no other claffes were regarded. The great merit of Buonaparte has been that of a skilful steersman, who with his boat in the most violent storm still keeps himself on the fummit of the waves, which not he, but the winds had raised. I will now proceed to my translation.

"That Charles was a hero, his exploits bear evidence. The fubjugation of the Lombards, protected as they were by the Alps, by fortreffes and fortified towns, by numerous armies, and by a great name; of the Saxons, fecured by their savage refoluteness, by an untameable love of freedom, by their defert plains and enormous forefts, and by their own poverty; the humbling of the Dukes of Bavaria, Aquitania, Bretagne, and Gascony; proud of their ancestry as well as of their ample domains; the almost entire extirpation of the Avars, so long the terror of Europe; are affuredly works which demanded a courage and a firmness of mind such as Charles only poffeffed.

"How great his reputation was, and this too beyond the limits of Europe, is proved by the embaffies fent to him out of Perfia, Palestine, Mauritania, and even from the Khalifs of Bagdad. If at the present day an embaffy from the Black or Cafpian Sea comes to a prince on the Baltic, it is not to be wondered at, fince fuch are now the political relations of the four quarters of the world, that a blow which is given to any one of them is felt more or less by all the others. Whereas in the times of Charlemagne, the inhabitants in one of

the known parts of the world scarcely knew what was going on in the reft. Nothing but the extraordinary, all-piercing, report of Charles's exploits could bring this to pass. His greatness, which fet the world in astonishment, was likewife, without doubt, that which begot in the Pope and the Romans the first idea of the re-establishment of their empire.

"It is true, that a number of things united to make Charles a great man-favourable circumstances of time, a nation already difciplined to warlike habits, a long life, and the confequent acquifition of experience, such as no one possessed in his whole realm. Still, however, the principal means of his greatness Charles found in himself. His great mind was capable of extending its attention to the greatest multiplicity of affairs. In the middle of Saxony he thought on Italy and Spain, and at Rome he made provifions for Saxony, Bavaria, and Pannonia. He gave audience to the ambassadors of the Greek emperor and other potentates, and himself audited the accounts of his own farms, where every thing was entered even to the number of the eggs. Bufy as his mind was, his body was not less in one continued state of motion. Charles would fee into every thing himself, and do every thing himself, as far as his powers extended: and even this it was, too, which gave to his undertakings fuch force and energy.

"But with all this the government of Charles was the government of a conqueror, that is fplen

did abroad and fearfully oppreffive at home. What a grievance must it not have been for the people, that Charles for forty years together dragged them now to the Elbe, then to the Ebro, after this to the Po, and from thence back again to the Elbe, and this not to check an invading enemy, but to make conquests which little profited the French nation! This must prove too much, at length, for a hired foldier how much more for confcripts, who did not live only to fight, but who were fathers of families, citizens, and proprietors? But above all, it is to be wondered at, that a nation, like the French, fhould fuffer themselves to be used as Charles used them. But the people no longer poffeffed any confiderable share of influence. All depended on the great chieftains, who gave their willing fuffrage for endless wars, by which they were always fure to win. They found the best opportunity, under fuch circumstances, to make themselves great and mighty at the expense of the freemen refident within the circle of their baronial courts; and when conquests were made, it was far more for their advantage than that of the monarchy. In the conquered provinces there was a neceffity for dukes, vaffal kings, and different high offices: all this fell to their share.

"I would not fay this if we did not poffefs incontrovertible original documents of those times, which prove clearly to us that Charles's government was an unhappy one for the people, and that this great man, by his actions, laboured to the direct

fubverfion of his firft principles. It was his first pretext to establish a greater equality among the members of his vast community, and to make all free and equal fubjects under a common fovereign. And from the neceffity occafioned by continual war, the exact contrary took place. Nothing gives us a better notion of the interior state of the French monarchy, than the third capitular of the year 811.* All is full of complaint, the bishops and earls clamouring against the freeholders, and these in their turn against the bishops and earls. And in truth the freeholders had no small reason to be difcontented and to refift, as far as they dared, even the imperial levies. A dependant must be content to follow his lord without further questioning: for he was paid for it. But a free citizen, who lived wholly on his own property, might reasonably object to suffer himself to be dragged about in all quarters of the world, at the fancies of his lord: especially as there was so much injustice intermixed. Those who gave up their properties entirely, or in part, of their own accord, were left undisturbed at home, while those, who refused to do this, were forced so often into service, that at length, becoming impoverished, they were compelled by want to give up, or difpofe of, their free tenures to the bishops or earls.t

*

Compare with this the four or five quarto volumes of the French Confcript Code.

+ It would require no great ingenuity to discover parallels, or at least, equivalent hardships to thefe, in the treatment of, and regulations concerning, the reluctant confcripts.

"It almoft furpaffes belief to what a height, at length, the averfion to war rofe in the French nation, from the multitude of the campaigns and the grievances connected with them. The national

vanity was now fatiated by the frequency of victories and the plunder which fell to the lot of individuals, made but a poor compenfation for the loffes and burthens fuftained by their families at home. Some, in order to become exempt from military service, fought for menial employments in the establishments of the bishops, abbots, abbeffes, and earls. Others made over their free property to become tenants at will of fuch lords, as from their age or other circumstances, they thought would be called to no further military fervices. Others even privately took away the life of their mothers, aunts, or other of their relatives, in order that no family refidents might remain through whom their names might be known, and themselves traced; others voluntarily made slaves of themfelves, in order thus to render themselves incapable of the military rank.”

When this extract was first published, namely, September 7, 1809, I prefixed the following fentence. "This paffage contains so much matter for political anticipation and well-grounded hope, that I feel no apprehenfion of the reader's being diffatisfied with its length." I truft, that I may now derive the fame confidence from his genial exultation, as a Christian, and from his honeft pride as a Briton, in the retrospect of its completion. In