Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

CHAP. XI.

SWEDEN. NETHERLANDS.-Concordat with the Pope concluded— Progress of the Insurrection in Java.- SAXONY.-BRUNSWICK. BAVARIA.-Law against Duelling.-PRUSSIA-Organization of the Provincial Estates.-AUSTRIA-Dissolution of the Hungarian Diet. -RUSSIA-Opening of the Campaign against Persia-Erivan besieged, and the Siege raised-Abbas Abad besieged-Battle of Djeuen Boulak-Battle of Etchmiazine-Sardar Abad surrenders-Erivan again besieged and taken-The Russians enter Tauris-Preliminaries of Peace signed-The Schah refuses to ratify them-Levy of Troops throughout the Russian Empire.

[merged small][ocr errors]

enjoy undisturbed repose. A census of the population of Norway, which had been begun in the preceding year, was completed. The number of inhabitants was found to be 1,050,132. The Storthing, with its usual sturdiness, refused to gratify some of the royal wishes, and exposed itself to words of reproof. It declined, in particular, to grant the sum of two hundred and eighty thousand dollars which his majesty had requested for continuing, during the next three years, the building of the royal palace. The Storthing alleged, as the principal reason of their refusal, the declining prosperity of the kingdom. They were willing, they said, that every thing should be done for the accommodation of his majesty, but added plainly, that they thought the proposed plan too extensive and costly. The king told them in return, that their present language was contradicted by the view of the state of the kingdom given at the opening of the session; that he could not approve of their reasons for suspending a work already begun,

that, if foreign trade had decreased, they should be the more anxious to find employment for the people at home, which might be done without increasing the debt; that the overplus of the revenue in the last three years clearly proved the care of the government in this respect; that even the most powerful nations had suffered a stagnation in their foreign trade, and Norway could not hope to escape the effects of it. His majesty did not easily forget their obstinacy; and, when, in the month of September, they sent him up a very dutiful and loyal address on the birth of a prince, expressing their hopes "that the young shoots of the noble royal stem will become flourishing trees, bidding defiance to storms, under whose shades the inhabitants of the peninsula will enjoy the blessings of civilization, liberty, and virtue," the king, while he thanked them for the attachment thus rhetorically manifested, told them, that he had observed, not without surprise, some resolutions of the Storthing, which did not appear to be con

sistent with the fundamental laws of the kingdom: that he already knew his own duties, as well as the sentiments of the nation, and would, by-and-by, take those of the Storthing into his consideration.

In the Netherlands, the most important transaction of the year was the final conclusion of a concordat between the government and the pope, settling the mode of appointing the great dignitaries of the church in the Catholic provinces. By this convention, it was provided, in the first place, that, whenever an archiepiscopal or episcopal see should become vacant, the chapter should transmit to the king, within one month from the notification of the vacancy, the names of the persons whom they might think proper to propose as candidates. Secondly, if, among these candidates there should be any persons "not agreeable to the king," their names were to be erased from the list, and their place supplied by others whom his majesty might esteem unobjectionable. From the list From the list thus made up, the chapter was then to elect the new prelate, according to the canonical forms, and communicate the result to his holiness within one month from the date of the election. Thirdly, the pope, on being informed of the election, was to order an inquiry into the condition of the see, and the qualifications of the prelate elect. If, after having received the result of this inquiry, his holiness should be satisfied with the qualifications of the presentee, he was to grant him canonical institution by apostolical letters in the established form, and with the least possible delay. If, on the contrary, the election should not

have been conducted in the canonical form, or if the candidate should not be judged by his holiness to possess the necessary qualifications, the sovereign pontiff, "by special favour," was to grant to the chapter the power of proceeding to a new election.

In the ratification by the pope, it was specially declared that every archbishop or bishop of the kingdom of the Netherlands, after receiving canonical institution from the apostolic see, should, before entering on the exercise of his functions, take the oath of allegiance to the king of the Netherlands in the following terms:"I swear and promise, on the Holy Gospels, obedience and fidelity to his majesty the king of the Netherlands, my legitimate sovereign. I promise also not to have any communication, to assist at no council, to maintain no suspicious correspondence, within or without the kingdom, which may be hurtful to the public tranquillity; and that if I should learn that any intrigues prejudicial to the state are carrying on in my diocese, or elsewhere, I will disclose it to the king my master."The same oath was to be taken by ecclesiastics of the second order, before the civil authorities appointed by the king; and that there might be no doubt with respect to the form of prayer, it was modified thus:- Domine Salvum fac Regem nostrum Gulielmum.” The bishops were to retain the free nomination and election of their vicars-general.

In addition to the existing sees of Malines, Liege, Namur, Tournay, and Ghent, three new ones were erected, viz.: Bruges, Amsterdam, and Bois le Duc. Of these eight dioceses, Malines was

to be the metropolitan, and the other seven the suffragans. The concordat provided, that each diocese should have its seminary for the education of churchmen. In these seminaries, such a number of young men was to be supported, lodged, and educated, as the bishop might think proportioned to the wants of the diocese. Their stu

dies were not to be confined to theology, and its kindred departments of erudition; for it was of the utmost importance that men intended for the service of the church should be accomplished in all human learning, "so that they might be," as his holiness expressed it, "models in society, and ready to answer every question." The bishops, therefore, were to establish in their seminaries all the professorships which they might judge necessary for the complete instruction of their clergy. The doctrine, discipline, instruction, education, and administration of the seminaries were put under the authority of the bishops, who might admit the clergy to the seminaries, or dismiss them, choose the rector and professors, and discharge them if they should see occasion. The king gave assurances, that he would provide liberally hoth for the existing seminaries and for those which should be established; but the convention itself did not contain any stipulation directed towards that object. It was only in regard to the system of clerical education that the king had yielded much. He long insisted that it should be imperative on candidates for the sacerdotal office in the Catholic church, to attend the schools of the philosophical colleges, as they were called. He gave up the point, and consented that their studies should

be regulated by their ecclesiastical superiors; and the pope, in return, proclaimed how much it was their duty to learn every thing. This concordat did not give the king a direct veto in the appointment of the prelate; he could not object to the individual whom the chapter might elect. But he had a substantial power of prohibition indirectly, for he might object to any one, or every one, of the persons, from among whom that individual was to be chosen. Every name not agreeable to the king" was to be erased from the list.

In the eastern dominions of the Netherlands, the insurrection of the natives still continued formidable. Djupo, or Dopó Negoro, who had put himself at the head of the insurgents, proved a skilful and indefatigable adversary, and pursued a system of warfare well calculated to exhaust the government troops, scattered over many positions. After the victory which he gained in the autumn of 1826, the Dutch authorities ordered the garrison of Padang, on the west coast of Sumatra, to Batavia, and all the disposable troops, which could be obtained from the neighbouring colonies, were summoned to the scene of action. Not satisfied with this, they set at liberty the old sultan of Djocjocarta, whom they had dethroned and imprisoned, conducted him to his capital, and re-invested him with authority, with the view that he might both prevent further defection, and be their mediator with the insurgents who were already in the field. Having received, in the meantime, a small reinforcement of troops from Europe, they applied themselves to dislodge the enemy from some of the strong positions which he occupied, and

succeeded, in the beginning of October, in carrying and burning some of his rude fortifications. On the 15th, a more general engage ment took place in the neighbourhood of Socracarta, the insurgents, whom the Dutch accounts made to amount to four thousand men, being commanded by Negoro in person. After a severe contest, Negoro retired; but the Dutch either did not dare, or were not able to follow him; for he immediately advanced again, and took up an almost inaccessible position on the mountain Merapie. The setting in of the rainy season put a stop to any further operations.

In April of the present year, the Dutch forces again took the field, divided into moveable columns, to oppose at as many different points as possible the detached bodies in which the insurgents conducted their warfare; and in the end of that month, and the beginning of May, several engagements, or rather skirmishes, took place, in which the Dutch uniformly claimed the advantage. On the 27th of April, colonel Vexela attacked one body in the neighbourhood of Padjung; though he succeeded in making them retreat, he allowed that they displayed great firmness, and maintained their ground against a heavy fire of musquetry, till they were broken by a charge with the bayonet. Colonel Cocchius, who commanded in Djocjocarta itself, was equally successful in an assault which he made, on the 7th of May, on a corps of the rebels who had advanced within a dangerous distance of the city; but on this occasion, too, they reserved their fire till the Dutch troops were within an hundred yards of them, when they opened it with great effect; and

the colonel's success was at last principally owing to his being able to bring artillery to bear upon them. But these partial successes tended in no degree to crush, scarcely to remove, the danger; the insurgents no sooner retired from one point, than they appeared, often in greater force, upon another; allowing their enemy no repose, in a climate which was illfitted to harden European troops to extraordinary fatigue. In the course of July they had made such progress, that, they attacked the strong post of Passer Gede, a position of the utmost importance to the defence of Djocjocarta, assaulted various points in the immediate vicinity of the city itself, and penetrated even to what is called the Chinese camp. The Dutch commander marched against them on the 15th. The action was warmly contested. The insurgents retired; but, in their retreat, they several times took up new positions, till compelled to move further off by repeated charges of cavalry and the fire of the artillery. Four days afterwards, however, they were on the same ground, attacked the same position, and were again repelled. It seemed evident that nothing but strong reinforcements from Europe would enable the Dutch commanders to break through the circle which was gradually closing round them, and overcome that spirit of resistance among the natives which the very duration of the insurrection tended so much to foster. The government at home was not inattentive to this state of affairs, and the budget of the year was considerably increased to maintain its tottering power in the East. A loan was raised for the service of these colonies; the mother country was compelled, in

the mean time, to take upon herself even the burthen of the interest. In the beginning of the year several vessels were despatched from Holland with troops. Part of these reinforcements arrived at Java in the month of August. Their appearance gave a more favourable aspect to the affairs of Holland. Negoro proposed to enter into negotiations; the Dutch authorities accepted of the offer, even though it came from a declared rebel, with arms in his hand, a sufficient proof that they did not promise themselves any very certain success in continuing the contest, and the military operations were, in the mean time, provisionally suspended.

The king of Saxony, Frederick Augustus IV, died at Dresden, on the 5th of May, in the 77th year of his age. He had long ceased to take an active part in politics, or even in the ordinary recreations of life. He was not distinguished by any brilliant qualities, but he was respected by his subjects as a good, worthy, pious, man. He had been called to the government in 1763, when he was only thirteen years old, under the guardianship of his uncle, prince Xavier of Saxony and Poland. He assumed the reins of government himself as elector, in 1768. He was the first sovereign of Saxony in whose person the electoral was raised to the regal dignity. Buonaparte bestowed on him the title of king in 1806, and extended his sovereignty to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. The allies, while they stripped him, not only of the Polish duchy, but even of a portion of his hereditary German dominions, allowed him to retain his regal title. He was succeeded by prince Anthony Clement, who was already seyenty-two years old.

Among the minor princes of Germany, the duke of Brunswick signalized himself by seeking a foolish quarrel with his relation the king of England, and rendered himself ridiculous by the mode in which he seemed inclined to bring it to an issue. When the father of the duke fell at Quatre Bras, he and his brother were left to the guardianship of his Britannic majesty; under his majesty's control had their education been conducted, and their states governed.

age,

The duke, having come of and entered on the exercise of his authority, issued a proclamation containing a very preposterous and foul-mouthed attack upon the king, and his Hanoverian minister, count Munster, to whom the affairs of Brunswick had more particularly been confided. He accused them not only of having mismanaged his education, of which, to be sure, his present conduct was no bad proof, but likewise of malversation in the government. He declared, that the last year of his majesty's government had been illegal altogether; and that the decrees and ordinances issued during that period were to be null and void, unless specially ratified by himself. The ministry of Hanover issued a counter-manifesto, stating, "that, with respect to the duration of the guardianship, his majesty had been guided by the deliberate advice of the first officers of state, and experienced officers of Brunswick, and had acted in perfect unison with the courts of Austria and Prussia, whose friendly advice he had requested on this subject;

that the beneficent effects of his majesty's guardianship had been acknowledged with the most cordial gratitude by the authorities and subjects;"-and that his ma

« ElőzőTovább »