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    paratively new in form and material . Her performances have proved her form to have been of the best description . Was she equally strong ? Was she capable- of bearing the rough weather and the mischances which alfrsea-going ships must encounter , considering the material of which she was composed , and the weight she had to carry ? She was a very swif t ship , and the extreme rigidity consequent on great strength is not favourable to swif tness . Ships in war time , chased or chasing , loose their rigging , give the masts play , and sometimes saw their beams , to increase velocity . We that the

    are inclined to infer , therefore , Royal Charter was not a very rigid nor a very strong shito . The iron ,. put together generally in comparatively small pieces , is more fragmentary than the loll"' timbers and planks which bind the wooden vessel firmly together from stern-post to cutwater , and from keel to gunnel . Then the material , with all that it has to support , sinks at once whenever the water displaces the air—reasons for building iron ships peculiarly strong . The material employed being comparatively new , as applied to this purpose , requires to be closely watched , and of late it has been said to be subject in a variety of ways to destruction . We cast not a shadow of blame on either the

    builder or the owner of the Royal Charter * but the mere fact of employing a new material for the construction of ships , which has in itself no buoyant power , makes it necessary , to profit by every calamity , to enforce care and attention on shipbuilders , shipowners , and ship captains .

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    THE BANQUET OF THE BARMACIDES . The story of the Barmaeide is known to us of old . We can remember still the heartfelt sympathy with which , as children , we listened to the tale of his gastronomic sufferings . We were hungry with his hunger ; we were glad with his joy , as the rich repast and dainty dishes were laid Tjefore his longing eyes ; and we sorrowed with his sorrow as dish af ter dish turned out a delusion ; as the platters were found empty , and th e goblets dry . Years have passed since we heard the story , ; but all its incidents rose before our memory as we read the narrative of the great Conservative

    banquet held in Lord Derb y ' s honour . We felt that we ourselves were political Barmacides . We had been invited to a feast of politics , to a refined repast of reason , to a very " saturnalia" of statesmanship . We came hungry and athirst . We had fasted for months , and were well nigh starving with political inanition . After the fashion of the boa constrictor , who gorges himself at one meal for weeks to come , we intended to fill our minds even to repletion , and to give ourselves a very surfeit of Knowledge . What , indeed , could be more tempting than the aspect of the banquetmore exhilai'ating than the . features of the goodly company ? All the leaders of the Conservative party , the professors of the orthodox creed , the

    expositors of the articles of Tory faith , were there gathered together . Everything about the affair was brilliant . The lamps sparkled . The Order of the Garter shone brilliantly on the ex-Premier ' s person ; the very casket which contained the address was conscious of its position , and shone as in duty bound . Silver was the base substance of the box , but its mouldings were of gold , typifying thereby the lustre which ai'istocracy bestows upon the vulgar herd , Seven thousand and odd good and true Conservatives , men who had never bowed the knee to the JBaalof Liberalism ,-had signed the address , and their language was brilliant as befitted the occasion . Pandora ' s box was not more rich

    in its contents , more fertile in promise , than this gold-encircled casket . Female smiles and the charms of beauty were not wanting to grace the scene . Every lady present wore the correct Conservative colours . Wo are ignorant of the fashions of political millinery , but wo ask in confidence was that colour " mauve . " We felt the . first premonitory pang of disappointment when we learnt that the viands wore mostlyoold .

    Who , wo should like to know , ever got oxcitod on cold roast beef ; whose heart was ever cheered or whose spirit roused by cold fowls and tongue ? ; Tho very idea of a cola collation is inseparably ttssooiated with a christening or a wedding— -the two most melancholy events in life . Still , however , we hoped against nope . There was much that ; we ¦ wanted to learn . There was such an array of pe&kere , such a host of topioe , that surely wo

    thought , we must learn something . We were present at a solemn gathering of a great political party , who but a few months ago ruled the state , and might well do so ere long again . We waited open-mouthed to learn what was their profession of faith ; what were the principles they uphe l d ; what the policy they meant to pursue . Speaker af ter speaker arose , uttered the same platitudes , repeated the same compliments , and retired "with the same self-complacency . There were no tri-• uinphs to point to , no record of great measures carried af ter long efforts , no mention of reforms to be made their own . We asked for a livinsr

    promise and we are given a dead memory . We are told that Lord Derby and his colleagues are the bodily impersonation of Conservative principles . We never doub ted that Conservatism had a body . What we wanted to learn was , whether it had a soul ? Our scepticism was rather confined than , shaken . The body , indeed , was there , but the attributes of life are wanting . All we could gather was the fact that the Conservatives were the party of resistance . Every great reform , every step in the path of progress , every popular measure they had resisted and delayed . They had done so from the beginning , and would do so to the end . We wonder that none of the speakers bethought himself of the scenes amidst which he stood . As the

    cheering died away the audience must have heard in the streets the rumbling of the great cotton drays , the whistle of the railway engines , or the splashing of the gigantic steamers which are ever passing on the noble Mersey river . It is not resistance which has created the great port of England . Liverpool has , indeed , a moral of its own , and that moral is not resistance . We are , in truth , sorry for this exhibition . We are no enthusiastic supporters of * any political

    faction , and are grieved to see the Conservative party doomed to a thankless and a fruitless cause . Like Sisyphus , they are always rolling up a stone which is certain to fall down , but , unlike the legendary hero , they are proud of their labour , and delight therein . The banquet was , indeed , a vanity I We sat down empty and rose up hungry . Our only consolation lies in the reflection that every lady present wore bonnet strings of the correct Conservative colour . Half a loaf is better than no bread , and in default of principles we must put up with badges . .

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    THE ITALIAN DUCHIES . The documents recently compiled by order of Dictator Farini , from the archives of Modcna , give a clear insight into the character of the governments of the recently deposed Dukes of Central Italy . That the ducal territories have not slipped from the grasp of their rulers without . just and sufficient cause , is a fact rendered unmistakably apparent . In addition to the personal bad faith and double dealing of the sovereigns , and the atrocious cruelty and despotism which have been practised by their governments , the subjection of the Dukes to Austria has" been such as of itself to give that Empire a power of interference in the

    Peninsula , totally at variance with the balance of European power , and the prevention of which has been one main object of various treaties . In 1848 Austria arrogated to herself the right to conclude peace in the namo of the Dukes of Modena . and Parma . Thus , while she loudly complained in the face of European diplomacy , that Piedmont had violated the treaties of 1815 , she unhesitatingly broke them herself by assuming sovereign supremacy , in opposition to ' them , over two States which were invested with full powers of sovereignty and independence . Hy the treaty concluded at Vienna , May 11 th , 17 . 03 , between tho Emperor Francis I ., tho Empress Maria Teresa ,

    and Francis III ., Duke of Modena , with tho mediation of George II . of England , tho right of succession to the sovereignty of the States of Modena was conferred , in case of the extinction of the male branch of the Este family , upon tho third son of the Emperor Francis and Maria Teresa , destined to beoome tho , husband of tho Princess Maria It ic car da , niece of tho Duke of Modonix . But tho fourth article of this treaty expressly stipulates that tho Duchy of Modciia shall never be united to Austria , but shall always remain a . distinct State . By tho seventh article , it was also agreed that , in oaso of the extinction of the male branch of the Arohduko declared immediate heir , the other branches of tho ai'chducal family , always excepting tho

    reigning branch , should succeed one after another to the sovereignly of the Duch y of Modena . which was , however , always to remain indepen ' dent and . separate from the Austrian dominions " By the forty-eighth article of the final act of the Congress of Vienna , the archducal family of Austria-Este was reinstated' in the possessions it had lost , and by the last paragraph of the same article , the eventual right of succession of the House of Austria to the State of Modena , wag re-established , but in conformity with article seventeen of the treaty concluded at Vienna in 1753 " With regard to the reversion of the Duchies of

    Parma , Modena , Piacenza , and Guastalla , in reference to the Archduchess Maria Louisa , the nineteenth article of the final act of the Congress of Vienna establishes that the courts of Vienna Russia , England , France , Spain and Prussia shall agree as to the determination to be taken relative to them , regard being had , however , to the reversionary rights of Austria and Sardinia . In accordance with arrangements then entered into respecting the treaty concluded at Paris , June 10 th , 1817 , on the death of the Archduchess Maria Louisa , the Duchies of Parma , Piacenza and Guastalla , would pass in full sovereignty in a direct male line to the sons and descendants of Maria Louisa , fante of

    Iu Spam , with the exception of the . territories'included in the imperial States which were to remain in the full possession of Austria according to the forty-ninth article of the final act of the Congress of Vienna . With respect , however , to the reversion of these Duchies , in case of the extinction of the male branch of the Infante , Don Carlo Lodovico di Barbone , it was decided to maintain the agreement already made in the treaty of Acquisgrana of 1748 , and in tire separate article of the treaty of May 20 th , 1815 , between Austria and Sardinia . In the above treaty it had been concluded , that in case , of the extinction of the male branch of the Bourbons at Parma , that-Duchy with Guastalla shouldrevert to Austria and Piacenza

    to Sardinia , but by the separate article of the treaty concluded in 1815 between Austria and Sardinia it was established that in case of such extinction the city of Piacenza , embracing a circle of two miles , should remain to Austria , and that Sardinia , by way of compensation , should receive an equivalent taken from the Parmesan territory in proximity to its own frontiers . This equivalent was eventually determined by the treaty concluded at Florence , Nov . 28 th , 1844 , between the Courts of Lucca , Modena , Tuscany , Austria , and Sardinia . Austria also concluded a treaty Dec . 24 th , 1847 , with the Duchy of Modena , and subsequently with the D uke of Parma , professedly of offensive and defensive alliance . Thus , in reality ,

    Austria became possessed of the right to exercise a control calculated to destroj the independence of these two States , which , by . the Powers assembled at Venice , had been purposely constituted independent , in order that , witli the other Italian States , they might counterbalance Austrian power in Italy . In 1847 , Austria , consulting only her own good pleasure , transferred her military Irontier beyond the Apennines to tlie confines of the two Duchies , and tlnn destroyed the equilibrium . The princes of Modena and Pnrma voluntarily threw awav their independence by uniting

    themselves with the Austrian empire rather thnn w , » tn the free family of tho Italian peoples , ami of then own act and deed removed themselves beyond the safeguard and protection of these treaties , ino Sardinian Government unceasingly protested against the arrangement , and in 1848 alleged tins fact ns one of the reasons for going to . wnr with Austria . Although Sardinia was conquered in 1 « 4 , ) , sue still perseveringly refused to rcco&niso and rat » y , either explicitly or tacitly , the right of Austria to sovereign supremacy over tho Duchies . Anotuei strange pretension advanced by Austria in t ho negogotiations for peace was , that Sardinia should pay 01 j

    an indemnity for tho war to tho JJouroons . " « ;»»» and tho Estensi of Modena . But ibv a long tunQ tho Piodmontese ministry ,, with great ren » on , rosolutely refused tho demand , declaring that as neumont had never recognised any right of supi'o » acy over tho Duohies on the part oi Austria , notuei would she , under any oiroumBtonocs whatever , pay over any sum to tho princes thomselvoa , seeing it was not the Picdmonteso arms , but tho mdlSnJ " tion of their own people , which had driven tftcm from their thrones . ^ At length , however , alter much controversy , a treaty of ponce was ° " ?" between Sardinia nnd Austria , by whioh mo

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    * 226 THE LEADEK [ No . 502 . Nov . 5 , 185 <) .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 5, 1859, page 1226, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2319/page/14/