but for the signal of their allies within, to rush into our temple, and to raze our sanctuary even to the dust. Or, by emanci pating himself from party views, it is for him to consolidate the strength, to confirm the unity of our established Church, and thus to disappoint the views of its treacherous friends and of its inveterate foes, who still triumph in the hope, that an ally is now in the garrison. The determination rests with himself; and we pray that a good Providence may direct his choice.→→→ The cause is that of the Established Church, and of the Gospel on which it is founded, and, as such, we are yet assured that it will find a firm, an affectionate, and an active friend, in the newly created Prelate; because we are persuaded that a man so conscientious as himself, would have accepted his elevation upon no other terms, and with no other views. ART. II. Memoirs of the War of the French in Spain. By M. de Rocca, Officer of Hussars, and Knight of the Order of the Legion of Honour. Translated from the French. 384 pp. 9s. Murray. 1815. IN this age of reading, every one who succeeds in giving to the world a work of merit and interest, is nearly certain of obtaining a degree of credit and notoriety tolerably proportioned to the depth of thinking which his effort evinces. It is perhaps surprising that among the many officers who have been engaged of late years upon the continent, scarcely one of our own countrymen, who would have been most fitted for the task, by their superiority in point of education over the soldiers of every other nation, has employed the leisure of a military life to throw into the form of a simple journal the active events of the day; to describe the manners of people, differing not more in language than in genius and nature, from his own habitual associates; or to sketch some general outline of a country which his situa tion gave him daily opportunities of observing in its most intimate relations. The volume which is before us, is, in fact, little more than the military journal of an intelligent officer in the French army, serving in the Spanish peninsula during the years 1808, 1809, and 1810. M. de Rocca is a Genevese, and well known on the continent by his connection with Madame de Stael, to whom he has been some time married. His memoirs have been perused with considerable interest: the first edition was in the press at London before the Bourbons arrived in France; and a second, published in Paris, was speedily exhausted. It could not be doubtful, that, during the government of Bonaparte, even at the time when he professed the the greatest anxiety for the liberty of the press, its circulation would not have been permitted in France; since it speaks in no measured terms of the impolicy, unpopularity, and hopelessness of the Spanish war. It is the work of an observant, intelligent man, aware of the injustice, and ashamed of the cause which his duty obliged him to defend, glad to escape at any price, at the expence of two severe wounds, from an inglorious contest, where his heart and his sword were at unceasing variance, and his better sentiments forced him continually to disavow the evil to which his arm was condemned. A subsequent residence of a year in England enabled him to verify the truth of many of his statements, and from the materials which he collected here, he has added to the description of those scenes of which he was a personal witness, an account of the campaign of Portugal, which he denominates the chef-d'œuvre of a defence at once national and military. We conceive that some detail of those parts of his book, which do not so much regard the military operations, as the manners of a people, which has deservedly attracted much of the public attention, will be acceptable to such of our readers as are pleased with contemplating at a distance those varieties of life and manners, of which the greater number are precluded from taking a nearer view by their insular situation. The crowd of important events which have recently contributed to plant the tree of liberty in every soil but that on which it was first boastfully erected, must not make us forget that Spain and Portugal were for no inconsiderable period, the only countries in which continental freedom could find a safe restingplace. Now that a long and arduous struggle appears to have ended as all honest men must wish every contest for independence should end, it is interesting to look back upon the spot *Napoleon in one of his celebrated conversations at Elba is reported to have confessed his surprise, that the censors of the press should have found any thing worthy of suppression in Madame de Stael's work on Germany, which he read for the first time during his exile. He is likewise said, while reflecting bitterly on the conduct of Chateaubriand, to have expressed his gratitude to Madame de Stael, for the silence she observed respecting him during his fall; and subsequently on his return to Paris, he intimated to her, through his brother Lucien, that it was perfectly unnecessary for her to leave the capital at his approach, adding this singular assurance, that she might perhaps enjoy there more liberty than she desired. M. de Stael knew Napoleon too well to trust to his civilities, and retired early in March to her estate at Coppet on the lake of Geneva. Where where the strife began, and trace the spread of that feeling, which statesmen at one time characterised as a fugitive and momentary ebullition, unsafe, inefficient, unproductive; while at another its very existence was obstinately denied, and they who believed and trusted in it, were denounced as unwise and credulous. It now appears, that it is not force of arms, but public opinion, which must be employed to keep in subjection above 175,000 square miles, and more than twelve millions of the descendants of that people who expelled the Moors after seven centuries of uninterrupted fighting, and who patiently bore the various result of 3600 battles. It is painful to reflect that a nation of such unwearied constancy, may not yet have reaped all the fruits of its perseverance, and the name of Ferdinan lo Settimo, long the watchword and rallying cry of loyalty and freedom, may have already become the synonyme of slavery and despotism, and persecution. In point of information, and in the perfection of social ha bits, Spain was more than a century behind the other states of the continent. Few traces were to be found there of the progress of the liberal sciences, fewer still of those enlarged principles which were becoming prevalent in all other lands. She had taken no part in the disputes and controversies of the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, which, while they agitated, enlightened the rest of Europe. Knowledge spread slowly and partially, unassisted by those, powerful engines, which have served to disseminate it through most other countries, and checked by that unworthy interest which induced the priests to continue, as far as was in their power, the reign of moral darkness and error. It was therefore long a subject of curiosity, what means enabled a handful of people, unorganised, unused to war and privations, licentiously impatient of control, often regardless of the advice of even a popular chief, long without a leader, and always without an efficient government,-a people who gave no signs of enjoying national blessings of such a deep and determined character, as to make the very idea of a foreign yoke insupportable,-what means enabled them to support for more than five years the weight of the immense power of the French empire, long directed solely against themselves. By what moral principle was a people, little enlightened, and not easily susceptible of receiving an external impulse, enabled to oppose the will of him who had dispensed law almost without resistance, in Italy, on the banks of the Danube, the Elbe, and the Niemen, at Petersburgh, at Vienna, and at Berlin? How could the undisciplined and unarmed and unequipped mountaineers of the Spanish provinces, present any effectual barrier to the progress of armies which were recruited among the ex tensive tensive departments of France, or Holland, or Poland, or Italy, or Switzerland, or Germany? These and other questions of equal interest, will, we conceive, find an easy solution in M. Rocca's memoirs. In the first place, however weak and corrupt the Spanish government proved itself to be in many instances, it bore no resemblance to the absolute military power which was the sole agent among the northern nations of Europe. It was the government of the people, and of publie opinion, not imposed and supported contrary to the national will. Spain and Portugal presented the extraordinary picture of nations, whose Sovereigns were driven into banishment, or imprisoned, at the command of a single man, and their kingdoms were unprovided with regular troops, or the still stronger resource of firmly esta blished authorities. Yet so far was the national character from having receive any blow, that its firmness was enabled to effect, without any legitimate head, what Germany, with all its arbitrary power, might not at last have dared to attempt without this example;-Germany, where the implicit submission of the many to the will of an individual, incessantly repressed or deranged the springs of natural energy. The war of regular troops, who are commonly little interested in the object of the quarrel they maintain, is of a very different character to that war of resistance which a nation can oppose to regular conquering armies. The Spanish patriots possessed invincible strength, even when they had no more of their native soil than the ground on which they trod, or the heath on the mountains in which they concealed themselves; while the French could neither gain the affection nor the contribution of one of their pretended subjects, though masters of every plain and every town, and domesticated in the capital itself. Soldiers who were defeated almost without an effort in the flat country, frequently made a resistance of twelve months within the walls of their town; and only dreaded lest they should arrive too late, where their hearts and their country called them. Of a very different nature were all the wars in which the French had been so long engaged, where they had nothing to fear from the inhabitants of the conquered countries, and where all those little partial actions were avoided, which only increase the miseries of individuals without leading to any important advantage. Rivalry rather than hatred exists between armies of regulars, and the talents of the general are seldom baffled by the spontaneous ex. ertions of the people. In Germany the French had only to subdue governments and armies, in Spain the legitimate authorities were already annihilated, and opposition did not arise from troops of the line, every where nearly the same, but from a people a people insulated from all the other continental nations, by its manners, by its prejudices, and even the nature of its country. The language of M. Rocca on this point is instructive and entertaining. "Quand nous quittames nos cantonnemens de la Prusse pour aller en Espagne, nous croyions marcher à une expédition facile, et de peu de durée: vainqueurs en Allemagne, nous ne supposions pas que rien put désormais nous résister. Nous n'avions point réfléchi aux obstacles imprévus que pouvoient nous présenter la nature d'un pays si nouveau pour nous, et le caractère de ses habitans. "Nos soldats ne demandoient jamais dans quelle contrée on les conduisoit, mais s'il y avoit des vivres là où ils alloient, c'étoit sous ce seul point de vue qu'ils considéroient la géographie de la terre. Le monde étoit partagé pour eux en deux parties, la zone heureuse où eroit la vigne, et la zone détestable qui en est privée. Ayant entendu dire au commencement de chaque campagne, qu'ils étoient appelles à porter le dernier coup à la puissance chancelante des Anglais, ils confondoient cette puissance, sous toutes ses formes, avec l'Angleterre elle-même. Ils jugeoient de la distance qui les en séparoit, par le nombre de marches qu'ils jaisoient depuis bien des années, d'un extrémité du monde à l'autre, sans avoir encore atteint cette espèce de pays imaginaire et lointain qui reculoit sans cesse devant eux. Enfin, disoient ils, si le đésert nous en a séparés en Egypte, et la mer à Boulogne, nous y arriverons bientôt par terre en traversant l'Espagne." ~P, 12, The second main cause of the successful resistance of the Spaniards, appears to have been the influence of the priests. The deference paid to the clergy was universal and absolute, and if the sentiment of patriotism had not been sufficiently strong to animate the active spirit of this order against the French, their interest supplied them with an additional motive for inveterate hatred, since they were well aware that the abolition of their privileges and temporal power would have been the imme, diate consequences of the subjugation of Spain. Their opinion carried with it the most implicit authority, and swayed the wills of the whole nation. They represented the war as a religious crusade against the French for their country and king; and the only military distinction of the greatest part of their citizen sol, diers was a red ribbon, with this inscription, " Vincer o morit pro patria et pro Ferdinando settimo." Thus their very patriot, ism was a religion, as it was with the ancients, and supplied the piace of the point of honour, which attaches the regular soldier to his standard. Every man hastened not to leave those altars defenceless, to which the pilgrims crowded in happier times fo obtain abundant harvests. The priests were too politic not to make |