Chapter XXX (5)

Another point which M. Drouyn de Lhuys has handled successfully, is that which relates to the difference in the measures adopted in common by France and England, when affairs reached a most alarming point, and those which Russia, in the impatience of her ambition, adopted, at the very outset. In the despatch of the 11th June, General Castelbajac is enjoined to apprise the Russian Government of the position in which it was about to place itself with respect to the rest of Europe; to warn it that it was grievously mistaken if it counted upon allies in the realisation of its designs, and particularly upon the German states. Indeed, it was not probable that these states would see with indifference the Lower Danube in the possession of a powerful government, which might at will obstruct its navigation, and at any moment block up a commercial outlet of so much importance. The French Minister clearly showed that the conduct of Russia was in opposition to the general interests of Europe; and that the realisation of the doctrines of the Russian Chancellor meant, in point of fact, the subjugation of the weaker states to the will of one great power. The replies of M. de Nesselrode are, of course, replete with the same pacific declarations which had produced so soporific an effect on our own Government, and with solemn denials of ambitious views, which present a curious contrast with the warlike preparations which were never for a moment suspended except by difficulties independent of the will of Russia. It was soon seen that, _coûte qui coûte_, Russia was determined not to give way. Smooth and hypocritical, like a thief at the bar, who profits by the scantiness of the evidence at first brought against him, earnestly to protest his innocence, she became bold, insolent, and defying, like the same culprit when accumulated proofs leave no doubt of his guilt. There are some despatches that have not been inserted in the _Moniteur_, but we have little doubt that the omitted ones are not less moderate, less firm, and not less characterised by good sense and dignity, than those we have noticed; and if any such doubt existed, the ultimatum, which was at once followed by a complete rupture of diplomatic relations, would suffice to remove it. Towards the close of December all was over. The massacre of Sinope had taken place, and no further hope remained of obtaining any satisfactory result from a power which, in its diplomacy as its hostility, appeared to have all at once lost every sentiment of truth, justice, and humanity. The autograph letter of the Emperor Napoleon is little more than a summary of the despatch of the 25th December, of the notes addressed to M. de Kisseleff before his departure from Paris, and of the last letter of M. Drouyn de Lhuys to the French ambassador at St Petersburg.

We believe the Emperor of Russia to have been led into his present difficult position—a position from which escape, unless through a disastrous war, seems almost impossible—by the erroneous information he received with respect to the state of public feeling in France and England, from “antiquated imbecilities” of both countries. In ordinary times it would be no easy task to so impose on any person of intelligence, even much inferior to that of the Emperor Nicholas; and his facility of belief in the present instance can only be explained by the social and political complications supposed to exist in a country which has gone through so many violent changes. Under the regime of Louis Philippe, the female diplomatists of the Rue St Florentin were enabled to ascertain with accuracy, and communicate with fidelity, the secret policy of the Tuileries. In the Russian _salons_ of Paris, the centre of the more important _espionage_, were nightly assembled ministers, ex-ministers, functionaries past and present, and, in fine, all who, in official parlance, were supposed to represent France. The secrets, the gossip, the scandal of every political coterie in the capital, were discharged, there, as in one common reservoir; and were thence transmitted for the information, or amusement, of the Imperial Court of Russia. The ministers of the citizen-king were too eager to propitiate the favour of the northern Court, to withhold their confidence from any of the Czar’s agents, official or non-official. The revolution of February rudely interfered with that machinery, directed by a well-known _intrigante_. Attendance at a half-dozen saloons no longer sufficed to obtain a knowledge of the state of the country. Whilst a dozen dowagers of the old schools, and as many retired, discontented, or broken-down statesmen, and a few amateur republicans, were indulging in reveries of a restoration, or the re-establishment of a convention, with its appendages of committees of public safety, the dream was broken by the acclamations of millions, who bestowed absolute power on the only man capable of saving them. The Cabinet of St. Petersburg could not be expected to know more about the country than those who had for so many years administered its affairs. The agents of Russia beheld the struggle that had been going on so long among political coteries, the selfish disputes of discarded placemen, and their ephemeral and hollow reconciliations; and they supposed that, because adventurers quarrelled, or political coteries made war on each other, the nation was similarly divided. The diplomatic communications of that period must be curious; and we confess we should like to be permitted a perusal of the confidential correspondence of the well-known _diplomate_ in petticoats, who for so many years was the pet agent of the Czar, and for whom existence was valueless unless passed in the atmosphere of political intrigue, to which it had been so long accustomed. When speaking of confidential correspondence, we do not, of course, allude to those indecent libels penned daily in the French capital; and, we regret to say, with the knowledge, or under the superintendence, of persons who, though known for profligacy in private life, were the confidential companions and bosom friends of personages whose praises we have heard, even to satiety, for austerity of morals, and who are held up as samples of every public and private virtue. Those chroniclers of scandal spared neither sex, nor age, nor rank. The meanest agency was set to work to furnish amusement for the _Cabinet_ of the Czar during his hours of recreation; and to record stories and anecdotes in the style and manner of _Taillement des Réaux_, the _Œil de Bœuf_, or the _Chevalier de Faublas_. With such unerring guides, it is no wonder that the Czar believed that the propitious moment was come. It was represented to him that the Court of Paris was more corrupt, more profligate, than that of Louis XV.; that all France was impoverished, degraded, and discontented, anxious to throw off the yoke of the Buonaparte, eager to receive a sovereign flung to it by any foreign despot; or, at all events, utterly incapable of resisting any encroachment, much less avenging any insult from abroad. The ruler of France, he was told, was overwhelmed by the difficulties that naturally encompass every government in its commencement. His declaration of the _pacific_ policy of the empire was but the unwilling avowal of his weakness, and of his fears. The agitation of political parties, he believed, ruined the country, though, since 1789, political intrigues, secret societies, and conspiracies never were more powerless than at the moment we speak of. The agents who thus instructed the Emperor of Russia crowned those reports by depicting Louis Napoleon as apathetic, because they saw him calm; as hesitating and timid, because they saw him patient and moderate.

We have no doubt that the Emperor of Russia was led into similar error with respect to this country. He was assured that it had become selfish and apathetic from its unexampled prosperity; and that so opulent and so sensual a nation would never expose itself, after so long a peace, to the chances and the dangers of a long war, for the sake of maintaining the integrity and independence of an empire whose people preferred the Koran to the Bible. Their commercial prudence, the love of ease engendered by opulence, the long period of time that passed since the wars with the first Napoleon, the many important interests which have grown up since then, religious antipathy—everything, in fact—indisposed the English nation to interfere with his designs in Turkey. But the presence in the Government of a statesman, recently so ridiculed and insulted by those who were now his colleagues, believed to be a warm admirer of the Emperor of Russia, and known for his cold hatred of the Emperor of the French, was considered the most fortunate circumstance of all; it was, at any rate, a guarantee against any favourable understanding with France or her ruler. Letters, said to be from that statesman, addressed to one of the former ministers of Louis Philippe, were read in one of the principal Russian saloons in Paris, the most notorious of all for intrigues, and the resort of the leaders of every anti-national party. These letters, asserted to be genuine, are described as having alluded in terms of the greatest contempt to the person, the character, and the intellect of Louis Napoleon; and as containing declarations that, under no circumstances whatever, could England act with France so long as its present regime lasted. The scum of the Orleanist agency were sent round to circulate the news, and despatches addressed to St Petersburg repeated the same. The tone of a portion of the daily press in England with reference to France seemed to confirm those assurances, and to render the formation of a coalition against the French Emperor, in which it was hoped England would join, by no means a difficult nor an improbable task. The falsest of all these calculations was unquestionably that which represented England as labouring under an oppression of wealth, a plethora of opulence, of which indifference, timidity, and inaction were the consequences. Yet such is the description given of us to Russia by Orleanists, whose incapacity and cowardice produced the overthrow of the dynasty of July. The acquisition of wealth and power supposes the possession of great energy of character; for those qualities we have been distinguished above all other people. That we have not become wearied or satiated, the events of each day that passes over our heads prove; and whatever be the period at which we are destined to reach the declining point, and which such scribblers as Ledru Rollin and the like maintain we have attained, we ourselves believe that the fatal moment is still far distant. We have shown energy without example, since the time of the Romans, in making ourselves what we are; and we are ready to let the world see that we know how to maintain the power which was supposed to have enervated us, with more than Roman courage. With admitted social and political evils—far less, however, than any other nation on earth—we have not become corrupt or effeminate. It is not true that the extraordinary development of our public and private fortune has buried us in that shameful indolence which made the Romans so easy a prey to the barbarians. Prosperity has not made us forget or disregard our rights. The wonderful development of our railway communications and our steam navigation, the extension of our commerce, the pacification of India, the colonisation of Africa, ought to have shown the Emperor of Russia that we have not yet fallen from our high estate in the political or moral world. The mighty fleets and the gallant bands of warriors that are even now conveying to him our answer to his insolent defiance, will show him the magnitude of his error. Our courage and our activity, our resolution in council, and our sternness in execution, are in proportion to the grandeur of the interests we have to defend. Our decline, much less our fall, has not yet commenced; and if any foreign or domestic friend has persuaded Russia that we resemble the Romans in the latter days of their empire, and that we are in a condition to fall a prey to the barbarians, he is an idiot or a calumniator.

Nothing is now so clear as that the Emperor of Russia has been most grossly deceived with respect to Turkey; but it is just to admit that the error has been also shared by many who should know better. Prince Menschikoff, during his short sojourn at Constantinople, had only time to insult the Sultan and his government, but also time to rouse a spirit of resentment and resistance. The backwardness of Turkey in civilisation was taken as a proof of her weakness and her deficiency in moral courage. But, with all her shortcomings, the old Mussulman spirit still subsisted amid the ruins of her former glory. It has been said that there are qualities which are effaced or destroyed by refinement, but there are others which live without it, though the occasion may have seldom occurred to call them forth. Turkish patriotism was regarded as a byword, Turkish loyalty as a mockery; Turkish courage was more than doubtful; and nothing remained of the daring valour which, in other times, made Christendom quail before the Crescent, except that vigour of faith which once distinguished the children of the Prophet: and even that, we were led to believe, had degenerated into a brutal and ignoble fanaticism, capable of vulgar crime, but unequal to a single act of heroism. The arrogant envoy of Russia rendered an essential service, not to his imperial master, but to his intended victim. His insults roused the dormant spirit of the Mussulman. The Ottoman army was undisciplined—unprovided with the commonest necessaries; the navy was but the melancholy remnant of Navarino; the Sultan’s authority was weakened by internal abuses and disorders; his territory dismembered by the separation of Greece, and by the all but successful rebellion of Egypt. Those to whom he looked for aid or protection against his colossal foe were long cold, if not hostile to him; yet Turkey rose with a courage and a dignity which have extorted applause, and won respect, even from those who were most indisposed to her cause, politically and religiously. She summoned her children about her; appealed, _not_ to the relentless fanaticism of their creed, but to their manlier and nobler instincts; and after making every sacrifice, every concession consistent with self-respect, to appease or disarm her unscrupulous and faithless enemy, who was bent on her destruction, drew the sword in the cause of her independence. Whilst still uncertain whether she was to maintain the struggle alone and unsympathised with, against fearful odds, she advanced to the contest with a bravery worthy of better times, and with a success which has astonished her friends as well as foes. The feelings which Prince Menschikoff believed he could most safely outrage were those which quickened the nation into life and vigour. The Emperor of Russia was astonished at a result so different from what he was led to expect. The advices which had reached him from his friends in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and Constantinople, were such as might have been true some twenty years ago, but were false in 1853. France and England were said to be divided, and likely to remain so as long as a Buonaparte ruled the destinies of the former, and as long as Lord Aberdeen directed the administration of the latter. France had become exhausted by revolution, discontented with her new chief, demoralised, and rotten at the very heart;—no remedy to restore her, till the Count de Chambord, or the Count de Paris, was restored to the throne; and with England, satiated and unwieldy with unwholesome prosperity, no desire remained, no passion survived, but that of enjoying in undisturbed tranquillity what she had hardly acquired. Count Orloff has learned something at Vienna; but it does not appear that the lesson has much profited him or his imperious master.

In these multiplied and intricate transactions, in which Russia was alternately the deceived and the deceiver, there is one point in particular to which we would direct the attention of our readers. We allude to the claim made by the Porte to the intervention of the great powers in its quarrel with Russia. It is a claim based on equity and on international law, which it is impossible to dispute. Previous to 1841, Turkey was hardly looked upon as forming part of the general combination of European states in the settlement of any great international question. Rightly or wrongly, the Turks were considered less as forming an integral part of the European family of nations, than as an agglomeration of various tribes of warriors, bound together only by a common superstition and a common fanaticism; not rooted in the soil they occupied, but merely encamped on the outskirts of Christendom. The Treaties of 1841, which facilitated to France the resumption of her place in Europe, after her separation the previous year, also admitted Turkey to that general political association. That privilege or right Turkey has not forgotten in her hour of need, as we believe she would have done in her hour of prosperity; and in her appeal to the world against the pretensions of Russia, she summoned Austria, France, Prussia, and Great Britain, in the name of those solemn obligations, to come to her aid. She maintained that her participation in what is termed, in diplomatic parlance, the _Concerte Européen_, was recognised; and she showed, we think successfully, that henceforth all questions affecting the independence and integrity of her territory should be brought before the great tribunal of European states, and not left to the judgment of a single and an interested power. The principle of the right claimed by Turkey was admitted by the Cabinets of Vienna, Berlin, Paris, and London; and that recognition is manifest in the documents that have been made public. In the note addressed to the Austrian Cabinet on the 31st December 1853, we find this declaration:—“The multiplicity of the relations and the alliances of the Sublime Porte and of the European States, giving to it, in every respect, the right and the faculty of participating in the community which binds these States to each other, and to the security which they derive from them, the necessity will be felt of confirming and completing in that sense the Treaty of 1841, and for that it reposes on the friendly efforts of the allied Courts.” And the allied Courts, in turn, declared, “that the Russian Government, which invaded the territory of the Sultan, had placed itself in opposition with the resolutions declared by the great powers of Europe in 1840 and 1841. That, moreover, the spirit of the important transaction in which Russia took part in 1841 with the other powers, and with Turkey herself, is opposed to the pretension that the affairs of the East should be treated otherwise than in common, and in the conferences in which all these interests should be examined and discussed. And it must be well understood that every such question must be treated by _five_; and that it does not belong to _one_ or to _two_ cabinets to settle, separately or apart, interests which may affect the whole of Europe.” The allies of Turkey also added, “that the Treaty of 1841, in the meaning of which all are this day agreed, is to serve as the basis of operations. All the powers who have signed that treaty are qualified to appeal to it. We present ourselves as the defenders of that treaty, violated in its spirit, and as the supporters of the equilibrium of Europe, menaced by the power which seemed, more than any other, to have the pretension of constituting herself the guardian of it. The cause for which we are armed is that of all.” That claim of Turkey to form part of the European community is precisely the one to which Russia is inexorably opposed. Its admission would destroy the monopoly of interference and protection which the Czar wishes to maintain over Turkey, and we need not therefore be surprised at the stern refusals which the good offices of any other power have invariably encountered at St Petersburg. Russia insisted throughout that the question only regarded Russia and Turkey; it denied the right of any one to interfere, except in advising Turkey to submit to her dictates; and to the last she rejected all intervention or mediation. It is true that intervention menaced the fundamental principle on which the traditional policy of Russia is based; and the day that the Treaty of 1841 forms part of the international law of Europe, the designs of Russia on Turkey are at once arrested. Russia will then have lost all exclusive rights; and all questions of public interest affecting the Porte must be treated by all the states who have affixed their signatures to that important instrument.

We are decidedly of opinion that the view taken by Turkey of the rights created for her by this new state of things, is the correct one; and we submit that the interpretation which gives the greatest effect to the joint engagement of the four powers, is that which is most conformable to the spirit and meaning of its framers. “The important act of this Convention,” said M. Guizot in the Chamber of Peers, “is to have included the Porte itself, the inviolability of the sovereign rights of the Sultan, the repose of the Ottoman Empire, in the public law of Europe. Therein is comprised the general recognition—the recognition made in common, and officially declared—of the inviolability of the sovereign rights of the Porte, and of the consolidation of the Turkish Empire. It cannot be supposed that France would have refused to facilitate by her adhesion the execution of that act.” “The Turco-Egyptian question,” said the same minister in the Chamber of deputies, “was settled—the question of Constantinople remained. What is the object the policy of Europe has in view for a long time past with reference to Constantinople? It is to withdraw Constantinople from exclusive protection; to admit Turkey into our European law; and to prevent her from becoming the Portugal of Russia. Well, then, a step has been made towards that end. It is true that the Porte has not been secured from ambition of all kinds—from all the chances of the future; but, at all events, we have an official instrument, signed by all the great powers of Europe, which admits Turkey into the European law, which declares that it is the intention of all the great powers to respect the inviolability of the Sultan’s rights, and to consolidate the repose of the Ottoman Empire.”

There is no doubt that Russia is deeply interested in the possession of Constantinople. It is equally certain that, whenever she becomes mistress of both shores of the Bosphorus, she will, in an incredibly short time, add to her present pre-eminent military character that of a first-rate commercial and maritime power. The populations that would then acknowledge the supremacy of the _Knout_ would be over eighty millions; and the seventy millions of Christians professing the Greek faith would bow their necks to the political and religious autocrat. Russia would then indeed hold at her girdle the keys of the Caspian Sea, the lake of Azof, the Black Sea, and the Mediterranean. The possession of Syria and Egypt would before long follow, as a matter of course, that of Turkey in Europe; and soon the fairest regions in the world, the most fertile shores of that inland sea, would fall under her rule. A single glance at the map will enable us to comprehend the magnificence, the vast extent, of such an acquisition; and the mind may dwell with wonder on the immensity of the new Russian Empire in Europe and Asia, and anticipate the supremacy she would gain by the conquest of Constantinople, which opens to her a path to the very heart of civilised Europe. That Russia should make gigantic efforts, and risk, as she is now risking, her rank as a first-rate Power, if not her existence, to attain such an object, is not astonishing. The fair capital that stands on the Bosphorus is the guarantee of the empire of the world. It is more than the ambition of Alexander, of Charlemagne, or of Napoleon, ever dreamed the realisation of; and if treachery or violence ever gives it to Russia, the irresistible and universal domination of Rome over the rest of the world, after the fall of Carthage, alone furnishes an example of what Russia would then become.

Russia has, by the tolerance or apathy of Europe, been singularly favoured since the seventeenth century; and she whose name was not even mentioned in the Treaty of Westphalia, which defined the limits of the great European states, has risen to gigantic proportions since then. She has invariably availed herself, as she is now ready to do, of the dissensions of the Western kingdoms; she has absorbed provinces and nations of various tongues, religions, and races; and has opened her way, through the territories of her neighbours, to the shores of two seas. Her hand it was that put an end to the existence of Poland. It was she that paralysed Sweden and Denmark; and it is by her that Persia and Turkey have been pushed on to their ruin. The history of her crimes in Poland is the same as that of her plunder in Turkey, Georgia, and Persia; and the partition of the ancient northern kingdom is now to be repeated with the Ottoman Empire. The means she employs are ever the same;—menaces and caresses by turns;—attempts at exclusive intervention;—a slow but steady system of dismemberment;—pretensions and claims, as impudently advanced as they are unfounded; then apparently withdrawn, postponed, placed in abeyance, seemingly forgotten, but never finally abandoned; revived with hypocritical humility, or with arrogance, according to circumstances; pretexts of quarrel of the most imaginary and untenable kind; intimidation mingled with seduction. Nothing is too bold, too base for her selfishness. Her princes and nobles are spies; her princesses—worse. No profligacy is too gross, no crime is too enormous, that advances by one inch the influence of “Holy Russia.” War is undertaken for no other object than to arrive at conventions ruinous to the conquered. Such is the hereditary policy of Russia; such it has been since she first assumed a standing in Europe; and we say it to our shame, that her unexampled success is in great part owing to the selfishness of some, the exaggerated fears of others, and the indifference and apathy of all the states of Europe. If England and France had but pronounced a _veto_ in 1774, Poland might, with a reformed constitution, and an improved administration, still be an independent kingdom, and stand the barrier between the barbarism of the north and the civilisation of the west. If the Western Powers had directed their attention a little more frequently, and more earnestly to Turkey, the events against which we are now preparing might not have taken place. Even now, it is not too late; and we firmly believe that it is in the power, as we have little doubt it is the desire, of Europe, to arrest for many years the aggressive policy of Russia.

We have heard one argument advanced against our interference to save Turkey from Russia, and which seems to have made a certain impression in some quarters. We think the argument to be more specious than real; and the only reason we notice it here is, because it has been dwelt upon by persons whose opinions are in other respects entitled to consideration. We are told that it is a shame and a scandal for a civilised and religious nation to go to war in support of a barbarous and unbelieving Government. If such an argument mean anything, it must mean that England is to have no ally but such as can boast of equal civilisation, and profess the same faith as ourselves. We deny that we go to war, and in support of Turkey, in order to insure the supremacy of the Koran over the Bible, of the Crescent over the Cross, of barbarism over civilisation. We take the part of Turkey, not on religious grounds, but on political; to prevent the extension of Russia in those parts of Europe and Asia where her power would seriously endanger the vital interests of Western Europe; to maintain what is termed the balance of Europe; or, in other words, to prevent any one Power from growing to such a colossal size as that all the others would be at her mercy. We do not go to war to continue Mussulman barbarism, or to perpetuate the despotism under which the Christian populations have groaned. The conditions on which France and England afford succour to the Sultan are, that the reform long since commenced by Sultan Mahmoud, and continued by Abdul Medjid, shall be still further developed; and that the Christian subjects of the Porte, whose condition has materially improved, shall be placed on an equality with the Mussulmans. As well might it be said that our wars in Spain had for their object the protection of the Roman Catholic religion, the consolidation of the influence of the Pope, the re-establishment of the Inquisition, or the perpetuation of the stupid despotism of Ferdinand. We entered on the Peninsular war, not for such objects, but for reasons similar to those which now lead us to the East;—to rescue the Spanish territory from the grasp of a usurper, from the power of a conqueror whose ambition of universal rule was not less than that of Nicholas; to prevent the whole of Europe from falling under the dominion of a single potentate. In this country we denounce the doctrines of the Church of Rome as contrary to Scripture, and we, a Protestant Government, employed its armies in defence of a nation whose principle has been, and still is, intolerance of all other creeds but its own, and against a Government which, whatever may have been its faults, had not, at all events, religious intolerance among them. In no country is the Roman Catholic religion made to assume a more odious form than in Spain. We are told that the Turks speak of Christians as “dogs;” but, in Christian Spain, English Protestants are actually treated as dogs, or worse. We have seen, and this within a very few years, those who fought, and bled, and died in the cause of Spanish independence, flung, like offal, into a hole, or left to rot on the sea coast below high-water mark. We have, within the last few months, witnessed the tedious negotiations carried on between our Minister at Madrid and the Government in whose cause our blood and treasures have been spent with profusion, to obtain a secluded spot of earth wherein the bones of those of our countrymen, who still labour to introduce civilisation into that country, may be sheltered from pollution; and we have no cause to rejoice at its humiliating conclusion. When we are told of Turkish bigotry and intolerance, we would point to Madrid, to Naples, and to Tuscany. Turkish honour and Turkish fidelity to engagements will not suffer by a comparison with the Government of her most Catholic Majesty, as we presume those Englishmen who have had anything to do with it will be ready to admit. We are not of opinion that the barbarism of the Turks is greater than that which may be found in many parts of the Spanish peninsula; and those who have travelled into the interior of both countries may bear witness to the fact that her Catholic Majesty’s subjects, with the exception of the large towns, cannot be surpassed by any others in ignorance, sloth, and bigotry. Corrupt as the Turkish Government may have been, and badly administered as the country unquestionably is, we doubt whether the general run of Spanish statesmen have exhibited much more probity, integrity, and talent in government, with all the advantages of our example; and, in the matter of private morals, we think we could point out Spanish sovereigns who, with all their piety and attachment to Catholicism, have not much to boast over Sultan Abdul Medjid. We are not of opinion that, as respects mere civilisation, the Russian serfs are superior to the Turks. We have no evidence that Russia has made any improvement within the recollection of the present generation; while it is undeniable that, within the same space of time, Turkey had made, and is still making, material progress in its administration. Since the time of Mahmoud, Turkey—though, of course, still far behind France and England—has effected immense ameliorations in all matters connected with internal navigation, with her military and naval establishments, and her political and judicial administration; and, from the great improvement that has taken place in the condition of her Christian populations, we are confident that, before long, she will realise the wish of Mahmoud, and those populations will be placed on a footing of political equality with the Mussulmans. We doubt whether all these things can be stated of Russia.

The Grand-duke Michael is said to have predicted the dismemberment of the Russian Empire soon after the death of the present autocrat. Whatever be the claims of that prince to the character of a prophet, it is evident that Russia is now approaching a more important crisis. Russia will give way, or she will not. If the former, her prestige is gone, and the pettiest Continental kingdom may regard her with indifference. If the latter, a more terrible fate may await her, for she can scarcely resist all that is powerful in Europe combined against her. Russia has been to Europe, for the last forty years, what a ball remaining in an old wound is to the limb of a veteran. Every change of temperature, the heat of summer, the cold of winter, produces uneasiness and pain. The ball must now be extracted; the wound must now be entirely closed up, that we may be all at rest.

Since the preceding pages were written, a “Confidential correspondence” has been brought to light, which no longer leaves any mystery in this once incomprehensible question. Our readers will find these important documents, and the indefensible conduct of the Ministry in the matter, fully discussed in the concluding article of this Number.

LIFE IN THE SAHARA.

Tired of poetical criticism, in which we last month so freely indulged, and turning with satisfaction from the political disquisitions now going through the press for the benefit of our sorely-perplexed countrymen, we feel disposed, cutting both poetry and politics, fairly to fly our shores, and recreate ourselves and readers in some less troubled quarter of the earth. Among the host of new books on our table, redolent of Cossack and Turk, Cross and Crescent, and here and there interspersed with cabalistic-looking titles, which, we are requested to believe, signify the “Doom of Turkey,” or the “Drying up of the Euphrates”—lo, there peeps forth one of a more pacific hue. There, lustrous on its boards, rises the feathery palm-tree of the Desert,—the Arab tent,—the camel; and what an emblem of peace is that cross-legged Oriental, smoking his long pipe, imperturbable as a statue! _Sedit æternumque sedebit._ We open the book, and, amidst the intricacies of a very long title, catch the piquant words—“Wanderings in the African Sahara.”[10] How we feel the breezes of the Desert come around us!—the freedom,—the expanse,—the wild novelty of the scene;—the heaving motion of the camel beneath us,—the flashing spears and pennons of the escort, as they whirl in mimic warfare around. Away into the Desert! with a sea of rigid white sand beneath, and a twin sea of glowing light above! On, over the waste, till the glare of day is done, and the cool breeze comes forth, and all the stars of night,—and we kiss our hand to the moon “walking in brightness,” and say, with Southey,

“How beautiful is night!
A dewy freshness fills the silent air;
No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor stain,
Breaks the serene of heaven;
In full-orbed glory yonder Moon divine
Rolls through the dark-blue depths.
Beneath her steady ray
The desert-circle spreads,
Like the round ocean, girdled by the sky!
How beautiful is night!”

What mystery hangs over this last-born of continents! whose plains are sea-beds, at whose vast upheaval the waters of ocean must have rushed furiously in all directions to regain their level. A land of mystery, from the days of Herodotus until now. How we long to join those yearly caravans, which, after leaving behind them the whole northern region of the coast, travel for sixty days southwards through the burning Sahara,—reaching springs but once a-week,—crossing alternately now mountain-ridges, now seas of sand; until, passing from oasis to oasis, they at length penetrate into the region of Soudaan,—the heart of Africa, the death-place of Clapperton, and Richardson, and Overweg,—and behold the great central lake of Tchad, the most inaccessible point on the globe, yet to within a few miles of whose shores the dying energies of Clapperton brought a boat,—whose waters have been navigated by his European comrade, and on whose bosom, perchance, that bark still floats, with the flag of England flying from its mast!

Such were the quick musings of the moment of imaginative pleasure which elapsed, as we cut open preface and contents, and plunged into the book itself. In a trice, the argument of the book is plain to us. After a residence of several years on the shores of North Africa—during which time he seems to have mastered the various dialects of the Arab tribes, and of course studied their manners—Mr Davis, the reverend author, catches sight of an excellent opportunity for visiting the interior. “Sidy Mohammed Bey,” he says, “the heir-apparent of the throne of Tunis,—a prince possessed of excellent qualities, among which extreme kindness and affability are not the least prominent,—was on the point of making a journey into the interior, in order to regulate some public affairs; and, upon application, he very kindly took me under his immediate protection.”

On the sixth day after starting, they came to a good deal of broken country,—traversed several dry beds of rivers,—and crossed a number of rugged heights, rent into strange shapes. Marching through an opening in one of these minor ridges, they passed at once from a beautiful plain into the wild and ragged outskirts of the great chain of Gebel Waslaat, celebrated for the warlike character of its ancient inhabitants. “At a little distance,” says Mr Davis, “these famous and romantic heights have a most lovely appearance, resembling the vineyards of Spain and of the south of France;” but on a nearer approach, he found—as on many other occasions during the expedition—that it was only distance that lent to them their enchanting look. The Arabs of the coast look upon this region as perhaps the blackest spot in all creation; and you may as well call one of them a devil as a _Waslaati_. They relate that this part was at one time inhabited by a very wicked people, and that the Pharaoh under whom the Israelites were in bondage, and who received such signal chastisement, was a native of these mountains. The Mohammedan doctors go still further, and assert that it was upon this Gebel Waslaat that Eblis (Satan) was hurled down, after his expulsion from the regions of light and happiness; and that it was in these mountains that he took up his first earthly abode.

Leaving these ill-omened mountains to the west, they journeyed south-eastwards, for two days, through a plain, which, says Mr Davis, “for this part of the world, must be pronounced a luxuriant one.” It is pretty well cultivated, and is watered by a river which has its source in the Waslaat mountains. They then encamped for a couple of days in the vicinity of Cairwan, the “city of saints.” “At a short distance,” he says, “this, like every other Mohammedan city of any note, has a fine appearance, but as one approaches, its beauty vanishes. Crooked and filthy streets, ruined and dilapidated houses, wretched shops and miserable hovels, are too glaring not to attract one’s attention.” The city is surrounded by a wall in pretty good condition, and has a garrison of regular as well as of irregular troops. Outside are large cisterns, supplementing the reservoirs with which the houses within are furnished for collecting rain-water; and, still more remarkable, though much less useful, the tomb wherein repose the holy remains of Saint _Shaab_, “the Prophet’s barber.”

After a two days’ halt, they left behind them the plain of Cairwan, and began to approach the borders of the Sahara. On the day after starting, the Prince’s party was met by the “noble and highly-favoured” tribe of Arabs, the Dreeds (who are allowed to sit in presence of a prince, whilst every other Arab is obliged to stand), headed by their _kaid_ or governor, Smeeda Ben Azooz. “Smeeda himself was mounted on a magnificent grey steed, whose saddle appeared to be of a solid mass of gold, so richly was it embroidered; and the other trappings were also sumptuously adorned with gold and silver. He rode in advance, and the hundred Dreeds who followed him were on horses not much inferior to that of their proud and haughty chief. When within about a hundred yards of the Prince, Smeeda dismounted, and approached on foot to kiss his hand. On resuming his seat in the saddle, he took up his position to his master’s left, whilst his attendants fell back in the rear of our party.”

The Prince was enthusiastically fond of hunting. Every day, when he had the opportunity, he was engaged in it. The chase of gazelles was his favourite sport, and it was one in which success was neither easily nor frequently achieved. “It is a grand sight,” says Mr Davis, “to behold these slender-limbed and feeble-looking tiny creatures defying the most spirited horse in speed. When pursued, they actually often stopped to nibble the grass,—as if to challenge the rider and ridicule his efforts, and treat him, his horse and hounds alike, with contempt.” They were frequently seen in companies of about twenty together. On the day after Smeeda and his Dreeds joined the expedition, a great many gazelles were chased by the Prince’s cavalry and the Arabs, but not a single one was killed. This, it is alleged, was owing, firstly, to the rough and broken character of the soil; secondly, to the burning heat which prevailed; and thirdly, the shirocco wind, which sometimes, as it blew in their faces, seemed as if it carried along with it flames of fire, and caused the riders to check the speed of their horses. But to compensate the party for their bootless efforts, Smeeda sent his servants for his well-trained hawks.

“In half an hour about twenty of these birds of prey, of an unusually
large size, were brought, accompanied by several Dreeds, expert in
hawking. Smeeda,—who is rather a short, but very corpulent man, with a
handsome face, ornamented by a fine black, neatly-trimmed beard, and
most penetrating dark eyes,—was this day mounted on a beautiful white
horse, decked out with the same saddle and trappings his grey horse
exhibited the day before. The dress of the rider was elegant and rich
in the extreme. As soon as he had protected his hands from the talons
by gauntlets, partly covered with plates of gold, a hawk was handed to
him by one of his attendants. He undid the hood which confined the
head of the bird, and prevented his quick eye from beholding the
objects around. In an instant the hawk was seen soaring up to the sky.
Another and another followed, and in this manner about twelve or
fifteen were despatched. A few seconds elapsed, when one after the
other pounced upon his prey. Hares and rabbits, partridges and other
birds, were thus secured in abundance. The servants were busily
engaged running in all directions to secure both the hawks and the
prey,—the former, in order to adjust their hoods for a short time
previous to being despatched again; and the latter, ‘to cut the
throat’ before life is extinct, so as to render them lawful food for
the _true believer_.”

In connection with this love of the chase, we must mention an incident which occurred as the expedition was approaching Cairwan, and which shows how little prevalent is any rule but the “law of the strongest” in those quarters, and how naturally men take to deceit as a refuge against lawless force. Mr Davis and some others of the party came to half-a-dozen Arab tents, where, to their great surprise, a general stillness and gloom prevailed. The men and children sat on the ground with an air of profoundest melancholy; whilst the women, usually so active, were resting from their labours, and exhibiting grief by floods of tears.

“‘What has happened, Ali, that you are all so much cast down?’ asked
one of our party, addressing an old man.

‘Such is the will of God,’ was the only reply.

‘But what has happened, Ali?’

‘_Maktoob_,—it is so preordained!’ answered the old man, shaking his
head, and clasping his hands.

‘Has any one died?’

To this he only replied with a sigh, and pointed us to the interior of
his tent. But instead of participating in his grief, my friend
abruptly asked him,—Where is the _sloghi_ (greyhound) of last year?’

‘How can you put such a question to me, when you witness my grief and
distress?’

‘Who, then, is dead?’ pursued my inquisitive companion.

‘My wife!’ replied the old Arab, again pointing us to the interior of
the tent, where apparently she lay, covered with a kind of blanket.

‘But what have you done with _the lovely_ (greyhound)?’

Old Ali now indignantly expressed his surprise that such a question
should be put to him at a time when his mind was so differently
occupied. He thought it manifested hard-heartedness, if not cruelty.

‘But are you sure your wife is _quite_ dead?’

‘Do not mock me, O Moslems!’

The interrogator then called a soldier, who happened to be near, and
gave him his horse to hold, while he himself ruthlessly entered the
tent. On removing the blanket, he found the Arab’s wife, all alive,
and holding the pet _sloghi_ in her arms. On being thus detected, the
poor woman cried out most beseechingly, ‘Do not take the dog!’ and the
whole company, men, women, and children, most imploringly re-echoed
the cry.

The intruder then turned to old Ali, and with an ironical smile
said,—‘You see your _dear_ wife is not _quite_ dead!’”

The Prince, as we have said, was a keen sportsman, and not one of his dogs could compare with Ali’s _sloghi_; but his veneration for justice predominated even over his love of the chase. “Ali is rich,” said he, when the hound was brought to him, “and money will not tempt him, else I would gladly offer it him. Send the _sloghi_ instantly back!”

The day after the junction of Smeeda and his noble Dreeds, the expedition entered the district of the Majer,—a tribe (numbering 200 tents, or 1200 souls) of a peculiarly rascally character, and the larger portion of whose scanty resources is obtained by the robbery and murder of travellers. For these outrages they are rarely brought to account, save when the Prince, or other representative of the Regency of Tunis, makes a tour in person among the tribes. On the present occasion they had a heavy debt to pay,—the value of a life, in the Desert, being generally reckoned at from twenty-five to thirty camels. Within the precincts of this tribe are the ruins of Spaitla, the ancient Sufetula; and, by the favour of the Prince, our author set out to visit them. Under the guidance of the Majer chief, and escorted by twenty soldiers well mounted, and armed to the teeth—after a gallop over a beautiful plain, and thence crossing a district of hill and dale, “all covered with verdure, and occasionally bordering upon the picturesque,” Mr Davis and his party arrived at the ruins. On their first approach all was perfectly still. Not a sound but their own was audible, save the rippling of a brook which glides past the ruins on their north-eastern side. Not a human being was to be seen, either among the ruins or in their vicinity; and even animal life seemed to have for ever departed from the sombre walls and mansions of the ancient Sufetulans. But such was not really the case. In the holes, caverns, and clefts of the rocks on which the city stands, were dispersed numbers of the followers and subjects of the Majer chief. From their dwellings they issued forth imperceptibly to the travellers. And most unpleasant company they must have been; for, says our author, “all the corrupt ramifications of the human heart,—all the vile actions of which man is capable, could be traced, and that distinctly, in the features of these sons of Ghiath.”

The situation of this ancient city is delightful. It is built upon an eminence, commanding a panoramic view of an expanse of country which, even in its present barren and deserted condition, has a charming aspect. Wild olive, juniper, and almond trees in abundance stud the banks of the brook. Of the place itself, Mr Davis says, “I had no conception of the extent of the ruins to be found here; so that my companions, as well as myself, were absolutely amazed on beholding the magnificence of some of them. As I viewed these from some angles, I could almost fancy myself again on the majestic ruins of Baalbec.” He especially notices a sumptuous triumphal arch of the Corinthian order, with a lesser arch on each side. From this he proceeded to three temples,—upon which time, and the innate destructive disposition of the Arabs, have left evident traces. “Parts are in a most dilapidated condition, yet it is surprising to meet with so much which, with very little trouble and expense, might easily be restored to its former grandeur. The front and entrance to the temples are in ruins, and large masses of stone are lying about in all directions, and block up the ingress; but the backs, which face the triumphal arch, are in capital repair.”

On his return from visiting the ruins of Spaitla, our author and his companions, miscalculating the movements of the main body of the expedition, found themselves very much out of their reckoning. Night came on,—their guide, the Majer chief, disappeared at the very time his presence was most required; and what with the fear of his rascally tribe before their eyes, as well as of the wild beasts of the desert, the night which the little party had to pass on the sands before they could rejoin the main body was anything but a comfortable one.

Lions are common in these parts, and their tracks were occasionally visible; but the king of beasts nowhere appeared in person, and the Prince, who longed to try his skill on this lordly tenant of the wastes, was balked of his sport. Hyenas are likewise to be met with; and the manner in which they are taken by the Arabs in these parts is very peculiar. Its subterranean abode, it appears, is so narrow as not to permit of the animal turning about in it; and hence, to use the Arab phraseology, it has “two doors,” by one of which it enters, and by the other goes out. The Arabs, lying _perdus_ in the vicinity of one of these dens, watch the particular hole by which the hyena enters, and then proceed to place a strong rope net over the opposite hole,—whilst one of their fraternity, skilled in the business, and prepared with a rope, works his way in by “the door” which the animal has entered. As he nears the brute (which cannot turn upon him), he “charms it,” according to our author’s informants, saying,—“Come, my dear little creature; I will lead you to places where many carcases are prepared for you,—plenty of food awaits you. Let me fasten this rope to your beautiful leg, and stand quiet whilst I do so.” This sentence, or something very similar to it, is repeated till the operation is effectually achieved; when the daring son of the Sahara begins to gore the brute with a dagger, till he is forced to rush out, when he is caught in the net, and either killed on the spot or carried off alive. If any blunder happens, however,—as is sometimes the case—through which the hyena is enabled to struggle and re-enter its abode, the “charmer,” in spite of his charming, falls a victim to its savage rage, and frequently his companions can scarcely contrive to get clear without feeling something of its effects.