self : he was but a short time in office. He had the manage-
ment of no other important matter, and but for the documents,
which he has himself made public, it would have been difhcult
to prove the source of the expedition, and impossible to
establish his guilt.
The Quadruple Treaty was the work of a man of another
mould, capable of no inadvertence, who never speaks save
on compulsion, and then only in reference to the occasion
and the prejudices of his hearers. All that it was ever requisite
for him to say in Parliament, limited itself to " Don Carlos,'*
and " Constitution :" for the time he rendered himself
perfectly secure by the affectation of a savage hatred against
the one,* and of a sentimental affection for the other ; but the
organs of the Government could not be so reserved, and by
them, especially the Morning Chronicle, the Treaty was attri-
buted to Talleyrand. f In the shifting grounds assumed at
various times, this credit was, when the Treaty had become
popular, withdrawn, and it was then revealed to the nation
that England had the merit of having produced the statesman
who had engendered this vast and "truly British plan.'*
When at another time it fell into disrepute as having
estranged Prance, then it was boldly charged by the organ of
the Poreign Office on M. Thiers. It is perfectly true that
M. Thiers exerted himself to extort the consent of Louis
Philippe to the measures proposed by the English minister,
and for my part I was led into the belief, not of Thiers's
* In the rapidity of incidents, the reader may hare forgotten tho
order sent out to Spain, to refuse access to Don Carlos on board of
any English vessel, even if flying for his life.
t Talleyrand's assent waa convoyed in a note in these terms, and
these alone :
" Puisque vous le vouhx, soitj*
70 SPAIN.
suggestion of the measurCj but of his zealous concurrence in
it ; however, during that Minister's recent visit to Spain,
I had the opportunity of ascertaining the truth. When
charged with his concurrence on this occasion, as having
produced all the subsequent dangers of Europe, he answered,
" Good God ! I had no love of the Treaty, but I yielded to it
as a choice of evils ; the English alliance was everything to
me, and it was to be had 07ily on this condition. I did not
know why Lord Palmerston was so bitter about it, but this
I did know, that he was the inevitable man."
Finally, the Morning Chronicle treats us with a cabinet
picture of the transaction, in which with the laborious
accuracy of a Teniers, the various groups are exhibited, some
in the market-place, some looking out at the window, some
entering at the door. It is varnished and framed to hang
up as a pendant to that other picture by the pencil of
Canning of the expedition to Portugal, dear to aU lovers of
art.
"On Eriday the news was received; on Saturday the
Cabinet was called together, &c."
" On Thursday, the application from the Spanish Minister
"vvas received ; on Eriday the Council sat ; on Saturday, the
adliesion of the Minister of Portugal was obtained; on
Sunday the Erench Ambassador was applied to, &c."
But if the Minister could thus shuflie oif the Parliament
and the public, by what means could he circumvent his
colleagues ? If I had merely the testimony of William IV,
now dead, it might be a very dangerous assertion to make
that he had brought a body of English gentlemen to concui
with him in this measure, — those gentlemen comprising
the most distinguished members of the party who had sent
Mr. Adair to St. Petersburgh, and the chief of them being
Lord Grey himself, compromised in that very act, — on the
grounds of its being a blow against Kussia. But in an
inadvertent moment he has himself revealed the fact in
an article in the Morning Chronicle^ which, of all his contri-
butions to the press, is the only one which has been brought
QUADRUPLE TEEATY. 71
home to him, and that not by me, but by another journalist,
and on grounds wholly irrespective of the cause of my present
reference. Meeting a charge which at the time had produced
some sensation, he writes in the Morning Chronicle of the
ICthof January, 1844.
" TJie originator and signer of the Qiiadrtiple Treaty which
withdrew Spain from Russian influence ; the statesman who
embarked with such frankness and boldness in the Consti*
tutional League of the West j and icho^ on the Indies and the
Danube y the Persiati Gulf and the BardanelleSy made the
boldest stand of any European politician against the
encroachments of Ptussia in Eui'ope and in Asia — he, * * *
Eussian in Soul !"
I might here ask, what had he to do with overthrowing
Eussia, who, in regard to the East, had declared himself
* satisfied with her declarations and conduct ;" who, in regard
to Poland, had declared the rights of the Emperor to be
*' undeniable ;" who, in regard to France, had broken the
English Alliance? But we are past inferential conclu-
sions ; here is a fact which is dii'ect and incontrovertible ; if
the object in Spain was to oppose Eussia, why was it kept
secret? If opposition to Eussia was intended, why was
Spain selected as the field ? What are the results ?
W' hen tracing the plot of the Congress of Verona, that
which I had to state every Englishman could take in at a
glance, but no Frenchman admit, or conceive. AVhat I have
said of the Quadi-uple Treaty will be equally plain to the
Frenchman and obscure to the Englishman. The Spaniard
will have no difficulty in apprehending the one transaction
and the other.
'<2
CHAPTER IX.
Future Marriages.
As some slight compensation and atonement for the evils
inflicted on Spain by my country, the limits of which diplo-
matically include Europe, and Muscovy to its furthest Calrauck
bounds ; and at the same time as a warning against the evils
which she is again about to inflict, Thave presented to Spaniards
this picture of the genius of Western systems, and of the
men of modern genius. From k they may collect that the
highest intelligence on earth has deeply pondered the means
of decomposing their country ; that by its " occult" command
over the Western Pentecraty, glittering with the tinsel of a
Yillele and a Canning, a Wellington and a Metternich, and
alas, too, of a Talleyrand^ — it has converted Spain into a
Pandora's box for Europe.
Can any reasonable Spaniard now doubt that a maep.iage
car. serve Eussia as well as a Constitution, or a Succession ?
Let your proverbial gallantry, if not your political foresiglit,
at kjast forbid, that ladies and their affections shall be, because
seated on or near your Throne, converted into cards and dice
in a game of perfidy and fraud. To prevent this is the
easiest of things; settle the matter at home; allow no
diplomatist to put his hand in ; Fortune offers a solution
without doing violence to Nature. You have two marriage-
able pinces.
73
POSTSCBIPT.
Ilmj, 1853.
The appreliensions which induced me to draw up the fore-
going paper have been verified to the extent of nearly
producing a war between England and France. Out of the
"Spanish Marriages" came the confiscation of Cracow, and,
within a short time, the fall of Louis Philippe and the revo-
lution of 1848, on which the Cossacks entered Hungaiy.
To that field I now pass on.
It is a fact here deserving of record, that the mutual
exasperation of the two countries, in reference to the Spanish
marriages, bore upon the Treaty of Utrecht, which the English
Minister asserted had been violated by the»nnion of a son of
Louis Philippe and a Spanish princess. This Treaty, as that
Minister had himself, on a previous occasion, stated in Parlia-
ment, had ceased to exist, having lapsed by war, and not
having been restored at a subsequent peace. Had the author
of the 'History of Civilisation' been a little earlier* ac-
quainted with this fact, there could have been no quarrel in
1847, and no revolutions in 1848.
• A note was sent to the French Embassy in London, inquiring
in what article in the Treaties of Luneville, Amiens, or Vienna, the
Treaty of Utrecht had been restored. It arrived two hom-s after
the note of M. Guizot, taking ground upon the Treaty, had beea
transmitted.
PART ri.
HUNGARY.
CHAPTER I.
Political Value of Hungary,
Canning electrified the year 1826 by a quotation from the
iEneid, "Celsa sedet ^olus aree," &c. It was not that it was
charmed by a "calida juuctura" in ^olus and England, but in
Opinion and wind. For war, Ambition, it was perceived, was
no longer required ; it could be engendered by thoughts alone ;
hurricanes to overwhelm Empires, and tempests to subvert
Thrones, could now be evolved from tropes and metaphors.
It took, however, two and twenty years for the poetic pro-
position to become historical, which it did in 1848, when
the Continental Governments were blown up, with the single
exception of the country (Spain) whence had been derived the
explosive matter. The man, in the Eastern tale, who let the
genius out of the bottle was only alarmed at his own work ;
but the nations of Europe, when they had ruptured their
bags, were confounded at themselves : after a wild dance over
hill and dale, they hurried back again to slmt themselves in,
and to sew themselves up. It was not, however, Canning's
iEolus, who, reversing his trident, had let forth Em'us and
Nothus', England did not ride the whirlwind, and had not
been the Merlin of the storm. It is not, indeed, to be expected
in the country of the winds, that operations should be veiy
distinct, or the figure of the genius very discernible ; and thus
76 HUNGAEY.
when thimderbolts do fall, the startled nations may attribute
them to a wrong Jove.
The astute, but earnest Emperor, Leopold the Second, had
elaborated in the alchemy of his German brain two antagonistic
Trhiciple-i, which threatened to devastate Germany in the
accident of their corporeal collision, — as he imagined them to
be embodied severally in the neighbours of Germany on the
North and on the West. That Emperor consequently adjusted
his policy to meet this contingency, and thence that tempo-
rising scheme for Hungary, which has not been without its
influence on recent events.
Napoleon too had his notions ; thjey agreed with those of
Leopold in respect to number, but differed in character. The
German's principles were Despotism and Anarchy; the
Corsican's, He volution and Ambition. In the first case,
Germany was only to be victimised ; in the second, Europe
herself Avas to be the prize. So he too was swept from the
scene, and passed away as a myth, only that he left behind
him a wreck, and a paradox. He bequeathed Europe to
Ambition (Alexander), as Leopold had prepared Austria for
Despotism (Paskie witch). As for his prophecy of our be-
coming " Eepublican or Cossack," what child does not now
see that these are but two stations on the same road, — all
the roads lead one way : "Empire" brought the Calmucks to
Paris ; " Constitution" tlie Baskirs to Pesth. Thus, whilst
the winds of '48 were blowing, and mankind was engaged in
ascertaining their direction and estimating their effects,
^Russia leisurely laid one mailed hand on the heart of Austria,
and stretched with the other arm, an encircling embrace around
the Danish Belt. Here, for a time, pauses the epic, which
opened at Isla de Leon, and we proceed to the incidents of
the Hungarian canto.
We have heard enough that the inhabitants of Hungary
are Magyars, but what it was important to know, and what
for the best of reasons no one comprehends, is, that the
Magyars are not Europeans : this trutli the legislation of a
hundred Diets and the rhetoric of a thousand Kossuths caiinot
POLITICAL VALUE. 77
peiTert ; it is a fact which the Camarilla of Vienna, the Foreiga
Office of London, and Field Marshal Prince Paskiewitch him-
self cannot alter. The upper basin of the Danube is not in-
cluded in the region of the winds, and owes as yet no fealty to
the sceptre of ^Eolus. Had it been so, the chaos of the conti-
nent would ere this have been reduced to the order that reigns
at Warsaw ; the Hungarians, like the Spaniards, are an un-
reasoning mass : slow in Progress, backwards in Civilization.
Wars in the West lead to great eflfusion of blood, but to
little alteration of frontiers ; those in the East alone deter-
mine great results. In the one case, contest is a mere shock of
equally powerful arms, or equally futile doctrines; in the other,
it is a tide sweeping on to dominion for a thousand years.
On the descendants of Attila and his Seven Hordes hangs
at this hour the future fate of European society ; for Poland,
and especially Hungary, though subjugated, stand even as
the wreck of a battered wall in the victor's way.
Identity of race is no motive for political union ; but when
two people have the same interests and the same enemies,
and happen to be of the same race, their enemy being of a
different one, then indeed does that relationship become
profitable and noble. The Turks are slow to move, and not
likely, under any considerations of advantage, to unite them-
selves with a Christian people. But their ancient associations
with the Hungarians, acting like gravitation on inanimate
bodies, steadying for a time at least the Eastern bulwarks of
the fabric of general power, afford to Europe a reprieve and
a security not the less real because she is unconscious of its
existence.
It is doubtless true that the fiercest wars have been carried
on between the two people : so long as Hungary stood by
herself, so long as the ancient line of monarchs, or the elected
sovereigns, possessed the supreme sway, she dreaded the
Turkish power ; the very ties which united the people
rendered that hostility all the more intense. When a member
of the House of Hapsburg was elected to the throne, the
position was reversed. Then Austria, the Empire, Germany,
IIUNGAP.Y.
and the West, became for Hungary the sources of dread and
the causes of suffering, and she turned towards the Sultans
as to Protectors. This change occurred in the sixteenth
century, when Turkey had ceased to he dangerous, but was
still powerful. It was, in fact, at the instigation of the
defeated competitor of Ferdinand (brother of Charles Y) that
the Turks invaded Austria and besieged Vienna. If Hungary
did, under the most trying circumstances, preserve her ancient
Institutions down to these evil days, it is to be attributed to
that confidence, no less than to that Constitution's inherent
worth.
So long as this latent alliance with Turkey imposed on
Austria respect for the Constitution of Hungary, that country
was the main strength of the Emperor at Vienna : its support
was yielded to him' on every contingency, not by a blind
and slavish submission, but by a free loyalty of the people,
exercisedthrough theorgan of their legitimate Eepresentatives,
Maria Theresa was enabled to maintain the seven years' war
against Prussia, only after carrying her infant son to the Diet
at Presburg, and entrusting him and herself to its chival-
rous guardianship. Again, against Napoleon was Francis-
enabled to make head in consequence of the enthusiastic
declaration of the Diet of Presburg and its steady refusal to
accede to the overtures of Prance. But the circumstance
peculiarly bearing upon present events, was the war of the
Spanish succession. The Austrian encroachments had at that
time driven Hungary into rebellion. Louis XIV did not
neglect the occasion thus offered to him, not only of paralys-
ing Austria, and depriving the Allies (England and Holland)
of her support, but of subduing the Empire itself while
securing the inheritance of Spain. There were, hov/ever, then
in England, not Diplomatists but Statesmen : Bolisigbroke
was still writing despatches, and had not taken to essays.
The Cabinet of St. James perceived that Austria could be
no Ally if Hungary was her foe, and that Hungary could be
her friend only on one condition, — the preservation of her
rights ; tiierefore, on being applied to by the Huiigcirians,
POLITICAL VxVLUE. 79
it hastened to offer its good offices, which were successful in
a settlement of differences between the two nations, Hung:ary
and Austria, and the two Sovereigns, though one person,
the Kinrf and the Ihnperor. This Treaty, concluded under
the mediation of England, was signed at Szathmar, in 1711.
In treating of Spain in 1834, we could find no reason for
England's intei-fcrencc ; in Hungary, in 1848, we are equally
destitute of a reason for her non-interference ; and if we
accept the only reason suggested in the one case, — that of
opposition to Russia where no Eussia appeared, we can only
be the more perplexed in accounting for the other.
Let us consider in what position Hungary will now stand
$0 Austria in any future war. Let us take the cases of a
rupture with Turkey, with Erance, and with Russia.
1. The sympathies between the Turks and the Hungarians ,
were, after all, one-sided. The recollections enduring in the
hearts of the former, had in the latter been in recent times
overlaid by their connection with Europe; thus Austria,
in her last three wars with Turkey, found no difficulty in
obtaining from the Diet its contingent in troops and its con-
tribution in money. Were a war now to break out, she
would be under no necessity indeed to apply to Presburg
for a contingent, and the Hungarians would without opposi-
tion be enrolled, and sent forward to the frontier. Need I
ask what effects would follow the first hostile shot ? — even
if the troops did not pass over to the Sultan, Hungary would
rise as one* man, to shake off the now^ detested yoke of
Austria.
S. The Diet of Presburg, which declared against Louis XIV
and Napoleon, no longer existing, the first symptom of a
difference with Erance would force Austria to send all her
disposable force away from the Rhine, and to concentrate it
•on the Danube. In such a war Hungary would no longer
be the right hand of Austria, but the principal Ally of her
enemy. She would be to Austria what Poland is to Russia,
multiplied sevenfold.
3. Of a war with Russia I need not speak. If Russia's
80 HUNGARY.
whole disposable force was r'squired to bring Hungary, even
after an exhausting struggle, into submission to Vienna, how
can Austria presume to stand a moment before that Ally,
now backed by the Dependency which her own arms had
before reduced.
Had England known that it was her own hand which had
stifled Poland, Hungary might have been spared. If she
could nowunderstand that itwas again her hand that had stifled
Hungary, Austria and Turkey may hereafter be spared. I
shall make the endeavour to put her in possession of this
truth, from the Blue Books. We must first, however, glance
at the petty treacheries within, by which armies were led
to slaushter.
81
CHAPTEE II.
Events in Hungary,
At the very moment of the dispersion of its Government
Hungary was achieving at Pakozd its first victory. The
vaunting Jellachich was absohitely beaten by a handful of
men ; he signed a suspension of arms, and decamped in the
night, leaving ten thousand of his rearguard prisoners.
The Austrian Government, infuriated at the murder of Count
Lamberg and the defeat of Pakozd, declared Jellachich, who
had been so easily defeated, and so ignominiously driven out,
Lieutenant-General of the kingdom, and reinforced his army
with the garrison of the capital. A sanguinary Insurrection
at Vienna itself was the result.
The Hungarian army had pursued Jellachich to the
frontier; there it halted, waiting legal authority to cross.
The Diet at Vienna gave an evasive answer, and enabled
Windischgratz to assemble and dispose his forces for the bom-
bardment of the city. The Hungarian army arrived too late,
and was placed by treachery in the power of the Austrians ;
its general, Moga, said before the court martial, by which,
he was afterwards tried, that the Austrian generals did
not hiou) how to take complete advantage of the opportunity
he had given them.
Kossuth, on the field of battle (Schwechat), displaced
Moga, and made over the command to Gorgey : from that
hour the Russian Intervention became inevitable. It has
been supposed that the treason of Gorgey was an after-
thought : I have it from Hungarian officers that, at that very-
moment, he spoke undisguisedly of the futility of the struggle i*
• He had personal ties with the establishment of the Archduke
Michael. Strange expressions are attributed to liim, wliich -vver©
interpreted aa marks of genius, as those of Szechenyi were of madness.
82 HUNGAliY.
yet it was the oifer to lead the troops to "Vienna that induced
Kossuth to give him the command.
Gorgey retreated across the frontier, followed bv Win-
dischgriitz ; both armies then remained in inaction for weeks !
In consequence of Gorgey's representations of the necessity
of concentration, the troops were collected from all parts,
and phiced under his command. Windischgratz at last
advanced. Gorgey had drawn out his forces on an extended
line — they were driven in upon every point, save one (Wiesel-
burg) ; he announced to the Government this action as a
victory, and retreated. Pirst, he neglected to take up a
position on the Lake Neusiedler, from which he could not
have been dislodged ; next, he passed through Eaab, neg-
lecting equally the intrenchments, which had, at great
expense, been thrown up ; then avoiding the impregnable
position of Comom, he made a straight course to Budp.. as
if, like the flying Scythian, to draw the Austrians on. Pertzel
advancing with about 13,000 men, reached Moor, when
Gorgey was distant about fifteen miles, and making sure of
support, engaged the advanced guard of Windischgratz —
he was left to be beaten. Himself neglecting the Capital,
its defences, its defenders, and the Danube, passed by Buda
in hurried flight, evacuated the town, and abandoned the
defence of the river and of the castle. Had he made a stand
anywhere, he would have been joined by Pertzel's, and other
small coi-ps then on their march; new le\4e3 were hastily
being raised, and the army of 20,000 men in the south was
marching to join him ; even while his army was at the lowest
number it could not have been left in the rear ; had he stood
still anywhere Windischgratz could not have penetrated into
Hungary.
Gorgey had, during his retreat, TVTitten to the Committee
of Defence to say that he could not insure the safety of the
capital twenty -four hours : the Diet, in consequence, retired
to Debretzin. He now issued a Proclamation, in which he
charged the Diet with abandoning the army, and declared
EVENTS. 85
that tlie army thenceforward would act for itself. This appeal
was not responded to by the soldiers.
Then, leaving the plain at the mercy of the enemy, he carried
his army northward among the mountains. He divided
it into two corps, — one of 10,000 men, commanded by
Guyon, the other of 15,000, which he headed in person.
These advanced or retreated, for it is difficult to define his
operations, on parallel lines. He suffered the corps of Generals
Simonich, Goetz, and Jablanowzski, to enter unopposed by dif-
ferent passes, and was pursued by them. On the riftht flank he
was cut off from the plain country by the main army of
Windischgriitz advancing from the Danube to the Theiss:
in front, his passage was barred by Scblick, who, entering
from the north, had taken up his position along the line of the
great Gallician road, with 25,000 men, and occupied passes
which it was supposed 100,000 men could not force. Gorgey
had always kept suspiciously close to the Gallician frontier ;
he had been deaf to every appeal from Guyon for cooperation :
now no escape was left him, save by entering Gallicia and
capitulating. Then it was that Guyon, at the battle of the
Braniszko pass, unexpectedly opened a passage to both corps ;
Gorgey allowed Schlick to carry off the remnants of his army
"when they were in his hands.*
Obliged through Guyon' s inconvenient victoiy to effect his
junction with the main army under Dembinski, he w;as present
at the battle of Kapolna, where the Hungarians were deci-
sively engaged with the main army of Windischgratz ; he
abandoned his post : he then called his officers together, and
deposed the Commander-in-Chief. Next day the action was
renewed without results ; both parties retreated. After the
first day at Kapolna, Windischgriitz had written to announce
too hastily the utter discomfiture of the Hungarians, and
thereupon was issued the rroclamation abolishing Hungary
• This action, scarcely paralleled for its fortunate audacity and its