The Press. — London, England, 1856-05-10 00:00:00

,56 A. Mills, Esq. urray. given a brief but ling Constitution of each British this sketch he has ineil, Acts of Par ports, and Papers adopting the five as the most con classification of titr Mr. Mills' work but he has pre tful essay on our rorthy of attention colonial govern when the actual )m is in a state of re rightly under le general princi -7 in his work on that it by no rersal maxim that )ny is the form of its welfare. As be derived from .bond is discussed rather calculated to Ade the question .e rather inquires ,ws that Eniland colonial depen- Itages which have reasons for maintain that there may be ldvantages result- Our dependencies to this country of gut if they were might in time of commerce, and we those advantages He writes:— argument, that Eng yet the advocates for hare gained not one step object by this concession, ttenance of a colonial empire as it is in very many, to -being of Great Britain. It _.e value of dependencies iplating for a moment the abandonment. if fairly argued conclusions. ty fair in his state ;hen he adopts Lord present condition of West Indian posses 'le theory of self :ys in his " Colo- I regret to sty, is far the possession of the tnst complete security for the good manage seem to suppose. e of argument British colony in which disastrously coexisted with social -Tarnaica is in this respect but dependencies which were tropical products, and are - physical, political, and . In the intelligence, and in strength and comeliness to the withered ; the skeletons of the May we not ask with ve of Mr. Mills, is it [eplorable state of r-government ? Is 'r-ruling action of Would the colo- .holished slavery, trade with slave-pro ruin of those colo argument at all, it resulting from the Had slavery not itish Legislature in 'amaica at this time Cuba? Is the en commonly interior Or why should .~ f THE PRESS. self-government (so-called) in Jamaica be of itself more injurious than in Canada? We call attention to this point only because we think Mr. Mills has not treated it with the fairness he usually displays. Little is said in this book upon India, though the question is becoming of overwhelming magnitude. It cannot be supposed that this country will will ingly consent to be taxed to the extent of two or three millions sterling for the maintenance of that empire, when under a different system it might unquestionably be made to contri bute largely (and with infinite advantage to the people) to meet the expenses of the Impe rial Government. Richard Cromwell and the Restoration of the Stuarts. By M. Guizot. London : Bentley. EVERY Englishman must fuel grateful to M. Guizot for setting before us in so lucid and temperate a manner the events of that turbu lent era which he has undertaken to delineate. The two volumes now published embrace that brief period which intervened between the death of Oliver Cromwell and the inevit able return to power of the Royal dynasty. The first of the two is occupied in narrating the squabbles of the two groat parties into which the revolutionary leaders had all along been divided—the Parliamentarians and the Cromwellians. Compressed by the heavy hand of Oliver, the Republican and Presby terian factions had remained quiet during his lifetime, but they seem to have con sidered his reign as a mere interlude, and as soon as he was removed from the helm they reasserted their claims with undiminished energy. Besides, the party of Republicans, was also the party of the army. Brought up to regard their late successful general with a veneration approaching to idolatry, the soldiers of Naseby and Worcester could not endure the rule of a young coxcomb, as they called him, who had never seen war, and who had given no evidence of the fanatic and enthusiastic courage which would doubtless be required of the warriors of Heaven in the Vale of Armageddon. Before this formidable opposition the partisans of an hereditary despotism were unable to hold their ground; yet it cannot be said that the advice which was given to the young Protector by the friends of his family was deficient in either spirit or sagacity. The Republicans, or Parliamentarians, hated him because he was the representative of a tyrannical Govern ment; the army despised him because he was not a soldier. Richard's counsellors saw clearly enough that the army was the most dangerous of the two, and they advised him to make it evident to the former that their only safeguard against a military despotism lay in himself. Now, from whatever cause it arose— whether from simple weakness, whether be cause at heart he was a Cavalier, or whether ' from a native epicureanism, which prompted him, not indeed to throw power from him, but to hold it only as long as he could hold it without a struggle—however this might be, Richard steadily refused to adopt any decisive measure ; and Faulconbridge, Howard, and Broghill, who saw that monarchy of some sort —that is to say, the rule of one man—was in dispensable, at once turned their thoughts towards the restoration of the Stuarts. Monk was the man upon whom the eyes of all moderate politicians were now turned ; and M. Guizot's second volume is almost entirely taken up with a narrative of his proceedings. We venture to think that in this portion of his work the historian is a little tedious. All Monk's sinuous course of conduct is followed out with laborious minuteness, till we come at length fully to share in the disgust and des pondency of the Royalists, and learn to doubt his intentions even at the eleventh hour. Nor has M. Guizot offered us any solution of this singular behaviour. The revolutionary party in Britain was exhausted ; the whole country was in a state of anarchy and incipient law lessness, from which the people would have hailed the advent of King Charles IL as their natural deliverer. The intentions of the Court of France were not dubious ; they would side with the most promising party. Holland and Spain were both devotedly attached to the Stuarts. And it is difficult to account fur Monk's conduct Lin auy other way than by 447 supposing he was determined to enhance his own importance as much, and retain the thread of affairs iu his own hands as long, as pos sible. Of Richard Cromwell s foreign policy M. Guizot says but little; and, in so far as he had no definite policy ut his own, but merely followed in the road which his father had laid down, doubtless our author is iu the right. Yet a few words on the Peace of the Pyrenees would not have been out of place. That was the culminating point of his father's policy, and interesting as the foundation of French ascendancy in Europe, and also as affording a direct contradiction to those laudations which it is the fashion to bestow upon Oliver's pa- triotism and foresight. In allying himself with France against Spain. he sacrificed the balance of power to his own private animosity. Had he exercised a cool and unbiassed judg went, he must have seen that the days of Spanish dominion were over, and that it was the part of a wise statesman to fortify that kingdom against France, rather than France against her. But the Court of Madrid had protected the Stuarts, and given employment to their followers, and that was an unpardon able offence to which all considerations of policy must bend. The illustrative letters published at the end of each volume will be found a valuable accessory to M. Guizot's work. They are principally from M. de Bordeaux, the French Ambassador at London, to Cardinal Mazarin, and show that France was watching the course of events, and prepared, as above stated, to side with whichever party promised best for herself. At Home and Abroad ; or, Things and Thoughts in America and Europe. By Margaret Fuller Ossoli. London : Sampson Low and Co. A WEAKMINDED woman trying to pass for a strong one is a type of character too often met with in American society. The absence of a leisure class amongst the men, and their devotion to " almighty dollars," casts the cultivation of the softer sex into exaggerated relief; and hence amongst clever American women there is an aiming after the style which a De Stael or a Roland might have affected, supposing them to have been born and bred in the States. The authoress of this thick book of travels is a fair specimen of the lite rary American woman, prone to transcendental rhetoric and to gushing effusions of sympathy with the universid wrongs of Christendom. Her book has in some parts such ridiculous exaggerations as almost to justify severe treat ment ; but the knowledge of her melancholy death by shipwreck, when in sight of her native shore, blunts a critical pen. The character of Mme. Ossoli seems to us to have been well discerned by Cooper, the American novelist, in some elegiac verses on her lamentable end : High hopes and bright thine early path bedecked, And aspirations beautiful though wild— A heart too strong, a powerful will unchecked, A dream that earth things could be undefiled. But soon around thee grew a golden chain, That bound the woman to more human things, And taaght with joy—and it may be with paint — That there are limits e'en to spirit's wings. Extravagant enthusiasm is not a crime, though the world often treats it as such ; but Mme. Fuller Ossoli only reminds us of the philan thropic platitudes of the platform. We cannot discern any real originality in her writings. Her sensibility is of the wordy kind, and her powers of description were scarcely second rate. Here is her description of Niagara : We have been here eight days, and I am quite willing to go away. So great a sight soon satisfies, making ns con tent with itself. and with what is less than itself. Oar desires once realised haunt us again less readily. Having lived one day," we would depart, and become worthy to live another. We have not been fortunate in weather, for there cannot be too mach or too warm sunlight for this scene, and the skies have been louring with cold unkind winds. My nerves, too much braced up by such an atmosphere, do not well boar the continual stress of sight anl sound. For here there is no escape from the weight of a perpetual creation ; all other forms and motions come and go, the tide rises and recedes, the wind at its mightiest moves in gales and gusts, but here is really an incessant, an inde fatigible motion. Awake or asleep there is no escape, still this rushing round you and through you. It is in this way MAy 10, 1856. $ Ituaturt Colonial Constitutions. By A. London : Murray. I N this volume Mr. Mills has (riv( su fficient sketch of the existing and form of Government of Dependency. To illustrate this collected the Orders in Council, liament, Parliamentary Reports, relating to each Dependency, ado great divisions of the world as t ventent arrangement for the chi these Dependencies. So far M is little more than routine, but fixed to his details a thoughtful colonial empire, peculiarly worth , at a time when principles of col ment are very unsettled, and wht working of our colonial system it transition. Mr. Mills, if we ri stand him, rather leans to the gl plea enunciated by Earl Grey in colonial policy, and argues th means holds good as a universal the self-government of a colony i government best suited to its regards the advantages to be colonies, the question of cui bone by Mr. Mills in a manner rather stimulate thought than to settle by his own conclusions. He ra than determines. He shows does not derive from her col , denies one of those advantage: generally been urged as reasons ng them, but he indicates that t negative as well as positive advat ing from colonial empire. Our are maintained at a cost to tl three millions annually ; but severed from us their ports migl war be closed against our coma might be excluded from thos , which we at present possess. H Let it be conceded, for the sake of argu land receives nothing in return, and yet the abandonment of colonies will have ga towards the attainment of their object by if it shall appear that the maintenance of is essential in any one respect, as it is it the national influence and well-being of C is impossible fair') to appreciate the value to a parent State without contemplating fi inevitable consequences of their abandon This is a logical view, and if out would lead to important con( Mr. Mills, who is usually fair meats, does not seem so when h( Grey's argument that the presen Jamaica, and our other West It sions, is unfavorable to the t.l government. Lord Grey says i nial Policy " : The actual condition of Jamaica, I rev from being such as to show that the powers of self-government affords tnat for the welfare of a community and for tl runt of affairs which many persons seem Mr. Mills follows up this line of Bat Jamaica is not the only British seltgovernment " has disastrously coez and political retrogression. Jamaica is it too accurate a type of all those dependen once the flourishing fields of tropical p now fast relapsing into a state of physic moral wilderness. . • • West Indian colonies, the wealth, into' dastry which once gave strength and c body politic, are shrunk and withered ; th , ancient Constitutions only remain. May oat irreverence, Can thew cones live ?" We appeal to the candour of Al fair to refer the present depict the West Indies to their self-gov( it not the result of the over-rul the Imperial Government? We vies themselves have first aboli and then sanctioned free trade v d ueing countries. If the ruin 4 nies is to be used as an argon must be to show the evils result want of self-government. Had been abolished by the British I !males, why might not Jamaica have been as flourishing as Cuba tepnse of English settlers comn to that of Spanish settlers? a _ -