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which have retarded the progress of the province, and of doing away with that monopoly of trade which Russia purchased at Redout Kaleh alone, but which she most unjustly exercises throughout the whole length of the coast. By throwing Mingrelia open to commercial enterprise, a new and profitable market would be created for our manufactures, whilst the resources of the country would be developed, and the prosperity of the population proportionately advanced. It does not seem that in making these demands we should be asking, either with respect to Abkhasia or Mingrelia, more than we have a right to expect; but whether we make peace and obtain independence for one, and free trade for the other, or make war and gain only a valuable strategical position for ourselves, let us hope that those political and military men who have hitherto riveted their delighted gaze upon the shattered docks of Sebastopol may extend the range of their mental vision to the opposite shore of the Black Sea; and as they gradually acquire a hazy consciousness of the existence of Russia in that quarter, may admit that the campaign which has just been prosecuted in those newly discovered regions has not been altogether barren of political and military results."

But Mr. Oliphant wrote in vain. These considerations passed unheeded; the campaign was barren of all political results; and the Treaty of Paris having ignored the existence of the Circassians, Russia began again to carry on a war of extermination against them. Suffering more from famine than from the prowess of Russian arms, the Circassians, driven to despair, sent two deputies to England in 1862. One of these, Hajy Hassan Hayder, was at forty an aged man with eighteen wounds upon his body, and worn down with a life passed in privation and warfare ever since his childhood. These deputies addressed a petition to the Queen, dated the 26th August, in which they represented that their country was independent, that the Ottoman Government had never possessed it, and that therefore Russia could not pretend to claim it in virtue of any treaties with the Porte. They complained that Russia led Europe to believe that the Circassians were barbarians or savages, who, if left alone, would destroy their neighbour's property. This opinion Russia has certainly done her best to disseminate. It is reported that the late Said Pasha, Viceroy of Egypt, was one day talking of the Circassians, and that the Russian Consul who was present would not lose the opportunity to make the observation, 'If a man steals a horse or a cow, we call him a Tcherkess.' Said Pasha replied, 'Yes; and if he seizes a whole province, then he is called a Tsar.'

The petition goes on to state that—

"The tyranny of the Russians was not confined to capturing our cattle, burning our dwellings and temples, and other unheard of atrecities, but in order to starve us on the mountains they destroyed all

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our growing crops in the plain, and captured our land.'

'If we were to emigrate, abandoning our homes for ages protected by our forefathers, who shed their blood for them, our poverty would prove a great obstacle to our doing so; in fact, how could we take away our own wives and children, and the widows, orphans, and helpless relations of those slain in this war? Such an undertaking would decimate the emigrants, and blot out for ever our Circassian name from the face of the earth.'

In the presence of these difficulties they implore the protection of the Queen, and pray her to interfere to prevent the extermination of a nation numbering a million of souls: these are the Circassians and Abkhasians. (We now know that these sad forebodings of the consequences of a forced emigration have been far surpassed by the reality, and that decimation is no word for the mortality that has overtaken the emigrants.) The only answer to this petition was a letter, dated September 12th, 1862, acquainting the deputies that 'Her Majesty's Government cannot interfere in the matter referred to in their petition.' Technically, perhaps, the Foreign Office could give no other answer, its hands being tied by the neglect of the Congress of Paris to establish the real position of Circassia towards Russia, and the false position assumed by Russia had apparently been acquiesced in; or, as Pozzo di Borgo said, 'The public opinion of Europe has given the Caucasus to Russia.'* Similar indifference led Europe to acquiesce in the partition of Poland, which the British Minister of that day described as a curious transaction. There is this distinction, however, between the two-that England had had no special relations with the Poles before the partition; whereas we called upon the Circassians to co-operate with us, and they did make a diversion in our favour by attacking the Russian territory during the operations of the Turkish army. Russia has set a precedent, which might have been used in favour of Circassia, by her remonstrances in behalf of the Montenegrins, whom no one ever thought of disturbing until they descended from their mountains on head-hunting expeditions into the plain.†

The conduct and policy of Russia in Circassia and in Poland has been very similar; the cruelties exercised in Poland have

* Reference to the Correspondence respecting the Regulations issued by the Russian Government in regard to Trade with the Eastern Coast of the Black Sea,' presented to the House of Commons in February, 1863, will show that Lord Malmesbury did his best to turn to account the meagre stipulations of the Treaty of Paris, to the advantage of the Circassians, and that he commenced a policy which, had it been sustained, might have averted their downfall.

We are glad to welcome Lady Strangford's pretty book, 'The Eastern Shores of the Adriatic,' in which an interesting account is given of the Montenegrins and their prince.

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excited more sympathy from being better known: yet that sympathy has been barren, because we are told that action is impracticable to us in a country which is washed by no sea. But as this objection does not hold in the case of Circassia, should we let the extermination of the mountaineers pass without remonstrance, the public opinion of Europe will have just cause for saying that in England, the will, rather than the power, has been wanting to withstand triumphant wrong.

The French, who during the Crimean war were so indifferent to the interests of their allies, and who prevented the departure of Omer Pasha's army from the Crimea till it was too late in the year for military operations in Transcaucasia, may now be sorry for the downfall of Circassia, which will enable the Russians to press still more heavily upon the unfortunate Poles. They will have yet more cause for regret should the Russian policy of depopulation now going on in the Caucasus be carried out also in Poland. We have already referred to the expulsion of the Moors from Spain, and a further parallel may be drawn from that event. Henri IV., either from political motives or from Protestant feelings of opposition to the Inquisition, had opened some communications with the Moriscoes; but when they were actually expelled, he shrunk from rendering them any effective assistance, and left Spain to triumph in her cruelty, and to set an example which was in due time imitated by Louis XIV., under whom, upon the revocationof the Edict of Nantes, the Protestants, for whom his grandfather had struggled so long, were made to undergo all the horrors, the sufferings, and decimation experienced by the Moriscoes.

Even from the history of these earlier persecutions but a faint idea can be formed of the cold, the famine, the diseases which have been destroying the unfortunate Circassians while waiting upon a shore within the grasp of Russia, which will not suffer Ottoman or even English Commissioners to approach its victims, either to alleviate their misery, or to be witnesses of her own tyranny. And yet greater sufferings await them when they disembark on the Turkish coasts where no preparation has been made for them. Shall modern Europe, one of whose everlastingly recurring watchwords is the cry of humanity, submit to the disgrace of not being more enlightened than inquisitorial fanatics of the middle ages? We can scarcely endure to read of such cruelties in the records of distant ages; yet when they are repeated under our own eyes by a government which calls itself Christian,* we cannot attempt to stay the hand

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It appears from the Parliamentary papers respecting the settlement of Circassian emigrants, that the expulsion of the mountaineers has been the direct act

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of the oppressor; or to tell him that he who does such deeds can only be regarded-indeed, is already regarded-as an enemy of Mankind. But at least we may stretch forth our hands to relieve the misery which we have done nothing to avert, to aid with purse and with effective management the misdirected efforts of the Porte, to mitigate to the remnant of a brave and beautiful race those dreadful and unparalleled sufferings which have been entailed upon them solely by their righteous and steadfast defence of the hearths and homesteads of their fathers.

ART. V.-1. Le Père Lacordaire. Par le Comte de Montalembert. Deuxième Edition, revue et augmentée. Paris. 1862. : 2. Euvres du R. P. Henri-Dominique Lacordaire, de l'Ordre des Frères Prêcheurs. 1858.

Paris.

3. Lettres du Révérend Père Lacordaire à des jeunes Gens. Recueillies et publiées par M. l'Abbé Henri Perreyve. Paris. 1863.

*

4. Lettres du R. P. Lacordaire à Madame la Comtesse Eudoxie de la Tour du Pin. Publiées par Madame de Paris. 1864.

5. Correspondance du R. P. Lacordaire et de Madame Swetchine publiée par le Cte. de Falloux, de l'Académie Française. Paris. 1864.

6. Les derniers Moments du R. P. H. D. Lacordaire. Par un Religieux de l'Ordre des Frères Prêcheurs. Paris. 1861. 7. Discours de Réception à l'Académie Française. Par le R. P. H. D. Lacordaire, des Frères Prêcheurs, le 24 Janvier, 1861. Paris. 1861.

8. Le Maudit.

Par l'Abbé * * 3 Vols. Paris. 1863.

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of the Russian Government. That Government had, it is true, offered the mountaineers the choice of settling in the steppes of the Kouban, or of emigrating to Turkey. But had they accepted the former alternative, they would equally have suffered loss of home, ruin, decimation, and national annihilation. We find the following passage in the Bulletin du Caucase,' in the Journal de St. Petersbourg' of May 19, 1864:- In the course of the month of March, thirty thousand individuals left Touapré; about fifty thousand others await their turn to embark at Anapa, Novorossüsk, Djouba, and Touapré, and at least as many more will go forth from the coasts of the Oubykh and Djighète territories. It is thus that the resistance of the last and most obstinate of the hostile tribes has been overcome, thanks to the perseverance and unheard-of labours of the troops of the Caucasus. Although it cannot be asserted that the war in the Caucasus is completely terminated until our soldiers shall have overrun all the mountain passes, and shall have driven out the last of the inhabitants, it is to be hoped that we shall no longer meet with any obstinate resistance anywhere, and that especially on account of their numerical weakness, the tribes that have remained in the defiles of the mountains can no longer be considered as the source of any danger to ourselves.'

THE

HE Romish Church was by no means popular in France during the times which preceded and immediately succeeded the Revolution of 1830. The tone of general literature was anti-clerical, and often irreligious. The number of Easter communicants in the metropolis had dwindled down to a quarter of what it had been under the Empire.* The Archbishop's palace was sacked by the mob during the three July days, and subsequently destroyed; and for the first few months of Louis Philippe's reign no priest could show himself in the streets of Paris in the dress of his order.

This state of feeling is easily accounted for. The Government of the Restoration, especially under Charles X., had laboured to extend the influence of the Romish Church, to annul the effect of such laws as were obnoxious to the clergy, and to restore many of that body's ancient privileges.

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'It had increased the number of bishops given them seats in the Chamber of Peers; augmented their stipends as well as those of the priests; founded scholarships (bourses) in the greater and lesser seminaries; sanctioned the erection of an additional number of those establishments; encouraged and maintained the pomp of religious ceremonies; favoured (home) missions; . . . . tolerated the formation of several (monastic) communities: in a word done all that a government could do by acts of favour.'†

In return for such substantial services, the clergy had not unnaturally thrown the weight of their influence into the political scale, and preached passive obedience and the doctrine of the right divine. Indeed, benefits were scarcely required to stir the Church's zeal. The burning remembrance of the spoliation and cruel wrongs she had suffered from the revolutionary governments, and of the tyranny with which she had been treated by the first Napoleon, was very fresh in her memory. She, as well as the nobility, looked back to the golden age prior to the catastrophe of 1789, and saw no hope of a second dawn of that good time unless the legitimate branch of the Bourbons remained in power.

Then, what had happened in England during the reign of Charles I. happened in France under Charles X. The close relationship between the Church and the State aggravated the unpopularity of both. The Government was detested for many reasons, some good and some bad, justly towards the last for its utterly unconstitutional spirit and measures. The Church was

*See Memorial presented to the Pope by the principal editors of the 'Avenir,' and stated by La Mennais in his 'Affaires de Rome' to have been drawn up by Lacordaire.

Extract from Memorial already referred to.

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