The Osceola times., 1880-10-09
ACCIDENTS OF HISTORY.
Great Events that Have sprung from Little
Causes.
london Standard,

l
1t was one of the maxlms of Cathenn,
de Medici that "a false report, if believed
for three days, may be of great servic,
to Government" A printers boy Will
bad memory was a few days since on
the point of doing the ministry a servic,
by forgetting TO deliver Lord Beacons
| fields amendment to the employers
liability bill. Lord Redesdale gave 1t tc
his secretary; the secretary gave it to the
boy, who put it in his pocket and forgot
all about it, and thus Lord Beaconsfield',
views failed to reach the members of the
House OF Peers in due time. The Incl.
dent in itself was trifiing, but ii does not
stand alone IN history. NJ. Fourniei
wrote a book on events which never
took place, and Lord Beaconsfeld's
father was the author of a learned essay
on history which might have been en-
acted. An equally curious volume might
be penned on the triiles which have
determined great events. Indeed, though
momentous historical incidents have
been due TO a long concourse OF cirCum-
stances, all working toward a common
end, the final catastrophe has often
been precipitated by the merest triile.
II was but triile that gave Spain for so
many generations the lordship of the
New World. and enabled her by the
wrath which she derived from that
source to become the most powerful ma
ton in Europe. 1t is well known that
Columbus, dispiritcd with the refusals
which he met at so many courts, de-
spatched his brother Bartolomeo to ask
aid from Henry VII of England. But
on the way the messenger fell into the
hands of the pirates, and by the time he
reached London was so destitute that he
had to try and earn the money to clothe
himself in proper style before he could
be presented at court. But by that time
it was too late. Even the fact that Fer
dinand and Isabella supplied the funds
TO equip the expedition was mainly due
to the accident that Jaun Perez de Mar
chena, the queens confessor, happened 10
be passingat the moment when the weary
mariner was knocking at the door of La
Rabda Monastery TO beg little bread
and water for his boy Diego, and was
struck with the noble face of the dusty
pedestrian. Had Bartolomeo Colon
reached London in time, bad Christoval
been by any ch7nce litde later or a
little earlier at the monastery door, the
tate of Europe might have been changed,
and the destiny of the Anglo-SaXon race
altered. Three centuries later it was
again nearly revolutionized, for in 1906
the English held Buenos Ayres, and it
is no secret that Napoleon was almost
persuaded to abandon Europe as field
for his ambition and try what he could
accomplish in the way of carving out an
empire among the dissatisfied provinces
of South America. When Citizen Bona
parte seemed little likely to sit on the
throne of Louis Capet, he was on the
point of offering his sword TO the sultan,
as, at later period, Won Moltke actual
ly did.
1t is curious now to speculate what
woul have been the present state of
the Eastern question had Napoleon car
ried his intentions into effect; or, sup
posing that Moltke had remained in the
Turkish service. whether the Danish
war would have been fought, or PRUSSIA S
supremacy established at Sadowa or
Sedan. Had Bonaparte not had friend
in the Directory, would he ever have
had the good fortune to keep his head
on his shoulders; or had not General
Grant accidentally been on good terms
with the Governor Of Illinois, would he
have been lucky enough to have obtain
ed that volunteer colonelcy which trans
ferred him from the saddler's shop IN
Galena to the White House in Washing
ton? Thackeiay used to delight in sim
liar speculations as to what might have
been had not trifle intervened to pre-
vent history running its course. In l7l5
the English Crown was much nearer the
Stuarts grasp than it was thirty years
later. Scotland might have been the
Pretender's had all his friends had the
courage of the Earl of Mar and the eight
thousand Highland gentlemen who
rallied around him. Edinburgh Cas- le
would undoubtly have been taken had
not the men who were to escalade it
tarried so long in tavern that while
they were "powdering their air" there
| confederates under the fortress grew
weary of waiting, and the rendezvous
was reached too late. But for that put
reris eripi; jdctd of the jovial conspirators
all Scntland might have been King
| .James's. and Northumberland and the
North Of England would have risen in
force. In that ten minutes King james
lost mis- crown. and was doomed to die q
French pensioner at st. Germans
| Prince Charlie to attempt to regain II
| under less favorable circumstances, and
| Cardinal York TO end the hapless Stuart
| line amid the wealth of song and story
| which their misiortunes have evoked
Had Give succeeded in his attempted
suicide, would not the English and the
French have changed places in lndial
If Lord John Russell had not shown an
unwonted firmness when Louis Philippe
was displaying a suspicious anxiety
about "prlority of discovery" at the an
tipodes, would our colonists have been
enioying to-day that peace which the
absence even of such amiable neighbor>
the French affords them? Suppose
might or the Prussians" had not come
at Waterloo. what would have been the
result-albeit ellington always declared
that he never expressed his longing iol
either?
War clouds have burst, and millions
of stout men have been slain owing tC
The yeriest trides. The cropping o
Louis WIS chin brought on three cen
turtles of bloodshed, and a sarcastic re
mark of Frederick the Great on Ellza
beth Petioyna of Russia reused thai
yirtuous empress to take such a vigorous
part in the seven years war that a
one time Prussia seemed well nigh
stricken unto death. Even Catherine l.
a. i. 80