spout on the instant a lyric or tragic chef d'œuvre. A vigorous and disciplined mind may strike off an eloquent harangue extempore on an emergency; but the practice of composition. is not the less useful, as it assists the talent of haranguing ex abundantia, or of expressing, with effect, a happy inspiration, or of improvising a reply. A certain fluency without premeditation is easy and common. Some gentlemen in the House of Commons, upon the strength of a mere volubility of speech-a certain shallow, babbling, current of the common places of discourse-fancy themselves orators. The worst inconvenience from this is the waste of the public time. A gentleman having got upon his legs, continues upon them for an hour, talking, repeating, and reiterating, to little or no purpose. Had he but taken the trouble of an hour's previous consideration, a speech of half a quarter of an hour would have sufficed, and better served him; or he would, perhaps, say nothing, having found, on examination, that he had nothing to say. We do not know a more necessary matter of reform, or regulation, in the House of Commons, than that of measuring and limiting the time of a speech by the importance of the subject, and the stock of ideas of the speaker. But such a reform is most difficult, if not impracticable. The klepsydra was employed by the Athenians-the sandglass was resorted to for a moment, and laid aside, by the French in the first national assembly. We are not prepared to recommend a chronometrical standard, or scale, in the reformed parliament: but it strikes us that much would be gained by consigning to the disposal of working committees much of the subordinate and routine business, now transacted by the House. We will add but one observation more-the duty of providing sufficiently spacious galleries for the public to witness the debates in the new House of Commons, is urgent and paramount.

65

ARTICLE III.

Speech of the Emperor Nicholas to the Municipal Body at Warsaw.

The Portfolio; or, a Collection of State Papers, illustrative of the History of our Times. London: 1835. MSS. Papers at the Literary Association of the Friends of Poland.

POLAND exhibits an ancient state up-rooted by its aggressors— its nationality suppressed—its religion persecuted-its aristocracy banished or degraded-its people in chains; and it awakens the sympathy of every friend of humanity. The heroic struggle of the Poles affords the bright example of a people endeavouring, with unequal means, to maintain constitutional liberty against despotic licentiousness-to oppose European civilisation to Tartar barbarism; it shews them wanderers from their native land, wielding the weapons of truth and justice, waging a moral war, against the disciplined power of their adversaries, and it kindles the enthusiasm of every friend of social liberty.

We are deeply sensible, under these circumstances, of the responsibility which attaches to us in again approaching this question. The cause of Poland can derive no benefit from the support of the political bigot; it can acquire no real strength from the promoters of anarchy. But we are anxious to extend, not to narrow, the circle of Poland's friends; and without compromising an important principle, or suppressing an essential fact, we shall study to avoid every expression that may either wound the feelings of the gallant exiles, or lead us from the broad national ground we seek to occupy, in humbly advocating their rights, into the narrow path of party feeling.

We are desirous, however, to guard against the error which induces many to suppose that the national rights of Poland are based solely on the treaty of Vienna-that her wrongs would be redressed if that treaty were fully carried into effect. By the treaty of Vienna,

The Duchy of Warsaw, with the exception of the provinces and districts which have been otherwise disposed of in the following articles, is re-united to

the Empire of Russia. It shall be irrevocably bound EY ITS CONSTITUTION, and be possessed by His Majesty the Emperor of all the Russias, his heirs, and successors, in perpetuity. His Imperial Majesty reserves to himself to give to this STATE enjoying a distinct administration, the territorial extension he shall deem fit. He will take, with his other titles, that of Czar, KING OF POLAND, according to the customary formula used for his other possessions.

The Polish subjects of Russia, Austria, and Prussia, shall obtain a representation and national institutions, regulated according to the mode of political existence which each of the governments to which they belong shall judge useful and fitting to grant them.

Such is the article, in virtue of which a constitution was conferred upon the Duchy of Warsaw by the Emperor Alexander. But the Polish nation was not represented at the Congress of Vienna, and the Poles of the Duchy of Warsaw, in submitting to the charter offered to them, did not for themselves or their fellow countrymen abandon their higher claims to a separate and independent national existence. The rights of Poland, therefore, rest now on the same basis as in the year 1772. The partition in that year was the dis"memberment of the territory of a numerous, brave, ancient, "and renowned people; passionately devoted to their native "land, without colour of right, or pretext of offence; in a "period of profound peace, in defiance of the law of nations, "and of the common interest of all states+." A full measure of justice will not be awarded to her, the splendid robbery perpetrated by her powerful neighbours will remain unavenged, till Poland is restored to the position in the European family she occupied previously to that partition.

In this view of the Polish question we are supported by the authority of Lord Grey in his celebrated letter to the patriot Kosciuszko in the year 1814-a letter which we do not apologise to our readers for transcribing here.

66 GENERAL, I request you to accept my thanks for your letter of the 20th of May, which was delivered to me by Count Krukowiecki, and for the flattering expressions with which you have been pleased to honour me.

"Be assured that it is impossible to take a deeper interest than I do in the fate of Poland. The calamities of that brave but unfortunate people—their constancy and their virtues, of which you, General, have given personally so illustrious an example, cannot fail to excite the sympathy of hearts truly imbued with the principles of humanity and justice.

"I am convinced that an enlightened policy is equally favourable to their just claims. To the first violation of the sacred principles of general liberty

• Treaty of Vienna, 9th June, 1815.

+ Edinburgh Review, Vol. XXXVII., p. 463.

which took place in the partition of Poland in 1772, and those which followed in 1793 and 1795, ought to be attributed all the dangers to which the whole of Europe has since been exposed, and from which we have so happily escaped. There can exist no real security against the return of these dangers, if Poland remain excluded from the benefit of the general deliverance, which, in order to be perfect, ought to he guaranteed by the solemn recognition of the rights and the independence of nations.

"If the Powers which seek to profit by the injustice, and which in the sequel have suffered so much, could learn the true lesson from experience, they would perceive that their security and their mutual tranquillity would be better preserved by re-establishing among them, as a state truly independent, that country which a false policy has so cruelly oppressed.

"These sentiments, General, are profoundly engraven in my soul; and you may be assured, that, in order to declare them loudly, I shall neglect no occasion in which I may believe I can do so with effect. If, during the late debates in Parliament, I have not dwelt so much on this subject as I could have desired, THIS PROCEEDS FROM THE CERTAINTY WHICH I HAD, THAT I COULD IN NO WAY INFLUENCE THE POLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT: and the fear of adding, perhaps, to the dangers which threaten the fate of a people, whose cause is so dear to me, but whom present circumstances deprive me of all hope of serving.

"Receive the most sincere assurances of my respect and my admiration, and believe me, General, "Your very faithful and humble servant,

Sixteen years passed away, and Lord Grey-the friend of Kosciuszko was prime minister of England. The Poles had commenced a struggle as sacred and as glorious as their former wars. The "principles of humanity and justice""the rights "and the independence of nations"-pleaded for them as strongly then as formerly. The violation-the mockery of solemn treaties to which England was a party-the national honour and interests-called loudly for the vindication of the country's insulted dignity. Yet the pen which describes the exertions of Lord Castlereagh at the congress of Vienna, on behalf of the Polish people, will record the speech of a distinguished member of Lord Grey's administration against the Polish cause, and point to the cold indifference with which his government looked on while Poland almost sunk into her tomb. As sincere friends of freedom, as zealous advocates for the establishment of peace in Europe on a permanent basis, we mourn over the policy adopted at that period. As independent journalists, we seek neither to conceal or palliate a political crime.

The charter granted by Russia to the Duchy of Warsaw, secured, nevertheless, important privileges to the people of that portion of ancient Poland. Had those privileges been respected, political freedom might have been gradually extended, so as to include within its limits all the dissevered parts of the Nation, and a constitutional effort in the Diet, instead of a sanguinary contest in the field, might, in the lapse of time, have effected the regeneration of the country. It becomes of importance, therefore, at the present time, and with reference to the speech* recently pronounced by the Emperor Nicholas, to state the leading provisions of the constitution promised to the Duchy of Warsaw, and to show how that constitution was trampled upon, before the Poles were driven to resistance by the merciless tyranny which oppressed them. We shall, for the convenience of reference, anticipate the course of events, by placing in juxta-position with an abstract of the Charter the substance of the "Organic Statute," as it was called, by which the Emperor Nicholas, after the late war, published to Europe his contempt for international treaties, and formally tore the seal from the compact-already violated in its more important provisions-which bound the Poles to his Muscovite dominions.

+ Polonia. Polish Miscellany. Mémoires de Michel Oginski, Vol. IV.