Germany from the Earliest Period Part 17

In Prussia, the cholera occasioned several disturbances at Koenigsberg, Stettin, and Breslau. At Koenigsberg the movement was not occasioned by the disease being attributed to poison. The strict quarantine regulations enforced by the government had produced a complete commercial stagnation, notwithstanding which permission had been given to the Russian troops, when hard pushed by the insurgent Poles, to provide themselves with provisions and ammunition from Prussia, so that not only Russian agents and commissaries, but whole convoys from Russia crossed the Prussian frontier. The appearance of cholera was ascribed to this circ.u.mstance, and the public discontent was evinced both by a popular outbreak and in an address from the chief magistrate of Koenigsberg to the throne. The Prussian army, under the command of Field-Marshal Gneisenau, stationed in Posen for the purpose of watching the movements of the Poles, was also attacked by the cholera, to which the field-marshal fell victim. It speedily reached Berlin, spread through the north of Germany to France, England, and North America, returned thence to the south of Europe, and, in 1836, crept steadily on from Italy through the Tyrol to Bavaria.

The veil had been torn from many an old and deep-rooted evil by the disturbances of 1830. The press now emulated the provincial diets and some of the governments that sought to meet the demands of the age in exposing to public view all the political wants of Germany. Party spirit, however, still ran too high, and the moderate const.i.tutionalists, who aimed at the gradual introduction of reforms by legal means, found themselves ere long outflanked by two extreme parties. While Gentz at Vienna, Jarcke at Berlin, etc., refused to make the slightest concession and in that spirit conducted the press, Rotteck's petty const.i.tutional reforms in Baden were treated with contempt by Wirth and Siebenpfeiffer, by whom a German republic was with tolerable publicity proclaimed in Rhenish Bavaria. Nor were attempts at mediation wanting. In Darmstadt, Schulz proposed the retention of the present distribution of the states of Germany and the a.s.sociation of a second chamber, composed of deputies elected by the people from every part of the German confederation, with the federal a.s.sembly at Frankfort.

The Tribune, edited by Dr. Wirth, and the Westboten, edited by Dr.

Siebenpfeiffer, were prohibited by the federal diet, March 2, 1832.

Schuler, Savoie, and Geib opposed this measure by the foundation of a club in Rhenish Bavaria for the promotion of liberty of the press, ramifications of which were intended by the founders to be extended throughout Germany. The approaching celebration of the festival in commemoration of the Bavarian const.i.tution afforded the malcontents a long-wished-for opportunity for the convocation of a monster meeting at the ancient castle of Hambach, on the 27th of May. Although the black, red and gold flag waved on this occasion high above the rest, the tendency to French liberalism predominated over that to German patriotism. Numbers of French being also present, Dr. Wirth deemed himself called upon to observe that the festival they had met to celebrate was intrinsically German, that he despised liberty as a French boon, and that the patriot's first thoughts were for his country, his second for liberty. These observations greatly displeased the numerous advocates for French republicanism among his audience, and one Rey, a Strasburg citizen, read him a severe lecture in the Mayence style of 1793.[2] There were also a number of Poles present, toward whom no demonstrations of jealousy were evinced. This meeting peaceably dissolved, but no means were for the future neglected for the purpose of crushing the spirit manifested by it. Marshal Wrede occupied Spires, Landau, Neustadt, etc., with Bavarian troops; the clubs for the promotion of liberty of the press were strictly prohibited, their original founders, as well as the orators of Hambach and the boldest of the newspaper editors, were either arrested or compelled to quit the country. Siebenpfeiffer took refuge in Switzerland; Wirth might have effected his escape, but refused. Some provocations in Neustadt, on the anniversary of the Hambach festival in 1833, were brought by the military to a tragical close. Some newspaper editors, printers, etc., were also arrested at Munich, Wurzburg, Augsburg, etc. The most celebrated among the accused was Professor Behr, court-councillor of Wurzburg, the burgomaster and former deputy of that city, who at the time of the meeting at Hambach made a public speech at Gaibach. On account of the revolutionary tendency manifested in it he was arrested, and, in 1886, sentenced to ask pardon on his knees before the king's portrait and to imprisonment, a punishment to which the greater part of the political offenders were condemned.

The federal diet had for some time been occupied with measures for the internal tranquillity of Germany. The Hambach festival both brought them to a conclusion and increased their severity. Under the date of the 28th of June, 1832, the resolutions of the federal a.s.sembly, by which first of all the provincial Estates, then the popular clubs, and finally the press, were to be deprived of every means of opposing in any the slightest degree the joint will of the princes, were published. The governments were bound not to tolerate within their jurisdiction aught contrary to the resolutions pa.s.sed by the federal a.s.sembly, and to call the whole power of the confederation to their aid if unable to enforce obedience; nay, in cases of urgency, the confederation reserved to itself the right of armed intervention, undemanded by the governments. Taxes, to meet the expenses of the confederation, were to be voted submissively by the provincial Estates. Finally, all popular a.s.sociations and a.s.semblies were also prohibited, and all newspapers, still remaining, of a liberal tendency, were suppressed.

The youthful revolutionists, princ.i.p.ally students, a.s.sembled secretly at Frankfort on the Maine, during the night of the 3d of April, 1833, attacked the town-watch for the purpose of liberating some political prisoners, and possibly intended to have carried the federal a.s.sembly by a _coup-de-main_ had they not been dispersed. These excesses had merely the effect of increasing the severity of the scrutiny and of crowding the prisons with suspected persons.

[Footnote 1: Also the unfortunate Dr. Plath, to whom science is indebted for an excellent historical work upon China. He became implicated in this affair and remained in confinement until 1836, when he was sentenced to fifteen years' further imprisonment.]

[Footnote 2: All national distinctions must cease and be fused in universal liberty and equality; this was the sole aim of the n.o.ble French people, and for this cause should we meet them with a fraternal embrace, etc. Paul Pfizer well observed in a pamphlet on German liberalism, published at that period, "What epithet would the majority of the French people bestow upon a liberty which a part of their nation would purchase by placing themselves beneath the protection of a foreign and superior power, called to their aid against their fellow-citizens? If the cause of German liberalism is to remain pure and unspotted, we must not, like Coriola.n.u.s, arm the foreign foe against our country. The egotistical tendency of the age is, unhappily, too much inclined (by a coalition with France) to prefer personal liberty and independence to the liberty and independence (thereby infallibly forfeited) of the whole community. The supposed fellowship with France would be subjection to her. France will support the German liberals as Richelien did the German Protestants."]

CCLXX. The Struggles of the Provincial Diets

The Estates of the different const.i.tutional states sought for const.i.tutional reform by legal means and separated themselves from the revolutionists. But, during periods of great political agitation, it is difficult to draw a distinctive line, and any opposition, however moderate, appears as dangerous as the most intemperate rebellion. It was, consequently, impossible for the governments and the Estates to come to an understanding during these stormy times. The result of the deliberations, whenever the opposition was in the majority, was protestations on both sides in defence of right; and, whenever the opposition was or fell in the minority, the chambers were the mere echo of the minister.

In Bavaria, in 1831, the second chamber raised a violent storm against the minister, von Schenk, princ.i.p.ally on account of the restoration of some monasteries and of the enormous expense attending the erection of the splendid public buildings at Munich. A law of censorship had, moreover, been published, and a number of civil officers elected by the people been refused permission to take their seats in the chamber.

Schwindel, von Closen, Cullmann, Seyffert, etc., were the leaders of the opposition. Schenk resigned office; the law of censorship was repealed, and the Estates struck two millions from the civil list. The first chamber, however, refused its a.s.sent to these resolutions, the law of censorship was retained, and the saving in the expenditure of the crown was reduced to an extremely insignificant amount. In the autumn of 1832, Prince Otto, the king's second son, was, with the consent of the sultan, elected king of Greece by the great maritime powers intrusted with the decision of the Greek question, and Count Armansperg, formerly minister of Bavaria, was placed at the head of the regency during the minority of the youthful monarch. Steps having to be taken for the levy of troops for the Greek service, some regiments were sent into Greece in order to carry the new regulations into effect. The Bavarian chambers were at a later period almost entirely purged from the opposition and granted every demand made by the government. The appearance of the Bavarians in ancient Greece forms one of the most interesting episodes in modern history. The jealousy of the great powers explains the election of a sovereign independent of them all: the n.o.ble sympathy displayed for the Grecian cause by King Louis, who, shortly after the congress of Verona, sent considerable sums of money and Colonel von Heideck to the aid of the Greeks, and, it may be, also the wish to bring the first among the second-rate powers of Germany into closer connection with the common interests of the first-rate powers, more particularly explains that of the youthful Otto.[1] The task of organizing a nation, n.o.ble, indeed, but debased by long slavery and still reeking with the blood of late rebellion, under the influence of a powerful and mutually jealous diplomacy, on a European and German footing, was, however, extremely difficult. Hence the opposite views entertained by the regency, the resignation of the councillors of state, von Maurer and von Abel, who were more inclined to administrate, and the retention of office by Count Armansperg, who was more inclined to diplomatize. Hence the ceaseless intrigues of party, the daily increasing contumacy, and the revolts, sometimes quenched in blood, of the wild mountain tribes and ancient robber-chiefs, to whom European inst.i.tutions were still an insupportable yoke. King Otto received, on his accession to the throne, in 1835, a visit from his royal parent; and, in the ensuing year, conducted the Princess of Oldenburg to Athens as his bride.

In Wurtemberg, the chambers first met in 1833, and were, two months later, again dissolved on account of the refusal of the second chamber to reject "with indignation" Pfizer's protestation against the resolutions of the confederation. In the newly-elected second chamber, the opposition, at whose head stood the celebrated poet, Uhland, brought forward numerous propositions for reform, but remained in the minority, and it was not until the new diet, held in 1836, that the aristocratic first chamber was induced to diminish socage service and other feudal dues twenty-two and one-half per cent in amount. The literary piracy that had hitherto continued to exist solely in Wurtemberg was also provisionally abolished, the system of national education was improved, and several other useful projects were carried into execution or prepared. A new criminal code, published in 1838, again bore traces of political caution. The old opposition lost power.

In Baden, the venerable grandduke, Louis, expired in 1830, and was succeeded by Leopold, a descendant of the collateral branch of the counts of Hochberg. Bavaria had, at an earlier period, stipulated, in case of the extinction of the elder and legitimate line, for the restoration of the Pfalz (Heidelberg and Mannheim), which had, in 1816, been secured to her by a treaty with Austria. The grandduke, Louis, had protested against this measure and had, in 1817, declared Baden indivisible. Bavaria finally relinquished her claims on the payment of two million florins (166,666 13_s_. 4_d_.) and the cession of the bailiwick of Steinfeld, to which Austria moreover added the county of Geroldseck. The new grandduke, who was surnamed "the citizen's friend," behaved with extreme liberality and consequently went hand in hand with the first chamber, of which Wessenberg and Prince von Furstenberg were active members, and with the second, at the head of which stood Professors Rotteck, Welcker, and von Itzstein.

Rotteck proposed and carried through the abolition of capital punishment as alone worthy of feudal times, and, on Welcker's motion, censorship was abolished and a law for the press was pa.s.sed. The federal a.s.sembly, however, speedily checked these reforms. The grandduke was compelled to repeal the law for the press, the Freiburg university was for some time closed, Professors Rotteck and Welcker were suspended, and their newspaper, the "Freisinnige" or liberal, was suppressed in 1832. Rotteck was, notwithstanding, at feud with the Hambachers, and had raised the Baden flag above that of Germany at a national fete at Badenweiler. This extremely popular deputy, who had been presented with thirteen silver cups in testimony of the affection with which he was regarded by the people, afterward protested against the resolutions of the confederation, but his motion was violently suppressed by the minister, Winter. The Baden chamber, nevertheless, still retained a good deal of energy, and, after the death of Rotteck, in 1841, a violent contest was carried on concerning the rights of election.

In Hesse-Darmstadt, the Estates again met in 1832; the liberal majority in the second chamber, led by von Gagern, E. E. Hoffmann, Hallwachs, etc., protested against the resolutions of the confederation, and the chamber was dissolved. A fresh election took place, notwithstanding which the chamber was again dissolved in 1834, on account of the government being charged with party spirit by von Gagern and the refusal of the chamber to call him to order. The people afterward elected a majority of submissive members.

In Hesse-Ca.s.sel the popular demonstrations were instantly followed by the convocation of the Estates and the proposal of a new and stipulated const.i.tution, which received the sanction of the chambers as early as January, 1831; but, amid the continual disturbances, and on account of the disinclination of the prince co-regent to the liberal reforms, the chamber, of which the talented professor, Jordan of Marburg, was the most distinguished member, yielded, notwithstanding its perseverance, after two rapidly successive dissolutions, in 1832 and 1833, to the influence of the (once liberal) minister, Ha.s.senpflug, and Jordan quitted the scene of contest.

Ha.s.senpflug's tyrannical behavior and the lapse of Hesse-Rotenburg (the mediatized collateral line, which became extinct with the Landgrave Victor in 1834), the revenues of which were appropriated as personal property by the prince elector instead of being declared state property, fed the opposition in the chambers, which was, notwithstanding the menaces of the prince elector, carried on until 1838. Ha.s.senpflug threw up office.

In Na.s.sau, the duke, William, fell into a violent dispute with the Estates. The second chamber, after vainly soliciting the rest.i.tution of the rich demesnes, appropriated by the duke as private property, on the ground of their being state property, and the application of their revenue to the payment of the state debts, refused, in the autumn of 1831, to vote the taxes. The first chamber, in which the duke had the power of raising at will a majority in his favor by the creation of fresh members, protested against the conduct of the second, which in return protested against that of the first and suspended its proceedings until their const.i.tutional rights should have received full recognition; five of the deputies, however, again protested against the suspension of the proceedings of the chamber and voted the taxes during the absence of the majority. The majority again protested, but became entangled in a political lawsuit, and Herber, the gray-headed president, was confined in the fortress of Marxburg.

In Brunswick, a good understanding prevailed between William the new duke, and the Estates, which were, however, accused of having an aristocratic tendency by the democratic party. Their sittings continued to be held in secret.

In Saxony, the long-wished-for reforms, above all, the grant of a new const.i.tution, were realized, owing to the influence of the popular co-regent, added to that of Lindenau, the highly-esteemed minister, and of the newly-elected Estates, in 1831. The law of censorship, nevertheless, continued to be enforced with extreme severity, which also marked the treatment of the political prisoners. Count Hohenthal and Baron Watzdorf, who seized every opportunity to put in protestations, even against the resolutions of the confederation, evinced the most liberal spirit. On the demise of the aged king, Antony, in 1835, and the accession of the co-regent, Frederick, to the throne, the political movements totally ceased.

Holstein and Schleswig had also, as early as 1823, solicited the rest.i.tution of their ancient const.i.tutional rights, which the king, Frederick IV., delayed to grant. Lornsen, the councillor of chancery, was arrested in 1830, for attempting to agitate the people. Separate provincial diets were, notwithstanding, decreed, in 1831, for Holstein and Schleswig, although both provinces urgently demanded their union.

Frederick IV. expired in 1839 and was succeeded by his cousin, Christian.

Immediately after the revolution of July, the princes of Oldenburg, Altenburg, Coburg, Meiningen, and Schwarzburg-Sondershausen made a public appeal to the confidence of their subjects, whom they called upon to lay before them their grievances, etc. Augustus, duke of Oldenburg, who had a.s.sumed the t.i.tle of grandduke, proclaimed a const.i.tution, but shortly afterward withdrew his promise and strictly forbade his subjects to annoy him by recalling it to his remembrance.

The prince von Sondershausen also refused the hoped-for const.i.tution.

In Sigmaringen, Altenburg, and Meiningen the const.i.tutional movement was, on the contrary, countenanced and encouraged by the princes.

Pauline, the liberal-minded princess of Lippe-Detmold, had already drawn up a const.i.tution for her petty territory with her own hand, when the n.o.bility rose against it, and, aided by the federal a.s.sembly, compelled her to withdraw it.

In the autumn of 1833, the emperor of Russia held a conference with the king of Prussia at Munchen-Gratz, whither the emperor of Austria also repaired. A German ministerial congress a.s.sembled immediately afterward at Vienna, and the first of its resolutions was made public late in the autumn of 1834. It announced the establishment of a court of arbitration, empowered, as the highest court of appeal, to decide all disputes between the governments and their provincial Estates. The whole of the members of this court were to be nominated by the governments, but the disputing parties were free to select their arbitrators from among the number.

A fresh and violent const.i.tutional battle was, notwithstanding these precautions, fought in Hanover, where Adolphus Frederick, duke of Cambridge, had, in the name of his brother, William IV., king of England, established a new const.i.tution, which had received many ameliorations notwithstanding the inefficiency of the liberals, Christiani, Luntzel, etc., to counteract the overpowering influence of the monarchical and aristocratic party. William IV., king of England and Hanover, expired in 1837, and was succeeded on the throne of Great Britain by Victoria Alexandrina, the daughter of his younger and deceased brother, Edward, duke of Kent, and of the Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg; and on that of Hanover, which was solely heritable in the male line, by his second brother, Ernest, duke of c.u.mberland, the leader of the Tory party in England. No sooner had this new sovereign set his foot on German soil[2] than he repealed the const.i.tution granted to Hanover in 1833 and ordained the restoration of the former one of 1819, drawn up in a less liberal but more monarchical and aristocratic spirit. Among the protestations made against this _coup d'etat_, that of the seven Gottingen professors, the two brothers, Grimm, to whom the German language and antiquarian research are so deeply indebted, Dahlmann, Gervinus, Ewald, Weber, and Albrecht, is most worthy of record. Their instant dismission produced an insurrection among the students, which was, after a good deal of bloodshed, quelled by the military. In the beginning of 1838, the Estates were convoked according to the articles of the const.i.tution of 1819 for the purpose of taking a const.i.tution, drawn up under the dictation of the king, under deliberation. Many of the towns refused to elect deputies, and some of those elected were not permitted to take their seats. The city of Osnabruck protested in the federal a.s.sembly. Notwithstanding this, the Estates meanwhile a.s.sembled, but declared themselves incompetent, regarding themselves simply in the light of an arbitrative committee, and, as such, threw out the const.i.tution presented by the king, June, 1838. The federal a.s.sembly remained pa.s.sive.[3] In 1839, Schele, the minister, finally succeeded, by means of menaces and bribery, and by arbitrarily calling into the chamber the ministerial candidates who had received the minority of votes during the elections, in collecting so many deputies devoted to his party as were requisite in order to form the chamber and to pa.s.s resolutions. The city of Hanover hereupon brought before the federal a.s.sembly a pet.i.tion for redress and a list of grievances in which Schele's chamber was described as "unworthy of the name of a const.i.tutional representative a.s.sembly, void of confidence, unpossessed of the public esteem, and unrecognized by the country."

The king instantly divested Rumann, the city director, of his office, but so far yielded to the magistrate, to whom he gave audience in the palace and who was followed by crowds of the populace, as to revoke the nomination, already declared illegal, of Rumann's successor, and to promise that the matter at issue should be brought before the common tribunal instead of the council of state, July 17th. Numerous other cities, corporations of landed proprietors, etc., also followed the example set by Hanover and laid their complaints before the federal a.s.sembly, which hereupon declared that, according to the laws of the confederation, it found no cause for interference, but at the same time advised the king to come to an understanding consistent with the rights of the crown and of the Estates, with the "present" Estates (unrecognized by the democratic party), concerning the form of the const.i.tution. In the federal a.s.sembly, Wurtemberg and Bavaria, most particularly, voted in favor of the Hanoverians. Professor Ewald was appointed to the university of Tubingen; Albrecht, at a later period, to that of Leipzig; the brothers Grimm, to that of Berlin; Dahlmann, to that of Bonn. Among the a.s.sembled Estates, those of Baden, Wurtemberg, and Saxony most warmly espoused the cause of the people of Hanover, but, as was natural, without result.[4]

In 1840, the king convoked a fresh diet. The people refused to elect members, and it was solely by means of intrigue that a small number of deputies (not half the number fixed by law) were a.s.sembled, creatures of the minister, Schele, who were disowned by the people in addresses couched in the most energetic terms (the address presented by the citizens of Osnabruck was the most remarkable) and their proceedings were protested against. This petty a.s.sembly, nevertheless, took under deliberation and pa.s.sed a new const.i.tution, against which the cities and the country again protested. The king also declared his only son, George, who was afflicted with blindness, capable of governing and of succeeding to the throne.

[Footnote 1: Thiersch, the Bavarian court-councillor, one of the most distinguished connoisseurs of Grecian antiquity, who visited Greece shortly after Heideck and before the arrival of the king, was received by the modern Greeks with touching demonstrations of delight. No nation has so deeply studied, so deeply become imbued with Grecian lore, as that of Germany, and the close connection formed, on the accession of the Bavarian Otto to the throne of Greece, between her sons and the children of that cla.s.sic land, justifies the proudest expectations.]

[Footnote 2: He did not restore the whole of the crown property that had, at an earlier period, been carried away to England. A considerable portion of the crown jewels had been taken away by George I., and when, in 1802, the French occupied Hanover, the whole of the movable crown property, even the great stud, was sent to England. On the demise of George III., the crown jewels were divided among the princes of the English house.--_Copied from the Courier of August, 1838._]

[Footnote 3: The Darmstadt government declared to the second chamber, on its bringing forward a motion for the intercession of Darmstadt with the federal a.s.sembly in favor of the legality of the ancient const.i.tution then in force in Hanover, that the grandduke would never tolerate any cooperation on the part of the Estates with his vote in the federal a.s.sembly.]

[Footnote 4: "This defeat is, however, not to be lamented: the battle for the separate const.i.tutions has not been fought in vain if German nationality spring from the wreck of German separatism, if we are taught that without a liberal federal const.i.tution liberal provincial const.i.tutions are impossible in Germany."--_Pfizer._]

CCLXXI. Austria and Prince Mettenich

Austria might, on the fall of Napoleon, have maintained Alsace, Lorraine, the Breisgau, and the whole of the territory of the Upper Rhine in the same manner in which Prussia had maintained that of the Lower Rhine, had she not preferred the preservation of her rule in Italy and rendered her position in Germany subordinate to her station as a European power. This policy is explained by the peculiar circ.u.mstances of the Austrian state, which had for centuries comprised within itself nations of the most distinct character, and the population of whose provinces were by far the greater part Slavonian, Hungarian, and Italian, the great minority German. By this policy she lost, as the Prussian Customs' Union has also again proved, much of her influence over Germany, while, on the other hand, she secured it the more firmly in Southern and Eastern Europe. Austria has long made a gradual and almost unperceived advance from the northwest in a southeasterly direction. In Germany she has continually lost ground.

Switzerland, the Netherlands, Alsace, Lorraine, the Swabian counties, Lusatia, Silesia, have one by one been severed from her, while her non-German possessions have as continually been increased, by the addition of Hungary, Transylvania, Galicia, Dalmatia, and Upper Italy.

The contest carried on between Austria, the French Revolution, and Napoleon, has at all events left deep and still visible traces; the characters of the emperor Francis and of his chancellor of state, Prince Metternich, that perfect representative of the aristocracy of Europe, sympathize also as closely with the Austrian system as the character of the emperor Joseph was antipathetical to it. This system dates, however, earlier than those revolutionary struggles, and has already outlived at least one of its supporters.

Austria is the only great state in Europe that comprises so many diverse but well-poised nationalities within its bosom; in all the other great states, one nation bears the preponderance. To this circ.u.mstance may be ascribed her peaceful policy, every great war threatening her with the revolt of some one of the foreign nations subordinate to her sceptre. To this may, moreover, be ascribed the tenacity with which she upholds the principle of legitimacy. The historical hereditary right of the reigning dynasty forms the sole but ideal tie by which the diverse and naturally inimical nations beneath her rule are linked together. For the same reason, the concentration of talent in the government contrasts, in Austria, more violently with the obscurantism of the provinces than in any other state. Not only does the overpowering intelligence of the chancery of state awe the nations beneath its rule, but the proverbial good nature and patriarchal cordiality of the imperial family win every heart. The army is a mere machine in the hands of the government; a standing army, in which the soldier serves for life or for the period of twenty years, during which he necessarily loses all sympathy with his fellow-citizens, and which is solely reintegrated from militia whom this privilege renders still more devoted to the government. The pretorian spirit usually prevalent in standing armies has been guarded against in Austria by there being no guards, and all sympathy between the military and the citizens of the various provinces whence they were drawn is at once prevented by the Hungarian troops being sent into Italy, the Italian troops into Galicia, etc., etc. The nationality of the private soldier is checked by the Germanism of the subalterns and by the Austrianism of the staff. Besides the power thus everywhere visible, there exists another partially invisible, that of the police, in connection with a censorship of the severest description, which keeps a guard over the inadvertencies of the tongue as well as over those of the press. The people are, on the other hand, closely bound up with the government and interested in the maintenance of the existing state of affairs by the paper currency, on the value of which the welfare of every subject in the state depends.

To a government thus strong in concentrated power and intelligence stands opposed the ma.s.s of nations subject to the Austrian sceptre whose natural antipathies have been artfully fostered and strengthened. In Austria the distinctions of cla.s.s, characteristic of the Middle Ages, are still preserved. The aristocracy and the clergy possess an influence almost unknown in Germany, but solely over the people, not over the government. As corporative bodies they still are, as in the days of Charles VI., convoked for the purpose of holding postulate diets, whose power, with the exception of that of the Hungarian diet, is merely nominal. The n.o.bility, even in Hungary, as everywhere else throughout the Austrian states (more particularly since the Spanish system adopted by Ferdinand II.), is split into two inimical cla.s.ses, those of the higher and lower aristocracy. Even in Galicia, where the Polish n.o.bility formed, at an earlier period and according to earlier usage, but one body, the distinction of a higher and lower cla.s.s has been introduced since the occupation of that country by Austria. The high aristocracy are either bound by favors, coincident with their origin, to the court, the great majority among them consisting of families on whom n.o.bility was conferred by Ferdinand II., or they are, if families belonging to the more powerful and more ancient national aristocracy, as, for instance, that of Esterhazy in Hungary, brought by the bestowal of fresh favors into closer affinity with the court and drawn within its sphere. The greater proportion of the aristocracy consequently reside at Vienna.

The lower n.o.bility make their way chiefly by talent and perseverance in the army and the civil offices, and are therefore naturally devoted to the government, on which all their hopes in life depend. The clergy, although permitted to retain the whole of their ancient pomp and their influence over the minds of the people, have been rendered dependent upon the government, a point easily gained, the pope being princ.i.p.ally protected by Austria.

The care of the government for the material welfare of the people cannot be denied; it is, however, frustrated by two obstacles raised by its own system. The maintenance of the high aristocracy is, for instance, antipathetic to the welfare of the subject, and, although comfort and plenty abound in the immediate vicinity of Vienna, the population on the enormous estates of the magnates in the provinces often present a lamentable contrast. The Austrian government moreover prohibits all free intercourse with foreign parts, and the old- fashioned system of taxation, senseless as many other existing regulations, entirely puts a stop to all free trade between Hungary and Austria. Consequently, the new and grand modes of communication, the Franzen Ca.n.a.l, that unites the Danube and the Thiess, the Louisenstra.s.se, between Carlstadt and Fiume, the magnificent road to Trieste, the admirable road across the rocks of the Stilfser Jock, and, more than all, the steam navigation as far as the mouths of the Danube and the railroads, will be unavailing to scatter the blessings of commerce and industry so long as these wretched prohibitions continue to be enforced.

Austria has, in regard to her foreign policy, left the increasing influence of Russia in Poland, Persia, and Turkey unopposed, and even allowed the mouths of the Danube to be guarded by Russian fortresses, while she has, on the other hand, energetically repelled the interference of France in the affairs of Italy. The July revolution induced a popular insurrection in the dominions of the Church, and the French threw a garrison into the citadel of Ancona; the Austrians, however, instantly entered the country and enforced the restoration of the _ancien regime_. In Lombardy, many ameliorations were introduced and the prosperity of the country promoted by the Austrian administration, notwithstanding the national jealousy of the inhabitants. Venice, with her choked-up harbor, could, it is true, no longer compete with Trieste. The German element has gained ground in Galicia by means of the public authorities and the immigration of agriculturists and artificers. The Hungarians endeavored to render their language the common medium throughout Hungary, and to expel the German element, but their apprehension of the numerous Slavonian population of Hungary, whom religious sympathy renders subject to Russian influence, has speedily reconciled them with the Germans.

Slavonism has, on the other hand, also gained ground in Bohemia.

The emperor, Francis I., expired in 1835, and was succeeded by his son, Ferdinand I., without a change taking place in the system of the government, of which Prince Metternich continued to be the directing principle.

The decease of some of the heads of foreign royal families and the marriages of their successors again placed several German princes on foreign thrones. The last of the Guelphs on the throne of Great Britain expired with William IV., whose niece and successor, Victoria Alexandrina, wedded, 1840, Albert of Saxe-Coburg, second son of Ernest, the reigning duke. That the descendant of the steadfast elector should, after such adverse fortune, be thus destined to occupy the highest position in the reformed world, is of itself remarkable.

One of this prince's uncles, Leopold, is seated on the throne of Belgium, and one of his cousins, Ferdinand, on that of Portugal, in right of his consort, Donna Maria da Gloria, the daughter of Dom Pedro, king of Portugal and emperor of the Brazils, to whom, on the expulsion of the usurper, Dom Miguel, he was wedded in 1835. These princes of Coburg are remarkable for manly beauty.

The antipathy with which the new dynasty on the throne of France was generally viewed rendered Ferdinand, Duke of Orleans, Louis Philippe's eldest son, for some time an unsuccessful suitor for the hand of a German princess; he at length conducted Helena, princess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, although against the consent of her stepfather, Paul Frederick, the reigning duke, to Paris in 1837, as future queen of the French. He was killed in 1842, by a fall from his carriage, and left two infant sons, the Count of Paris and the Duke of Chartres. The Czarowitz, Alexander, espoused Maria, Princess of Darmstadt.

The French chambers and journals have rea.s.sumed toward Germany the tone formerly affected by Napoleon, and, with incessant cries for war, in which, in 1840, the voice of the prime minister Thiers joined, demand the restoration of the left bank of the Rhine. Thiers was, however, compelled to resign office, and the close alliance between Austria, Prussia, and the whole of the confederated princes, as well as the feeling universally displayed throughout Germany, demonstrated the energy with which an attack on the side of France would be repelled. The erection of the long-forgotten federal fortresses on the Upper Rhine was also taken at length under consideration, and it was resolved to fortify both Rastadt and Ulm without further delay.

Nor have the statesmen of France failed to threaten Germany with a Russo-Gallic alliance in the spirit of the Erfurt congress of 1808; while Russia perseveres in the prohibitory system so prejudicial to German commerce, attempts to suppress every spark of German nationality in Livonia, Courland, and Esthonia, and fosters Panslavism, or the union of all the Slavonic nations for the subjection of the world, among the Slavonian subjects of Austria in Hungaria and Bohemia. The extension of the Greek church is also connected with this idea. "The European Pentarchy," a work that attracted much attention in 1839, insolently boasts how Russia, in defiance of Austria, has seized the mouths of the Danube, has wedged herself, as it were, by means of Poland, between Austria and Prussia, in a position equally threatening to both, recommends the minor states of Germany to seek the protection of Russia, and darkly hints at the alliance between that power and France.

Nor are the prospects of Germany alone threatened by France and Russia; disturbances, like a fantastic renewal of the horrors of the Middle Age, are ready to burst forth on the other side of the Alps, as though, according to the ancient saga of Germany, the dead were about to rise in order to mingle in the last great contest between the G.o.ds and mankind.