Aided by Britain, the people continued to maintain the contest till 1813, when the triumph of Wellington at Vittoria finally freed the Peninsula from its invaders. In that year Ferdinand VII. was set at liberty by Napoleon, and immediately returned to his dominions, where he was received with enthusiastic demonstrations of joy. The expectations which had previously been formed of his character, however, were soon disappointed. A meeting of the cortes, convoked at Cadiz by the central junta at the close of 1810, had formed a liberal constitution for the country, abolished the inquisition, and decreed various ecclesiastical reforms. The restored monarch refused to take the oath to observe this new constitution, dissolved the cortes, which he declared to have been illegally assembled, and resumed the powers of absolute government. The inquisition was of course re-established, and the liberty of the press abolished; and the nation became once more subjected to the same vicious system of administration from which it had already suffered such manifold evils.

PORTUGAL.

The pacification of Amiens, 1802, allowed Portugal to resume her commercial intercourse with England; but on the breaking out of hostilities in the following year, Bonaparte required, through his ambassador, that the ports should again be closed. After various attempts to elude this ruinous demand, the prince-regent was compelled to purchase exemption from it by the payment of £40,000 sterling monthly to France during the continuance of the contest. The neutrality thus disgracefully obtained was permitted to exist until 1807; when Bonaparte, determined that all Europe should acquiesce in his continental system, not only insisted on the cessation of the trade with Britain, but on the confiscation of all English property in the country. To this demand Prince John could not be brought to consent; and Napoleon, declaring the dynasty of Braganza at an end, sent Junot with an army to invade the country. A British fleet in the Tagus was provided to convey the royal family to Brazil; and as no measures whatever had been taken for the national defence, the French general obtained possession of Portugal without difficulty, treating it in all respects as a conquered province.

This state of affairs greatly exasperated the people. In the northern provinces, numerous bodies took up arms in defence of national independence; a junta was established at Oporto to conduct the government; and on the 21st August 1808, the British auxiliary army under Sir Arthur Wellesley defeated the troops of Junot, and prepared the way for the celebrated convention of Cintra, and the evacuation of the country by the invaders. The Portuguese were afterwards greatly distinguished throughout the whole of the Peninsular war.

In 1810, on the death of Maria Isabella, the regent was called to the throne as JoHN VI.; but he still continued to reside in Brazil. The peace of Paris, in 1814, gave little satisfaction to the Portuguese, who were obliged to restore some portion of French Guiana, which they had conquered during the war, while several harassing disputes with Spain also arose. The king, after an absence of nearly fourteen years, returned to his native country in 1821, having previously to his landing confirmed a constitution demanded by the people.

ITALY.

NAPLES.-The kingdom of Naples did not escape the contagion of the French revolution. After an ineffectual endeavour to oppose the progress of the invading armies, the king was compelled to make peace with Napoleon in 1796, and close his ports against the enemies of France. A popular insurrection, 1799, ended in the temporary establishment of the Parthenopean Republic; but it was soon after replaced by the old government. Ferdinand IV. joined in the coalition of 1800 against France; but his aid was of little value, and his continental territories were speedily occupied by hostile armies. In 1805, when these were withdrawn to operate against Austria, a combined Russian and British force landed at Naples, but speedily retired; a circumstance which Napoleon made the pretext for sending a new army into the country, and conferring the crown on his brother Joseph, March 1806. It was in Calabria that the revived system of attacking in column, so admirably suited for raw levies, and which had hitherto led to victory, was found unavailing against a line of British soldiers, Sir J. Stuart with a small force defeating Regnier at Maida, 4th July. On the transference of Joseph Bonaparte to Spain, Murat became king of Naples, 1808, all whose attempts to reduce Sicily were frustrated by General Stuart and Admiral Martin. In 1812, Lord W. Bentinck was instrumental in forming a new and liberal constitution for that island. Murat, who had negotiated both with the allied sovereigns and the French emperor during the hundred days, ultimately sided with the latter, and invaded the Papal territories, threatening also Northern Italy. The rout at Waterloo decided his fate: exiled from his throne, he perished in a rash descent on Calabria, 1815; Ferdinand IV. having shortly before been reinstated in his dominions.

UPPER ITALY.-During the contests of the Republic and the Empire this portion of the peninsula became the theatre of great events, which together with the changes undergone by its various states, have already been incidentally noticed under FRANCE. The congress of Vienna 1815, again re-established the preponderance of Austria, and erecte northern Italy into the following six governments:-1. The kingdon. of Sardinia, under Victor Emmanuel, who regained the whole of his continental territories except Savoy, together with the duchy of Genoa; 2. The Venetian provinces, with Mantua and Milan, were erected into the kingdom of Lombardy and Venice, and given to Austria; 3. The house of Austro-Este was replaced in the sovereignty of Modena; 4. The sovereign duchy of Parma became a principality for the ex-empress, Maria Louisa; 5. The Archduke Ferdinand of Austria was reinstated as grandduke of Tuscany; and, 6. Lucca became a sovereign state for the ex-queen of Etruria. Sardinia was afterwards increased by the addition of Savoy, taken from France at the second peace of Paris.

SWITZERLAND.-This country underwent the same vicissitudes as its neighbours, Italy and France. At last, after several petty revolutions general tranquillity was restored, and a new federal compact formed at Zurich, 1815. The cantons were increased from nineteen to twenty-two by the addition of Geneva, Neuchatel, and Vallais, all recovered from France.

GERMANY.

FRANCIS II. Succeeded to the dominions of Austria and the imperial title at the period of the first war of the revolution, 1792, in which he struggled long, and at last successfully, against a most formidable enemy. By the battle of Marengo, 1800, and of Austerlitz, 1805, Germany was twice laid prostrate at the feet of Napoleon. The main result of the latter defeat was the establishment of the Confederation of the Rhine, under the protectorate of the French ruler; and as this event put an end to the old German or Roman empire, after a duration of a thousand years, Francis assumed the title of Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary and Bohemia. He now availed himself of an interval of peace to repair the ravages which war had made in his dominions, and felt bound to maintain neutrality in Bonaparte's contest with Prussia, while he made every exertion to augment his own financial and military resources. The French monarch, on his part, effected various changes in the constitution of the confederacy, conferring new titles on several of the princes, while his own general, Murat, was created Grandduke of Berg; and in order to complete the humiliation of the country, various counts and princes were mediatized, that is, deprived of all immediate government in their respective states, and their sovereign rights given over to contiguous princes.

The embarrassments of the French in Spain in 1809, again induced the Austrian government to make an effort for the independence of Germany. The war which then took place differed in character from former contests, inasmuch as the people generally took part against the French, who were annoyed on all sides by vigorous and enterprising corps of partisans under various leaders. The Archduke Charles defeated Bonaparte in person at Aspern; and though fortune again changed sides at Wagram, the Austrians retired in good order to Bohemia, where an armistice was concluded, followed by the peace of Schönbrunn. Shortly after, Maria Louisa, daughter of the emperor, was married to the Emperor of France.

By the treaty of Presburg, 1805, the mountainous district of the Tyrol had been ceded to Bavaria; but early in 1809, the inhabitants commenced an insurrection under a native chief named Hofer, aided by the Austrians. A murderous conflict was sustained against the Bavarians and French with varying success, until the end of November, its ulti mate issue depending on the greater contest decided in the two dreadful days of Wagram. The cruel execution of Hofer and others of his heroic associates, after an amnesty had been proclaimed, added another stain to the reputation of Napoleon.

After the battle of Waterloo, the restoration of the Austrian monarchy was effected at the congress of Vienna by means of the dissolved kingdom of Italy, of the reconquered Illyrian provinces, and by the recovery of the cessions formerly made to Bavaria.

The battle of Leipsic and the subsequent disasters of the French in 1813 dissolved the Confederation of the Rhine; and the congress of Vienna, after indemnifying Prussia and other powers at the expense of those princes who had most eagerly supported the invader, by an act dated 9th June 1815, formed the German states, including portions of the dominions of Austria, Prussia, and the Netherlands, with the free

cities, into a new federal relation called the Germanic League. This union, which was left without any acknowledged head, has in view the preservation of the security of Germany, and the independence of the respective states; the members of the confederation have equal rights, and meet in diet at Frankfort-on-the-Maine.

HOLLAND.

From 1795 this country continued in a state of hopeless dependency on France, losing her commerce and colonies in constrained hostilities with Britain. In 1806, the Batavian Republic was converted into the kingdom of Holland, and Louis Bonaparte placed upon the throne. This prince was of an amiable character, and really exerted the little power reposed in him for the benefit of his subjects. In particular, he readily connived at the evasion of the decrees of his imperious brother, prohibiting intercourse with England; but this policy, so consonant with the true interests of his people, soon exposed him to such a series of reproaches as to render his position insupportable. In 1810, he abdicated in favour of his eldest son; but this change not meeting with the approbation of the head of the family, Holland was without ceremony incorporated with France. At length the people, whose dreams of liberty had been fearfully dispelled by the painful realities of despotism, in the shape of the conscription and the most grinding exactions, rose against the oppressor; the popular cry, "Up with the house of Orange!" once more resounded over the land; and a provisional government being formed at Amsterdam, William Frederick of Nassau arrived from England, and was proclaimed sovereign of the United Netherlands in December 1813.

In October 1814, a treaty of peace was concluded with Great Britain, by which that country was allowed to retain the Cape of Good Hope, Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice, but restored Batavia, the Moluccas, Surinam, and all other places taken from Holland during the war. The congress of Vienna, by an act dated 31st May 1815, reunited the ten provinces of the Low Countries, formerly subject to the Dukes of Burgundy (now the kingdom of Belgium), under the authority of William Frederick, who thereupon assumed the title of King of the United Netherlands. The government was declared a limited hereditary monarchy, with a representative legislature.

DENMARK.

During the French wars, Denmark twice suffered from the arms of Britain: her fleet engaged in the defence of Copenhagen was sunk, burnt, or captured by Nelson, 1801; and after the bombardment of the capital by an armament under Admiral Gambier and Lord Cathcart, all her ships of war were surrendered, 1807. On the fall of Napoleon, she was compelled to cede Norway to Sweden, in exchange for Swedish Pomerania and the Isle of Rugen; but by the treaty of Vienna, June 1815, these districts were transferred to Prussia, the Danish king receiving the duchy of Lauenburg as a trifling compensation.

SWEDEN.

Gustavus IV. attained his majority in 1796; but his conduct showing that he laboured under mental derangement, he was deposed in 1809, and his uncle, CHARLES XIII., proclaimed king. The aristocracy took this opportunity to effect several modifications in the constitution, tending to diminish the power of the crown; the general outline remaining as settled in 1772. Charles now concluded the war which had broken out with Russia and Denmark in the preceding year, ceding to the former power the whole of Finland, with East Bothnia and Aaland; an arrangement which stripped the country of one-fourth of its territory and onethird of its inhabitants. After this heavy blow, he joined the continental system of Napoleon, 1810, receiving back, as a reward for his adherence, the district of Pomerania, which had been wrested by the French from his predecessor. In the same year, on the sudden death of Prince Christian, who had been nominated to succeed Charles, the diet elected Bernadotte, prince of Ponte-Corvo, one of the ablest of Bonaparte's marshals, as successor to the throne, under the title of Charles John.

The crown-prince saw too clearly the real interests of his country to allow it to remain long in the state of subserviency to France to which it had been brought; and he was easily induced to abandon the continental system on the first favourable opportunity. In 1812, the Swedish ports were again thrown open to all nations; and early in 1813, he formed an alliance with England, and soon after openly entered the field against his former commander. In return for the important aid thus afforded to the allies, he was gratified by obtaining the valuable territory of Norway at the peace of Kiel with Denmark in 1814, the natives being permitted to retain their own constitution. The people, who were much attached to their Danish rulers, made some opposition to this arrangement, and set up Prince Christian Frederick of Denmark as their king; but they were speedily compelled to yield. Bernadotte attained the crown of the united kingdoms, as CHARLES XIV., in 1818.

PRUSSIA.

FREDERICK III. succeeded his father in 1797, prudently announcing his design to maintain the peace with France. He applied his attention to the re-establishment of the finances, by introducing a wise economy into all parts of the administration, hoping thereby in a few years to pay the debts left by his father, and even part of those of Poland, with which he had been charged by the last partition. After a long neutrality, the country was rashly hurried into a war with Napoleon, when the double defeat at Jena and Auerstadt, 1806, placed it at the mercy of an unspar ing conqueror. By the peace of Tilsit, 1807, Prussia lost half her terri tories: Westphalia was given to Jerome Bonaparte; Warsaw, erected into a grand-duchy, was placed under the protection of the king of Saxony; Dantzic was declared a free town; and the other remaining ports were closed against the commerce of England. This last stipulation was but the prelude to the most oppressive pecuniary exactions, and every species of insult and degradation. In no one of the subjugated European states was the insolence of the French domination carried