And are such panegyrics to be echoed by the mean tools of a political faction, because they relate to one whose daily prose is understood to be dedicated to the support of all that courtiers think should be supported? If it be true that the author has thus earned the patronage of those liberal dispensers of bounty, we can have no objection that they should give him proper proofs of their gratitude; but we cannot help wishing, for his sake, as well as our own, that they would pay in solid pudding instead of empty praise; and adhere, at least in this instance, to the good old system of rewarding their champions with places and pensions, instead of puffing their bad poetry, and endeavouring to cram their nonsense down the throats of all the loyal and well affected.

ART. III. Der Krieg der Tyroler Landleute im Jahre 1809. Von J. L. S. BARTHOLDY. Berlin, 1814.

THIS HIS work contains the only connected and authentic narrative which has yet been published, of the stand made by the Tyrolese against the Gallo-Bavarian armies in the year 1809. Their patriotism attracted a short and transient notice: But the Tyrolese war was an episode in the great tragical drama, which had little influence on the important scenes that succeeded :— Empires rose and fell-crowns and sceptres were lost and won by kings and keisars-and the fate of the hunters and herdsmen, who had perished in the defence of their secluded vallies, was soon forgotten.

We think that war never wears a more unpleasing aspect, than when, according to the accustomed phraseology, it is considered on a grand scale, and in what is called a scientific point of view. So many details are given of long-planned operations, foredooming to spoil and havoc all that the industry of man has won from the bounty of nature:-then we are taught to join in lauding the sagacity of the commander, who, by sacrificing a few hecatombs of his followers, ensured the victories of the remainder: And after summing up, in round numbers, the total amount of killed, wounded, and missing, the balance is struck, and carried to the profit and loss account of the ledger of the royal merchant on whose behalf the speculation is carried on, to be duly estimated at the next partition. Man is so naturally a fighting animal, that even the best of us hardly feel a sufficient dislike to the art of destruction, except when it is invested with this air of cold-blooded calculation.

When war is conducted with forethought, we are forced to dwell on its abundant wretchedness. The end becomes contrasted with the means. There appears to be such utter indifference to the sufferings of our fellow creatures, in calmly sending forth the mandates of destruction, such guilt in wilfully afflicting them with an endless train of physical and moral evil, that it becomes no longer possible to deny the dreadful price which is paid for military glory.

The more, however, that the share which the politician has in the pastime of princes, can be prevented from becoming conspicuous, the more difficult does it become to resist the influence of those feelings which an ingenious casuist can represent, either as the ornaments or as the deformities of the human heart, and which seduce the spectator to take an interest in the game. Let us once be placed in the midst of the glittering tumult of the camp, and many of the doctrines which led us to condemn the ambition of the cabinet, will be unheeded and forgotten.

Whatever interest may be taken in the atchievements of an army, it is far inferior to the appeal which is made to our passions by the union of personal prowess and mental energy. By all regular systems of military tactics, the exercise, at least, of these qualities must generally be separated. So much is said about echelons and deployments, and columns, and hollow squares, that we seem to be contemplating mere masses of inert matter, driven about by some extraneous cause, and whose impulse and effect can be best calculated according to the laws of dynamics. The military Behemoth covers a thousand hills; but, as in the frontispiece to Hobbes, the monster is an aggragate of unities-and those which compose the members have nothing in common with the head which thinks for them. It is true that the commander would ill deserve his rank, were he to exhibit the rash impetuosity of a Guerilla chief. But, of the two, the partisan who both plans the combat, and mingles in the fray, will always excite the livelier sympathy. The semblance of volition is too much obscured in rank and file. The gallantry of each individual arm is lost in the compacted charge; and, although it may very possibly be a mere illusion, we are prone to fancy there is more motive in irregular levies. From causes which are somewhat analogous, sailors have more of the rough enterprize of ancient chivalry than soldiers. The admiral of the fleet shares all the common danger of his men; and they have greater scope for individual exertion and sagacity. The cutting of a vessel out of a hostile harbour, rivets our attention more than the rout of a detachment; and the chase of a frigate gives rise to greater anxiety than the flight

of a discomfited army. We doze in listless languor, when the veteran fights his battles over again: But the relation of the oruize may continue til midnight, and not a yawn shall confess. the influence of the witching hou. To these sources we may also trace the romantic charm of the history of rude ages and nations; and, without detracting from the merits of the campaign, we, for our parts, have always dwelt more willingly on the vicissitudes of the Border foray.

In the present instance, the conflict assumed many of the features which are nearly banished from the warfare of the modern world, and which are only to be found in the chronicles of the days of the lance and shield. From beginning to end, it was wholly a war of the commons-for the nobility, with a few honourable exceptions, remained inert and idle-conducted with all the energy, and at the same time with all the unthinking rashness of men inured to hardships, but not to discipline-in defence of opinions, which it was the duty of their ruler to have treated with forbearance—and of rights which he had solemnly bound himself to maintain.

These rights and liberties of the Tyrolese, and indeed their constitution itself, had been secured to them by the concessions. with which Frederick, surnamed Empty Pocket, rewarded their fidelity in the hour of distress and danger. The Tyrol continued a favoured country-it furnished a never-failing supply of hardy soldiers. Fortunate in its poverty, it afforded no temptation to the financier ;—and, until the latest period, the House of Austria had allowed the Tyrolese to continue nearly in the fall possession of their antient immunities; whilst the inhabitants of every other part of the hereditary dominions had seen the last faint traces of liberty vanish under the sway of the mild and polished Joseph, the Imperial philosopher. The leading outlines of the balanced system of polity of the Teu-. tonic nations, are always uniform. When the States of the Tyrol are mentioned, it may be immediately inferred, that no taxes could be raised without their concurrence: But it becomes necessary to add, that, by a happy peculiarity, villanage and servitude were unknown. The land was tilled by a free peasantry, whose representatives formed one of the branches of the legislature. The local magistracy of the country districts, although the privilege had been narrowed by Joseph's regulations, was mostly nominated by the popular voice; and the doctrine, that all ranks are equal before the law, was fully recognized both in theory and practice. The Tyrolese had not been visited by the mischievous policy which rendered their fellow subjects the sluggish and torpid spectators of the misfortunesof

the government; and consequently, the princely earldom' * of the Tyrol was almost the only corner of the dominions of the Emperor of Austria in which the people were really attached to the dynasty of Hapsburgh. Both in physical and moral strength, it was the most important of the bulwarks of his empire; and we may well believe, that it was with reluctance that he obeyed the mandate which compelled him to cede it, as part of the tribute by which he purchased the transitory respite afforded by the peace of Presburg, to Napoleon's Bavarian ally-who, under the auspices of the august Protector of the confederation of the Rhine, had just exchanged the cap of maintenance and furred mantle of a German elector, for the prouder ensigns of the royal dignity. The States assembled whilst the negociations were pending, and endeavoured, by their remonstrances, to avert this transfer of their country. But the Emperor Francis could only reply to their address, that although it had not been in his power to prevent this painful visitation, he had, nevertheless, used all his influence to secure the integrity of the Tyrolese territory, and the preservation of its constitution; And he referred them to the eighth article of the treaty, by which the King of Bavaria engaged to maintain them in the full possession of all their rights and immunities."

By the constitution of the Tyrol, the sovereign did not acquire a right to the allegiance of the people, until the oath of fealty had been taken in the name of the community by the four Estates ;-the representatives of the diocesan and collegiate churches-the heads of the regular clergy-the barons and knights-and the burgesses and yeomanry, convened in full and solemn assembly at Innspruck. But the Bavarian government neglected to observe this impressive ceremony, and possession was taken of the country in the name of the new sovereign, by means of a set of French commissioners. In the month of January 1806, however, the Estates met, and for the last time; and, in their memorial, the King was respectfully requested to give audience to a deputation from their body, chosen according to their constitutional forms, and which was instructed to lay before him their advice and wishes respecting the most eligible methods of alleviating the distresses of the country. The King answered this address, by assuring them, that he relied on the promises of fidelity and attachment which they had now given; and in return,' he proceeds, they may rest confident, that we will not only protect them to the utmost of our power in the possession of their constitution, and of their well-earned rights and fran

Gefürstete graffschaft.

chises, but that we will always exert ourselves to promote their general welfare and happiness.

The Monarch, or his ministers, found, ere long, that the fulfilment of these most gracious promises could be conveniently dispensed with. The constitution of the Tyrol was abolished by a royal ordonnance.. The country was deprived of its very name, by its subdivision into the circles of the Inn, the Eisach, and the Etsch, under which denominations it was incorporated in the Bavarian monarchy, which was then newly remodelled into a dwarfish resemblance of its great foster-mother, the French empire. And as Bavaria was ambitious to figure as a great military power, notwithstanding the impoverished state of her finances, one of the first fruits of the union was the arbitrary imposition of eight new and oppressive taxes, which were levied with the greatest rigour.

The judicious indulgence extended by the old masters of the world to the religion and habits of the conquered nations, insured the health and vigour of the Roman empire. Apis fattened at his sacred crib in peace and quietness. The priests of the Great Mother were left in full enjoyment of their property and their penances: And the tribunal was filled by the Archon, although a foreign power had placed him there. The French, on the contrary, stung and teased their vassals into resistance, by childishly attempting to do the work of ages in a moment, and to transmute the whole heterogeneous mass of continental population into Frenchmen. From North to South, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, all national character was to be crushed out, all national distinctions were to be effaced. Neither those institutions, founded in the eternal bases of justice. and morality, and therefore appreciated with reason,-nor those upon which the ties of long continued usage bestows a greater though imaginary value,-nor those tastes and opinions by which each nation asserts its individuality, were to be suffered to exist. All was to assume a uniform colouring. The Parisian was to find the image of his gay and proud metropolis reflected from the waters of the Elbe and the Tagus. Alcaides and Burgomasters were kicked out to make room for mayors and municipalities. The fame of Emanuel Kant, and St Thomas Aquinas, were equally to sink in everlasting night; and the professors of Gottingen, or the licentiates of Alcala were bound to replenish their emptied heads out of the ampler stores of the Encyclopædia. Schiller and Calderon and Alfieri were trundled off the boards, by the Artistes' of the grand opera. And, unlike Frederick the Great, who wrote to his loving subjects at Neufchatel, that he had not the slightest objection