in close column the tendency of measures, and disrein the middle of the street, exposed garding altogether all considerations to a plunging fire on both sides. If connected with their practicability, or the barricade still holds out, a few the consequences which, under existsappers and miners, who should be ing circumstances, they are calculated with each of such columns, or soldiers to have. Such a disposition may be armed and equipped as such, should a suitable preparation for the crown be sent into the houses adjoining it, of martyrdom, but it is the one of all with orders to work their way through others most calculated to cast temthe partitions, till they come into poral crowns to the ground; and if a the rear of the barricade, when a monarch, in an age of advancing inplunging fire from the windows will telligence, desires to lose his throne, speedily render the position no longer he cannot take any means more effectenable. tually to attain his object, than by surrendering himself to the direction of such a party. 112. The great cause of the unpopularity of the Government of the Restoration, during its later years, was the influence which the Parti-prêtre had acquired in the Cabinet, and the efforts which they were visibly making to acquire the direction of the education of the young, and with it of the entire country. This influence was much less, so far as Charles X. was concerned, than was generally supposed; for though strongly impressed in his later years with religious ideas, that monarch was far from being the slave of the priests, and went into their measures rather from the belief that it was by them alone that a counterpoise to the influence of the revolutionary passions could be obtained, than from a blind submission to their authority. But the ruin which those measures brought on the monarchy affords a memorable proof of the extreme danger of surrendering the national councils to the direction of such a party, especially when they belong to the Roman Catholic religion. Often highly estimable in private life, invaluable when their labours are confined to their proper sphere-works of religion, instruction, and charity-ecclesiastics are in general the most dangerous of all councillors in affairs of state. They are so, precisely on account of the very qualities which in their own sphere 113. Even, however, after giving full weight to this consideration, there is something very strange, and almost inexplicable, in the violent opposition which the Government of the Restoration experienced in France. It had bestowed on the inhabitants of that country the whole objects for which they contended in the first Revolution, and which they had so passionately endeavoured to attain through such oceans of blood. They enjoyed in the highest degree the great elements of liberty, freedom of conscience, universal and unrestrained discussion on public affairs, trial by jury, representative institutions; and in addition to this, the race of their ancient monarchs had conferred upon them, what they had proved incapable of earning for themselves, internal prosperity and external peace. Such had been the blessings which these circumstances had induced, that they had not only given the people unexampled general prosperity, but entirely restored the national finances, and all but healed the wounds which, in the chase of more popular institutions, the nation had inflicted (upon itself. Writers of all parties now concur in these sentiments; they all contrast the mild government and general freedom of the |