GENERAL INTRODUCTION

BY THE EDITOR.

CIRCUMSTANCES above the control either of the Editor or Publisher of this Work, have deferred the appearance of the first volume for some months beyond the period originally indicated. It was thought well, moreover, to begin the year with the premices of an enterprise which is designed to provide for the public a stock of history and literature of something more than temporary interest. The contents of the present volume will, I trust, be acknowledged to have this character, although they may not seem to support its title, according to the usual composition of books of the same denomination, or to correspond exactly with the schedule of the prospectus. I had reserved to myself, however, in the prospectus, a latitude of choice as to topics and arrangement, and I soon discovered that the scope of the semiannual volume would not properly admit of all the common ingredients of a work of the kind. Several of these I have, in consequence, withheld for the next volume, which will be in the nature of a sequel to the present. Together they will more fully realize the idea of a Register.

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The materials of the second are for the most part collected, and may be put to press without delay, should the public be disposed to extend to the undertaking the degree of patronage required by the interests of the Bookseller. It will offer as the first article, French Affairs from the battle of Waterloo up to the present time: The interval between that great event and the reestablishment of the Bourbons in Paris, although short, is scarcely less curious and instructive in its history, than any other particular period of the French revolutionary annals. The next volume will contain, besides, an abstract of the condition and politics of the principal powers of Europe;-a review of the proceedings of the fourteenth Congress:-a synopsis of English and American literature;-a chronicle drawn from domestic and foreign sources;-a necrology, &c. &c.

VOL. I.

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For the present volume, as respects the history of Europe, I have selected as my theme the country which has of late almost monopolized the attention of mankind; and, in preference to more recent events, that vicissitude of its fortunes which if not, in itself, the most wonderful, is the most imposing as well as decisive. I found in my hands authentic materials for the history of the restoration of Bonaparte, and of the last desperate struggles of the imperial government: The impressiveness of the subject so remarkable for the display of character and rapidity of action, led me to reduce them into the shape of a regular narrative. The cause of truth, too, appeared to demand something that might serve to counteract the gross misrepresentations which have been palmed upon the public, in a work entitled "Letters from Paris by an English gentleman." This work is ascribed to Mr. Hobhouse, the author of the Travels in Albania; but I yet find it almost impossible to persuade myself, that the accomplished and sagacious scholar who wrote these admirable travels, could have produced a tissue of falsehood, inconsistency and ribaldry worthy only and properly characteristic of a Barrere or of a slavish pamphleteer of the palais-royal. I hold myself bound, in pursuance of my first steady aim of serving my native country by exposing French jacobinism in all its frauds, to improve every fair opportunity of dispelling, by facts, the illusions industriously spread concerning the character of Bonaparte, his co-adjutors and their institutions. The man is chained-inextricably I hope —to the rock of St. Helena,* but his name is dangerous as the rallying point, the watch-word of a foreign sect who know their own credit and the success of their designs to depend on his reputation, and who, therefore, labour indefatigably to invest it with the effulgence of the most philanthropic heroism. Borne along by testimony in all respects irresistible, I shall pursue him closely, in the next volume, from Paris to his present residence. It behooves every writer of cotemporary history however humble the grade, who is at the same time a friend of truth and of his fellow-men, to treasure up whatever may conduce to exhibit in the full deformity of his spirit and career, the most audacious and mischievous of the impostors of this or any age.

"Stamp we our vengeance deep and ratify his doom.”

No honest mind can fail to rejoice at the downfall of a government of organised falsehood and hypocrisy, which, with the language the most beneficent and consolatory always in its mouth, incessantly fomented the passions and fortified the institutions

* Prometheus vinctus, or rather the man of Prometheus formed out of the slime of the earth, to whom Minerva gave the cunning of the fox, the ambition of the peacock, the ferocity of the tiger, the strength of the lion, and the pusillanimity of the hare. The mythological composition has been completely realized in the history of Bonaparte."

most destructive to the human species. Not content with its own race of imposture, it had sought to enlist and train in the same profligate career, all the youth, even the most tender, of a large empire. We cannot but shudder when we find,-as the French gazettes of the particular period show-the boys of all the schools including even the primary, brought forward with addresses to the emperor written for them by his stipendiaries, and full of adulation, oaths, and bravados; at the same time that the poor infants either really or (what would be still worse) feignedly, surrender with many flourishes of sentiment their weekly allowance of pocket-money as a patriotic donation! The regents of the polytechnick school of Paris,-themselves conspicuous members of the government of Bonaparte,-state formally, in their official report of the last year, that he and his colleagues had laboured to heat the minds of the youth of all the schools and give them a direction favourable to their views. "Ceux qui se trouvoient à la tête du pouvoir cherchoient à exalter les opinions de la jeunesse de toutes les Ecoles, et à leur donner une direction favorable à leurs vues." We need not be surprised if, while the administration of France under the Bourbons ceased to be homicidal and invasive, it was marked more or less by Charlatanerie and deception, and this not merely because it was in the hands of the creatures of Bonaparte. One of the ablest of the late French writers remarks, in allusion to the principles both of obedience and rule among his countrymen-" the habits of the government of Napoleon remain to us like a species of instinct, of which, it is to be feared, we shall, for a long time and blindly, follow the impulse."

Neither I, nor any American in my situation, can prefer the cause of the Bourbons, from any other motive, than a conviction of its greater eligibleness with a view to the happiness of France, the tranquillity of Europe, the cause of liberty every where, and the prosperity of the United States. Under the peculiar circumstances of France divided within, threatened from abroad, I can see no anchorage for her, however exposed or mortifying it may be, but the old race of her monarchs, who certainly carry with them no inconsiderable part of her population, and who, while they reign at all, deprive the allied powers of the pretext which they may want, of totally overwhelming her by their hostilities. Where else could the vessel of the state be moored to save her from being beaten to pieces by tempests of every description? Which of the great military or civil leaders is it that could unite the people; or propitiate the foreign powers? and who will pretend that without perfect union at home, France could successfully resist those powers?-Remove the Bourbons, and we should witness a scene upon a mighty scale of horror, similar to that of the raft which bore the crew of the French frigate Medusa; an infuriate mutual butchery, while the elements were exerting their utmost force to consummate the tragedy;-to bury all in a com mon ruin.

With the Bourbons, Europe is not likely to be soon again involved in war;-the substitution of any other rule in France would be the signal for general hostilities. Whatever may be the dispositions of the Bourbons, whatever they may do to establish despotism at home,a worse than that of Bonaparte it is not in the power of man to establish,-they cannot assail nor affect the cause of liberty abroad, as did their predecessors with unwearied malignity and awful power. The United States have had sufficient experience in their relations with all the revolutionary governments of France-the Imperial especially-to know that they cannot but gain in the exchange for that of a Bourbon, whether as to the light in which their institutions may be viewed and treated; the freedom of their commerce, and the community of policy and effort between them and France as respects the British' power. The Bourbons, if they do not relish our republicanism, cannot at least hope, and will not, therefore, intrigue, to injure it; they are compelled by every motive of necessity and expediency, to open a wide door to trade, and to abstain from depredation on the commerce of other nations; they may be willing, obliged, to keep up certain appearances as to England, but they must view her in secret with jealousy and dislike; they must be disposed to promote the prosperity, particularly the commercialof the true maritime rival of England, and to ripen the sympathy of interest into one of feeling, its surest auxiliary.

We have, on the other hand, from the same cause, a direct concern in the growth of the French navy and commerce; consequently, in the peace of France, in the subordination of the military spirit in that country, and, if the remarks made above are just, in the continuance of the Bourbon government. Without an express knowledge of the fact, I yet cannot doubt, but that our cabinet has received from the French, assurances in unison with this theory; assurances very different in their sense and drift from those of Bonaparte; connected with no schemes of action impracticable for our united faculties, and pernicious to ourselves in the execution.

But to return to the contents of the present volume. The translation from the French of Mr. de Say, as well as that of the Report of the French Minister of Finance, I owe to the Honourable Eligius Fromentin, of the Senate of the United States, a gentleman of a truly classical education, enlightened mind, and most independent character. He attaches more importance to the pamphlet of Mr. de Say than I am myself disposed to allow it, at the same time that I think it merits attention and preservation. It is, indeed, in its very errors-which are many both of fact and speculationcurious as the production of one who is placed by general opinion at the head of the French writers on political economy. The flippant, emphatic, doctrinal tone, the distension of small particulars into teeming causes, the misapplication of postulates, the loose

ness of discussion which mark the writings of Mr. de Say, belong to the whole modern French school of economists. The refutation of his fallacies is to be found complete in the English journals, and present experience sufficiently disproves his statements relative to exchanges, the sale of British goods on the continent, &c. I shall have occasion in my next volume to show, what must be at once evident to all who attend to the present bibliography of England, how much he is mistaken in his ideas respecting the diminution of the number of serious readers in that country, and the general decline of English literature.

Mr. Brackenridge, who has arranged the article on the Florida question, is the author of the well-known " Views of Louisiana,' the most valuable work of the kind, along with the Geographical Tract of Mr. Darby recently published, which our literature has as yet produced. I am entirely convinced from a patient investigation of the subject, that the claims of the United States to West Florida are just under the treaty of St. Ildephonso, and this point Mr. Brackenridge appears to me to have satisfactorily established. As an impartial enquirer he has stated, in their full force, the arguments which have been employed to overthrow the American title, without entertaining, himself, a doubt of its validity.

The United States will have serious feuds with Spain, and are likely, as far as the temper of their government can now be understood, to pursue the true policy in the case,-a course of moderation accompanying a resolute maintenance of their rights. The dispositions of Spain are hostile, but she wants the means and the spirit to wage open war.

She suffered a cruel and still rankling disappointment by our acquisition of Louisiana. She had parted with it, chiefly for the purpose of interposing the power of France between us and her Mexican empire. It is this corrosive recollection which animates her, more than any calculation of present loss, in the controversy concerning West Florida. Without absolute necessity, the United States will not, however, we may presume, admit of a rupture with any power. War is a vicious circle; it is a strong eddy. Who may ultimately be the parties to it, can never be foreseen at the outset. War, says a wise statesman, never left where it found a

nation.

I had hopes of collecting some authentic information, for my readers, concerning the origin and progress of the insurrections in South America. But so contradictory are the accounts from that quarter, so inaccessible the sources of full or correct information, that I have preferred being silent on the subject, to running the risk of scantiness or inaccuracy. What may be safely inferred from the past history and condition of the population of South America, what seems to be generally admitted, is, that they are by no means ripe for republican institutions. Whether they will ever be qualified to enjoy them, I very much doubt; but of this I