The Press.
London, England, 1854-01-14 00:00:00

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salaries, souu accumulate large fortunes;
' functionaries are often not proof against
f a handsome woman, or a magnificent
for their wives or daughters. The Elu-
-1 a moment of irritation at some great
he had discovered in the naval stores,
•w where to hide them, they would
the line; if they could draw my teeth
me, they would extract them during the

The accession of Nicholas; the strange ne-
gotiations that passed between him and Con-
stantine, in which each brother sought to
decline the burden of empire ; the secret
intrigues by which Alexander's life was
shortened, and which broke out when the
throne became vacant ; the final revolt, its
suppression, and the heroic death of the in-
surgents, arc an often-told tale : yet uo narrator
has told them better than our author ; and he
seems to do equal justice to both parties. Of
the Autocrat himself, whose ambition now
threatens European peace, the following por-
trait will by most persons be thought too
flattering. In the opening sentences he is
contrasted with the Czar Peter, undoubtedly
the only Russian Sovereign who can bear com-
parison with him in point of energy and
talent :
Nicholas, on the other hand, is essentially Russian in
all his ideas. He is heart and soul patriotic, not merely
in wish, but in spirit and thought. He wishes to improve
and elevate his country, and he has done much to effect
that noble object ; but he desires to do so by developing,
not changing, the national spirit, by making it become a
first Russia, not a second France or England. He has
adopted the maxim of Montesquieu, that no nation ever
attained to real greatness but by institutions in conformity
with its spirit.

• • •
The improvements he has effected in the government of
his dominions have been vast, the triumphs with which
his external policy have been attended unbounded
they have all been achieved, not in imitation of, but in
opposition to, the ideas of Western Europe. They be-
speak, not less than his internal government, the national
character of his policy. But if success is the test of
worldly wisdom, he has not been far wrong in his system ;
for he has passed the Balkan, heretofore impervious to
his predecessors; he has conquered Poland, converted the
Euxiue into a Russian lake, planted the cross on the
bastions of Erivan, and opened through subdued Hungary
a path to Constantinople.
Nature has given him all the qualities fitted for such
an elevated destiny. A lofty stature and princely air
give additional influence to a majestic countenance, in
which the prevailing character is resolution, yet not un-
mixed with sweetness. Like Wellington, Caesar, and
many other of the greatest men recorded in history, his
expression has become more intellectual as he advanced in
years, and became exercised in the duties of sovereignty,
instead of the stern routine of military discipline. Ex-
emplary in all the relations of private life, a faithful hus-
band, an affectionate father, he has exhibited in a brilliant
court, and when surrounded by every temptation which
life can offer, the simplicity and affections of patriarchal
life. Yet he is not a perfect character. His virtues often
border upon vices. His excellences are akin to defects.
Deeply impressed with the responsibility of his situation,
his firmness has sometimes become sternness, his sense of
justice degenerated into severity. He knows how to
distinguish the innocent from the guilty, and has often
evinced a noble and magnanimous spirit in separating the
one from the other, and showing oblivion of injury, even
kindness to the relatives of those who had conspired
against his throne and life. But towards the guilty
themselves he has not been equally compassionate. He
has not always let the passions of the :mutest pass away
with its termination. He is an Alexander the Great in
resolution, but not iti magnanimity. He wants the last
grace in time heroic character—he does not know how to
forgive.
The Russian revenues are small in propor-
tion to population and area, not exceeding
twenty millions sterling ; but the debt is
likewise trifling, salaries are low, and the
necessaries of life cheap. Before quitting this
subject we quote, though protesting against,
the opinion of Sir Archibald on the future of
the Muscovite empire :
She is probably not intended to shine in the career of
civilisation. Her sons will not, at least for long, rival the
arts of Italy or the chivalry of France, the intellect of
England or the imagination of Germany. There will be
no Shakspeares or Miltons, no Itacines or Compiles, no
Taasos or Raphaels, no Schillers or Goethes, amidst the
countless millions of her boundless territory; but there
may be—there will be—an Alexander, an Attila, a Timonr.
Literature, science, the arts, are the efflorescence of
civilisation ; but, in the moral not less than the physical
world, efflorescence is succeeded by decline, the riches
of the harvest border on the decoy of autumn. There
is a winter in nations as well as in seasons; the vulture
and the eagle are required to cleanse the moral not less
than the physical world. If the glories of civilisation
are denied to Russia, she is saved from its corruption ; if
she does not exhibit the beauties of summer, she i,
stained by its consequent decay. Hardened by snifei
inured to privation, compelled to struggle eternally unit
the seventies of climate, the difficulties of space, the

40
Met moderate salari
and even elevated fun
the seductions of a
Cashmere shawl for
peror Alexander, in
dilapidation which I
said, " If they kne,
steal my ships of th
without wakening in
night."
_ __ •