an amendment in favor of war. He deprecated all "balmy balderdash" about peace and that sort of humbug. "There is," he said, "no opinion in Ireland, worth a farthing, which is not illegal." The debaters could not agree, and adjourned their discussion.-Spectator. THE IRISH IN LIVERPOOL.-Since Monday morning, one hundred and sixty-nine Irish offenders have been brought before Mr. Rushton-an average exceeding forty per day! The borough gaol contains at this moment more than one thousand prisoners-five hundred being about the usual average and the workhouse is so full that many shivering vagrants have been denied admittance. Liverpool Mercury. like speech from his great rival, Thiers, M. Guizot suddenly remembered that France and he had all along sympathized with the regeneration of Italy. M. Guizot, it is clear, has at last perceived, what we ventured to assert months ago, that France herself adheres to the Italian alliance, and that the official government cannot safely array itself on the side of Austria.-Spectator, 5 Feb. EMANCIPATION OF ITALY.-There have been stirring debates and most eloquent speeches in the French chamber. The members of the liberal party seem to have awakened from a long trance, during which jealousy to England absorbed their Of a sudden this spell has thoughts and energy. been dissolved. The Italians are struggling for their freedom, and Englishmen and Frenchmen, both sympathizing with and eager to help them, SICILY has rebelled, by rebellion has regained see how efficacious their help would be, were the the constitution of 1812 or '21, has won a consti- countries united. What is the obstacle? Simply tution of some sort for Naples, and has thus con- M. Guizot having quarrelled with England about solidated Italian Italy in a general bond of freedom. the Spanish marriages, and his having in conseThe conduct of the King of Naples was as paltry quence formed a close alliance with Austria. The as it could well be; he absolutely rejected the question now is, shall Italy be sacrificed to this early petitions of his subjects who urged him to alliance? Shall France disgrace herself by aiding follow the moderate example of the other Italian Austria to enslave the Italians, whilst England princes; when the Sicilians took up arms, he tried takes the glorious part of striving in their behalf? to suppress the revolt by cruel measures; finding Such is the question that M. Thiers asked with tyranny becoming hazardous, he offered half-meas-consummate eloquence from the tribune of the ures; and, meeting with more obstinate firmness chamber; such the question mutually put by press than he expected, he granted all. The nature of revolt, its thoroughly national character, is indicated by the fact that it was led by men of rank and known discretion. The king's concessions were advised by his brother, the Conte d'Aquila. King Ferdinand has just escaped the fate of Charles the Tenth of France, and, as it were, doubles with that part the one of Louis Philippe. and public. Mr. Cobden desires the mission of peace-maker, and now is the time for him to come forward. He has no need of appeasing the French by disbanding the British army and laying up the British navy in ordinary. He has but to propose a frank coöperation to save Italy, and a mutual sacrifice of French and English pretensions in Spain on the altar of Italian liberty. The effect of this successful rebellion must soon It is no easy task to rear that altar. We canappear. Should the subjects in the other Italian not conceive a more difficult political problem, than, states remain in discreet alliance with their imme-given the pope and his supreme power, to establish diate rulers, the nationalization of Italy will be in and around his dominions a free or representagreatly hastened, as well as the progress of reform tive government? If there are immense objections throughout the peninsula. The demand for a to the pope being swayed by Austrian or by French specific constitution like that of Sicily might breed councils, what is to be said of the papal cabinet ill feeling, and alienate the well-disposed princes. being forced open by a constitutional opposition, Austria will retrieve her strength, or lose it, ac- which has acquired a majority in a Roman parliacording to the course of affairs in Central Italy. If ment? M. Guizot says, the great object is to rulers and people remain united, Austria must reconcile the Catholic religion and its chief with either fall into the custom of the day, or consent to the ideas and liberal progress of the age. M. lose her Italian possessions. Thiers adds, that this can only be done by secularAlready the success of the Sicilians has had the izing the Roman government. One says, that in usual influence in commanding assistance. M. the difficulties of reform the priest will save the Guizot, who inclined to Austria while the Italian sovereign; the other, that the sovereign will save cause seemed doubtful, has now discovered that the priest. We must own that we ourselves, France sympathizes with Italy, and sanctions even though influenced by a sincere desire to be neither organic changes. The conversion of the astute extravagant nor extreme, cannot but consider the statesman took place all on a Sunday. On Satur- pope as a huge anomaly, a monster fragment of day, M. de Lamartine made an eloquent attack on the great wreck of the middle ages, still surviving ministers for abandoning the traditional policy of for no purpose except as a shoal and an obstrucFrance in Italy; but M. Guizot was coldly imper- tion. And with all our respect for Pius the Ninth, turbable, unshaken as to his faith in Austrian we do not see how either the priestly part of power moderation and enlightenment, and firm in main- is to save the monarchical, or vice versa. Unless, taining the status quo. On Monday, instigated by indeed, as M. Mariotti suggests, the Ferretti were a penetrating, brilliant, and dangerously statesman- to form a dynasty of popes and proclaim themselves the chiefs of free Italy, sacerdotal and lay. Here, however, would be the end of the universal popedom. The Sicilians, however, have made the important step. They have deposed a vacillating despot, driven him and his troops out of their capital, and rejected his offers of state councils and quasi-independence, insisting on nothing less than the constitution given by Lord William Bentinck in 1820. This constitution is very favorable both to the clergy and the noblesse, and would rally these classes, as well as the rural population, in its favor. But unfortunately its house of commons is a very diminutive assembly. Sicily, divided into twentythree districts, would elect but two members each district, which, with six for Palermo and three for the other great towns, would form a very small body for the national representation. Had Ferdinand of Sicily any wisdom, he ought to be contented with such a constitution; nay, ought to have grasped at it, since it gave him an upper chamber, like that of Westminster, which could be made a firm bulwark of the throne. The king has, however, flung them away, and prefers something "on the basis of the French Charter." What this something is he does not appear to say; but the Sicilians will probably ask him, and the Neapolitans too. The latter people despise their noblesse, and would gladly do without a chamber of peers. Therefore the refusal of the constitution of 1812 is no unwelcome act to them. But to the Sicilian nobles it will prove the contrary; and it may impel them to unseat Ferdinand altogether, and divide the island of Sicily from the mainland of Naples. But then comes the consideration that the king has married an Austrian princess, and that Austria I will desire to intervene. The pope denies the Austrians passage. But the Austrians can go by sea. It is not for the pope to bar their passage by this route; it is for France and England. Have they courage?-have they unity for this? That is the question.—Examiner. Which Hiero, Gelon, Pindar sat among In the lone woods, and late, Within the circle of six hundred years, The cursed upas. Never trust We have yet to learn the most interesting and important of the consequences of the Sicilian revolution, namely, its effect on the adjacent states of Italy and on the decision of the cabinet of Vienna. In both quarters that effect will be extremely great, and we fear that it will tend to excite the passions of anarchy in one direction, as much as the fears of absolutism in another. At this moment, too, the leading orators of the French chamber have been engaged in a discussion on the delicate and complicated affairs of Italy in a manner which demonstrates that, whatever may be the disposition of M. Guizot's cabinet, it will be impossible for France to tolerate any aggression of Aus From the Spectator. HISTORICAL PARALLELS: SWITZERLAND AND POLAND.-There are some historical events cited as parallels, which are very angular illustrationshaving one point in common, the further they are traced the more they deviate. The affairs of Switzerland, however, do seem to afford a parallel to the proceedings which terminated in the partition of Poland. tria on the rights of the independent states of Italy. | retti, nephew of the cardinal and cousin of the The papal government has already given a decisive holy father, and Count Marchetti." refusal to the Austrian application for the passage of troops, and announced its intention of defending the neutrality and independence of the dominions of Rome by all the weapons it can command. Can Austria, then, dare to run the risks of war in Italy, with her finances exhausted, her alliances shaken, and the certainty that France would sooner or later be driven to espouse the popular cause? Can she, on the other hand, avow to Italy and to Europe, that in principle she is already vanquished, that her ascendency over that peninsula is annihilated, Take these passages in the Edinburgh Review, that the interventions of 1821 and 1831 are now said to have been written by Sir James Mackintosh. beyond her power, and that the defence of Lom- "The death of Augustus, in 1733, had nearly bardy is all that remains of the Italian policy of occasioned a general war throughout Europe. Prince Metternich? Either alternative is equally The court of St. Petersburg then set up the fatal formidable-the choice between them more formi-pretext of a guarantee of the Polish constitution, founded on the transactions of 1717. A guarantee dable still; yet that option is the only power of the territories and rights of one independent state Prince Metternich still enjoys; the rest is beyond against others, is perfectly compatible with justice; but a guarantee of the institutions of a people against themselves, is but another name for dependence on the foreign power which enforces it. In pursuance of this pretended guarantee, the country was invaded by 60,000 Russians, who ravaged with fire and sword every district opposed to their progress." his control.-Times. À STATISTICAL account of the population of Italy, up to the end of last year, gives the following results: The Two Sicilies, 8,566,900 7,580 7,950 483,000 477,000 Piedmont & Sardinia, 4,879,000 Roman States, 2,877,000 4,759,000 Italian Tyrol, Istria, Total, 522,608 24,567,238 The writer then remarks on the liberum veto, which enabled every nuncio to stop every public measure if he dissented from it; and he adds 66 Generally speaking, the absolute negative enjoyed by every member of the Polish diet seems to have arisen from the principle that the nuncios were not representative, but ministers; that the power of acting was limited by the imperative instructions of the provinces; that the constitution was rather a confederacy than a commonwealth, and the diet not so much a deliberative assembly as a meeting of delegates, whose whole duty con A LETTER from Constantinople of the 17th says:sisted in declaring the determination of their re"The pope's nuncio, Mgr. Ferrieri, arrived spective constituents." yesterday at Constantinople, on the Sardinian The result was, that war between the majority steamer the Tripoli. A very brilliant reception and minority was legitimate, and neither party was given to him. After the usual salutes were were treated as rebels, for both were composed exchanged between the Sardinian packet-boat and of members of the sovereign class. "The ordithe foreign vessels of war, the nuncio, accompa-nary was converted into a confederate diet, and is nied by the Catholic Armenian patriarch, disem- perhaps the most singular example in history of a barked at Top-Khane in a superb boat with five legislative assembly assuming the form of a party pairs of oars, which was placed at his disposal by in civil war in order to escape from the restraints the government. He was then conducted with of an inconvenient law." the other persons of the mission, in carriages belonging to the court, to his hotel at Pera. The crowd which assembled on his passage cried, 'Long live Pius IX! Long live the liberty of Italy!' The nuncio from these cries might almost have believed that he had not left Rome. Immediately after reaching his hotel he received the congratulations of the diplomatic body, and of the deputations of the different religious communities, united and not united. The porte has given him the hotel he occupies, and will pay all his expenses whilst he remains here, which will be for two or three months. Among the persons who form part of the nuncio's suite are Monsignor Vespesiani, the Canon Capri Galanti, Count Fer The French government, by its note of the 18th January, 1848, has formally declared, that no change shall be made in the federal pact of Switzerland without the unanimous consent of the twenty-two cantons. Its right of interference is founded on its having been a guarantee as respects the independence of the republic. We have, then, foreign nations interfering in the internal organization of the government of Switzerland under the pretence of asserting guaranteed rights; the diet of Switzerland assuming the form of a party in the civil war; the present state of the organization of Switzerland requiring change to prevent the recurrence of such an event, and such change forbidden by foreign powers. Is the result to be, that on account of civil dissensions which may occur if no organic change is made in the pact, foreign troops may ravage with fire and sword every district opposed to them; and then a partition of Switzerland, having the protectorate of neighboring governments for its several portions; those portions finally to be absorbed in the territory of neighboring states? Behold the fruit of a guarantee! From the Times. M. THIERS.-The speeches delivered by M. Thiers in the course of that general review of the politics of the world which takes place before the chamber of deputies in the beginning of the year, do credit to his talents and his sincerity. Although he evidently participates in the passions which are excited at this time to an extraordinary degree against the French ministers, he has abstained from the more dangerous and excessive demonstrations of the radical party, and confined himself within the limits of a policy which might be pursued by a government. In short, whilst others have been indulging in the extravagance of declamation, M. Thiers has sought to convince the French chamber, and the rest of Europe, that his views are still governed by the principles of a statesman. We, therefore, give him the credit due to some discretion, as well as sincerity; but, although we believe that he has frankly stated his opinions, and that those opinions have no immediate connection with the wild schemes of the French radicals, we hasten to add that these speeches have in no degree increased our confidence in his political character or our sympathy with the cause he defends. We do him no injustice in saying that this cause is the cause of the French revolution. He began his political career as the ingenious, eloquent, and unscrupulous defender of revolutionary governments; he is now completing that part of his labors by an equally elaborate and fantastic panegyric of the man by whom all the despotic, aggressive, and anti-social tendencies of the revolution were raised to their highest power. In public life he has professed his adherence to the same creed, especially since he exchanged the cause of the government for that of the opposition. His policy avowedly is to promote, by means adapted to the present state of his country, and of the world, the same objects which have been marked out at different times, and by different powers throughout the course of the greatest convulsion in modern society. It cannot be repeated too often that the French revolution, or rather the revolution in the affairs of Europe, produced mainly by the dissemination of French principles, is not an event terminated, concluded, and accomplished, but that it is still and continually in progress. It is still fomenting the same hatred of religious aristocratical institutions and privileges; it is still subverting the principles of authority to which men yielded in former ages a loyal or unconscious obedience; and though it cares but little for the evils of anarchy or the benefits of genuine liberty, no sacrifice is too great to throw off and extirpate the natural checks to democratic license. To use M. Thiers' own words-"I am," said he "of the party of the revolution in Europe; I wish the revolution to be carried on by the hands of its moderate supporters. I shall do all that I can to keep it in the hands of that moderate party, but if it should pass into the hands of a party not moderate, I shall not abandon the cause of the revolution. I shall be always of the party of the revolution." These expressions deserve to be remembered-and especially by those who have affected to regard M. Thiers as the champion of an alliance with this country. This country must, indeed, be strangely changed before it would select an avowed French revolutionist as the object of its confidence and respect. M. Thiers proceeded to apply these principles to the Swiss question. In his opinion, the revolution and the counter-revolution are there at war; and we cannot be surprised that the man who as a writer could palliate the black crimes of the French convention should, as an orator, find it a very easy task to excuse the conduct of the Swiss diet. The Swiss have certainly not exhibited the fanatical levity or the sanguinary violence of the Parisian sections of 1793, but they have shown enough of the revolutionary spirit to entitle them to M. Thiers' applause. The success of the late campaign, the expulsion of the Jesuits, and the complete subversion of the legal governments in the conservative cantons, have not been followed by the species of pacification we ourselves had at one moment hoped for. The promise of an amnesty, and of other conciliatory measures, though made to Sir Stratford Canning, is still so distant that four of the principal members of the moderate party in Switzerland have resigned their commissions on the federal staff, because they feel themselves compelled to withdraw the support they had hitherto given to the government. In spite of the indignation caused throughout Europe by the unworthy proceedings of the government of the Valais, supported by federal commissioners and federal troops, at the Monastery of St. Bernard, these outrages have continued. The occupation took place on the 15th of December; on the 12th of January the garrison, still remaining there, ordered the monks to be confined to their cells, which were guarded by armed sentries, and permission was reluctantly conceded to the fathers to attend divine service in the chapel. On the 21st of January they were forcibly driven out of the monastery by the soldiers, and compelled to march to the infirmary at Martigny; afterwards even that refuge was denied them. In the Canton de Vaud the legislative council has been engaged in the discussion of a law for the complete suppression of all religious worship not in connection with the established church, and this enactment has been carried by 64 to 38 votes. The avowed object of the measure is to annihilate the Protestant evangelical sects, or, as they are improperly termed in Switzerland, the Methodists. These unfortunate sects will now be persecuted with as much ardor as the Jesuits have been. They are called the all Germany. We shall examine with the greater interest the other bills which may be submitted to urgently requires reforms in the administration of us, as we are so fully convinced that our epoch justice. Your majesty has deigned to make allusion to a neighboring country, with which we have numerous relations. If we should experience any serious alarms for the public order and tranquillity of our country, your majesty will find in the whole body of your people that good spirit which never recoils from making any sacrifice for the maintenance of order and right in the country. Strong in the union and reciprocal confidence between the sovereign and the people, we shall rally round the constitutional throne of our beloved king, and meet with calmness the coming storms." Protestant Jesuits; and, accordingly, the purest | protector of German nationality, we hail this meas Protestant democracy in Europe puts in force ure as a first step towards a common legislation for against them a law scarcly less intolerant than the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Already there are in London at this time fugitives from the Swiss cantons who are not monks or Jesuits, but Protestant pastors and Christians, proscribed and banished for having sought to worship God in their own way. M. Thiers is right; these are indeed triumphs of liberty which may well remind him of the favorite passages in his French revolution. We must, however, deny the converse of the proposition, which he seeks to fix on his opponents. It is not true that all who are not partisans of his revolutionary theory are therefore counter-revolutionary—that is, the partisans of repressive measures almost equally contrary to the rights and interests of mankind, and it is a gross misrepresentation to thrust his antagonists into the one extreme because they recoil from the other. In the name of this country, at least, and in the name of a large and enlightened party in France, in Germany, and elsewhere, we may assert the influence and the worth of principles equally opposed to the violence of the Swiss diet or the French convention, and to the policy which is professed by the cabinets of Vienna and St. Petersburg. The best friends of liberty are anti-revolutionists, without being counter-revolutionists; that is, they reject the pretended benefits which are purchased at the expense of justice and right, without being the more disposed to thwart or oppose the progress of rational reform. In that middle course lies the only safe track for those who are intrusted with the management of public affairs, and he would prove a dangerous guide who should allow his sympathies or his fears to urge From the Spectator. or to repel him to either extreme. In spite, there- PROGRESS OF CHEAP POSTAGE.-We print a fore, of the moderation of the tone of these speeches table showing the increase in the number of chargeof M. Thiers, there is that in the stamp and pur-able letters delivered in the United Kingdom, in pose of his mind which identifies him and his party with the enemies of the tranquillity and the permanent interests of Europe. THE following are the most prominent passages in the address of the second chamber of the states of Wurtemberg, in answer to the speech from the throne : "We participate in the convictions of your majesty, that the present state of the periodical press in Germany does not answer either to the just expectations of the governments or to the wants of the people. May the propositions presented by your majesty to the diet bring about a legal establishment of the freedom of the press in all Germany, and quickly insure to the people the faculty of making their opinions freely known. Will your majesty permit us, the representatives of your faithful subjects, to hope for a greater liberty for the press, in discussing the internal affairs of the country, in conformity with the words your majesty has addressed to us, and with the fundamental law. Incessantly occupied in developing our legislation, your majesty announces to us that at the next diet we shall have several judicial reforms, in consonance with the wants of the age. Filled with joy and gratitude towards your majesty, the august THE Prussian Universal Gazette gives the following statistical account of the Jewish population of Europe. England and Ireland, 13,000, being only the 2076th part of the whole population Belgium, 1954, the 2157th of the population Sweden and Norway, 850, the 5012th part of the population; Denmark, 6000, the 356th part of the population; France, 70,000, the 487th part of the population; the Netherlands, 52,000, the 61st part of the population; in Russia, including the Asiatic portion, the Jews form the 56th part of the population. The states of Austria, 641,000, being the 57th part of the population; in Italy, with the exception of the Austrian provinces, 40,000; Germany, not including Austria and Prussia, 175,000; Prussia, 222,814, being about a 74th part of the population. As a mat The each year from 1839 to 1847 inclusive. The first |