were the words of the Greek poet so applicable as to him, ύβρις, ην one The humiliation of Prussia has been the most profound; her prince had been degraded into a mere cipher; her cities unremittingly spoiled by a succession of brutal generals; and every sentiment, national as well as manly, which could pave the way to vengeance, had been rivetted in the heart of every subject, by Napoleon's unworthy treatment of the queen. It was fitting that in Prussia also the first manifestation of these feelings should break forth. When, after an unequalled series of calamities, defeats, and degradations, it at last became visible to the people of Germany, that their governments might yet, by bold and simultaneous struggle, accomplish that which, in spite of them, had been so well begun, an appeal was made, first tacitly and then openly, to the King of Prussia, which, to his eternal shame be it spoken, he did not hear with that promptness and decision of purpose, which suited alike his own interest and the inclination of his people. It is well known that his person was in danger at Berlin, before he yielded to the popular voice and put himself at the head of the army of Silesia. By the influence of the memorable society of virtue (the Tugend-bund), and now by the artful, though energetic, proclamations of Frederick-William, a sentiment of enthusiasm, equal to that which fires the bosoms of religious martyrs, was kindled in the breast of noble, merchant, and peasant. The old barriers of custom, precedence, and dignity, fell away, like gossamer webs, before the strong breath of necessity. Armies were to be made, and the sovereign had it no longer in his power to criticise in his war-office, the quarterings of those who were willing to assume his uniform. A time was come in which barons, burghers, and Jews, became aware that, as their cause was the same, their exertions should be equal. What Frederick-William did, at the opening of the campaign, the sovereigns of Baden, Wurtemberg, and Bavaria, were compelled by their sol diers to do before its close. The spirit which had been conjured up was one too powerful to be controlled by those who had evoked it. The course of events proceeded. The spectacle which Germany exhibited in the year 1813, has never been equalled since the days of Marathon and Salamis. It was not suspected by the sovereigns of the country, that the future results of the enthusiasm should bear so near a resemblance to that of those first struggles of Athenian patriotism. They who presided at the great national conflicts of Lutzen, Leipsic, and Hanau, will learn ere long, that on those terrible days the Germans fought for themselves as well as for their princes. Among the motley multitude who crowded in those animating days to the standards of their country, the most remarkable and grotesque, and certainly not the least efficient, consisted of the students of the German universities. For the first time in modern ages, professors became the military leaders of their pupils, and Körner and Wolfe performed the same part among the Landwehr, which Æschylus did at Salamis, and Socrates at Platea. Who can wonder to hear that the survivors did not return to their academic bowers the same beings as they left them? Their souls had been moved in the strong current of the world. To the spirit of enthusiasm wherewith they had of old been imbued, there was now added the sense of power, and the commanding energy of will. They have learned what they can do themselves. They have acquired the still more important knowledge, that they are not an isolated set of beings, cut off from men, and devoted to books that they are in truth the same people with those around them; that their interests, their wishes, their passions, and their powers, are the same. In the retirement to which they have returned, they can no longer muster by beat of drum, and mingle in the tumults of the real battle; but they who have seen the warlike aspect of their persons and amusements, their beards, their sabres, and their fencing-schools, will have no difficulty in perceiving that these men do not look upon themselves as for ever done with war. He will observe in them the determination to wait till the moment come, and then, rising as before with one irresistible impulse, to drive every thing befor them that opposes right. From the intercourse of those campaigns, the hussar derived illumination, and the scholar firmness. The chief defect of German minds was supplied by the fortuitous reunion of those too long separated powers-reflection and ardour. The late tumults of rejoicing patriotism, with which the day of the reformation was celebrated at Jena, at Leipsic, and at Berlin, is proof sufficient of a secret understanding, and a good omen of what may yet be done, when the day, not for words, but for action, shall arrive. Of all the oppressions by which the spirit of the enlightened and manly Germans are irritated, the most galling and insufferable is that occasioned by the preposterous privileges of the nobility. A class such as this numerous without limit, idle, and excluded from most of the useful professions-to a liberal and generous nation, even the lower orders of whose society are distinguished by very excellent education and by universal habits of reading, is a nuisance beyond imagination intolerable, insulting, and absurd. The financial distresses of Austria have produced at least one happy effect, by rendering it absolutely necessary for the imperial government to redeem the profession of the merchant from that disgraceful situation, in which, throughout the other monarchies of Germany, it is placed. In Bavaria and Saxony also, some approximations have of late been made to the introduction of a more liberal state of affairs, -in consequence, I suppose, in the former of these countries, of the great acuteness and penetration of the reigning monarch; and in the latter, of the flourishing condition of the trade of Saxony, and the secret wishes of the nobles themselves to participate, without degradation, in the profits which it affords. Count Bühl, the descendant of the celebrated prime minister of the last Polish Augustus, is at this moment understood (although his name is suppressed in every firm) to be one of the first merchants in the wool trade; by which wise measure he has, in a great degree, restored the dilapidated wealth of his illustrious family; and it is expected, that in a few years the Saxon gentlemen will be legally permitted to engage in trade, without forfeiting any of the lustre of their birth. In Prussia, the privileges of the nobility have at all times been more distressing than in any other of the great German States; their freedom from all imposts amounting to a terrible piece of oppression on all the other orders of society. FrederickWilliam was obliged to throw his army open to every one in the year 1813, and he promised at that time, that neither the military, nor any other of the offensive parts of their privileges, should ever be restored. It is distressing to relate, that a virtual recall of all these promises has since taken place; for an edict has been uttered, preventing the rise of any man, not nobly born, to any rank higher than that of a sublieutenant. But the most disagreeable narrative to British ears is that which details the situation of Hanover. So far from the state of the nobility being altered in conformity to the spirit of the age, whatever alterations have oсcurred in that country have all tended exactly the other way. Till the present reign, one place in the supreme council was always open to all Hanoverian subjects; in the days of George III. it, like all the other six, has been declared to belong exclusively to the noblesse. Hanover is a small, and by no means a rich country, but its inhabitants are among the best educated and most moral people in the world; and as the soil is in every part excellent, the greatest possible facility is by nature afforded to every sort of agricultural and political improvement. But so long as the whole gentry of the country are prevented from occupying themselves, without degradation, in commerce; so long as the predilections of the reigning family render necessary the maintenance of the present enormously disproportionate military force, a complete stop is put to every rational prospect of good. I am unwilling to say much upon this subject, for I gladly acquit our Royal Family of having any seriously bad intentions. But surely their residence in our free and happy country might have been expected to produce impressions on their minds, sufficient to prevent them from pursuing a system of conduct which renders their native province, at this moment, the worst cultivated, and, without any exception, the most nobleridden district of Northern Germany. Compare Hanover with Weimar, Gotha, or even with the kingdom of Saxony, and it is impossible not to lament over the miserable contrast. Before the French despotism was established over the German States bordering on the Rhine, only one of these States could be said to possess a good constitution. This was Wurtemberg-the constitution of which, Mr Pitt once said, was the best in the world next to that of England. With the assistance of Napoleon, the representatives of the nobility and people were deprived, by the sovereign family, of the share which they had always had in the government of their country, and a pure monarchy was established. In other words, Wurtemberg became a mere department of France. After Louis XVIII. had re-ascended the throne of his fathers, the people of this German State saw no reason why the tyranny established by Bonaparte among them should survive the other institutions of his despotism; since that period, a perpetual struggle has subsisted between them and their king; and, notwithstanding all the alliances by which he has fortified himself, I have very little doubt as to the mode in which it will terminate. The Prussians, the Bavarians, the Wurtembergers, and the people of Baden, have all been promised representative constitutions by their princes. The fulfilment of these promises has been deferred from year to year; and, in some instances, this has been accompanied with measures of royal violence, and testifications of popular displeasure, which leave but too much reason to doubt, whether the result of the approaching Congress at Dusselsdorf, will be more soothing to the general mind than those of the similar meetings which have already been held at Frankfort and Vienna. The plans which have as yet been suggested by the political writers in Germany, are, I think, all alike visionary and impracticable. The best of all these authors, Scheffer, whose book you should certainly read, proposes, very seriously, the establishment of a great national confederacy, to consist of all the German States, excepting Austria and Bavaria. The princes of these countries, he observes, should not be permitted to join the confederacy, for several reasons-Their subjects are not all Germans; and the greater part of their territories have always been accustomed to a mere military government. But has Mr Scheffer forgotten the difficulties which must, in any case, attend the establishment of a confederacy of Independent States? or does he conceal from himself how greatly these difficulties must, in the present instance, be increased by the determined opposition of the first and third power in Germany? to say nothing of the insuperable objections which all Saxons and Hanoverians will feel to the erection of a system which could not fail to add new weight to the already odious superiority of Prussia. The thing is quite impossible-I do not hesitate to say so, although I am quite sensible that I have no better plan to suggest. Something, however, must be done. If Frederick-William, and Prince Hardenberg, and the petty Princes of Wurtemberg and Baden, do not hasten to do what they have promised, the work will very soon be taken out of their hands. The national independence of Germany is an object of much concern to every enlightened German, but civil rights, and internal repose, are yet dearer to him. The privileges of the nobility must, in the first place, be lessened,commerce must be rendered honourable, and every part of the educated and enlightened people must somehow find its organ in the deliberative assembly of the State. All this has been solemnly promised and patiently waited for. The silence which at present prevails, is the best proof that the public of Germany are firm, resolved, and confident. Let the Congress of Dusselsdorf do their duty, and all is well. If not, the time shall soon have gone by, when restitution might have prevented the necessity of revenge. If the Germans have a Revolution, it will, I hope and trust, be calm and rational, when compared with that of the French. Its precursors have not been, as in France, ridicule, raillery, derision, impiety; but sober reflection, Christian confidence, and manly resolutions, gathered and confirmed by the experience of many sorrowful years. The sentiment is so universally diffused-so seriously establishedso irresistible in its unity, that I confess I should be greatly delighted, but not very much astonished, to hear of the mighty work being accomplished almost without resistance, and entirely without outrage. THE FAIRIES. A Dream-like remembrance of a Dream. IT chanced three merry Fairies met tresses, And green the turf as their Elfin-dresses. Was mocking, with a gleesome din, All happy to meet by a blink o' the moon. They strove to deaden that ceaseless roar; midnight trance, From the silent heart of a hollow Yew, In the sea-green glow of their wild attire. They pulled at his horns, and with many a tweak, Around and around they skrewed his beak; The wild-wood's harmless Cuirassiers. Thro' the depth of Ivy on the wall (The sole remains of old Greystock Hall) bright! Then they dropt at once into the Pool- A charm had hushed the thundering shocks, The mountain's night-voice was subdued Mountain Fairy. "Soon as the lingering Sun was gone, O beauteous sight!' the Shepherd cried, To the Shepherd slumbering at his side, Look where the Mountain-Fairy flies!" But e'er he had opened his heavy eyes, I had flown o'er Grassmere's moonlight flood, And the rustling swing of old Rydal-Wood, And sunk down 'mid the heather-bells On the shady side of sweet Furness-Fells. 'Twas but one soft wave o' my wing! A start and an end to my journeying. One moment's rest in a spot so dear,For the Moonlight was sleeping on Winder mere, And I saw in that long pure streak of light Like stars amid the milky way. But what had I with the Lake to do? And in dark ravines, and creviced rocks, Till the fleece lay smooth on its strengthened form, And the happy Creatures lay down together They withered at once both stalk and root, And with mellower lustre bade them spring And the horn twang through the Felon'scave, The Raven sat upon Langdale-Peak And the Eaglets couched warm beneath her breast, But the Shepherd shall miss her cry at morn, My Tale is told-nor strange nor new Now, sweet Lady Bright-Eyes! what say you?" As some wild Night-Flower thro' the dew, Till, like a breath breathed clear from To her at once a voice was given, Rose. At these wild words their sports gave o'er, And through the wicket with a glide head?' His little wondering Sister said, |