Chapter 19

Reform of all kinds had become popular in England under the dexterous resistance of O'Connell, who held the balance in Parliament. The government was induced to bring in a corporation reform bill for Ireland. An official register of births, deaths, and marriages was conceded to the dissenters. Next came the abolition of one of the most barbarous practices of English and Irish law courts. Up to this time prisoners accused of felony were not allowed to be defended by counsel. At the instance of Lord Lyndhurst this was now changed. Another gain for humanity was made by the abolition of the law which required that persons convicted of murder should be executed on the next day but one. On the other hand a bill for the abolition of imprisonment for debt miscarried. The most potent plea against the abuses of this particular relic of barbarism in England was put forth by Charles Dickens in his "Pickwick Papers." These serial papers relating the humorous adventures of Mr. Pickwick and his body servant Sam Weller, when brought in conflict with the English laws governing breach of marital promise and debt, had an immense success in England and all English-speaking countries. Already Dickens had published a series of "Sketches of London," under the pseudonym of Boz, while working as a Parliamentary reporter for the "Morning Chronicle." The success of the "Pickwick Papers" was such that he felt encouraged to emerge from his pseudonym and to devote himself entirely to literature. Other literary events of the year in England were the publication of the initial volumes of Lockhart's "Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott," of Captain Marryat's "Mr. Midshipman Easy," and "The Pirate and the Three Cutters," and of Landor's "Pericles and Aspasia." The first Shakespeare jubilee was celebrated at Stratford-on-Avon in the spring. A loss to English letters was the death of James Mill, the great political economist, in his sixty-third year. About this time Wheatstone constructed his electro-magnetic apparatus by which he could send signals over nearly four miles of wire. The Irish composer Balfe began his brilliant career as a composer of English operas with the "Siege of Rochelle," produced at Drury Lane in London. About the same time Mendelssohn brought out his "St. Paul" in Duesseldorf.

[Sidenote: Death of La Malibran]

[Sidenote: Her operatic career]

[Sidenote: Alfred de Musset's lines]

Maria Felicita Malibran, the great contralto singer of the early part of the Nineteenth Century, died on September 23, at Manchester, in her twenty-eighth year. Taken from Paris to Naples at the age of three, she made her first appearance as a public singer in her fifth year. Two years later she studied solfeggio with Panseron. At the age of sixteen she made her debut as Rosina in "Barbiere di Seville" at London. The success of her first appearance was so great that she was at once engaged for the season. Next she appeared in New York, where she was a popular favorite for two years, singing in Mozart's "Don Giovanni," in "Tancred," "Romeo and Juliet," and two of her father's operas. Here she married a French merchant, Malibran. After her separation from him she returned to Paris, where she was engaged as prima donna at a salary of 50,000 francs. Thereafter she sang at every season in Paris, London, Milan, Rome and Naples. For one engagement of forty nights in Naples she received 100,000 francs. Both as a singer and woman she exercised an extraordinary fascination over her contemporaries. Only a few months before her death she married the violinist De Beriot. In England she suffered a severe fall from her horse, which shattered her health. After this she literally sang herself to death. Her loss was mourned most of all in France, where her death has been commemorated by Alfred de Musset's beautiful threnody ending with the lines:

Die, then. Thy death is sweet, thy goal is won; What is called genius by men here below Is the great cry for Love; all else is but show; And since, soon or late, human love is undone, It is for great hearts and great voices like thine To die as thou didst--for Love all-divine.

[Sidenote: Meyerbeer's "Huguenots"]

[Sidenote: Gounod]

[Sidenote: Chopin]

[Sidenote: Liszt]

[Sidenote: Georges Sand]

[Sidenote: Death of Ampere]

In France, great strides had been made in music, art and literature. Giacomo Meyerbeer, whose real name was Jacob Beer, surpassed the success of his "Robert le Diable" with his greatest opera "Les Huguenots," produced on February 20, at the Paris Opera House. The success of this masterpiece so disheartened Rossini that he resolved to write no more operas, and withdrew to Bologna. Charles Francois Gounod, on the other hand, now began his musical career by entering the Paris Conservatory. Frederick Chopin, the Polish composer, at this time was at the height of his vogue as the most _recherche_ pianist of Paris. He was the favorite of a circle of friends consisting of Meyerbeer, Bellini, Berlioz, Liszt, Balzac, and Heine. It was during this year that Liszt introduced Chopin to Madame Dudevant, better known as Georges Sand, the famous French novelist. Their attachment was the talk of Paris. Andre Marie Ampere, the noted French mathematician and physicist, died during this year at sixty-one years of age. He was the inventor of the electrical unit of measure which bears his name.

[Sidenote: Thiers Prime Minister]

[Sidenote: Algerian reverses]

[Sidenote: Thiers resigns]

[Sidenote: Fiasco of Strasburg]

[Sidenote: Louis Napoleon exiled]

[Sidenote: Amnesty acts]

Politically it was a turbulent year for France. On the question of the budget the Ministry was defeated in January and had to resign. The new Ministry called in went to pieces on February 22, when Guizot and De Broglie retired from the Cabinet. Thiers was placed at the helm. On June 26, another attempt to assassinate the King was made by Louis Alibaud, a former soldier of the south who had taken part in the revolution of July. The military expedition to Algeria under Marshal Clauzel and the Duke of Orleans first met with distinguished success. The French army occupied Mascera. But later the unfortunate issue of an expedition against the town of Constantine caused the retirement of Marshal Clauzel as Governor-General of Algeria. Commander Changarnier at the head of a French battalion was beaten back step by step by an overwhelming body of Achmet Bey's cavalry of the desert. The question of French intervention in Spain resulted in the downfall of the Ministry of Thiers. King Louis Philippe, ever since Lord Palmerston's chilling reply to his overtures for joint intervention, was opposed to such a project. "Let us aid the Spaniards from a distance," said he, "but never let us enter the same boat with them. Once there we should have to take the helm, and God knows where that would bring us." He demanded the retirement of the French corps of observation in the Pyrenees. Thiers was utterly opposed to this: "Nothing can bring the King to intervention," said he, "and nothing can make me renounce it." On September 6, the Cabinet resigned, having been in power but six months. Count Mole was charged with forming a new Ministry. A new cause of disquietude was given late in October by Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte at Strasburg. On the last day of that month, Louis Napoleon, with no other support than that of Persigny and Colonel Vauterey, paraded the streets of that town and presented himself at the barracks of the 4th regiment of artillery. He was received with the cry "Vive l'Empereur." An attempt to win over the soldiers of the other barracks failed. The young prince was arrested. Ex-Queen Hortense interceded in his behalf. The attempt to regain the Napoleonic crown had been so manifest a fiasco that Louis Philippe thought he could afford to be generous. Louis Napoleon was permitted to take himself off to the United States of America with an annuity of fifteen thousand francs from the royal purse. His adherents were taken before the court at Colmar and were all acquitted by the jury. A simultaneous military mutiny at Vendome was treated with like leniency. After the death of ex-King Charles X., Prince Polignac and other of his Ministers who had come to grief after the revolution of 1830 were sent out of the country. A general amnesty was announced.

[Sidenote: American elections]

[Sidenote: The "Gag Law"]

[Sidenote: Smithson's bequest]

[Sidenote: Jackson's specie circular]

The arrival of Prince Louis Napoleon created little stir in the United States. The people there were in the midst of a Presidential election. President Jackson wished Vice-President Van Buren to be his successor. He therefore recommended that the Democratic nomination should be by national convention. The National Republicans had by this time generally adopted the name of Whigs. They supported William H. Harrison and John McLaine of Ohio with Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. The opposition hoped to throw the Presidential election into the House, but did not succeed in doing so. A majority of Van Buren electors were chosen by 761,549 votes against 736,656 divided among the other candidates. Congress met on December 5. Arkansas and Michigan were admitted as new States of the Union. Before this Jackson's Administration had won a complete success over his opponents. The President gave his sanction to a Congressional resolution in favor of the South, that "all petitions, memorials, and resolutions relating to slavery shall be laid on the table, and no further action whatever shall be had thereon." A select committee resolved that "Congress cannot constitutionally interfere with slavery in the United States and it ought not to do so." The so-called "Gag Law" was adopted by 117 over 68 votes. About this same time Congress accepted the bequest of James Smithson, an Englishman, who left $515,169 to be expended in America "for the general diffusion of knowledge among men." After the fall of the United States Bank, a number of State banks were formed, many of which were without adequate capital. Their notes were used in large quantities for the purchase of public lands from the United States. Thereupon President Jackson issued the so-called specie circular, ordering federal agents to receive no other money but gold and silver. This caused such a demand for specie that many of these minor banks fell into difficulties. By the close of the year bank failures had become so numerous that a financial crisis was at hand.

[Sidenote: Death of Madison]

Ex-President James Madison died this year at the ripe age of eighty-five. His entire career was such as to make him one of the great line of Southern Presidents of Virginian stock: Washington, Jefferson and Monroe.

[Sidenote: Seminole War]

[Sidenote: American railroad development]

The military campaign against the Seminoles was far from satisfactory. Many of the soldiers sent into Georgia and Florida succumbed to disease. They had to abandon Forts King, Dane and Micanopy, giving up a large tract to the Indians. The Indians were defeated in battle at New Mannsville, and in the fall of the year General Call rallied them on the Withlacoochee, but could not drive them into the Wahoo Swamp. A change in commanders was once more made, and Jesup succeeded Call. With 8,000 men he entered on a winter campaign. The Indians were forced from their positions on the Withlacoochee, and were pursued toward the Everglades, and at the end of 1836 sued for peace. On December 15, the Federal Post-Office and Patent-Office burned down. Irreparable loss was caused by the destruction of 7,000 models and 10,000 designs of new inventions. At the close of Jackson's Administration some three thousand miles of railroad had been constructed. Eight years previously, when he came into office, no railway had ever been seen in America.

1837

[Sidenote: American financial crisis]

[Sidenote: Government relief measures]

[Sidenote: Sub-Treasury system]

[Sidenote: Texas independent]

The financial crisis of this year was not only one of the most severe, but also the most remarkable in the financial history of the United States. A Congressional act of the previous year provided that after January 1, 1837, all surplus revenues of the government should be divided as loans among the States. The amount to be distributed this year aggregated $28,000,000. No part of this large sum was ever recalled. When the government called for its deposits in order to distribute the surplus an immediate shrinkage of specie was the result. As bank after bank suspended, it was found that the paper issue had increased from $51,000,000 in 1830 to $149,000,000 in 1837. Jackson's attacks on the National Bank had shaken public confidence in this institution, and it likewise suspended specie payments. The mercantile failures of a single fortnight in New York City amounted to $100,000,000. A repeal of Jackson's order that payments for public lands should be in coin filled the National Treasury with paper money. Congress met in special session to relieve the financial distress. A law was passed authorizing the issue of $10,000,000 in Treasury notes. This brought some relief. President Van Buren's first message recommended the adoption by the government of the Sub-Treasury plan. A bill for the establishment of an independent treasury passed the Senate, but was defeated in the House by a union of Whigs and Conservatives. The Sub-Treasury plan, as eventually carried out, provided for complete separation of the National Bank and the government, and established the principle that the government revenues should be received in coin only. President Van Buren in his message specially deprecated any interference by Congress in the struggle between Texas and Mexico. Texas, which had been bargained away by Southern votes in 1819, was now an eagerly desired prize. It had now become a part of Coahuila, and had declared its independence. Still Congress persisted in its attempt to interfere, but a bill to that effect was voted down by the adherents of the President.

[Sidenote: Distress in Spain]

In Mexico, Bustamente had again become President. In the neighboring State of Colombia, President Marquez, likewise, had himself re-elected. The influence of North American progress was shown in Cuba by the opening of the first railway there, long before the mother country, Spain, could boast of such an advance in civilization. There the civil war was still draining the resources of the country. On May 17, General Evans took Trun, but failed to follow up his success. In Portugal, the restoration of Pedro's Charta de Ley was proclaimed by the Duke of Terceira.

[Sidenote: Fall of Guizot]

[Sidenote: Death of Fourier]

In France, an unfortunate attempt to fix large dowries on the Duc de Nemours and the Queen of the Belgians raised an outcry against the private avarice of the King. As the result of the Ministerial crisis that followed the defeat of these measures in the Chambers Guizot had to retire from the Ministry. Mole remained in charge with the reconstituted Cabinet. The success of a second expedition against Constantine, in which the Duc de Nemours gained distinction, invested Mole's new Ministry with a certain popularity. Measures for a general political amnesty and for the closing of gambling houses were readily voted by the Chambers. The people of Paris were kept amused first by the marriage of the Duc d'Orleans to Princess Helene of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and by the subsequent wedding of Princess Marie d'Orleans, the amateur sculptress, to Duke Alexander of Wurtemberg, a dilettante, like herself, in letters. The occasion provoked the German poet Heine, then lying ill at Paris, to some of his most pungent witticisms. Ailing though he was, Heine was made a member of the new "Societe des Gens de Lettres," founded by Balzac, Lamennais, Dumas and Georges Sand. Further events in French letters were the publication of Eugene Sue's "Latreaumont," and the appearance of the early part of Michelet's "History of France." Francois Charles Marie Fourier, the philosophic writer and follower of St. Simon, died in his sixty-fifth year. Before his death his well-elaborated system of communism, as put forward in his "Traite de l'Association Domestique et Agricole," had found general acceptance among the radical orders of France.

[Sidenote: Death of Leopardi]

[Sidenote: Ode to Brutus Minor]

[Sidenote: A self-apostrophe]

Count Giacomo Leopardi, the foremost lyric poet of modern Italy, died on June 14. Leopardi's genius was tinctured with pessimism. Like Byron, he was powerfully moved by the painful contrast between the classic grandeur of ancient Italy and the degeneracy of its latter days. The tendency toward pessimism was increased by his own ill health. His first works were the result of his eager study of classic antiquities. Thus he brought out a new edition and translation of Porphyrios' "De vita Plotini." His earliest verses, such as the fine "Ode to Italy," and his poem on a projected monument for Dante, already contained the strain of sadness that ran through all his later poems. On the publication of Leopardi's first collection of verses, Niebuhr, the Prussian Ambassador at Rome, offered him a professorship at Berlin, but the poet's failing health prevented acceptance. Religious dissensions with his father depressed his spirits still more. He gave expression to his increasing sadness in the beautiful ode on the "Minor Brutus." In 1825 he took part in bringing out the famous "Antologia" at Florence, and also issued an edition of Petrarch and two collections of Italian verse. Another collection of his own poems was published in 1826, followed by the prose dialogues "Operette Morali." In 1833, declining health led Leopardi to withdraw to Naples. One year before his death he brought out a last collection of poems distinguished alike for poignant pessimism and for their high lyric beauty. Characteristic of Leopardi's verse is this poem addressed to himself:

Now lie forever still, My weary heart. Farewell, my last illusion The dream that we endure. Farewell! Too surely I know my end, and now of self-deception The hope long since and dear desire has left me. Be still forever! Enough Of fluttering such as thine has been. Vain, vain Thy palpitation, the wide world is not worth Our sighs; for bitter pain Life's portion is, naught else, and slime this earth. Subside henceforth, despair forever! Fate gave this race of ours For only guerdon death. Then make a sport Of thine own self, of nature, and the dark First power that, hidden, rules the world for harm-- And of the infinite emptiness of all.

[Sidenote: Death of Pushkin]

[Sidenote: Lermontov]

Russia lost her foremost man of letters at this period by the death of Count Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin, as the result of a duel. His last work, the drama "Boris Goudunov," was left uncompleted. After his recall from his exile in Bessarabia, Pushkin had been appointed as imperial historian by Czar Nicholas, in which capacity he wrote a history of Peter the Great and an account of the conspiracy of Pugatshev. Of his poetic works, the most important was "Eugene Onegin," an epic written after the manner of Byron's "Don Juan." "Eugene Onegin" has remained one of the classics of Russian literature throughout the Nineteenth Century. Pushkin's brother poet Lermontov, then an officer of the Guards, wrote a poem demanding vengeance for Pushkin's death. He was banished to the Caucasus, and his writings were suppressed. Under a false name he now wrote his famous epic: "Song of Czar Ivan Vasilyevitch."

[Sidenote: The first kindergarten]

[Sidenote: German clerical struggle]

A joyful event in German letters was the great festival at Mainz in honor of Gutenberg and his invention of the art of printing. Froebel opened his first kindergarten at Blankenburg in Thuringia. Auerbach, the popular novelist, brought out his "Spinoza." Much was made by Germans of the opening of the first railway between Dresden and Leipzig, and of the invention of coal-tar colors, or aniline dyes, by a process destined to revolutionize the arts of coloring and dyeing throughout the world. A great stir was created by the imprisonment of the Archbishop of Cologne at Minden after a quarrel with the Prussian Government concerning marriages between persons of different creeds. He was forbidden to go to Bonn. Backed by the Holy See in Rome, he continued to defy the Protestant authorities.

[Sidenote: Death of William IV.]

[Sidenote: Victoria's accession]

A change of rule, fraught with future consequences for Hanover, resulted from the death of William IV., King of England and Hanover, on the 20th of June. By the death of the old King, his niece, Victoria Alexandra, then in her eighteenth year, became Queen of England. Miss Wynn, in her "Diaries of a Lady of Quality," has told how the news was brought to the young Princess at Kensington by the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr. Howley) and the Lord Chamberlain (Marquis Conyngham): "They did not reach Kensington Palace until five o'clock in the morning. They knocked, they rang, they thumped for a considerable time before they could rouse the porter at the gate; they were again kept waiting in the courtyard, then turned into one of the lower rooms, where they seemed forgotten by everybody. They rang the bell, and desired that the attendant of the Princess Victoria might be sent to inform Her Royal Highness that they requested an audience on business of importance. After another delay, and another ringing to inquire the cause, the attendant was summoned, who stated that the Princess was in such a deep sleep that she could not venture to disturb her. Then they said, 'We are come on business of state to the Queen, and even her sleep must give way to that.' In a few minutes she came into the room in a loose white nightgown and shawl, her nightcap thrown off, and her hair falling upon her shoulders, her feet in slippers, tears in her eyes, but perfectly collected and dignified."

[Sidenote: Her first Privy Council]

Lord Melbourne, the Prime Minister, was summoned, and at eleven o'clock that same morning a Privy Council was held, which is thus described by Charles Greville, an eye-witness: "Never was anything like the first impression she produced, or the chorus of praise and admiration which is raised about her manner and behavior, and certainly not without justice. It was very extraordinary, and something far beyond what was looked for. Her extreme youth and inexperience, and the ignorance of the world concerning her, naturally excited intense curiosity to see how she would act on this trying occasion, and there was a considerable assemblage at the palace, notwithstanding the short notice which was given. The first thing to be done was to teach her her lesson, which for this purpose Melbourne had himself to learn.... She bowed to the Lords, took her seat, and then read her speech in a clear, distinct, and audible voice, and without any appearance of fear or embarrassment."

[Sidenote: Hanover separates from England]

[Sidenote: Ernest, King of Hanover]

[Sidenote: Royal breach of faith]

[Sidenote: Revolt at Goettingen]