ART. VIII.-Procès contre L. de Potter, F. Tielemans, A. Barthels, J. J. Coché-Mommens, E. Vanderstraeten, et J. B. de Nevé, accusés d'avoir excité directement à un complot ou attentat ayant pour but de changer ou de détruire le gouvernement; contenant la Correspondance saisie chez les accusés et leurs interrogatoires, donnant l'explication des dénominations insultantes par lesquelles sont désignés de hauts personnages, d'eminens fonctionnaires et autres, &c. ainsi que nombre de pieces diverses des plus interessantes: orné de deux lithographies, &c. Bruxelles, chez Brest van Kempen, 3 Mai 1830. 2 vol. 8vo. pp. 208 and p. 348.

THE same sympathy has not been shewn for the efforts of the Belgians to better their political condition that was exhibited in behalf of the French. Certainly there is a difference in the two cases, but the difference is not so unfavourable to the Pays Bas as might be expected. The movement in France was a mighty and spontaneous expression of the national will, indignant at an open and impudent attempt upon its liberties. Belgium, on the other hand, feels its wrongs with as great unanimity, and has long and as loudly as it dared, uttered its complaints and vindicated its rights. In France an abominable ministry attempted to destroy the Charter: in Belgium an antipopular one has long refused to fulfil the promises of the constitution. The Belgians have suffered numerous national outrages with a population far greater than that of Holland, it has been attached to that kingdom, almost in the character of a conquered country: it has been deprived of the use of its language, it has been saddled with debt not its own, its places of authority have been filled by foreigners, the promises of constitutional privileges have been refused, its productions have been heavily and unequally taxed, while the commerce of Holland has been comparatively protected from impost. When patriotic writers have given voice to these grievances, they have been prosecuted under arbitrary laws, and fined, imprisoned, and banished, and the press itself placed under restrictions which deprive it of wholesome power, and, in fact, smother all free expression of opinion. These are evils acutely felt and universally understood : the unanimity of all ranks on the subject of their grievances is even more general than was that of France; nobles, citizens, Catholics, Protestants, are at this moment all of one accord: all demand a change, and none wish for more than a constitutional change. An expression of opinion has at length burst forth on the part of the lower classes, and, like all ignorant persons who feel themselves aggrieved, they have shewn it in acts of violence. This may be blamed, but it would be difficult to

say what other means they should have taken. These acts of violence have been quickly repressed, but it required the population of citizens to take arms in order to effect that object, as well as the dismissal of the soldiery, whose presence irritated the masses whom they had resisted. Wherever the armed citizens have assembled with the design of preserving order, and protecting lives and property from the fury of an enraged people, they have taken the fortunate opportunity which their formidable position presented, of displaying to the king, in the most forcible manner possible, the wrongs of the country; and requiring, as the sole method of preserving order, and the only condition on which they could ensure tranquillity, a full redress of grievances. Deputations have proceeded to the residence of the king with petitions and lists of grievances, and demands of melioration, which alone demonstrate how very far the Belgians have been from enjoying practical freedom. The ministers of the Crown are not responsible, and the judges of the court are removable at pleasure; the press is at the mercy of courts thus constituted, and the judges are universally considered as the mere tools of the ministry. Thus the three great securities of constitutional liberty are wanting in Belgium-the responsibility of ministers, the independence of judges, and the freedom of the press. When men are galled by numerous burthens, grievances, and petty oppressions, when they are pinched by want, harassed by imposts, the old vice of a Dutch government, and insulted in their national character, it is not unnatural that they should at least break out into a peremptory and unceremonious demand of their constitutional privileges. The loi fondamentale, or constitution, was never accepted by the Belgians: they refused it and it was imposed upon them it is doubly hard, therefore, that its promises such as the three securities we have here mentioned, which, or at least two of them, are there directly stipulated for, have not been kept. We have said that the Belgians in point of fact refused the loi fondamentale which they are now at least content to live under with some ameliorations. The States-General of Holland accepted it unanimously: the Assembly of Notables in Belgium rejected it. The circumstances were these:

In the nine departments of Belgium 1603 notables were convoked: 280 never attended to the summons. Of the 1323 that appeared 796 voted in the negative and 527 in the affirmative. Of the 796 negative votes, 126 were given on grounds of a religious nature, the Catholics refusing to accept a Protestant king, and these votes were put aside as contrary to the dynasty and going beyond the question. This reduced the negative votes

to 670, and gave a majority of 143 voices for the rejection of the constitution. In this difficult position, the government resolved to consider the absent 280 notables as consenting by their silence. By this extraordinary measure a pretended majority of 11 voices was vamped up, and on the 24th August 1815 the adoption of the constitution or loi fondamentale was proclaimed.

We are certain that it only requires a knowledge of the real political condition of the Pays Bas to vindicate completely the steps the people have lately taken in their own behalf. Not that we advocate the burning of houses and the destruction of the property of obnoxious persons, but we would lay the blame on the true malefactor. If an ignorant people are op pressed and injured, and their interests and wishes neglected or despised, what is to be expected, but that they will pursue the measures open to them, and be it said, the only measures open to them, of procuring redress. The mob at Brussels have committed various violences; the population armed itself, the troops were driven out of the city, the streets were unpaved, and the accesses into the town barricaded, while deputations passed to and fro between the monarch and his capital: and insurrection demanded what was refused to petition. Are then the people so wrong in an extreme case, in taking the law into their own hands? what else was to be done, while gross injuries remained unredressed. The truth is, however, that a mere mob is never dangerous until the sense of the people happens to be with them when all classes are pleased lookers-on upon the vengeance wreaked upon hated wrong-doers, what police, what hired soldiery, themselves of the people, what authorities, can then resist the fury of a multitude? Little is known in this country of the condition of the Pays Bas, and little notice has been taken of their political disputes, hence the indifference with which their proceedings have been viewed. Even in France, where the recent triumph of the popular cause might have disposed the French to look down with pleasure and sympathy on men pursuing a similar course, the movements in Belgium have not been viewed altogether without regret. It has been apprehended that the foreign powers might fear the spread of the contagion, seeing that the fever of liberty was infectious, and thus be induced to attempt the repression of the original source and supply of the evil. This is, however, a view of the subject unworthy of so great and powerful a nation of freemen, and will not be long, and is perhaps not at all, generally entertained. In England, where a love of liberty is mixed up with a respect for so many aristocratic privileges, and so many ancient abuses, and where the fear of change is a species of national ague, it is

probable the commotions of Belgium will be by some loudly abused, and by others faintly lauded, more especially as they who speak at all will probably speak in ignorance.

The passing events were shortly preceded and prepared by the trial and banishment of the two political writers, Messrs. de Potter and Tielemans. A very full account of this trial, and the whole of the correspondence seized among the papers of the accused, have been published, it is believed, under the authority of the government, though it has not the impudence to come forward and confess itself the authorizer of so disgraceful an act. We think that an account of this most extraordinary of all trials for high treason, will afford us the best and readiest mode of throwing some light upon the political state of Belgium, for the benefit of those lovers of freedom, in whom late circumstances have excited a curiosity respecting the actual condition of a country, closely allied to our own by historical events, by proximity, by similarity of language, and something of character; by mutual interests, and more than all, by a love of liberal institutions.

M. de Potter was in prison when he was charged with the design of conspiring against the state. He had been condemned to eighteen months' confinement, under an arbitrary law of the critical times of 1815, which, though capable of being converted against the press, had grown obsolete. It was repealed very soon after de Potter's condemnation, and both he and the country very naturally thought, that the man who had been condemned by a law confessed by the legislature to be unjust, should not continue to be punished under it after its abolition. He claimed his enlargement, but claimed it as a right: the king appears not to have been unfavourably disposed towards the prisoner, but he would only listen to the application as one of grace, and in one instance expressed himself kindly enough, only desiring that M. de Potter would not treat with him exactly as from sovereign to sovereign. De Potter, independent in his fortunes, surrounded by ardent admirers, and followed to prison by the respect and attachment of the whole country, remained in confinement, industrious and contented. To a man of his stamp, one whose sympathies are always with the oppressed, and whose mind is continually occupied with the interests of his country, or the pursuits of literature, confinement is no punishment. A student with his books, his papers, and his correspondence, and the visits of his friends, regards little the fact of the movements of his body being circumscribed within certain limits, provided the cause of his detention be both honorable and useful. In one of his letters from prison, M. de Potter

avers, in a moment of natural excitement, that he had never spent more happy month sthan in the gaol of Brussels, and that he was in love with punishment, and would gladly consent to be chosen the expiatory victim of the whole human race. While

in confinement, a constant correspondence was maintained on political as well as private subjects between M. de Potter and his friend, M. Tielemans, who chiefly resided at the Hague, where he held a ministerial employment: they were both deeply interested in all the political questions of the day, and both contributed freely to the opposition newspapers.

Soon after, the violent proceedings of the government, in displacing several deputies who had voted against the ministry, some ideas were communicated, in a letter from Tielemans to de Potter, respecting the formation of a society, with the object of recompensing those individuals who had suffered loss by voting in the interest of the people, and also, with further views of protecting the popular deputies in giving conscientious votes, and of furthering the election of such individuals only as were approved by the society. This idea pleased de Potter, and upon it he immediately (January 30th, 1830) wrote an article for the newspapers, recommending the project as a project, and requesting, at the same time, the opinions of the public upon it. On the 8th of February he wrote another letter on the subject, signed with his name. This is a conspiracy in the Pays Bas. This is the offence described in the following round-about phrase, and for which de Potter, Tielemans, and the printer of the newspaper were banished the country. The crime in the formal act of accusation, is thus described, "accused of having, by printed writings, excited directly the citizens to join in a plot or an attempt to change or destroy the government of the country, and to have committed this act as authors, co-authors, or accomplices." The act of accusation, signed by the advocategeneral, is the meanest attempt to construct treason out of innocent acts or free discussion, either on their part or that of others, we believe, to be recorded in the annals of justice or injustice. The proceedings it more nearly resembles, are the infamous trials under the reign of the Jeffreys' and Scroggs' of our Stuart Epoch. We will quote an example of accusation which, in fact, contains the gravamen of the charge: our readers will probably think with us, that the government which can put the life and liberty of a subject in jeopardy on charges so supported and explained, ought to be held up to the contempt and abhorrence of the universal world.

Extract from the Acte d'Accusation (or Indictmen.), signed de Stoop