work to make a superabundant stock of all sorts of silk articles, for which a ready sale cannot reasonably be expected.

Patience will soon clear up all. That the country is prospering, may be evinced from the circumstance, that in the past year, the exports exceeded the imports by twenty-one millions.

Could all duties be dispensed with, the nation might rejoice in their extinction.-How much misery and vice is occasioned by the temptations to smuggling!

From the regular returns, it appears that the expense of the establishments for the prevention of smuggling, costs 1,533,7081.4s. 10d. and the produce of all the seizures 282,5417. 8s. 5d. So that the seizures are but little more than one-eighth of the expenses incurred in making them.

Among other benefits of this year, we must not forget the assimilation of English and Irish currency, and the annihilation of the colonial system.

In the colonies and dependencies, we find our empire in India, after combating so long the barbarous Burmese, has received the -accession of five provinces, and conquered peace: Owing to the li

beral government of the Marquis of Hastings, Indian finance was never in so flourishing a state. In 1823, the revenue amounted to 22,213,6231. whereas five years before it was only 18,375,000l.

The legislations of the different West India colonies will not agree to any one of the recommendations sent last year by ministers: to relinquish the use of the whip as a stimulus to labour, no longer to flog females, and to abolish Sunday markets and Sunday labour, that their slaves might have an opportunity of religious instruction, &c. &c.

Further, the assembly of Jamaica have petitioned his Majesty to prevent the discussion in parliament of any slave question, giving the pretended reason, that their human property is in danger of being lost, and asking indemnity.

The profound and highly-gifted governor has arrived from the Cape of Good Hope, and it is not supposed the colony will suffer much by his absence.

Van Dieman's Land is rapidly advancing. A quantity of the country wool has been sent to Yorkshire, where it receives a high character, and has been returned in cloth.

CHAPTER

A YEAR of profound tranquillity might afford opportunity for the advancement of society. Not so, however, if ultra-royalism and ultra-priestism can prevent it. In France, this year has witnessed the passing of the horrible law of sacrilege. The Constitutionel and Courier Français newspapers have been prosecuted at the instance of the Jesuits, and they have lost no opportunity of proclaiming their principles.

General La Fayette landed from an American frigate at Havre, where he was well received by the inhabitants, but no tumult took place. On arriving at Rouen, he dined with M. Cabanon, one of his old colleagues in the Chamber of Deputies. More than 2000 persons assembled in front of the house in the evening, shouting "Vive La Fayette !" The police thought fit to call out the gendarmerie to clear the street, who charged the unoffending people with drawn sabres, and many were injured. They also prohibited the supplying his carriage with post-horses to leave the city. La Fayette, however, contrived to quit the place, escorted by a number of his friends. Nothing can set in a clearer point of view the degradation of the French people, and the odious character of the Jesuit-ridden noblesse, who fill the places of authority under the Bour

bons, than the meanness of such conduct.

The principal laws passed in the Chambers, were the indemnity to emigrants and the reduction of the rentes, in which last M. Villele partially succeeded, 30,688,268 fr. having been converted. The independance of Hayti has been recognised for a compensation of 150,000,000 of francs to the ancient proprietors, and only half the duty to be levied upon French goods which is taken from other nations.

The coronation of the king, with the most frivolous ceremonies, took place at Rheims on the 29th of May. The mummeries practised on this occasion, particularly in the priestly part of the show, were unworthy a Chinese gala, and totally at variance with the good sense of the nation over which the monarch is placed. The French people, light and frivolous as they are, seemed to take little participation in the festivities and grovelling superstition displayed on this occasion. The silence and apathy of the bulk of the people is said not to have been unnoticed by the king, and the just detestation in which the agents of the Jesuits, and the attempts to extend the power of the clergy, are held, and the known support they receive from Charles X. have rendered him suspected and disliked. Great RR 2 extortions

extortions have been daily made by the priests. Remonstrances to the king and ministers have been made, not only without effect, but the complainants have been reprimanded for their conduct.

Spain exhibits, under its wretched state of legitimate misgovernment, alternate apathy, rebellion, anarchy, cruelty, and in every variation, varied misery.

Bessieres, an ultra, having decamped from Madrid, intending to head a party against the too moderate councils of Ferdinand! was pursued, taken, and shot; while the Empecinado, Don Juan Martin, perished by the hands of the executioner as bravely as he lived, after a long and cruel imprisonment. The noted Trappist has been put out of the way, or died rather suddenly. The Empecinado exclaimed, "What! is this the way I am rewarded by a king for all my services! I, who was the very first to raise the standard in his favour, and conduced more than any other to the destruction of the French, and the placing the crown on his head!" He made strong efforts to escape, released his hands from their fetters, grasped a sword of one of the officers, and, if his legs had been free, perhaps might have succeeded. It required several to secure him and to finish the business. He died execrating the king, the priests, and all around him. Orders were sent to Granada to put the laws in execution with regard to the Freemasons, who were apprehended holding a lodge. Paul Iglesias, a most excellent and virtuous citizen, perished on the scaffold at Madrid: when the people saw on a hurdle a man whom they had known as one of the most flourishing citizens

of the capital, a general sentiment of pity was manifested. But Iglesias mounted the scaffold, and having already the cord round his neck, asked to speak:-" Spaniards, my brothers," said he, "I have been devoted to liberty; I die like a Christian; I have received the aids of religion; pray for me. I die for my country,— for you all; learn from me to die with courage." Here the executioner threw himself off with him, and Iglesias, already suspended, cried with a loud voice, Liberty or Death."

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Surely, fearful retribution will one day be awarded for this, and much beside which the world knows not!

The pope has been excommunicating, imprisoning, and putting to death, certain of his obnoxious subjects, under the vague charge of being carbonari, just as his pious son of Spain has been butchering freemasons. To their credit, the unhappy men met death bravely, and were insensible to the threats and entreaties of the monks, who disturbed their last moments in this world.

A treaty has been concluded, under the mediation of England, between Portugal and Brazil, in which the latter is declared independent. The emperor is to retain the independent sovereignty of the Brazils during his father's life, and to continue to reside at Rio Janeiro, even though the kingdom of Portugal should descend to him by right of succession, which is to be preserved. Two millions sterling, given by the Brazilian government, are not the purchase-money for its independence, but an indemnity paid to King John VI. for the produce of

the

the mines and other property belonging to him.

A "Treaty of Commerce and Navigation," was entered into between Great Britain and the Hanseatic towns. This treaty is one of pure reciprocity, by which the vessels of Great Britain are admitted to the ports of the Hanseatic towns on the same conditions as their own vessels, which possess a similar privilege in British ports.

The Emperor of Austria and the Diet of Hungary do not appear to have been on the best terms; the latter addressed a warm remonstrance to him, the emperor has moderated his tone, assuring them that he intended no attack on their constitution, that he will certainly convoke a diet every three years, and that, even if they wish a meeting before the expiring of the first triennial term, he will comply with their petition to that effect.

The Hon. Leycester Stanhope, so distinguished for his exertions in the cause of Greece, having visited Milan, was ordered to quit that city in twenty-four hours. Like Lord Holland and Lady Morgan, he has been turned off the territory of the Austrian satrap, but with the difference, that no reason for the proceeding has been given.

In Russia, the most important event is the death of the Emperor at Taganrog, on the 1st December, -some say of fever, others of erysipelas. The Emperors of Russia are remarkable for dying suddenly but when the mildness of his rule is considered, it seems full as likely that he died a natural as a violent death. Time alone can settle the question. The Emperor was born in 1777, and succeeded his father Paul in 1801.

His brother Constantine is the legitimate successor; but Alexander willed that the crown should not be placed upon the head of Constantine, but of Nicholas, the second in right; and he had prevailed upon Constantine to sign an instrument of renunciation, in furtherance of his views. On the death of Alexander being known, a part of the troops and people proceeded to take the oaths to Constantine, the legal successor. Among those who were the foremost to do this, were the soldiers of the regiment of which this prince was colonel. In the mean time the archduke Nicholas was not idle. He produced the document signed by Constantine, renouncing the throne, and claiming the crown as the next in succession. The regiment of Constantine refused to take the oath to Nicholas, having just taken it to Constantine, and perhaps suspecting foul play to their colonel. The number of soldiers who acted thus were between two and three thousand. The new Emperor Nicholas parleyed with the refractory troops in vain, on which they were attacked by artillery and infantry, who had taken the oaths to Nicholas, and dispersed after two hundred had been killed.

Greece has lost ground in the past year, and now Missolonghi has fallen: but the powers of Europe appear about to interfere in her favour.

The election to the presidency of the United States was decided in favour of Mr. Adams. The numbers at the close of the proceedings stood as follows:-For Mr. Adams, 13: General Jackson, 7; Mr. Crawford, 4.

Accounts make mention of the project

project for making a sloop canal around the falls of Niagara: a measure of great utility.

In South America, Bolivar obtained a great victory over the Spaniards at Guamanguilla, and achieved the complete destruction of the Spanish force in Peru. In Upper Peru, Olaneta had been totally defeated by General Sucre. The speech of the President to the Mexican Congress furnishes a most satisfactory statement with respect to the state of the country, in a financial point of view. Warlike magazines have been formed---funds provided for the purchase of ships of war---and the current expenses of the State provided for; paper money no longer exists, and a part of the national debt has already been paid off.

A most important document has been published by that Congress, respecting the interference of the head of the church in the civil affairs of foreign states---and it is the more important, as the Mexicans are such bigoted Catholics, that they do not permit the exercise of any other religion within their territory. This paper is moderate in its language, but firm in purpose, and traces with a vigorous hand the limits between civil authority and ecclesiastical usurpation. It strips his Holiness of that dangerous prerogative by which his predecessors pretended to free subjects from their allegiance, and by which he himself now offers to patch up a claim of allegiance for Ferdinand. In the declaration of the Mexican congress, the Pope is so far from being considered as the Deus in terris, that any attention to his commands in civil or political

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matters is declared rebellion against the state, for which no alliance to the Tiara can obtain pardon. Nay, in this document, his Holiness is defeated with his own theological weapons; for if the court of Rome adopt the maxim of some ultra-Catholics--Papa et Christus faciunt unum Consistorium (the Pope and Christ form one Consistory)--- the Mexican government replies, that the latter member of the Consistory never claimed temporal obedience, and never interfered with secular authority. They consider his reply to the Pharisees, who provoked him to give his opinion respecting the Roman dominion exercised over the Jewish people---" Give to Cæsar those that be Cæsar's, and to God those that be God's"- as full of prudence and wisdom, admirable in all respects, and which in a few words comprehends all the plan of the Gospel respecting civil governments. The declaration concludes by stating, that "Congress is not afraid that the public tranquillity can be disturbed on pretexts of religion: but if, unfortunately, any wayward incendiary should endeavour to excite disturbances, whatever be his class, dignity, or condition, or under whatever disguise he appears, even though it should be that of supporting religion, the state has at its head a

vigorous and energetic government, which can make itself respected, and bring down the sword of justice on the guilty, severing from the rest of the inhabitants, and even of mankind, the rash man who would dare to cause the ruin of his brethren."

Captain Martinez sent out by the Spanish government with the