the Field for the Drama since performed in that unhappy Country. So will these Quarantine Partitions be carried from Province to Province of the Ottoman Empire. She who has no Faith in Religion, no Principle in Politics, no Doctrine in Trade, and no Fear in Contagion, entwines each Population or Province with a four-fold Web of Religious, Political, Commercial, and Medical Doctrines Men do sometimes amuse themselves in moving Bits of Wood or Ivory upon a Board, attributing fictitious Properties to each Piece, they make the one subdue the other, and so please themselves by exerting each his own, and testing his Antagonist's Ingenuity. Russia amuses herself with such a Game, in which the Men of Europe are at once Players and Pieces-and she wins always, and yet the Amusement is not thereby lessened. This Game affords her such excessive Delight, that it would be worth the Playing even were it costly.

The Use of the Fear of Contagion, is not, however, of recent Application. The first Body of Troops that penetrated into Poland in 1772, marched under the Pretence of establishing a Sanatory Cordon, against Infection. No doubt, People, then, too, commended Russia for her Care of the general Health, and thought she had adopted in Medical Diplomacy, very Anti-Contagious Principles.

When the Holy Alliance was established by Russia, on the 26th of September, 1816, a German Writer profoundly penetrating into its Thoughts, discovered that the Terms of the Treaty itself, of Necessity, excluded three European Powers, namely England, the Pope, and the Sultan; he, moreover, discovered the secret Reason for the Exclusion of each from the sacred Compact. Turkey was excluded because it did not take Precautions against the Plague! "The Government of Turkey was in a State of constant Hostility against Europe, in nourishing in its Breast the Plague with which it menaces

530 THE PLAGUE IN ITS RELATION TO DESPOTISM.

us each Day. Europe has the Right to require that it should take the Precautions commanded by Prudence, in Order that the Plague should be expelled from Europe; and in case of Refusal, she has the Right to constrain her thereto, and to see to it even by armed Invasion."

Such are the Doctrines which Sir S. Canning-the Man who brought the Case of the "Vixen" into the House of Commons-has been made the first Instrument for accomplishing on the Behalf of that Holy Alliance, which is itself extinct.

A few Years later, the Holy Alliance proved the Correctness of the Views above quoted, by deducing from an Analogy with the Plague, a Right of the most extraordinary Character-the Right of invading the Territory of a foreign Government to support those Principles which the Members of the Holy Alliance had recognised as applicable to their own States. The Right to invade Naples and Piedmont was established upon the Analogy "of the Dispositions that had been manifested amongst the People of those two Countries, with that physical Scourge; the Plague." Upon this, the Historian of French Diplomacy, M. Bignon, remarks, "If a Thing, because it is compared to the Plague, gives such Rights, what Rights would not the Plague itself confer."

Inextricable Confusion will now flow from the Establishment of Quarantine at Constantinople; for urging which, Russia got the greatest Merit for Liberality and Benevolence. Of these the Effects appear in the Interference of a British Ambassador to cut off the Trade between Circassia and Constantinople. The Plague may be eradicated by the doing away with its local Causes, and the Means employed to effect that Purpose were sedulously counteracted and suppressed.

We will return to this most important Subject.

CAUCASUS.-THE VIXEN AGAIN.

A SERIES of very interesting Letters have appeared in the Augsburg Gazette from a German Traveller in the Caucasus, from which we make some Extracts. In these the Vixen figures under a new Name, the Russians having called her Soudjouk-Kalé, that being the Name of the Harbour where this unparalleled Victory was achievedthe capture in peace of a British Vessel; and the interruption thereby of all communication between the only People that resisted her, and the rest of the World.

On May 13th, 1837, the following Despatch was penned in the British Embassy of St. Petersburg, and presented to the House of Commons as the Case of the Government, when it allowed the Russian Government to confiscate that British Vessel.

"MY LORD,

"With respect to the military de facto occupation of Soudjouk-Kalé, I have to state to your Lordship that there is a fortress in the bay which bears the name of the Empress (Alexandrinsky,) and that it has been always occupied by a Russian garrison. "I have, &c.

"The Viscount Palmerston, G.C.B. &c."

" DURHAM.

The Statement contained in this Despatch was a Falsehood adjusted between the Writer of it, and the Russian Government on the one hand, and the Foreign Secretary on the other. If Lord Durham had been simply deceived as to the Fact of Russian occupation of a Fort at Soudjouk Kalé (which was not the Question,) he would have said,

*The Reader would apply the "it" to the Bay, Soudjouk-Kalé. Should any Criticisms arise, (a very improbable Contingency,) then the it would apply to the Fortress, which had no existence, save in the Despatch.

"I am informed by the Russian Government." Misled he could not have been, for there was the Testimony of several of his Countrymen before him, proving that there was no Russian Occupation whatever, and there was the Offer of the distinct Testimony to that Effect, of the Crews of two British Vessels who had visited it-the one in Sept. 1834, the other, that of the "Vixen" itself,* amounting to thirty-two Individuals. On the other hand, the British Minister for Foreign Affairs, had before him, British Testimony disproving the Allegations which he thus accepted. The Despatch of Lord Durham, written for the House of Commons, is in Answer to a Despatch prepared to call it forth. Had Lord Durham said, "I am informed by the Russian Government, &c."+ the Assertion would have been of no Value; but speaking as of his own Knowledge, to have refused Belief, would have been to allege Falsehood, which is not according to modern Parliamentary Usage.

Such was the Service of the Man whom the Emperor, to the exclusion of Sir S. Canning, selected to fill the Post of Ambassador of England at the Court of St. Petersburg. Sir S. Canning was the only Man in England who had in Parliament raised his Voice against this great and dangerous Crime; but he only consented to bring it forward, because the aggrieved Party could not find in either House, any other Man who would undertake it. Sir S. Canning has now become Ambassador of England at Constantinople, and he applies his Hand to complete the Task commenced with the Confiscation of the Vixen! Among public Men, one only had had the Conscience and Courage to set his Face against Evil, and he has become entangled in the Web, and industrious in this Labour!

* Confirmed subsequently by the published Statements of two British Travellers, who visited the Harbour, in 1837-8. +Affair of the Vixen," 1838.-Hatchard.

THE RUSSIAN FLEET. -THE VIXEN.-SEVASTOPOL. THE CHE

CHENSES. DANGER TO RUSSIA FROM THE CAUCASUS-SOCIAL

ORDERS OF THE CIRCASSIANS-PERSONAL BEAUTY.

6

"In the beginning of 1843, the last time I saw Sevastopol, I counted twelve ships of the line, ready for sea, and amongst them three three-deckers of 120 guns, the 'Warsaw,' the Twelve Apostles,' and the Three Saints; the others, Mahmoud,' 'Silistria,'' Adrianople,' 'Uriel,' 'Catharine,' 'Eustachius,' 'Silafael,' Maria,' Anapa,' carried from 90 to 94 guns each. A new ship, the Varna,' was ready to be launched at Nicolaieff. There were besides eight frigates, and about thirty brigs, cutters, &c. at Sevastopol-a few light vessels, and the war-steamers are mostly laid up at Kertsch, to be employed for the service of the Circassian Coast.-Admiral Awinaff, with that readiness which one is always sure to find in the higher order of Russian officers, gave me permission to see the Russian fleet. I began with the new built threedecker, the Twelve Apostles,' the handsomest ship of the line, in the Russian Navy, in which Vice-Adinira! Lazaroff generally hoisted his flag. The three-deckers have generally a crew of 800 men-the second rates about 600. Upon the ships of the line of the first class, there are two batteries of 48 pounders, and one battery of 36 pounders. The calibre of the other ships of the line is 36; but each ship has six mortars à la Paixhans, carrying balls of 60 lbs. But after all the Russian ships of the line which I visited no vessel excited my curiosity more than the Soudjouk-Kaleh, formerly the Vixen, that celebrated little ship which was almost the cause of war between two of the leading powers of the globe. The Vixen attained her present fame from her connection with the Circassian Coast, where the Russian cruisers took possession of an English ship,'which neither avoided them, nor defended itself. Under Russian colours, she has now quite changed her appearance, even her colour, and Mr. Bell would have some difficulty in recognizing his former property. This little vessel is now the best sailer in the Russian fleet, and is generally employed as a transport between Sevastopol and the Coast of Circassia with a good breeze she can