From The Philadelphia Ledger. MODERN SCHEMES OF POLITICAL ANNEXATION. out that of the government already established, it is public robbery and spoliation. Islands may offer to become annexed for the sake of the protection and the commerce of wealthy and powerful nations like the United States, yet the policy of accepting such an offer remains to be considered. But it is a very different matter when a few penniless adventurers go into a foreign State, not for the real purpose of an honest settlement, but of raising a dust, seizing the government, and annexing it to some other country, that one in fact with which they can make the best bargain for themselves. We do not of course mean here to assert THE eternal law of right and the most that annexation is always unjust. Where for subtle and sagacious policy are always at last instance a debt is due from one nation to found to unite in one line of the greatest pos- another, that cannot or will not be paid in sible simplicity. This is true in private life, any other way, it may be right to seize their and it is not less true in regard to all ques- public domain? But what debts in India tions of public policy. The great difference could have justified the seizure of all the between taking one and the other principle as public domains and revenues that have been a rule of life, is simply this, that no man sequestered by the English East India Comwho is governed by policy alone can possibly pany within the last hundred, or even the know that he is pursuing the most sagacious last ten year s? Half of Burmah and the course, since he can never be sure that he whole of Oude are not trifles, while the sees all the bearings of any line of conduct operations now in progress in the Persian he may adopt. But the cases are compara- gulf promise much more fruit of the same tively rare when the quick and immediate kind. A free country like the Sandwich instinct of what is right, will not at once suggest to those who are habitually governed by it, the true line of duty and therefore of policy. Indeed, there is this singular contrast between the two methods of discovering the wisest course of action, that whereas the sagacious course can only be known in any case by protracted reflection, the course of rectitude is best determined by consulting the instinctive feeling, the intuition of duty without too much reasoning and reflection. A man's first impulses on all questions of honor and of moral obligation are generally the best. There is hardly any thing which a man cannot reason himself into as right, proper, and honorable, if he once stop to argue, and there is hardly a deviation from the path of rectitude so slight, but what at the first wrong step the moral sense will give some intimation to the man who is willing to consult and to bė guided by it. Nothing then is more clear in theory than that the man, the politician, and the government, who always act upon settled principles rather than policy, giving supremacy to the right, will eventually act best for themselves, although they will continually seem to be sacrificing opportunity of promoting their own interests. Let this principle be applied to modern schemes of political annexation. We might be able to justify many plans for extending the area of the United States, by annexing the territory now lying barren, or in that worst of all desolation, civil discord, and lying contiguously. But the moral sense instinctively suggests that without the consent of the annexed, it is all usurpation, and with One of the chief mischiefs of all these schemes is, that honest overtures of annexation are thus covered with an unjust suspicion and infamy. There can be little doubt that had no wrong measures ever been used to bring about annexation of territories, very far more countries might have been honestly and very properly added to the national domain. Instead of all this, the dragon's teeth of enmity have been sown all around us by a few artful fillibusters, until the most honest and proper and natural extensions of our institutions come to be, not only watched with anxiety by foreign nations, but looked upon with suspicion by our own best citizens. There is one method of annexation, however, which is not only honest in the sight of all, but beneficial to all; we mean the commercial annexation of free trade. Adam Smith demonstrated, years ago, that this was and must be the most sagacious as well as the most simple and natural method of advancing the interests of the world. Since then, the wonderfully analytic mind of Dr. Wayland has enabled him to put the same great truths in a more compact, clear, and comprehensive wastes of our own territory yet to be subdued. form, and this American work on political It is urged that political annexation extends economy inculcates principles that will never be eradicated from the mind of a student who has once successfully mastered them. cost. By free commercial intercourse with any nation we obtain all the advantages without any of the difficulties and dangers to the Union which all political schemes of annexation must entail. We secure a free market for our productions, and we are enabled to procure such things of theirs as we desire at What more can any one wish or wishing obtain honestly? All beyond this is only so much temptation to our citizens to leave our own uncleared forests and uncultivated prairies for other soil. This must operate injuriously upon every property-holder in America, whose interest it is to induce every citizen to stay at home and fill up the boundless our political power. But in fact it weakens it immensely, for it annexes all the ignorance and corruption and secret hostility to our institutions indigenous to foreign soils, and clothes them with an equal share of the governing power. Those who voluntarily come to our shores because they love our institutions and seek our liberties we should encourage in every way and admit to all just rights. Their value in a country like this has been and is incalculable. But to enfranchise all the mixed breeds of foreign lands by wholesale, is the direct way to weaken and to destroy our institutions. Nor can it even extend our power over their territories, except by entrenching upon that great fundamental principle which underlies our constitution, local self-government. turned to the ghaut."-Life of Sir J. Malcolm. "FROM Compoully," wrote John Malcolm to guards halted and began to smoke their hubbleLady Clive," I marched to Panwell, a distance bubbles, or pipes. The prisoner's hands were of twenty-four miles. When I had proceeded untied, and he took a pipe along with them, two or three miles I came up with a small guard | with much apparent unconcern. Indeed, his of armed men belonging to the Poonah Govern-whole conduct marked indifference to his fate. ment, who were carrying a young man, with After he had smoked, his hands were tied behis hands bound, along the road. I asked them hind his back as before; he was taken a few who the prisoner was, and where they were yards from the road, and desired to kneel. The going. The commander of the guard said that executioner, who stood beside him, grasping a they were going about a mile farther, to a spot straight two-edged sword with both hands, where a robbery and murder had recently been called out to him, Bend your head.' The man committed. 'And when there,' he added, 'I did as desired, and by a most dexterous blow it shall cut this man's head off.'-'Is he the mur- was severed from his body. The trunk sprung derer?' I asked. 'No,' said the man, nor upright, and fell backwards. A rope was then does he, I believe, know any thing about it. tied round the heels of the dead body, and it was But he belongs to the country of the Siddee' hung up, on a low tree, for the terror of others. (pointing to a province in the vicinity which is After this was done, the guard sate down, still held by the descendants of the former ad-smoked another hubble-bubble, and then remirals of the Mogul Emperor), from which the murderers, we well know, came; and we have orders, whenever an occurrence of this na- FRANCO-AMERICANS.-A French paper has ture happens, to proceed into that country and just been issued at Kankakee, Illinois, which to seize and put to death the first male, who has starts with a list of twelve hundred subscribers. arrived at the years of maturity, that we meet. From this, it seems that the French element of This youth,' he concluded, was taken yester- the population of Illinois maintains its distincday, and must suffer to-day. On my express-tive character and language with the same teing my astonishment and horror at a proceeding nacity as the French of Louisiana and the Gerin which the innocent was doomed to suffer for mans of Pennsylvania. It is a remarkable the guilty, he said that that was not his busi- feature of our national progress, that the prodiness; he only obeyed orders. But,' he con-gious power of assimilation which is so strongly tinued, I believe it is a very good plan. First, because it was adopted by Nanah Furnavese, who was a wise man; and secondly, because I am old enough to recollect when no year ever passed without twenty or thirty murders and robberies on this road; and all by gangs from the Siddee's country. Now they are quite rare; not above four or five within these twelve or fifteen years, which is the period this custom has been established.' As we were conversing we reached the spot fixed for the execution. The possessed by this republic, measurably fails with the colonies originally settled by the French. To this day, the French part of New Orleans remains as distinct from the American part as it can possibly be. The society there is exclusive; the customs peculiar. They have their own theatre, cafés, shops, etc., and several of the newspapers are published half in French. The French settlers of Illinois and Missouri seem in the same way to maintain their original language and customs.-North American. From The Athenæum. History of the Reign of Charles the Fifth. ROBERTSON was unquestionably least in the trinity of historians Gibbon, Hume, and Robertson-who flourished together. He possessed less learning, less color, less dramatic force than the author of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"-less strength and less philosophy than the author of our only "History of England." Yet his merits were considerable. He had industry, zeal, patience, and integrity,-much moderation of spirit ("I look upon you as a very moderate Whig," said the wicked Walpole), -and a cold, clear, readable style. Towards the end of a century from the first appearance of his historical writings in print, it is something to say they are not yet wholly super seded. Yuste," and by M. Gachard in his "Retraite et Mort de Charles Quint." Mr. Prescott has had the advantage of using all these writers for the four books of history which he has added to Robertson's work. But his supplement is not a mere condensation of ampler details supplied by others: on the contrary, it is original in form, purpose, and (to some extent) material. Mr. Prescott uses without abusing the rights of a later writer. For example, Mr. Stirling's "Cloister Life" is a piece of private romance, which grew out of a sentimental passion, born of a visit to Yuste,-and the charm of which lies in its being unlike any biography or any history, and the interest of which no regular narrative, however true and bright, can wholly take away. Mr. Prescott, on the other side, while gracefully yielding all the merits of the work, parts from it as not suf ficiently historical, and justifies the parting. In "Cloister Life" we have beside us the monk of Yuste, "Brother Charles," the reader and translator, the clock-maker, the gardener, the penitent, and the glutton. Mr. Prescott shows us that this was only part of the rôle of this extraordinary actor; and while he leaves the reader to enjoy the delicious scenes and humorous pictures drawn Of the three works on which Robertson built his fame-"The History of Scotland," "The History of Charles the Fifth," and "The History of America "—the second has the fewest faults and the greatest inherent vitality. Laing and Tytler have dispossessed Robertson of the glory of being considered by the English artist, he shows us this transthe historian of his own country; as other and more industrious writers may by-and-by dispossess Laing and Tytler. Southey and Prescott make us very willing to forget "The History of America," which Burke praised so magnificently and so undeservedly in his day. But the story of Charles the Fifth, as told by Robertson" composed," said David Hume, "with nobleness, with dignity, with elegance, and with judgment to which there are few equals "—is still read with pleasure, in spite of unsparing German and French criticism on its demerits; and it has now received from Mr. Prescott, the highest living authority on such a subject, a compliment more practical than that of Hume, and which secures to it another century of life. The story of Charles after his abdication, so tamely hinted by Robertson, has been often told in recent times,-most notably by Mr. Stirling in his "Cloister Life of Charles the Fifth," by M. Amédée Pichot in his "Chronique de Charles Quint," by M. Mignet in his "Charles Quint: son Abdication, son Séjour, et sa Mort au Monastère de lator of bad verses writing state dispatches of the utmost moment, this admirer of clock-work directing sieges and campaigns,— this gluttonous eater of game and fish controlling the finances of half Europe, feeding armies that would otherwise have starved, devouring news with the avidity of youth, receiving messengers from foreign princes, and issuing decrees in right regal style. In Mr. Stirling's volume Yuste is a by-path of history, in Mr. Prescott's it is the highway. In conformity with his idea that the retreat at Yuste was properly a part of the history of Europe in the sixteenth century, Mr. Prescott takes up his hero in Flanders and describes the ceremony of his abdication. From Flanders he sailed to Spain. Emperor's gouty limbs might be as little | How different must have been the reflections incommoded as possible by the motion of the which now crowded on his mind, as with vessel. On the same deck accommodations wasted health, and spirits sorely depressed, were provided for some of his principal attendants; while below, ample space was allotted to the royal kitchen, and to the larder, which was bountifully supplied with stores for the voyage." it may The larder, wherever Charles travelled, was the chief care of his household; for this prince, who ruled with iron sway over one half of Europe, was perhaps the greatest glutton in his dominions. Indeed, mean as sound in romantic ears, the Caesars have commonly been fearful eaters. Not to fall back on Suetonius and the Twelve, Louis the Fourteenth and Frederick the Great are as conspicuous examples of blended gluttony and greatness as Charles the Fifth. Napoleon was also a great eater. Mr. Prescott tells an illustrative anecdote of this imperial weakness in Charles. he embarked on the same voyage! He had run the raco of glory, had won the prize, and found that all was vanity. He was now returning to the goal whence he had started, anxious only to reach some quiet spot where he might lay down his weary limbs and be at rest." As a rule Mr. Prescott sets his face against these "points," as an actor would call them. He robs us, by authority of his knowledge, of many a picturesque legend, such as the monks loved to invent and the painters to work in colors. He will insist on proofs. He will believe nothing on trust, however pleasant. Of course we find no fault with a writer for his severe rejection of evidence. But occasionally he may go too far. Thus, when Charles landed,— 66 Scarcely had he set foot on shore when "A Venetian envoy at his court, in the the wind freshened into a tempest, which latter part of Charles' reign, tells us that, scattered his little navy, compelling the ship before rising in the morning, potted capon bearing the queens to take refuge in the was usually served to him, prepared with neighboring port of Santander, and doing sugar, milk, and spices, after which he would much damage to some merchant-vessels off the coast, one of which, with its crew on turn to sleep again. At noon he dined on a variety of dishes. Soon after vespers he board, went to the bottom. This disaster is took another meal, and later in the evening so far embellished by the chroniclers of the supped heartily on anchovies, or some other time, that, giving a touch of the marvellous gross and savory food, of which he was to the account, they represent the lost ship particularly fond. The invention of his to have been the Emperor's, and that it went cooks was sorely puzzled how to devise rich down as soon as he had left it. If this and high-seasoned dishes to suit his palate; that no' allusion to the circumstance should were so, it would be still more marvellous and his maître d'hôtel, much perplexed, told his discontented master one day, knowing have several from members of Charles' be found in any of the letters-of which we his passion for time-pieces, that he really did not know what he could do, unless it household while at Laredo. As little do we were to serve up his majesty a fricassee of find mention made of another extraordinary watches.' The reply had the effect of pro- tell us that the Emperor, on landing, proscircumstance reported by the historians, who voking a hearty laugh from the Emperor,trated himself on the earth, exclaiming, O a circumstance of rare occurrence in the latter days of his reign." When the larder had been filled and the household got on board, the winds blew contrary for some days. At last the fleet got under way, and an opportunity occurs for a pictorial passage.— thou common mother of mankind, naked came I from thy bosom, and naked I return to it.' The incident, however edifying in the moral it may convey, has no better who, far removed from the scene of action, foundation than the invention of writers and ignorant of what really took place there, were willing, by the exhibition of startling contrasts, to stimulate the imagination of their readers." The "It was on the 7th of September, 1517, thirty-nine years before this, that Charles had quitted these same shores on a visit to Probably Mr. Prescott is right. Spain, whither he was going to receive the going down of the ship the moment Charles rich inheritance which had descended to him was safe is a dramatic incident naturally dear from his grand-parents, Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic. He was then in the to the monkish imagination, and very like the morning of life, just entering on a career as daily experience of life in romances and in splendid as ever opened to young ambition. theatres. The prostration of the monarch is more natural and characteristic, and although it is unmentioned in the letters from the spot, may nevertheless have been true. How many facts escape notice in letters! The most voluminous writers of letters must omit nine-tenths of their story. Walpole has not exhausted the scandal of his time. Every visitor at a foreign capital will tell you stories never chronicled by "our own Correspondent." And if Charles did not throw himself on the ground and exclaim "O thou," &c., we can only say that he ought to have done so. Another favorite anecdote is brushed away with as little remorse. savage character of the scenery that surrounded it. Charles, who had an eye for the beautiful in nature as well as in art, loved to gaze upon this landscape; and in the in the western gallery, when warm with the afternoon he would frequently take his seat rays of the declining sun, as it was sinking in glory behind the mountains." fall of interest and picture. The chief of We have also a glance at the household, the Imperial household was Quixada-a fine specimen of the major-domo of the sixteenth century-proud, honest, clear-sighted, faithful, and fertile in resources. "Charles intrusted to his care his ille gitimate son, Don John of Austria, the Doña "Charles had a passion for timepieces, though one might have thought that he would have cared little for the precise measurement of the hours as they glided away in the monotonous routine of the monastery. The difficulty which he found major-domo was married to Doña Magdalena in adjusting his clocks and watches is said to de Ulloa, a lady of illustrious lineage, which have drawn from the monarch a philoso- she graced by virtues so rare as to be comphical reflection on the absurdity of his memorated in a special biography, that has having attempted to bring men to any thing expanded into a respectable quarto under the hands of one of her countrymen. like uniformity of belief in matters of faith, when he could not make any two of his time Magdalena took the boy to her home and her pieces agree with each other. But that he heart, supposing him the fruit of some early never reached the degree of philosophy reamour of her lord's, previous to his marriage. quired for such a reflection, is abundantly Quixada did not think proper to undeceive shown by more than one sentiment that fell the kind-hearted lady, and faithfully kept from his pen, as well as his lips, during his the perilous secret, which he may have thought was the Emperor's secret rather than his own. Under her maternal care the young hero, who always regarded his fostermother with grateful affection, was carefully trained in those accomplishments which fitted him for the brilliant career on which residence at Yuste." Against this easy way of obliterating the "moral" of Charles's cloister life many persons will protest. The watch story is a very pretty story, and if it be no more than an invention, it displays at least an excellent genius in the man who made it. If Charles did not draw such a reflection from his failure to make his clocks keep time, we repeat-he ought to have done so. When Charles arrives at Yuste we have a picture of the place, brightly and softly tinted: the landscape warm and southern. he was afterwards to enter." Among the visitors who came to Yuste the most conspicuous perhaps for character was the celebrated warrior, writer, and monk, Francisco de Borja, formerly Duke of Gandia, afterwards General of the Order of Jesus,a man whose story closely resembled in its main lines the story of Charles himself. Mr. Prescott says: "The rooms lay open to the sun, and looked pleasantly down upon the garden. "Born in the highest rank of the Spanish Here the vines, clambering up the walls, aristocracy, he had early shown himself to hung their colored tassels around the case-be possessed of those refined and elegant ments, and the white blossoms of the orange-accomplishments which in a rough age are trees, as they were shaken by the breeze, less frequently to be found than the talents filled the apartment with delicious odors. of the soldier or the statesman. But these From the windows the eye of the monarch talents also he possessed in an eminent ranged over a magnificent prospect. Far degree. Charles, quick to discern merit in above rose the bold peaks of the sierra, the meanest of his subjects, was not likely to dark with its forests of chestnut and oak, while below, for many a league, was spread out the luxuriant savanna, like a sea of verdure, its gay colors contrasting with the be blind to it in one whose birth placed him in so conspicuous a position; and he testified his confidence in Borja by raising him to offices of the highest trust and consideration. |