From the Examiner, 12 May.
THE RUSSIAN INVASION.

THE Hungarian war has unexpectedly assumed a new aspect, of the deepest importance and interest. In the same moment that the Austrian army, after having been defeated in eight battles during the course of the month of April, had removed his head quarters to Laxenburg within the Austrian frontier, and at the instant when news arrived that Bem had taken the fortress of Temesvar and occupied all the Banat as far as the Iron Gate-50,000 Russian troops (according to the official journal of Vienna) entered Cracow, in order, with the consent of Prussia, to invade Hungary through Moravia by way of Prussian Silesia. This invasion, should it actually take place, will have momentous results. It is either the oppression of every liberal idea, of all progress, and even of the shadow of freedom, in the east of Europe; it is either the destruction of Hungary's constitution of eight centuries, and the political suicide of Austria; or it is the commencement of a European war which will last many years, and into the whirlpool of which even those governments will be drawn that hitherto, out of love to peace, have preferred to keep aloof.

moral and material, is broken as soon as Russian bayonets are required to support the policy of her cabinet. Is this the interest of France or of England? Is it the interest of civilization? Is it by such means the integrity of Turkey is likely to be secured? On the other hand, a case quite possible suggests itself—that the Russians, in spite of their superior force, may yet be defeated. That first defeat would excite a rising in Poland as well as in Bohemia, and in Prussia as well as in Bavaria. The dregs of the movement, which, after the revolutions of last year, were beginning to settle themselves, would again be driven to the surface, unfettered passions would find fresh vent, and a new revolution, more terrible than that of last year, would once more rage through Europe and shake society to its foundations.

Incredible as any such victory of the Hungarians against the united power of two empires may appear at this moment, yet is it not impossible. With fewer resources Kossuth has already once defeated the superior power of Austria. When the capital was lost, the armies beaten, and Transylvania in the hands of the enemy, the spirit of the Hungarians was not broken. Out of the little circle between the Theiss, the Maros, and the mountains that bound Transylvania, into which the

The interference of Russia has decided the char-Hungarian constitutionalists had been driven by acter of the struggle. Lord Brougham himself will hardly have the face to assert that the czar enters Austria to support the liberties of Germany; that he has become unfaithful to the policy which peopled the snows of Siberia and the mines on the Chinese frontier with thousands of liberal-minded men; and that now, with an army of 150,000 soldiers, he takes the field in defence of ideas which for years he has pursued with fire and sword, and punished with imprisonment and confiscation. As difficult will Lord Aberdeen find it to make Europe believe that Russia sacrifices her armies and her treasures with the disinterested wish to strengthen Austria, and maintain the balance of power in Europe. Austria's position in Europe has been that of a barrier against the advance of Russia towards the south; and if she no longer fulfils this condition, her continuance is no longer called for. If chained to Russia by the indissoluble and unceasing necessity of support against her own subjects, her empire becomes but the advanced outpost of absolutism against the progress and the liberties of the west.

The victorious advance of the Russians in Hungary will not fail of its effects upon Germany, upon Italy, and upon the Slavonian population of Turkey. Europe will become Cossack, as Napoleon predicted, to the Rhine and the Bosphorus. Should the national rising of Hungary be stifled by the superior force of the Russians, should the liberal party in Germany be again forced back into absolutism, still, for a long series of years, the vast extent of country from the Black Sea to the Rhine will only be governable by the iron hand of force. The sole hope of tranquillity will rest on military occupation. The influence of Austria,

the superior force of their adversaries, the valiant
armies and the able generals of the Debreczin Par-
liament carried within two months the victorious
colors of Hungary in every direction to the frontiers
of the realm. Now, 150,000 men, well appointed
and provided with artillery, inured to war, flushed
with success, and animated with the most resolute
patriotism, stand opposed to Russian armies which as
yet have only earned their laurels on parade. The
celebrated generals of Russia who were schooled
in the Turkish and Polish war are now grown old,
and have not in vain tasted the joys of tranquillity
and comfort, the fruits of the favors which the czar
has heaped upon them. Who can assert that their
twenty years of peace may not have been their
capua? To the Hungarians, let us add, they are
no longer an unaccustomed enemy.
Bem's troops
have been arrayed against them at Hermannstadt,
and at the Rothenthurm Pass.
A Russian corps
of picked men, which three years ago had dis-
tinguished itself in the Caucasian war, has been
obliged to give way before Hungarian valor, and
fly disgracefully. How, if such a scene should be
repeated in the Passes of Jablunka and Dukla ?

If we may trust the French and German journals, this Russian invasion has already produced its first bitter fruit. A few days ago the Hun garian Diet was still monarchical and dynastic, contented if the concessions of last year were but guaranteed to it; whereas now, irritated by the demand for Russian assistance, it is said to have renounced its allegiance to the House of Hapsburg. Whether this is prudent, whether it is politic, is a question we will not enter into. If Europe calmly looks on while Austria makes use of Russian aid to rob a nation of its liberties,

572

PROGRESS OF HUNGARIAN AFFAIRS. THE CONSPIRACY OF PRINCES.

which are more ancient, not merely than the Austrian imperial crown, but than the race of the ruling dynasty, we surely cannot be surprised if this nation collects itself with all the energies of despair; if, not blindly, but in pursuance of a determined plan, it cuts off from itself every possibility of retreat; knowing as it does that it is fighting for existence, and must, in order to secure it, disregard the risk of delivering over Europe to the flames of a general war.

PROGRESS OF HUNGARIAN AFFAIRS.

From the N. Y. Evening Post.

THE CONSPIRACY OF PRINCES.

THE following is an extract of a letter dated Berlin, May 3d, and is written by one who has the opportunity of observing the circumstances which betray the designs of the monarchs of Europe, as accurately almost as any other American abroad:

The moment has now arrived when the reality of the revolution in Germany is to be tested. Since it commenced a year has passed, and the princes have quietly collected their strength and matured their plans, while the National Assembly at FrankTo resume our account of military operations fort, representing the revolution and the great Gerin Hungary. Our last number brought the nar-man idea of unity, has been, I hear, talking till the rative down to the 24th April, when the Hunga-iron is cold. Prussia has positively refused the imrians entered Pesth, since which time they have which would mediatize all the states; erect, in the perial crown, and with it the new constitution, been uniformly successful. They crossed the centre of Europe, the whole German people into Danube at Ais on the 26th of April, and the Waag the freest and most powerful nation ever seen this at Szered on the 2nd of May; they have taken side of the Atlantic; and, if it really worked well, Raab and Tyrnan, and compelled the Austrian prove the greatest event in the history of the world troops to retreat to Presburg, where they have since the fall of the Roman empire. But the princes entrenched themselves, and intend to await the are not disposed to be extinguished without a strugRussians. In Lower Hungary, also, the Hunga- fort philosophers and patriots can be carried into gle, and, before the splendid theory of the Frankrian arms are victorious. Temesvar, and, with practice, the real revolution must take place. I will this fortress, the whole of the Banat, (the granary not pretend to predict the result, but they are fightof Hungary,) have submitted to Bem. Jellachiching at Dresden, and Frankfort has recently assumed at the same time has been beaten by Vetter and a revolutionary tone, which must speedily bring the Perczel on the Lower Danube. Dissatisfaction increases in Croatia, especially as the war will now most likely be directed against Agram; for the Hungarians endeavor to gain Fiume and the coast of the Adriatic, in order to enter into uninterrupted communication with Europe. Important news will probably reach us before long from this quarter.

German question to an issue. Hungary has proclaimed the republic, at a moment when her example is likely to be contagious, and you may look for news from these parts before long.

In truth, all the signs of the times in Europe seem to indicate that the moment is at hand when the heads of the royal families are to engage in a The march of the Russians has undergone some desperate struggle for the preservation of their andelay. It was on the third of May only that their cient prerogatives. What the event will be, devanguard, consisting of 8,000 men, entered Cra-pends upon circumstances which it is hardly poscow; and although the Vienna papers officially sible at this moment to estimate and define. If affirm the entry of the Russians into Transylvania, the controversy were left to be settled between the they have not yet appeared there. Whether the cause of this delay is to be ascribed to a note by Lord Palmerston, or to some disturbances said to have taken place in the interior of the Russian empire, is somewhat doubtful.

Perhaps the Russians desire that the Hungarians should be allowed time enough to destroy the Austrian army utterly, that they may then appear as the only saviors of the empire, and thus render it more completely dependent upon St. Petersburg. The Hungarians, in the mean time, are not inactive. They are energetically preparing to oppose the attack of the Russians, who, there can be no doubt, will encounter a most desperate resistance, should they venture to penetrate into Hungary.

It is reported that General Bem, in consideration of his distinguished services, has received from the grateful Hungarian nation the grant of the domain of Alesuth. This princely estate, which formerly belonged to the late Palatine or Viceroy of Hungary, is situated in the fertile county of Stuhlweissenburg, and has always been considered one of the best managed and most productive estates in the kingdon. It is worth about 200,0002.

governments to the east and south of Russia and their people, we should not regard the result as doubtful; the popular movement must be triumphant. But when Russia interposes with her immense and well trained armies, accustomed to blind obedience, the struggle on the part of the people becomes embarrassed with difficulties which, at first sight, seem to render it almost hopeless. Much will depend, however, on the fidelity of the troops on whom the princes rely to crush the people. Among this very soldiery all over middle and southern Europe, from the Seine to the Danube, ideas of personal freedom and a liberal government, often, indeed, crude and mingled with much error, but still in utter hostility to the old forms of arbitrary rule, have been disseminated, and taken deep root. It is natural to suppose also that the pride of the German race will be deeply offended by the presence of a Russian army interfering in the politics of the German empire. If, from these causes, the defection of the German soldiery should be considerable, the scale may be turned against the royal conspirators.

Among these, though nominally the chief magis

From the Examiner, 12th May.
TO LORD DUDLEY STUART.

My lord, I am quite unknown to you; not so
your lordship to me, or to any man in any quarter
of the globe who is interested in the cause of free-
dom and humanity. A letter from General Bem
to you is the cause and the excuse of mine. With-
out preamble, may I suggest the propriety and the
practicability of raising a subsidy, however small,
in aid of the Hungarians? I myself am willing
and ready to subscribe for thirty pounds at the
commencement; the money shall be paid, wherever
I am directed, on the 1st of July. Before that
time I anxiously hope that many thousand may be
contributed; at all events, that something worth
sending may be in readiness to be sent. People
there are, in great numbers, who excuse to them-
selves and one another their parsimony on such
occasions, and who ask us reproachfully whether
there are no objects for our charity nearer home.
Do they act upon their own suggestion? Do they
give a quarter or even a tenth of their income to
the necessities of their neighbors ? If they do,
which they do not, even then they fall greatly short
of what equity, humanity, and Christianity, imper-
atively demand. But for myself I will speak out
plainly. I am of opinion that a single man like
Washington, like Koziusko, like Kossuth, like
Bem, is of infinitely more importance to the world
than twenty or thirty or any other quantity of
millions, I will not say such as the Irish, for that
would seem invidious, but such as the Portuguese,
the Spaniards, or the French. What great prin-
ciple are these nations working out? What ben-
efit is to be expected from them, proximate or re-
mote, to any portion of mankind? It is in Hun-
gary, and in Hungary alone, that the spirit of
freedom has burnt purely, brightly, and ardently,
six hundred years. The Hungarians now demand
'the fulfilment of those conditions on which they
offered the sceptre to the Dukes of Austria.* The
late emperor swore to observe and to maintain
them. He would not have broken his promise;
but his ministers came in and broke it for him.
They who know the character of the present em-
peror, and who have seen much of him in private,
represent him to me as a young man possessed of
many virtues, conciliating, honorable, and humane.
Certainly it was not by his invitation, or with his
desire, that the Russians are now advancing to
suppress the free institutions of central Europe.
No less certainly was it with the desire and by
the invitation of the King of Prussia. When he
was prince royal he was the avowed adversary of
the constitutions which the king had promised his
subjects. In the hour of danger and detection he
changed his tone, but never his sentiments. When
he published his declaration that, if the Russians
advanced to the frontier he would march against
them at the head of his army, I most earnestly en-
treated the popular power at Frankfort to oppose
it, well knowing the man's perfidy.

In

crueller and longer war than history has recorded;
a war of civilization against barbarism, of freedom
against despotism, of nations against cabinets.
Unhappily, no two peoples have confidence in each
other. France has been playing in Sicily the
game she played at the marriage feast in Spain,
with similar success. We may and must be at
peace with her; but no alliance, no treaty.
twenty months, or earlier, she will again see the
Russians on her frontier, and perhaps far within it.
Russia is the only rich government in the world.
At last she has formed a commissariat; nothing
else was wanting to the efficiency of her armies.
If in the time of Napoleon she found it not diffi-
cult to bring into the field two hundred thousand
men, marching through countries exhausted of
provisions by other armies more numerous, she
will now find it easy enough to supply three armies,
each as great, with infinite reserves. The oligar-
chies of Austria and Prussia will open their for-
tresses and magazines to her, and the Baltic and
the Danube are her high-roads. So vast a calamity
as the invasion of Germany and Hungary by the
Russians is not to be averted. The natural death
of Tzars and Tzarinas may befall the Emperor
Alexander too late nothing is to be hoped but
from the virtue and valor of such patriots as Kos-
suth and Bem. Low as is the ebb of public spirit
in England-lower than in the time of Charles
the Second-generosity and munificence have not
been stranded in the mud with it. The contact
of a Napier has galvanized the half-dead; let us
turn them round on their sides, and perhaps they
may hear the cries of victory from Vienna.
I have the honor, &c.,

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.

Correspondence of the Journal of Commerce.
OLD PANAMA.

Panama, April 22, 1949.

The city

I HAVE just returned from a residence of four days in the ruins of the old city of Panama. Messrs. Fry, Bell, Vandervoort, and myself, took a tent, and cooking utensils, and camped on the site of the city, near a small river. covered a large plain, about twelve feet above high water mark, and was built mostly of stone and brick. But you had best search for some historical description of the city, as it was in its palmy days, and I will tell you what it now is. A forest now covers the whole plain, a heavy growth of timber, something like a maple forest in Maine, and a thick underbrush, so that walls now standing, say thirty to seventy feet high, cannot be seen more than a hundred feet, in many instances fifty feet. Immense blocks of buildings, half fallen down, and sections of walls, peering up among the trunks of trees, form a striking picture to the eye of the traveller. One immense cathedral is standing, except one end which has tumbled in. Within its walls stands a cottonwood tree, measuring eighteen feet in circumferMy lord, we are at the commencement of a ence, of great height; and on one of the arches,

This was written before the dethronement.

about thirty feet high, grows a tree, some thirty

ly arrived on a visit, just in time to help us discuss the merits of the plunder, bringing with him Mr. Eigenbrot; and such a dinner is not often laid before a keen appetite, as we then and there enjoyed. The next morning Mr. Vandervoort fired at a tiger, and missed him, within a hundred rods of our tent; but Mr. Bell made up for it by shooting a nine-foot snake, much like a whipsnake, but without fangs; at least, we could not discover any, though our guide went half way into convulsions with fear that we should be bitten and killed by examining his jaws. In follow

mens of agate, blood-stone, and chalcedony, which I send you by the bearer.

Friday morning, at daybreak, 20th, our native boy came in with the intelligence that a deer was near us. Bell and Vandervoort took their guns and went in pursuit; but instead of the deer, they saw a large tiger that had been following it. Bell snapped at him with a charge of buckshot, but his gun missed fire. Vandervoort fired a rifle-ball, and missed him, or slightly wounded him.

feet high. One wall, thirty feet high, is supported by a large tree which has grown exactly on the top of it, and sent down its roots on either side into the ground, forming a perfect Van Burenite; and this stone wall stands per force, with a heavy tree astride of it. Old cisterns and wells half caved in are scattered around. The only tower standing is one hundred feet by forty feet square at the base, and thirty at the top, the walls seven feet thick, of solid brick and stone masonry, evidently a watch-tower, as there are loop-holes, out of which to fire upon an enemy. There was once a stone winding staircase up the inside of the towing up old Panama river, I found some fine specier, but it has felt the hand of time, and tumbled down, except about twelve feet. Small trees are growing on top of the tower, and vines running around and up its sides, so as to make it look like a growing mass. This city, once so wealthy and populous, is now the abode of wild beasts, which have driven man from its vicinity. We saw tigers, alligators, deer, wild boar, monkeys, snakes, iguanos, squirrels, cormorants, owls, pigeons, doves, parrots, bats, and any quantity of brickbats. In our ramble among the ruins, a tiger sprang from a tree within fifty feet of me, and ran as though Barnum was after him. Other tracks we discov- | ered, where they pass through the deserted arches unmolested. Is it not strange that such a city, within seven miles of the present Panama, should so soon have been so completely destroyed and overgrown, as to make it impossible to discover where the streets were, or to what use the buildings were appropriated, and to be the fixed abode of wild beasts of prey! I was surprised to find how ignorant the natives are in regard to the history and localities of the old city. I had great difficulty in finding a man to go as a guide. We pitched our tent near the arch crossing the river, on the road to Gorgona and Cruces. The arch is nearly perfect. Mr. Bell is an ornithologist of some note in New York, and Mr. Fry a scientific gentleman, formerly of the firm of Fry & Shaw, mathematical instrument-makers in New York city. A pleasant party of us.

They shot game, and I assisted the servant to put it in "pot-pie" order, for the mutual sustenance of the party. Mr. Bell, on an excursion after birds, fell in with two wild hogs and their pigs. He blazed away, with a charge of No. 8 shot, and killed the pig aimed at, when the old boar made a grab at him, and he barely escaped a serious encounter, by turning, not only his thoughts upwards, but his corporation after them, in double quick time, up the nearest tree, gun in hand; but before he could charge his piece with buckshot, the animals took to their heels, gnashing their tusks in an interesting manner. That same pig made the best dinner I ever sat down to. I picked up a terrapin without an owner, and friend Fry killed several pigeons and squirrels; and on our return to the tent, our boy had a six foot alligator tied up to a stick of wood. This we considered a great day's work, and Mr. Brinsmade fortunate

Yesterday, Saturday morning, 21st, Mr. Bell killed a large boar, and brought him in, without accident. They are a curious animal, with ferocious tusks and teeth, no tail, rather a fox color, having a musk-bag, or teat, on the top of the rump, which it is unpleasant to disturb. This is used as a means of defence, the same as a certain other little animal we wot of would do. That nuisance removed, the flesh of the young boar is delicious; the elder ones, rather strong in flavor. We brought the large one in last night, and our landlord is to give us a Sunday dinner off from it to-day. It is about half grown, and we think will cook up well. We remained from Tuesday morning to Saturday evening, and a more pleasant, exciting week I never passed. Perhaps I shall try it again next week, if no steamer arrives, which we fear will be the case. I have become deeply interested in the past history of Panama, but cannot find a man or book here that can give me any information of the time the city was founded, or when and how destroyed. There are no such records here. I believe it was sacked, and destroyed by the Buccaneers, and the inhabitants put to the sword.