The Revolution of 1848 then arrived. It has been considered an uprising of the people; but the first uprisings of the people of Vienna were no more formidable than any London riot. The true insurrection was that of the courtiers and employés against Metternich, whom all wanted to get rid of; and all, instead of aiding to put down the popular insurrection, fanned and encouraged it. This émeute of the courtiers against Metternich was headed by the Arch-duke John, who turned the Prince out of office, much against his will, by making the people cry for his dismissal under the court windows, the Arch-duke appearing on the balcony to grant their request. The courtiers' object thus gained by means of the popular insurrection, the object became to put down the insurrection after it had served their own purpose. But it was too late. They had raised the evil spirit, and could not lay it. The revolution treated them as they had treated Metternich. The most melancholy circumstance of these revolutionary days was certainly the imbecile state of the mind of the Emperor. The courtiers around him made the most nefarious use of the imperial imbecility. It enabled them to make his majesty promise everything to his subjects, and they, holding the reins, of course went in a sense directly contrary to that promise. This led to a series of most abominable treasons, some of which gave rise to the civil war in Hungary, often to massacre at home. It is to Prince Felix Schwarzenberg's credit, that he at once saw through the vile and unsatisfactory nature of such a government as this; and that on his very first view of affairs he declared the indispensable preliminary to anything like a resuscitation of government and of imperial authority must be the resignation of the Emperor, and the elevation to the throne of a young and capable scion of the family, such as Europe and the army could respect. The Emperor Ferdinand set aside, the next in succession was his brother, the husband of the Arch-duchess Sophia, a princess of great ability and influence. None dared to propose that her husband should also be set aside, and their son, Francis Joseph, be proclaimed Emperor; but Schwarzenberg had the courage at once not only to propose, but to insist upon this, and he carried it, to the surprise of all, to the restoration of the Empire, and to the consolidation of his own power as Prime Minister. Previous to his appointment, Prince Felix had been studying politics in the camp of Radetsky. Austrian ambassador at Naples, when the troubles broke out, he withdrew by order of his Court from that country, when the revolutionary general there marched back to take part in the war north of the Po. And when General Pepe left Naples to take the command in Verona against the Austrians, Prince Schwarzenberg joined Radetsky's force in Verona. He thus made one of the combatants at the battle of Custoza. The Marquis d'Azeglio, the constitutional minister of Piedmont, served in the opposite ranks to Schwarzenberg on that day. And both statesmen received severe wounds, fighting each for the principles he professed, for the cause and the sovereign that he revered. The great desideratum at Vienna towards the close of 1848, became thenceforth a politician and a minister, not a military commander, yet having the confidence of the army and its generals. Felix Schwarzenberg, with all the éclat of his wound at Custoza and his intimacy with Radetsky, fulfilled these conditions. He became Minister for Foreign Affairs, and his first decisive acts have been already mentioned. His brother-in-law, Prince Windischgratz, was then marching into Hungary with hopes of succeeding, as Radetsky had done, Schwarzenberg having provided him with the same ample means of equipment, provisions, and artillery. The Bohemian Prince failed, however, before the stubbornness of the Hungarians, and he was driven back upon Vienna in discomfiture and rout. It was then that Schwarzenberg sought Russian aid, with the result that we all know. All the counsellors of the Emperor Nicholas were most averse to his engaging in it, and more than one declared that the severance of Hungary from Austria was the best thing that could happen for Russia. But Nicholas deemed the cause of hereditary monarchy more precious than even Russian aggrandizement, and he ordered the advance into Hungary. Meantime the insanity of Stadion, which had forced that statesman to retire to Pritznitz, left the domestic, as well as war administration of Austria in the power of Schwarzenberg, and he proceeded gradually to undo all the progress that had been made towards constitutional government. He declared the constitution abrogated, suppressed even those local privileges which the provinces had before enjoyed, set at defiance and at nought the rising pretensions of the territorial aristocracy, just as much as he destroyed the privileges of the lower classes. In fact, he Russianized Austria, and in reality established the same system and spirit of government from the Sea of Archangel to the banks of the Tiber. An Englishman, be he Tory or be he Whig, can have but one idea of such an alliance of absolutism, which he cannot but consider likely to defeat its own ends by the violent means employed, the innumerable extremities proceeded to, and the inveterate reactions and resistance it sooner or later produces. But driven into such an alliance, Schwarzenberg at least made the most of it, and that not only to crush Hungary, but also to humiliate the old rival of Austria, Prussia. For the three years previous the King of Prussia had been animated by the almost one idea, that of making himself and his crown independent of, and superior to, Austria in the councils and politics of Germany; Schwarzenberg made the most adroit use of the Russian alliance to defeat and destroy them, to humble Prussia and its king, not only in reality but in public appearance and estimation, to the second rank, and to deprive it not only of the political and military equality with Austria, which it pretended to, but even to dethrone it from that commercial superiority, which the industry of its people, the talent of its statesmen, and the advantages of its territorial and maritime position had enabled Prussia to assume. To those who are so truly German as to take a paramount interest in the rivalry between Prussia and Austria, and to prefer the ascendancy of Austria, the conduct of Prince Felix Schwarzenberg must appear the very perfection of good and able statesmanship. We can by no means venture to take this circumscribed and local view; but still we cannot but admit the skill and perseverance with which the Prince followed out his idea and attained his aim. The King of Prussia must have breathed more freely on hearing of the death of the greatest enemy of his house that even Austria ever produced. Felix Schwarzenberg was not, however, without his domestic enemies, the friends of the old Emperor; and those, who like M. De Bombelles, made use of him and were intimate with that monarch. On passing through some town where the people thronged to the coach door with acclamation, the wife of the dethroned Emperor put her head out of the window to ask the people, in what they were better off under the new Emperor than under the old. Even the Arch-duchess Sophia, the mother of Francis Joseph, might ask the same question. Schwarzenberg contrived to dominate the court, which was the more easy as Francis Joseph thought merely of the camp. The chief enemies of Schwarzenberg were the old noblesse. They looked to the restoration of their old supremacy in Hungary and elsewhere, and they deprecated the absolutism and centralization of Schwarzenberg. They were powerless for want of a mouthpiece, until Prince Metternich's return. But no sooner was that veteran politician re-established in the Rennweg than he opened his batteries against the young Prime Minister. When Metternich was in London and in Brussels, he invariably spoke of public affairs in the same tone, and not an illiberal one. He said he had always perceived the necessity for a change in a liberal direction, but had found it impossible to remove one stone of a building so old, without the old pillars threatening to fall out. When events and revelations had, however, undertaken to do what no statesman durst have ventured, it was necessary to take advantage of the co-operation of events instead of seeking to resist them and set them at defiance. There were no democratic interests in Austria, but there were strong landed and manufacturing interests, both conservative, and both should be called to the support of the throne, instead of having a sponge passed over their names, and a rolling stone run over their importance and their pride. Such was the language of Metternich, language that Schwarzenberg stigmatized as democratic. And he was preparing a triumph for himself over Metternich, by winning for the commercial interests of Austria that ascendancy in Germany, by means of a new and sound commercial union, akin to the political ascendancy which the empire had already acquired. How far Schwarzenberg would have succeeded in his schemes, or how far Metternich will succeed in his, fate has left us in uncertainty, by the paralytic stroke which has just carried off Prince Felix. He had come from the cabinet council, where he had met some contrariety, it is believed, from Kubeck. He had gone home to dress, in order to dine with his brother, Prince Adolf, when the stroke of death levelled him to the earth, at the early age, for a statesman, of fifty-two. Prince Felix died unmarried. His elder brother, who married Princess Eleanor of Lichtenstein, has a family. Field-Marshal Schwarzenberg also left a son, Prince Frederic, who has somewhat distinguished himself with the pen. POPULAR FRENCH AUTHORESSES OF THE THERE is nothing so unjust as prejudice, and it cannot but be worth while, in order to dissipate that failing as much as possible, to read what is really good in the works of our neighbours, by which simple process the English reader may become convinced that all foreign female writers are not George Sands, but that the purity and right feeling natural to the feminine mind may be traced in many a page, once enjoying deserved popularity in spite of the absence of highly coloured scenes or sentiments only calculated to excite impure aspirations, such as have of late years been given to the public and allowed to pass for a picture of French literature in general. All the female writers mentioned in these pages were the fashion of their day, and were courted, read, and admired, which is enough to prove that in France, as in England, perversion of manners and immorality of thought are only accidental, not necessary evils. Madame de Sevigné, Madame Dacier, Mademoiselle de Scudery, and some others, are too well known to require the slight notice which is here introduced of female writers, but there are many others whose merit makes the task of chaperoning them delightful, and who have been left so long in obscurity that they will no doubt appear as perfect strangers to the English reader, who need not regret making their acquaintance. MADAME DE LAMBERT. The Marquise de Lambert was the daughter-in-law of a writer named Bachaumont, known to French literature by agreeable travels, and what is called in France poetry, though scarcely understood as such on the other side of the Channel. He discovered the merit of his daughter-in-law, and notably encouraged her to avow her writings, a false sense of her own dignity having caused her to publish them anonymously in the first instance. She married, became a widow, and addressed to her children several works which possess great moral value. Her house was a rendezvous of all that was elegant and wellinformed, and, to be received there, gave the stamp of condition and refinement. The style of her writings may be judged of by a few extracts, which show the general tenor of her mind. "Twice in our lives truth appears to us in a useful form in youth to instruct us, in age to console us. During the reign of the passions truth abandons us altogether." "High birth possesses less honour than it bestows: those who boast of their birth praise the merit of another." "The true use of speech is to serve the cause of truth. When a man has attained the reputation of truthfulness his word is a law, and has all the authority of an oath. We have, for all that he asserts, a religious veneration.' 99 The talent of praising adroitly is rare for it is not a little difficult to praise agreeably, and at the same time justly: the misanthrope does "It is sometimes useful to make yourself feared, but never to be "Above all things, beware of envy: it is the lowest and most degrading of passions. Envy is the shadow of glory, as glory is the shade of virtue." The opinion of Madame de Lambert on the Italian language will be startling to some of our readers, as coming from a French woman. "Women readily learn Italian, which I consider a dangerous language, for it is the language of Love. Italian authors are too free and too little guarded in their expressions, and their imaginations are too little regulated by rectitude of mind and thought. "If the maxims of the age we live in are alone followed, what a barren prospect have we for our old age! The past furnishes us with regret, the present with vexations, and the future with fears. Poetry has its dangers: but the habit of reading romances is much more dangerous. Novels, never being the image of truth, kindle the imagination, weaken modesty, and disturb the heart; and, with sus ceptible young persons, hasten and precipitate their foibles and frailties. Neither the charm nor the illusion of Love should be augmented, the more it is disguised and softened the more dangerous it becomes. 66 In order to arrest the boldness of our minds and to diminish our self-confidence, we ought to reflect that the two principles of our know ledge, reason and sensibility, are insincere and deceive us. Our sensibility misleads our reason, and our reason in turn equally leads us astray. There is but one point in which we should give ourself up unswerving faith, and that is religion. 66 to We get accustomed to our own defects as to the perfumes we carry about with us; we are no longer aware of them, they are only felt by others. "There is not one of our weaknesses that, with good will, we may not convert to some utility." Madame de Lambert's fable of "Psyche" was looked upon as a chef-d'œuvre, and is very gracefully turned, but perhaps her most valuable work is her "Treatise on Friendship," of which Voltaire remarked that it proved that she deserved friends. There is a justice and rectitude in her manner of judging and feeling which cannot fail of their effect the following extracts are very striking from their truth: "Frivolous and dissipated persons may offer you gifts and services, but have no longer sentiments to bestow in early youth it is rare that the true pleasures of friendship can be felt. Many young people talk of and believe in their friendships; but they are united to their friends by pleasure alone, which is not the fitting tie to make their union durable. "The real duty of friendship is to warn a friend of error. If he |