The Sun.
London, England, 1859-05-04 00:00:00

RAILWAYS.

Cash. Account.
Orleans
Northern B2l 25 810
New ditto 7OO .. 700
Lyons and Moditerranean 752 50 740

New ditto —
--
Geneva
Southern

Western 475 . , 476 25

Eastern •

540 - .. 535

Sardinian 322 50 .. 315
Austrian ...... 335 .. 428 75

Exchange on London, at sight, paper, 25f. 6c. ; money,
25f. 5c.; three months, paper, 24f. 971 c.; money, 24f. 92ic.

AUSTRIA.

The following is the text of the circular despatch
addressed by Count de Buol, Austrian Minister of
Foreign Affairs, to the Austrian diplomatic agents,
under date of April 29 : •
I send you herewith a copy of the manifesto which the
Emperor, our maeter, has this day addressed to his people.
His Majesty announces to the Empire that he has resolved
to cause the Austrian army to cross the Ticino. The
Cabinet had accepted the last proposition of mediation of
Great Britain, but our adversaries have not followed that
example, and we have accordingly remitted to arms the
defence of our muse. At this solemn moment it is my duty
to expose once again to our representatives abroad the
circumstances against the fatal power of which have failed
all the attempts to maintain European peace which has been
so long and so happily preserved.
" The Court of Turin, in returning an evasive reply to
our summons to disarm, only gave once more a proof of
the same hostility which for too long a time already has had
the triple and unfortunate privilege of combating the sacred
rights of Austria, disquieting Europe, and encouraging the
hopes of the revolution. As this hostility could not be
broken down by the longanimity of Austria, the Empire
was destined to End itself at last under the necessity of
having recourse to arms.
"Austria has tranquilly supported a long series of
offences from an enemy weaker than herself, because sht
knows that her high mission is to preserve as long as pos-
sible the peace of the world, because the Emperor and his
people know and love the labours of a progressive pacific
development, which leads to a higher degree of prosperity.
But no man of just mind and of upright heart can now
doubt the right which Austria has to make war on Pied-
mont:

" Piedmont has never sincerely accepted the treaty by
which, ten years ago, she promised at Milan to live in peace
and friendship with Austria. Twice beaten in war, which
had been caused. by her mad pretensions, and although she
has been cruelly punished, that State still maintains her
former views with a deplorable tenacity. The son of Charles
Albert appears to passionately desire the day when the in-
heritance of his house, which has been restored to it in its
integrity by the moderation and magnanimity of Austria,
should be for the third time made the stake of a game dis-
astrous to the people.
" The ambition of a dynasty whose vain pretensions
affect the future welfare of Italy, and are neither justified
by the nature nor by the history of the country, has not
hesitated to make with the forces of revolution an alliance
contrary to nature. Deaf to all warnings it has surrounded
itself with the malcontents of all the States of Italy, and
the hopes of the enemies of the legitimate governments of
the Italian peninsula have found their chief support at
Turin. A criminal abuse has been made of the national
feelings of the Italian people. Endeavours have been made
to keep up and encourage disturbances in Italy in order that
Piedmont might have a pretext for hypocritically deploring
the state of Italy, and for assuming, in the eyes of short-
sighted and senseless people, the part of liberator.
"To assist this rash undertaking an unbridled press
every day endeavoured to carry beyond the frontiers of the
neighbouring States a moral insurrection against the order
of legitimate things; this state of things no country in Europe
could support without exposing itself in the end to deep
and dangerous excitement. Out of love for those hollow
dreams of the future, and in order to- secure to herself sup-
port from abroad, Piedmont took part in a war in which
she had no concern; against a foreign power, and sacrificed
her soldiers for a foreign object. She was also seen at the
Conferences of Paris with a presumption quite new in the
annals of diplomacy, to criticise with effrontery the Govern-
ments of Italy, her own country—Governments which had
never offended her. •
" But that nobody might believe that these wild depires
and efforts were associated with the least sincere sentiment
in favour of the peaceful prosperity of Italy, the angry pas-
sions of Sardinia redoubled whenever any of the Sovereigns
of Italy followed the inspirations of indulgence and conci-
liation, and whenever the Emperor Francis Joseph gave
signal proofs of his love for his Italian subjects, of his
solicitude for the happiness and progress of the richest and
most favoured countries of Italy.
" When their Imperial Majesties visited the Italian pro-
vinces, receiving the homage of their faithful subjects and
marking their every step by a host of benefits, the journals
of Turin were allowed freely to advocate regicide.
46 When the Emperor confided the administration of
Lombardy and Venice to the Archduke Ferdinand Maxi-
milian, his brother, a prince endowed with high intelligence,
animated by liberal and kindly intentions, and profoundly
sympathising with the true spirit of the Italian people, no
pains were spared at Turin to cause the prince's liable in-
tentions to be repaid with as much ingratitude as could be
produced in a well-disposed nation by odious instigations
incessantly repeated.

" The Court of Turin, having once entered upon the path
in which its only choice v,-3,s either to follow the revolution
or take the lead, could not but more and more lose the
power and the will to observe the laws which regulate the

relations of independent States, or even to recognise any of
the limits imposed by the law of nations on the conduct of
all civilised States. Under the most frivolous pretexts,
Sardinia declares herself liberated from the obligations
clearly imposed by treaties, as proved by the conventions
with Austria and the Italian States for the extradition of
criminals and deserters. Her emissaries overrun the neigh-
bouring States, exciting soldiers to disobey their chiefs,
treading under foot all the rules of military discipline,
Piedmont admitted deserters into the ranks of her own
army.

" Such were the acts of a Government which boasts its
civilising mission, and in whose States there are journalists
whose journals find readers, and who, not content with
simply making the apology of assassination, count their
bleeding victims with fiendish joy.
"'Vho, afterthat, can any longer doubt that this Govern-
ment regarded as the chiefobstacle the rights which Austria
derives from treaties, and accordingly sought to get rid of
them by all the means of an underhand policy ? The true in-
tentions of Piedmont, which had long ceased to be a secret
to any one, were openly avowed, as soon as that State was
sufficiently assured of foreign assistance, and had no fur-
ther necessity for masking its projects of war and revolu-
tion. Europe, which sees in the respect of existing treaties
the palladium of its repose, received with well- merited dis-
favour the declaration containing the assertion that Sar-
dinia considered herself attacked by Austria, because Aus-
tria would not relinquish the exercise of rights and duties
conferred by treaties ;—because she maintained her right to
keep a garrison in Piacenza, a right guaranteed by the great
powers of Europe ; and because she presumed to form alli-
ances with other sovereigns of the Peninsula for the com-
mon defence of their legitimate interests. There remained
but one other pretext, and that was alleged accordingly. The
cabinet of Turin declares that all remedies for the state
of Italy would be mere palliatives, so long as the Aus
trian domination extended over the Italian soil. This
was an open attack on the territorial possessions of Austria,
exceeding the utmost limit to which a power like Austria
could tolerate the provocations of a less powerful state
without an appeal to arms. Such is, stripped of the tissue
of falsehoods with which it was enveloped, the truth respect-
ing the line of conduct which for ten years past the house
of Savoy has followed at the suggestion of unprincipled ad-
visers. Be it said, also, that the accusations and reproaches
by which the Sardinian Cabinet endeavours to present
under a false light its attacks on Austria are nothing but
wicked calumnies.

" Austria is a Conservative power, with whom religion, 1,
morality, and historical right are sacred. It knows how to
estimate, to protect, and to weigh in the scales of equality
what is noble and legitimate in the national spirit of the
people. In her extensive dominions reside nations of diffe-
rent races and of different languages ; the Emperor em-
braces them all in the same love, and their union under the
sceptre of our august dynasty is advantageous to the whole
of the great family of European nations ; but the pretension
of forming new States, according to the limits of nationa-
lities, is the most dangerous of all utopian schemes.
" To put forward such a pretension is to break with his-
tory ; and to seek to carry it into execution in any point of
Europe is to shake to its foundations the firmly organised
order of States, and to threaten the Continent with over-
throw and chaos. Europe feels this, and she attaches her-
self the more firmly to the territorial division fixed by the
Congress of Vienna at the close of an epoch of continental
wars with as much regard as possible to historical condi-
tions. There is not a power whose possessions are more
legitimate than those in Italy restored to the House of
Hapsburg by the Congress which re-established the king-
dom of Sardinia, and made it the brilliant present of Genoa.
" Lombardy has been for centuries a fief of the empire
of Germany; Venice was given to Austria in exchange
for her giving up her Belgian provinces. Thus, there-
fore, what the Cabinet of Turin calls the true reason
of the discontent of the inhabitants of Lombardo-Venetia,
namely, the domination of Austria on the Po and
on the Adriatic, is a solid and unquestionable right in every
respect, and one which the Austrian eagles will preserve
from all attack. But it is not only a legitimate Government
—it is a just and benevolent one, which administers the
Lombardo-Venetian provinces. These beautiful countries
have prospered more rapidly than could have been hoped
after the long and painful years of revolution : Milan and
several other celebrated towns display wealth worthy of their
history ; Venice is recovering from her profound decline,
and displaying new life; the administration and justice are
regulated, manufactures and commerce prosper, science and
art are cultivated with ardour. The public burdens are not
heavier than in other parts of the monarchy ; they would
even be lighter, if the fatal effects of Sardinian policy did
not require that the State should augment its forces, and
consequently raise new revenues. The great majority of
the people of Lombardy and Venetia are content ; the
number of discontented who have forgotten the lessons of
1848 is small in comparison; and it would be less without
the incessant excitations of Piedmont.
" Piedmont therefore does not disquiet herself about
populations which are suffering and oppressed ; but she
rather interrupts a regular state of things, and the develop •
ment of future prosperity. Human prudence cannot fore-
see how lcng this deplorable enterprise will trouble the
peace of Italy ; but terrible responsibility weighs on those
who have wickedly and deliberately exposed their country
and Europe to new catastrophes.
" The revolution so carefully kept alive in all the Penin-
sula has promptly followed the impulsion given it. A mili-
tary rising has taken place at Florence ; it has compelled
H.I.H. the Duke of Tuscany to leave his States. Insur-
rection reigns at Massa and Carrara, under the protection
of Sardinia.
" But France, which for a long time past, we repeat, has
shared that terrible moral responsibility, France has
hastened by acts to assume it altogether. The Government
of the Emperor of the French caused on the 26th of this
month his charge d'affaires at Vienna to declare that he
should consider the passage of the Ticino by the Austrian
' troops as a declaration of war against France. Whilst we
were still waiting at Vienna the reply of Piedmont to the
summons to disarm, France caused her troops to enter Sar-
dinia by the land and sea frontiers, knowing well that by
so doing she placed in the balance the weight which would
bring down the last resolutions of the Court of Turin.
" And why, wo ask, were the legitimate hopes of the
friends of peace in Europe thus to be annihilated by a
single blow ? Because the time had arrived at which pro-
' ' jects long meditated in silence have arrived at maturity—
at which the second French Empire desires to give
substance to its ideas—at which the political state of
, Europe, based on right, is to be sacrificed to its illegitimate
pretensions—at which the treaties which form the basis of
public European power are to be reduced by the political
wisdom which the power which rules at Paris has
announced to the astonished world.
." The traditions of the First Napoleon, in a word, are
resumed. And such is the signification of the conflict on
the eve of which Europe is placed.
"May the world, undeceived, be penetrated with this
conviction—that now, as half a century ago, the question
at stake is to defend the independence of States, and to
protect the most precious possessions of nations against
ambition and the spirit of domination.
"The Emperor Francis Joseph, the chief of our Empire,
although he deplores the woes which will be occasioned by
the impending war, has remitted with calmness his just cause
to the hands of Divine Providence. He has drawn the
sword because guilty hands have attacked the dignity and
honour of his crown ; he will combat with the profound
sentiment of his right;. he will be strong in the enthusiasm
and courage of his people, and ho will be accompanied by
the wishes of all those whose conscience distinguishesp truth
from falsehood, and right from injustice.
"You will communicate to tke Government to which
you have the honour to be accredited both the Imperial
manifesto and the present despatch.—Aecept, &c."