Current:

Leader (1850-1860), 8th January 1859, Edition 2 of 2, Page 21, FRANCE. (From our own Correspondent.) Pa...

Page 21
Page 21
21 of 32

On this page

  • Text (3)
  • Transcript

    • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

      Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

      Biographies Of German Princes. ,?S T O. ...

      nances without the sanction of the Legislature . Upon this , Prince John hastened to Leipzig , the centre of the movement , in order to overawe the population by a display of military force . Undaunted , however , by the threatening demonstration , the citizens of Leipzig continued in their protestations , and a number of the people even gave unmistakable signs of their dissatisfaction by interrupting the military review , and

      otherwise displaying- their liberal sympathies . The tumult increased , and , in the midst of it , a stray stone chanced to break the glass in the window ; of the hotel whither the Prince had repaired with his staff ; Scarcely had the shattered pane fallen , when the infuriated champion of Romanism , without deigning to summon the crowd to disperse , ordered the military to pour a volley into the dense mass before them—an order that was carried out with a savage alacrity only to be found in the faithful followers of the doctrine illustrated on the eve .

      St . Bartholomew . An appalling spectacle ensued . The ground before the hotel was , in an instant , covered with the dead and dying : Men , women , and children lay motionless or writhing in their gore . Shrieks of . fear and agony , cries of malediction , against the sanguinary Prince , rent the air . The town of Leipzig was frantic with horror and indignation . Freiligrath has sung of this ghastly night in heartstirring accents : — Ich bin die Xacht , die Bartholomaus-Naeht— _ mein Fuss ist blutig , und mein Haupt verschleiert ;

      es hat in Deutschland eine Fiirsterimacht zwolf Tage heuer niichi zu friih gefeiert . Prince John , the author of the crime , fled that very night from Leipzig . The military , in expectation of an insurrection , retired into the Pleisscnburg . The murdered victims of tyranny were followed to the grave on the ensuing day by an . immense multitude of sympathising mourners . Subsequently , a deputation of the people waited upon the King at Dresden , demanding redress , and guarantees for the future . But , instead of giving these , the King and Prince haughtily dismissed the deputation , and immediately garrisoned Leipzig with a . strong force of foot , horse ; and artillery , to keep down any attempt . At the same time , a

      book , as it " was not becoming that freedom should be alluded to in the work of one condemned for high treason . " T ! n matters of foreign policy , the name of King John has obtained an unenviable notoriety both during and after the Russian war . It ^ was his envoy , Baron von Seebach , who exerted himself in Paris in favour of the Czar , and at last succeeded in drawing over Louis Bonaparte to the Muscovite cause . Some censorious observers will have it that the fair Baronesse von Seebach was not altogether unconnected with these underhand manoeuvres .

      The interview between the French ruler and Alexander IT ., at Stuttgart- —an interview pregnant with future European complications—is attributed also to the agency of the Dresden Court . In internal affairs , moreover , the rule' of the King of Saxony has turned out one of the most reactionary in Germany . Saxony is the country where torture , in optima forma , is re-established ; it being provided that " accused persons who persist in denying " t . lifv' nrimes the ' v mav be charered with , are to be

      floffged at the discretion of the authorities , until by " such means the " truth" is elicited from them . So far for politics and justice . As to religious matters , the Romanist tendencies of the Kingkept in unflagging zeal by his wife Amelia , a Bavarian princess—have ' . . late found their expression in despicable concessions to Rome , and threaten to invade even further the policy of the Court . Thus the Government of King John—of that " aiiuable litterateur " - —has proved , under every respect , to the full as great a plague in Saxony as could have been the rule of the most crass and unlearned despot .

      Committee of Inquisition was despatched there , which gave the finishing touch to the horrors that had been perpetrated , Dy delivering many citizens to the sufferings of protracted imprisonment . ¦ In this way , Prince John tried his hand against the aspirations for religious liberty in 1845 . We need not say what were his sympathies and doings in ISIS and 1849 , when Dresden , which had risen in democratic insurrection against the King , was re-subjected by the intervention of a Prussian army . We pass over the sanguinary horrors enacted at that time in the Saxon capital , and hasten to come to the year 1854 , when Prince John assumed sovereign power in consequence of the sudden death of his brother , which had been brought about by the accident in Tvrol .

      It had been fondly believed that King John , on ascending the throne , would issue , as had formerly been the custom in . Germany , an amnesty for the numerous political prisoners . Nothing , nowevcr , of the kind happened ; he continued keeping them in the dungeon of Waldhcim , whore they have remained since 1849 , the majority of them condemnod for life . One of tho most distinguished of these captives , n former member of the Provisional Government of Dresden , died in consequence of his sufferings . Another , Ilcubncr , a man of great learning , has his health shuttered , nnd is in danger of sucounvbing to tho effect of his punishment . In vnin have been the supplications of the aged mother and of tho wifo and children of Heubncr . The

      did not confine himself to the pale of instruction assi «< ned him . He worked to increase his store _ ot knowledge in matters of history , language , and literature , cultivating at the same time with great zeal the gentle art of music . A journey to Italy , made in 1821 , in company with his brother Clemens , had for its result a marked predilection lor the Italian tongue ; but also served to confirm him even more in his Romanist principles . One . of the fruits of his" dilettantism at this time was the translation into German , under the pseudonym of " Philalethes" of a portion of Dante ' s Inferno , which ,

      , of course , was rapturously received by las admiring courtiers . Those more independent critics , however , who have seen a copy of this princely labour , are not at all ecstatic in their admiration thereof . Still , emanating as it did from those exalted quarters which are not generally noted for originality of intellect or profundity of knowledge , it may pass as a tolerable performance . In later years , the Prince also published a translation of the Divina Commedia , winch is considered , by some , an these

      acceptable rendering of the text . Jiesiaes Italian studies , John-Ncpomuk indulged a taste for Hellenic literature . The events in Greece , which he regarded with a double interest in his capacity of phil-Hellene and of philo-Russian , formed the ' - 'first inducement for him to devote attention to that tongue . Altogether , he made himself remarkable for years by his attachmeht to literary pursuits , showing himself in this , not a coarse Capuchin , but ah elegant , smooth , artistic Jesuit of the rare old school , which is gradually dying out .

      This occupation with classic attainments by no means , however , prevented the disciple of the Abbe " dc Sylvestre and of Father Lofller from pursuing in polities' a very decided Conservative course . In political matters , Prince JohiirNepomuk , from early manhood , followed the usual royalist track , scarcely even taking the trouble to give his conduct that peculiar hue of sham-liberalism generally

      observable in heirs-presumptive . After having taken his scat in the Upper Chamber of Saxony , he forthwith came out as the uncompromising champion of the interests of Rome . Mere than , once , in the debates of the Legislature , he opposed . himself with strenuous energy to the cause of religious liberty . More than once he strove to force laws upon the country which would have given immense advantages to the Catholic Church over the Protestant communities ,

      though it is well known that the vast majority of the population belong to the . latter . There were few topics referring to priestly hierarchy , or monarchic bon plaisir , on which the Prince was not found on the reactionary side . In matters of the administration of justice ^ too —which at one time he had studied with greater earnestness than is generally the case with princes—he resolutely set himself against the abolition of the most crying abuses . He fought 1 i 1 * . il . . TT jTil . ' ---1 ' ' ¦ ± llLn ' . '« . in iiuunucr ^ nnai / in

      aesperuieiy me uppur ^ u mu - troduction of a more equitable system of judicial procedures . Thus , whilst apparently abating , by an easy intercourse with literary men , the divisions hitherto existing between the Court and all those outside that " charmed circle , " he , on the other hand , did his worst to prolong the life of those institutions which form the surest impediment to the Srogress of a nation . If we add that already in 830 he had figured conspicuously at the head of the military force called the " Communal Guard , " in repressing the dissatisfaction of tho pcoplo , it may easily bo imagined what ho proved to bo when an epoch of greater agitation arrived . The true Jesuit character camo out for the first

      tune in all its hidcousness in August , 1845 , on the occasion of the Leipzig massacre . About that year a lively movement had sprung up in Saxony , not only among Catholics , who dosired to establish a National German Church , independent of , will in opposition to , tho Popo . but also among tho Protestants of tho country , who desired to reform their ecclesiastical organisation by means of the popular principle of election , in lieu of tho despotic procedures of ffovormnontul annointmont hitherto

      Srovailing . Tho Court , chiefly urged on by Prince ohn , deolared against this movement in u violent manifesto , The Ministors issued an ordinance in which , most unconstitutionally , all moctinga , asso « ciationa , and combinations undertaken Tor the purpose of plaoing ooolesiastical affairs on a froor basis , wore declared illegal , and punishable with heavy penalties . Tho people wore naturally deeply exasporatod at this attaok upon thoir " Pro » testant freedom . " Thoy rofusod to acknowledge the right of tho Court to issuo such mufti

      ordi-King remains inexorable . Nay , ho has oven had a law onaoted stipulating that no man condemned for life should bo allowed to beg for pardon ! Fortunately , wo may say that , even were there no such law , tho exulted feeling' of dignity _ prevailing among tho prisonors would not permit thorn to descend to suo for mercy . A characteristic oocurrenoo took place not long ago , which shows tho

      tyranny of King John towards these caplavos in nil its unworthy pettiness . A Gorman translation of some English poots having bcou published from the pon of ono of tho accomplished men incarcerated at Waldhoim , it was remarked . by tho authorities of King John that one of the poems so trrtnslatod contained some allusions to Liberty . Immediately thereupon tho King—who , bo it remembered , pridos himself on being a mombor of tho " ltopublio of Letters "—gave orders for tho suppression of the

      -Ntn. 4,59. Jajtoaby 8, 1859. 1 T H E X ...

      -NTn . 4 , 59 . Jajtoaby 8 , 1859 . 1 T H E X E , & 33 E R . 53

      Original C0reesp01dence,

      ORIGINAL C 0 REESP 01 DENCE ,

      France. (From Our Own Correspondent.) Pa...

      FRANCE . ( From our own Correspondent . ) Paris , Thursday , 6 £ p . m . THE EJIPEROK AND M . HCBSEE . The year ' opens gloomily with rumours of war , which every day acquire greater consistency . The extraordinary observation addressed by the Emperor to the Austrian . Ambassador upon New Year ' s ^ day- —a festive occasion , when the corroding cares of politics might well be for the nonce forgotten—have filled the commercial classes with consternation , routed the condottieri of speculation , « nd disturbed the even tenor of all men ' s ways . Last year was not entitled to a red letter in the imperial calendar , for it was filled with a long succession of blunders , beginning with the terrorist panic which followed the attentcit of Orsini . The hectoring

      of gentlemen who believed their mission was to go put coloneling on English soil insulted the national dignity of Englishmen , and showed how one-sided people here wished the alliance to be . The coercion inflicted on Belgium , Switzerland , and Piedmont offended all Europe ; and the proceedings taken against M . de Montalembert closed the melancholy category of errors . To some men experience teaches nothing ; and I doubt if a greater mistake jcould have been committed than to outrage the common forms'of decency and good breeding by publicly insulting the representative of an allied power on the greatest festival of the year—upon the day when even the commonest in the land wishes happiness and prosperity to all he meets with . The commentary which was made this morning by a high functionary of the Government , was that the conduct of the Emperor was incomprehensible , and would give substance to the rumour that it was a preconcerted thing to " Bear" the market and facilitate tho Stock Exchange transactions of certain well-known individuals . The proceeding wai ? so unusual and so uncalled for , that people seek for its cause in regions remote from politics . Thoycuuinot conceive that mero diplomatic disagreements would induce such an outburst of ill-tompov and so complete an abr aenco of bienscances . There must bo some other reason , thoy affirm , and with the profound conviction that there & , deeply rooted in society generally , you can readily understand how gront hns boon tho blunder to encourage tho belief that tho foreign policy of France

      is shaped to servo tho views of speculators on 'Change—that the language of thq Empire is to day obsequious to Russia to sustain tho Dulls , nnd almost brutal to Austria to-morrow to make the path easy for tho " Boars . " " Of course I do not for ono moment suppose that tho Emporor hud any such intention . Ho is surrounded with men—Ministers and adherents—who , if thoy are plastic in their natures and pliable to his will , for that very reason know how to serve thoir ends , which ull have a marvellous rosomblanco—to foathor their pwn nests , in vulgar parlance . It is a groat mistako to represent tho Emperor ns a dark , unfiathomablo nature , always full of plots and schemes . Ho may have boon so when he wan ft protenilor , but now suoeoss has wonderfully softenod and expanded his character . It is only by Ills ami marts Hint lie U onoitfollu and active .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 8, 1859, page 21, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_08011859/page/21/