in contemplation with the court of Petersburg. We find, however, that this negotiation, which promised such beneficial results to the contracting parties, and so rapid a success, was soon checked in its progress by a secretary of count Ostermann having betrayed the secret to Mr. Fraser, at that time the English chargé d'affaires at the court of Catherine, who advertised the British cabinet of the whole plan by an extraor dinary courier.

The author next proceeds to develope what he calls the am-. bitious project of the Anglo-Prussian league, and to treat of the war between the Russians and the Swedes, &c.

The sequel of this history will shew (he says) that Fortune constantly repaired the errors of Frederic William, and always saved him from the evils into which the active inquietude of his Ministers might draw him, from the unsteadiness of his politics, and the indolence of his character.

Nothing disturbed his tranquillity during the winter of 1788; but every thing combined to give flattery the appearance of truth. Victorious in Holland, dreaded by France, caressed by Spain, extolled by England, looked up to by the Princes of Germany as the protector of the liberties of the Empire; the Turks implored his assistance; Poland his support; the Swede followed his advice; Denmark was terrified by his threats; the German Poets celebrated his magnificence, and applauded his aversion to French literature; his mistresses alleviated the weight of his lassitude; his Ministers that of business.

His Courtiers predicted to him a solid glory; and the Illuminati promised him long life, by means of an elixir, which, in fact, abridged its duration. The Monarch then thought, and might believe, that the part of a King was as easy as it was agreeable; he did not foresee the explosion which was so soon to rouse up so many nations, shake so many thrones, and blast the first laurels of his reign.'

M. de Ségur's account of Poland, in this chapter, is extremely interesting, but we cannot afford to be very profuse in extracts. Then proceding to give some general view of the French revolution, he prefaces his narrative by a short account of M. Necker, which seems to contain a fair statement of that Minister's character. He next conducts us through the antient and modern state of France; very ably lays down the constitution of the Franks, with the establishment of the feudal system until its fall; displays the absolute power of the kings since the administration of cardinal de Richelieu; notices the progress of knowlege since the invention of the art of printing, with its natural consequence, the decline of aristocratical and superstitious prejudices; and, in short, carries us, in an agreeable and satisfactory manner, through the several stages of that stupendous event, to the breaking up of the Con

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stituent Assembly: giving us, as we proceed, a comparative view of the opinions and manners of other European nations at the same epoch.

Few authors have a happier facility in the art of drawing characters, than is possessed by the present historian:-that of the Emperor Joseph II. we shall here insert.

Travelling and military fatigues had impaired his constitution;" toil had exhausted his strength; grief inflamed his blood, and hastened the conclusion of his days. His character presented a singular mixture of qualities, from which he derived some glory; and of de feets, by which that glory was tarnished. Simple in his manners; austere in regard to himself; indulgent in respect to others; affable towards all his subjects; continually engaged in the duties of his rank; indefatigable in labour; supporting censure of his conduct without caprice; despising effeminacy; braving dangers, he took an interest in cherishing all the arts, and shewed favour to all talents.

• Initiated in the military art by Laudon and Lascy; formed to politics by Kaunitz; versed in ancient and modern literature; the merchant, the soldier, the philosopher, found his conversation equally interesting and instructive. His mind was not fettered by any prejudice; and, uuder such a Prince, every thing promised to his people a glorious reign: but serious defects annihilated these brilliant hopes.

Ambitious without genius, enterprising without constancy, and warlike without success, he never suffered Europe to be at rest; was continually changing his plans, and miscarried in almost all his projects. His Bavarian war added some laurels to the crown of Frederic the Great, and he gained nothing by it: he threatened Holland, which disarmed him by a few cannon shot and a light tribute. He endeavoured to compel the Duke des Deux-Ponts to consent to the exchange of Bavaria for the Low Countries; and was stopped in this design by the threats of the King of Prussia, who, from that time, has been regarded as the protector of the Empire against Austrian ambition. The dread of the Frussian arms impelled him to make impolitic sacrifices to Russia, in order to purchase her alliance. He became the Courtier of Catherine; facilitated for her the conquest of the Krimea, graced the triumphal pomp of her journey into Tartary, and suffered her to hurry him into a disastrous war, which cost him two hundred thousand men, exhausted his treasures, and exposed the House of Austria to the dangers of a ruin that had been certain, if Frederic William had known how to profit by his errors.

Joseph II. was avaricious, but ruined his country; he was a philosopher in his opinions, but a despot in his conduct; he had, by enlightening them, cured his subjects of their prejudices; he irritated them, by wishing to lead them to reason by force; and at the same time that France rose to destroy the power of Nobles and Priests, he contrived to lose the Low Countries, by there suppressing, by authority, the seigniorial Judges, and establishing, by constraint, a tolerance of worship.

• Forgetting

Forgetting that he governed several nations, who had neither the same knowlege, manners, nor genius, he wished, in spite of their propensities, habits, and privileges, to subject them uniformly and suddenly to the same law, and the same form of government; to inspire them with the same principles; to make them adopt the same education. The sad result of these absurdities was, that on his death-bed he saw his armies beaten, his finances ruined, his influence in the Empire lost, his frontiers threatened :-Hungary in a fermentation, the Belgic Provinces in a state of revolt, and his perpetual rival, Prussia, at the head of a menacing league, ready to overturn his throne on his tomb.

The death of this Prince seemed to open a more extensive career to the ambitious designs of the Prussian Cabinet. The House of Austria saw itself threatened at once with the loss of its dominions and the Imperial throne; but Fortune, although she has been deified, depends on men; she is fickle to Temerity, and constant to Prudence. The Austrian power, ready to fall, was quickly saved by the wisdom of Leopold, the successor of Joseph; by the versatility of Frederic William, and by the unreflecting ardour of the French, who wished every where to extend a Liberty they were themselves far from possessing.'

M. de Ségur now adverts to the Brabantine revolt, which was seriously fomented by the apostles of the French revolution, and artfully irritated by the partisans of Austria: both of whom, avowing only the public good, but listening merely to their private passions, availed themselves of the same weapon for mutual destruction. It was in the name of the sovereign people that they spoke; it was for the glory of the people that they acted the people were at once their apparent idol, their blind sport, and their cruel instrument. Resuming the thread of the French revolution, the author then brings it down to the retreat of Frederic William and the subsequent successes of General Custine.

The Id volume opens with the trial and death of Louis XVI. and extends to the execution of Robespierre; after which, the historian turns to Poland, gives the particulars of the revolution in that country, and concludes his twelfth chapter with the total partition and subjugation of the Poles. The influence of these events on the minds of the French is then stated; and their history is continued to the campaigns of Bonaparte and Moreau in 1795, when we arrive at the following animated conclusion:

At length this campaign was terminated by a suspension of arms, which was soon followed by fresh hostilities.

Frederic William, who had just completed the partition of Poland, and concluded a peace with France, disappeared about this time from the political scene of Europe.

REV. MARCH, 1802.

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He afterwards projected some farther dismemberment and secu. larization in Germany, which were proposed to him by France, who then believed it to be his interest to weaken the Emperor, and to augment the power of the protestant party in the Empire, at the expense of the catholic party; but these schemes, too complicated, would have required an activity which this monarch never possessed; and the declining state of his health augmented his natural indolence.

Aspiring to the character of a mediator, he made some fruitless attempts to bring about peace; but to this the passions of the coalition and the French directory were almost equally adverse.

The expenses of the war, the malady of the King, his profusion, and his mistresses, had deranged his finances, and he negociated a loan at Frankfort to relieve the exhaustion of his treasury, which he had lavished without glory. His infirmities daily increased his indifference for the storms with which he was surrounded; the illuminati amused him with deceitful promises, in the hope of recovering that health which excess of pleasures had irrevocably destroyed; at length the dropsy having decidedly declared itself, he died on the 17th November 1797, regretted by his family, and by a few friends who rendered justice to his mildness and his beneficence, but leaving behind him no trace of glorious remembrance.

His intrigues had exposed Sweden and Turkey to a ruinous war; his protection had destroyed Poland; the first to form the coalition, he was the first to abandon it. The Stadtholder might reproach him with the loss of his power, and Brabant with that of her liberty. His defects had diminished the lustre shed by his predecessor over the Prussian arms. His abortive enterprises, and the avidity of his mistresses, had dissipated the treasures of the Great Frederic; and although the partition of Poland had added several rich provinces to his dominions, Frederic William III. his son, was obliged to exert the most unremitting prudence, and to observe the strictest economy, in order to repair the faults of his father, and to restore to Prussia her real importance and prosperity.

On his accession to the throne, he arrested Madame de Lichtnan Rietz, and those persons who had imposed on the weakness of the late King to enrich themselves. The justice which he exercised towards them, his choice of ministers, and the example which he set of a regular life, inspired a just confidence in his subjects, to whom these augured a happier reign; and endeavouring rather to restore tranquillity to Europe by his influence than to trouble it by his ambition, he firmly persisted, in spite of the intrigues of England, and the councils of some violent men, in a system of neutrality, which he pursued from prudence, but which his predecessor had adopted only from inconstancy.

If during the last two years of the reign of Frederic William II. Prussia was not distinguished by any important event, it was far otherwise with the rest of Europe, which became the theatre of the most sanguinary battles, the most brilliant exploits, and the most memorable conquests, recorded in the annals of modern history.

The recital of these new revolutions extends beyond the canvas which I proposed to fill it presents rich materials for another work; but the more fertile and important the subject is, the less it ought to be ornamented.

The historian who undertakes to treat of it, will say, "that there appeared one of those men whom Fate destines to celebrity, and whom she seems seldom to create in the space of ages, for the purpose of executing her decrees, and changing the face of Empires."

He will recount the battles of Millesimo-Cerasco, the capture of Ceva, the sudden invasion of Piedmont, which forced the King of Sardinia to accept peace; he will describe the temerity of the French conquerors at Rastadt, Altenkirchen, and Rhincen, advancing to the centre of the Empire under the command of Jourdan, and afterwards forced to repass the Rhine; the talents of Moreau, who acquired as much glory by his skilful retreat as others have by their brilliant victories.

The battle of Fombio, that of Lodi, and of Rivoli, the conquest of Lombardy, the capture of Mantua, the Austrian army of Provera laying down their arms, Rome imploring the generosity of the conqueror of Italy, will enrich this splendid picture.

The contest betwixt two celebrated generals, the battles of the Archduke Charles against Bonaparte, the victories of Taglia ment, of the Wis, of Brixen and Clagenfurth, the capture of Gradiska and Trieste, will attest the courage of the French, and perpetuate the glory of their young and fortunate General.

The alliance of Spain with France, the secret efforts of England to prolong the war, her public overtures for restoring peace, the insolent and unconstitutional conduct of the French Government, the weak and imprudent course of the legislative body, the ardour and indiscretion of the Royalists, the revolution of the 18th Fructidor, the proscriptions which followed it will open a vast field for the reflexions of the Philosopher and the Politician on the delirium of human passions.

To relieve the eye from these dismal objects, the reader will accompany the conqueror of Italy, marching to the gates of Vienna, subduing Venice, and forcing the Emperor to conclude a peace; he will then hope that the world, weary of such continued tempests, is at length on the eve of enjoying some repose.

But this hope will suddenly vanish; and whilst he follows Bonaparte in his almost incredible conquest of Egypt, the defeat of the Mamelucks, the capture of Alexandria, of Damietta, Cairo and Suez, the battles of the Pyramids, the invasion of Syria, the murderous siege of St. Jean d'Acre, the battles in Palestine, and the victory of Aboukir, will induce him to doubt whether these prodigies belong to history or to romance; he will at the same time perceive with regret the directory inflated by pride, and blinded by fear, exhausting all the resources of France by its ignorance, irritate all minds by it's injustice, lose the fruits of the peace of Campo Formio by it's ambition, break up the congress at Rastadt by it's insincerity, ruin ensanguined Switzerland by the cupidity of it's agents,

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