Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 56, No. 345, July, 1844

My reply was—"That it depended on the spirit of England herself, whether the conflict was to be followed by honour or by shame; that she had a glorious career before her, if she had magnanimity sufficient to take the part marked out for her by circumstances; and that, with the championship of the world in her hands, even defeat would be a triumph."

He now turned the conversation to myself; spoke with more than official civility of my services, and peculiarly of the immediate one; and asked in what branch of diplomacy I desired advancement?

My answer was prompt. "In none. I desired promotion but in one way—the army." I then briefly stated the accidental loss of my original appointment, and received, before I left the chamber, a note for the secretary at war, recommending me, in the strongest terms, for a commission in the Guards.—The world was now before me, and the world in the most vivid, various, and dazzling shape; in the boldest development of grandeur, terror, and wild vicissitude, which it exhibited for a thousand years—ENGLAND WAS AT WAR!

There is no sight on earth more singular, or more awful, than a great nation going to war. I saw the scene in its highest point of view, by seeing it in England. Its perfect freedom, its infinite, and often conflicting, variety of opinion—its passionate excitement, and its stupendous power, gave the summons to hostilities a character of interest, of grandeur, and of indefinite but vast purposes, unexampled in any other time, or in any other country. When one of the old monarchies commenced war, the operation, however large and formidable, was simple. A monarch resolved, a council sat, less to guide than to echo his resolution; an army marched, invaded the enemy's territory, fought a battle—perhaps a dubious one—rested on its arms; and while Te Deum was sung in both capitals alike for the "victory" of neither, the ministers of both were constructing an armistice, a negotiation, and a peace—each and all to be null and void on the first opportunity.

But the war of England was a war of the nation—a war of wrath and indignation—a war of the dangers of civilized society entrusted to a single championship—a great effort of human nature to discharge, in the shape of blood, a disease which was sapping the vitals of Europe; or in a still higher, and therefore a more faithful view, the gathering of a tempest, which, after sweeping France in its fury, was to restore the exhausted soil and blasted vegetation of monarchy throughout the Continent; and in whose highest, England, serene and undismayed, was to

"Ride in the whirlwind, and direct the storm."

I must acknowledge, that I looked upon the coming conflict with a strange sense of mingled alarm and rejoicing. For the latter feeling, perhaps I ought to make some apology; but I was young, ardent, and ambitious. My place in life was unfixed; standing in that unhappy middle position, in which stands a man of birth too high to suffer his adoption of the humbler means of existence, and yet of resources too inadequate to sustain him without action—nay, bold and indefatigable exertion. I, at the moment, felt a very inferior degree of compunction at the crisis which offered to give me at least a chance of being seen, known, and understood among men. I felt like a man whose ship was stranded, and who saw the storm lifting the surges that were to lift him along with them; or like the traveller in an earthquake, who saw the cleft in the ground swallowing up the river which had hitherto presented an impassable obstacle—cities and mountains might sink before the concussion had done its irresistible will, but, at all events, it had cleared his way.

In thoughts like these, rash and unconnected as they were, I spent many a restless day, and still more restless night. I often sprang from a pillow which, if I had lived in the days of witchcraft, I should have thought spelled to refuse me sleep; and walking for hours, endeavoured to reduce into shape the speculations which filled my mind with splendours and catastrophes worthy of oriental dreams. Why did I not then pursue the career in which I had begun the world? Why not devote myself to diplomacy, in which I had hitherto received honour? Why not enter into Parliament, which opened all the secrets of power? For this I had two reasons. The first—and, let me confess, the most imperious—was, that my pride had been deeply hurt by the loss of my commission. I felt that I had not only been deprived of a noble profession, accidental as was the loss; but that I had subjected myself to the trivial, but stinging remarks, which never fail to find an obnoxious cause for every failure. While this cloud hung over me, I was determined never to return to my father's house. Good-natured as the friends of my family might be, I was fully aware of the style in which misfortune is treated in the idleness of country life; and the Honourable Mr Marston's loss of his rank in his Majesty's guards, or his preference of a more pacific promotion, was too tempting a topic to lose any of its stimulants by the popular ignorance of the true transaction. My next reason was, that my mind was harassed and wearied by disappointment, until I should not have regreted to terminate the struggle in the first field of battle. The only woman whom I loved, and whom, in the strange frenzy of passion, I solemnly believed to be the only woman on earth deserving to be so loved, had wholly disappeared, and was, by this time, probably wedded. The only woman whom I regarded as a friend, was in another country, probably dying. If I could have returned to Mortimer Castle—which I had already determined to be impossible—I should have found only a callous, perhaps a contemptuous, head of the family, angry at my return to burden him. Even Vincent—my old and kind-hearted friend Vincent—had been a soldier; and though I was sure of never receiving a reproach from his wise and gentle lips, was I equally sure that I could escape the flash, or the sorrow, of his eye?

In thoughts like these, and they were dangerous ones, I made many a solitary rush out into the wild winds and beating snows of the winter, which had set in early and been remarkably severe; walking bareheaded in the most lonely places of the suburbs, stripping my bosom to the blast, and longing for its tenfold chill to assuage the fever which burned within me. I had also found the old delay at the Horse-guards. The feelings of this period make me look with infinite compassion on the unhappy beings who take their lives into their own hands, and who extinguish all their earthly anxieties at a plunge. But I had imbibed principles of a firmer substance, and but upon one occasion, and one alone, felt tempted to an act of despair.

Taking my lonely dinner in a tavern of the suburbs, the waiter handed me a newspaper, which he had rescued for my behoof from the hands of a group, eager, as all the world then was, for French intelligence. My eye rambled into the fashionable column; and the first paragraph, headed "Marriage in high life," announced that, on the morrow, were to be solemnized the nuptials of Clotilde, Countess de Tourville, with the Marquis de Montrecour, colonel of the French Mousquetaires, &c. The paper dropped from my hands. I rushed out of the house; and, scarcely knowing where I went, I hurried on, until I found myself out of the sight or sound of mortal. The night was pitch-dark; there was no lamp near; the wind roared; and it was only by the flash of the foam that I discovered the broad sheet of water before me. I had strayed into Hyde Park, and was on the bank of the Serpentine. With what ease might I not finish all! It was another step. Life was a burden—thought was a torment—the light of day a loathing. But the paroxysm soon gave way. Impressions of the duty and the trials of human nature, made in earlier years, revived within me with a singular freshness and force. Tears gushed from my eyes, fast and flowing; and, with a long-forgotten prayer for patience and humility, I turned from the place of temptation. As I reached the streets once more, I heard the trumpets of the Life Guards, and the band of a battalion returning to their quarters. The infantry were the Coldstream. They had been lining the streets for the king's procession to open the sitting of Parliament. This was the 13th of December—the memorable day to which every heart in Europe was more or less vibrating; yet which I had totally forgotten. What is man but an electrical machine after all? The sound and sight of soldiership restored me to the full vividness of my nature. The machine required only to be touched, to shoot out its latent sparks; and with a new spirit and a new determination kindling through every fibre, I hastened to be present at that debate which was to be the judgment of nations.

My official intercourse with ministers had given me some privileges, and I obtained a seat under the gallery—that part of the House of Commons which is occasionally allotted to strangers of a certain rank. The House was crowded, and every countenance was pictured with interest and solemn anxiety. Grey, Sheridan, and other distinguished names of party, had already taken their seats; but the great heads of Government and Opposition were still absent. At length a buzz among the crowd who filled the floor,—and the name of Fox repeated in every tone of congratulation, announced the pre-eminent orator of England. I now saw Fox for the first time; and I was instantly struck with the incomparable similitude of all that I saw of him to all that I had conceived from his character and his style. In the broad bold forehead, the strong sense—in the relaxed mouth, the self-indulgent and reckless enjoyment—in the quick, small eye under those magnificent black brows, the man of sagacity, of sarcasm, and of humour; and in the grand contour of a countenance and head, which might have been sculptured to take its place among the sages and sovereigns of antiquity, the living proof of those extraordinary powers, which could have been checked in their ascent to the highest elevation of public life, only by prejudices and passions not less extraordinary. As he advanced up the House, he recognized every one on both sides, and spoke or smiled to nearly all. He stopped once or twice in his way, and was surrounded by a circle with whom, as I could judge from their laughter, he exchanged some pleasantry of the hour. When at length he arrived at the seat which had been reserved for him, he threw himself upon it with the easy look of comfort of a man who had reached home—gave nod to Windham, held out a finger to Grey, warmly shook hands with Sheridan; and then, opening his well-known blue and buff costume, threw himself back into the bench, and laughingly gasped for air.

But another movement of the crowd at the bar announced another arrival, and Pitt entered the House. His look and movement were equally characteristic with those of his great rival. He looked to neither the right nor the left; replied to the salutations of his friends by the slightest possible bow; neither spoke nor smiled; but, slowly advancing, took his seat in total silence. The Speaker, hitherto occupied with some routine business, now read the King's speech, and, calling on "Mr Pitt," the minister rose. I have for that rising but one description—the one which filled my memory at the moment, from the noblest poet of the world.

"Deep on his front engraven,
Deliberation sat, and public care.
Sage he stood,
With Atlantean shoulders, fit to bear
The weight of mightiest monarchies. His look
Drew audience and attention, still as night,
Or summer's noontide air."

THE WEEK OF AN EMPEROR

The week ending the 8th of June, was the most brilliant that ever occupied and captivated the fashionable world of a metropolis of two millions of souls, the head of an empire of two hundred millions. The recollection runs us out of breath. Every hour was a new summons to a new fête, a new fantasy, or a new exhibition of the handsomest man of the forty-two millions of Russia proper. The toilettes of the whole beau monde were in activity from sunny morn to dewy eve; and from dewy eve to waxlighted midnight. A parade of the Guards, by which the world was tempted into rising at ten o'clock; a dejeuner à la fourchette, by which it was surprised into dining at three, (more majorum;) an opera, by which those whose hour for going out is eleven, were forced into their carriages at nine; a concert at Hanover Square, finished by a ball and supper at Buckingham palace;—all were among those brilliant perversions of the habits of high life which make the week one brilliant tumult; but which never could have been revolutionized but by an emperor in the flower of his age. Wherever he moved, he was followed by a host of the fair and fashionable. The showy equipages of the nobility were in perpetual motion. The parks were a whirlwind of horsemen and horsewomen. The streets were a levy en masse of the peerage. The opera-house was a gilded "black hole of Calcutta." The front of Buckingham palace was a scene of loyalty, dangerous to life and limb; men, careful of either, gave their shillings for a glimpse through a telescope; and shortsighted ladies fainted, that they might be carried into houses which gave then a full view. Mivart's, the retreat of princes, had the bustle of a Bond Street hotel. Ashburnham House was in a state of siege. And Buckingham palace, with its guards, cavalcades, musterings of the multitude, and thundering of brass bands, seemed to be the focus of a national revolution. But it was within the palace that the grand display existed. The gilt candelabra, the gold plate, the maids of honour, all fresh as tares in June; and the ladies in waiting, all Junos and Minervas, all jewelled, and none under forty-five, enraptured the mortal eye, to a degree unrivalled in the recollections of the oldest courtier, and unrecorded in the annals of queenly hospitality.

But we must descend to the world again; we must, as the poet said,

"Bridle in our struggling muse with pain,
That longs to launch into a nobler strain."

We bid farewell to a description of the indescribable.

During this week, but one question was asked by the universal world of St James's—"What was the cause of the Czar's coming?"

Every one answered in his own style. The tourists—a race who cannot live without rambling through the same continental roads, which they libel for their roughness every year; the same hotels, which they libel for their discomforts; and the same table-d'hotes, which they libel as the perfection of bad cookery, and barefaced chicane—pronounced that the love of travel was the imperial impulse. The politicians of the clubs—who, having nothing to do for themselves, manage the affairs of all nations, and can discover high treason in the manipulation of a toothpick, and symptoms of war in a waltz—were of opinion, that the Czar had come either to construct an European league against the marriage of little Queen Isabella, or to beat up for recruits for the "holy" hostilities of Morocco. With the fashionable world, the decision was, that he had come to see Ascot races, and the Duke of Devonshire's gardens, before the sun withered, or St Swithin washed them away. The John Bull world—as wise at least as any of their betters, who love a holiday, and think Whitsuntide the happiest period of the year for that reason, and Greenwich hill the finest spot in creation—were convinced that his Majesty's visit was merely that of a good-humoured and active gentleman, glad to escape from the troubles of royalty and the heaviness of home, and take a week's ramble among the oddities of England. "Who shall decide," says Pope, "when doctors disagree?" Perhaps the nearest way of reaching the truth is, to take all the reasons together, and try how far they may be made to agree. What can be more probable than that the fineness of the finest season within memory, the occurrence of a moment of leisure in the life of a monarch ruling a fifth of the habitable globe, roused the curiosity of an intelligent mind, excited, like that of his great ancestor Peter, by a wish to see the national improvements of the great country of engineering, shipbuilding, and tunnelling; perhaps with Ascot races—the most showy exhibition of the most beautiful horses in the world—to wind up the display, might tempt a man of vigorous frame and active spirit, to gallop across Europe, and give seven brief days to England!

An additional conjecture has been proposed by the papers presumed to be best informed in cabinet secrets; that this rapid journey has had for its distinct purpose the expression of the Imperial scorn for the miserable folly and malignant coxcombry of the pamphlet on the French navy; which has excited so much contempt in England, and so much boasting in France, and so much surprise and ridicule every where else in Europe. Nothing could be more in consonance with a manly character, than to show how little it shared the conceptions of a coxcomb; and no more direct mode could be adopted than the visit, to prove his willingness to be on the best terms with her government and her people. We readily receive this conjecture, because it impresses a higher character on the whole transaction; it belongs to an advanced spirit of royal intercourse, and it constitutes an important pledge for that European peace, which is the greatest benefaction capable of being conferred by kings.

The Emperor may be said to have come direct from St Petersburg, as his stops on the road were only momentary. He reached Berlin from his capital with courier's speed, in four days and six hours, on Sunday fortnight last. His arrival was so unexpected, that the Russian ambassador in Prussia was taken by surprise. He travelled through Germany incognito, and on Thursday night, the 30th, arrived at the Hague. Next day, at two o'clock, he embarked at Rotterdam for England. Here, two steamers had been prepared for his embarkation. The steamers anchored for the night at Helvoetsluys. At three in the following morning, they continued the passage, arriving at Woolwich at ten. The Russian ambassador and officers of the garrison prepared to receive him; but on his intimating his particular wish to land in private, the customary honours were dispensed with. Shortly after ten, the Emperor landed. He was dressed in the Russian costume, covered with an ample and richly-furred cloak. After a stay of a few minutes, he entered Baron Brunow's carriage with Count Orloff, and drove to the Russian embassy. The remainder of the day was given to rest after his fatigue.

On the next morning, Sunday, Prince Albert paid a visit to the Emperor. They met on the grand staircase, and embraced each other cordially in the foreign style. The Prince proposed that the Emperor should remove to the apartments which were provided for him in the palace—an offer which was politely declined. At eleven, the Emperor attended divine service at the chapel of the Russian embassy in Welbeck Street. At half-past one, Prince Albert arrived to conduct him to the palace. He wore a scarlet uniform, with the riband and badge of the Garter. The Queen received the Emperor in the grand hall. A dejeuner was soon afterwards served. The remainder of the day was spent in visits to the Queen-Dowager and the Royal Family. One visit of peculiar interest was paid. The Emperor drove to Apsley House, to visit the Duke of Wellington. The Duke received him in the hall, and conducted him to the grand saloon on the first floor. The meeting on both sides was most cordial. The Emperor conversed much and cheerfully with the illustrious Duke, and complimented him highly on the beauty of his pictures, and the magnificence of his mansion. But even emperors are but men, and the Czar, fatigued with his round of driving, on his return to the embassy fell asleep, and slumbered till dinner-time, though his Royal Highness of Cambridge and the Monarch of Saxony called to visit him. At a quarter to eight o'clock, three of the royal carriages arrived, for the purpose of conveying the Emperor and his suite to Buckingham palace.

On Monday, the Emperor rose at seven. After breakfast he drove to Mortimer's, the celebrated jeweller's, where he remained for an hour, and is said to have purchased L.5000 worth of jewellery. He then drove to the Zoological gardens and the Regent's park. In the course of the drive, he visited Sir Robert Peel, and the families of some of our ambassadors in Russia. At three o'clock, he gave a dejeuner to the Duke of Devonshire, who had also been an ambassador in Russia. Dover Street was crowded with the carriages of the nobility, who came to put down their names in the visiting-book.

At five, a guard of honour of the First Life-Guards came to escort him to the railway, on his visit to Windsor; but on his observing its arrival, he expressed a wish to decline the honour, for the purpose of avoiding all parade. The Queen's carriages had arrived, and the Emperor and his suite drove off through streets crowded with horsemen. On arriving at the railway station, the Emperor examined the electrical telegraph, and, entering the saloon carriage, the train set off, and arrived at Slough, a distance of nearly twenty miles, in the astonishingly brief time of twenty-five minutes.

At the station, the Emperor was met by Prince Albert, and conveyed to the castle.

The banquet took place in the Waterloo chamber, a vast hall hung with portraits of the principal sovereigns and statesmen of Europe, to paint which, the late Sir Thomas Laurence had been sent on a special mission at the close of the war in 1815. Sir Thomas's conception of form and likeness was admirable, but his colouring was cold and thin. His "Waterloo Gallery" forms a melancholy contrast with the depth and richness of the adjoining "Vandyk Chamber;" but his likenesses are complete. The banquet was royally splendid. The table was covered with gold plate and chased ornaments of remarkable beauty—the whole lighted by rows of gold candelabra. The King of Saxony, the Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert Peel, Lord Aberdeen, and the chief noblemen of the household, were present at the entertainment.

TUESDAY

This was the day of Ascot races. The road from Windsor to the course passes through a couple of miles of the rich quiet scenery which peculiarly belongs to England. The course itself is a file open plain, commanding an extensive view. Some rumours, doubting the visit of the royal party, excited a double interest in the first sight of the cavalcade, preceded by the royal yeomen, galloping up to the stand. They were received with shouts. The Emperor, the King of Saxony, and Prince Albert, were in the leading carriage. They were attired simply as private gentlemen, in blue frock-coats. The Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert Peel, and the household, followed in the royal carriages. The view of the Stand at this period was striking, and the royal and noble personages were repeatedly cheered. An announcement was conveyed to the people, that the Emperor had determined to give L.500 a-year to the course. The Czarewitch had already given L.200 at Newmarket. The announcement was received with renewed cheering. All kings are fond of horses; and the monarch of the most numerous and active cavalry in the world, may be allowed to be a connoisseur in their strength, swiftness, and perseverance, by a superior right. The Emperor can call out 80,000 Cossacks at a sound of his trumpet. He exhibited an evident interest in the races. The horses were saddled before the race in front of the grand stand, and brought up to it after the race, for the purpose of weighing the jockeys. He had a full opportunity of inspection; but not content with this, when the winner of the gold vase, the mare Alice Hawthorn, was brought up to the stand, he descended, and examined this beautiful animal with the closeness and critical eye of a judge.

On Wednesday, the pageant in which emperors most delight was exhibited—a review of the royal guards. There are so few troops in England, as the Prince de Joinville has "the happiness" to observe, that a review on the continental scale of tens of thousands, is out of the question. Yet, to the eye which can discern the excellence of soldiership, and the completeness of soldierly equipment, the few in line before the Emperor on this day, were enough to gratify the intelligent eye which this active monarch turns upon every thing. The infantry were—the second battalion of the grenadier guards, the second battalion of the Coldstream guards, the second battalion of the fusilier guards, and the forty-seventh regiment. The cavalry were—two troops of the royal horse guards, (blue,) the first regiment of the life guards, and the seventeenth lancers. The artillery were—detachments of the royal horse artillery, and the field artillery.

A vast multitude from London by the trains, and from the adjoining country, formed a line parallel to the troops; and nothing could exceed the universal animation and cheering when the Emperor, the King of Saxony, and the numerous and glittering staff, entered the field, and came down the line.

After the usual salutes, and marching past the centre, where the royal carriages had taken their stand, the evolutions began. They were few and simple, but of that order which is most effective in the field. The formation of the line from the sections; the general advance of the line; the halt, and a running fire along the whole front; the breaking up of the line into squares; the squares firing, then deploying into line, and marching to the rear. The Queen, with the royal children, left the ground before the firing began, The review was over at half-past two. The appearance of the troops was admirable; the manoeuvres were completely successful; and the fineness of the day gave all the advantages of sun and landscape to this most brilliant spectacle.

But the most characteristic portion of the display consisted in the commanding-officers who attended, to give this unusual mark of respect to the Emperor.

Wellington, the "conqueror of a hundred fights," rode at the head of the grenadier guards, as their colonel Lord Combermere, general of the cavalry in the Peninsula, rode at the head of his regiment, the first life guards. The Marquis of Anglesey, general of the cavalry at Waterloo, rode at the head of his regiment, the royal horse guards. Sir George Murray, quartermaster-general in the Peninsula, rode at the head of the artillery, as master-general of the ordnance. His royal highness the Duke of Cambridge rode at the head of his regiment, the Coldstream. His royal highness Prince Albert rode at the head of his regiment, the Scotch fusiliers. General Sir William Anson rode at the head of his regiment, the forty-seventh. Lieutenant-Colonel Quentin rode at the head of the seventeenth lancers, the colonel of the regiment, Prince George of Cambridge, being in the Ionian Islands. Thus, three field-marshals, and four generals, passed in review before the illustrious guests of her Majesty. The Emperor expressed himself highly gratified; as every eye accustomed to troops must have been, by the admirable precision of the movements, and the fine appearance of the men. A striking instance of the value of railways for military operations, was connected with this review. The forty-seventh regiment, quartered in Gosport, was brought to Windsor in the morning, and sent back in the evening of the review day; the journey, altogether, was about 140 miles! Such are the miracles of machinery in our days. This was certainly an extraordinary performance, when we recollect that it was the conveyance of about 700 men; and shows what might be done in case of any demand for the actual services of the troops. But even this exploit will be eclipsed within a few days, by the opening of the direct line from London to Newcastle, which will convey troops, or any thing, 300 miles in twelve hours. The next step will be to reach Edinburgh in a day! The Emperor was observed to pay marked attention to the troops of the line, the forty-seventh and the lancers; observing, as it is said, "your household troops are noble fellows; but what I wished particularly to see, were the troops with which you gained your victories in India and China." A speech of this kind was worthy of the sagacity of a man who knew where the true strength of a national army lies, and who probably, besides, has often had his glance turned to the dashing services of our soldiery in Asia. The household troops of every nation are select men, and the most showy which the country can supply. Thus they are nearly of equal excellence. The infantry of ours, it is true, have been always "fighting regiments"—the first in every expedition, and distinguished for the gallantry of their conduct in every field. The cavalry, though seldomer sent on foreign service, exhibited pre-eminent bravery in the Peninsula, and their charges at Waterloo were irresistible. But it is of the marching regiments that the actual "army" consists, and their character forms the character of the national arms.

In the evening the Emperor and the King of Saxony dined with her Majesty at Windsor.

THURSDAY

The royal party again drove to the Ascot course, and were received with the usual acclamations. The Emperor and King were in plain clothes, without decorations of any kind; Prince Albert wore the Windsor uniform. The cheers were loud for Wellington.

The gold cup, value three hundred guineas, was the principal prize. Eight horses ran, and the cup was won by a colt of Lord Albemarle's. His lordship is lucky, at least on the turf. He won the cup at Ascot last year.

FRIDAY

The royal party came to London by the railway. The Emperor spent the chief part of the day in paying visits, in the Russian ambassador's private carriage, to his personal friends—chiefly the families of those noblemen who had been ambassadors to Russia.

SATURDAY

The Emperor, the King, and Prince Albert, went to the Duke of Devonshire's dejeuner at Chiswick. The Duke's mansion and gardens are proverbial as evidences of his taste, magnificence, and princely expenditure. All the nobility in London at this period were present. The royal party were received with distinguished attention by the noble host, and his hospitality was exhibited in a style worthy of his guests and himself. While the suite of salons were thrown open for the general company, the royal party were received in a salon which had been decorated as a Turkish tent. Bands of the guards played in the gardens, a quadille band played in the ball-room, and the fineness of the weather gave the last charm to a fête prepared with equal elegance and splendour. We doubt whether Europe can exhibit any open air festivity that can compete with a dejeuner at Chiswick. The gardens of some of the continental palaces are larger, but they want the finish of the English garden. Their statues and decorations are sometimes fine; but they want the perfect and exquisite neatness which gives an especial charm to English horticulture. The verdure of the lawns, the richness and variety of the flowers, and the general taste displayed, in even the most minute and least ornamental features, render the English garden wholly superior, in fitness and in beauty, to the gardens of the continental sovereigns and nobility.

In the evening, the Queen and her guests went to the Italian opera. The house was greatly, and even hazardously crowded. It is said that, in some instances, forty guineas was paid for a box. But whether this may be an exaggeration or not, the sum would have been well worth paying, to escape the tremendous pressure in the pit. After all, the majority of the spectators were disappointed in their principal object, the view of the royal party. They all sat far back in the box, and thus, to three-fourths of the house, were completely invisible. In this privacy, for which it is not easy to account, and which it would have been so much wiser to have avoided, the audience were long kept in doubt whether the national anthem was to be sung. At last, a stentorian voice from the gallery called for it. A general response was made by the multitude; the curtain rose, and God save the Queen was sung with acclamation. The ice thus broken, it was followed by the Russian national anthem, a firm, rich, and bold composition. The Emperor was said to have shed tears at the unexpected sound of that noble chorus, which brought back the recollection of his country at so vast a distance from home. But if these anthems had not been thus accidentally performed, the royal party would have lost a much finer display than any thing which they could have seen on the stage—the rising of the whole audience in the boxes—all the fashionable world in gala, in its youth, beauty, and ornament, seen at full sight, while the chorus was on the stage.

SUNDAY

On this day at two o'clock, the Emperor, after taking leave of the Queen and the principal members of the Royal family, embarked at Woolwich in the government steamer, the Black Eagle, commanded for the time by the Earl of Hardwicke. The vessel dropped down the river under the usual salutes from the batteries at Woolwich; the day was serene, and the Black Eagle cut the water with a keel as smooth as it was rapid. The Emperor entered into the habits of the sailor with as much ease as he had done into those of the soldier. He conversed good-humouredly with the officers and men, admired the discipline and appearance of the marines, who had been sent as his escort, was peculiarly obliging to Lord Hardwicke and Lieutenant Peel, (a son of the premier,) and ordered his dinner on deck, that he might enjoy the scenery on the banks of the Thames. The medals of some of the marines who had served in Syria, attracted his attention, and he enquired into the nature of their services. He next expressed a wish to see the manual exercise performed, which of course was done; and his majesty, taking a musket, went through the Russian manual exercise. On his arrival on the Dutch coast, the King of Holland came out to meet him in a steamer; and on his landing, the British crew parted with him with three cheers. The Imperial munificence was large to a degree which we regret; for it would be much more gratifying to the national feelings to receive those distinguished strangers, without suffering the cravers for subscriptions to intrude themselves into their presence.

On the Emperor's landing in Holland, he reviewed a large body of Dutch troops, and had intended to proceed up the Rhine, and enjoy the landscape of its lovely shores at his leisure. But for him there is no leisure; and his project was broken up by the anxious intelligence of the illness of one of his daughters by a premature confinement. He immediately changed his route, and set off at full speed for St Petersburg.