Mr. Carlyle paused ere he spoke, and a red flush dyed his face. "Those sort of feelings man rarely acknowledges to man, Lord Mount Severn, but I will answer you. I do love her, passionately and sincerely; I learnt to love her at East Lynne; but I could have carried my love silently within me to the end of my life, and never betrayed it; and probably should have done so, but for that unexpected visit to Castle Marling. If the idea of making her my wife had never previously occurred to me as practicable, it was that I deemed her rank incompatible with my own."

"As it was," said the earl.

Country solicitors have married peers' daughters before now," remarked Mr. Carlyle. "I only add another to the list."

"But you cannot keep her as a peer's daughter, I presume?" "East Lynne will be her home. Our establishment will be small and quiet, as compared with her father's. I explained to Isabel how quiet at the first, and she might have retracted, had she wished: I explained also in full to Lady Mount Severn. East Lynne will descend to our eldest son, should we have children. My profession is most lucrative, my income good: were I to die to-morrow, Isabel would enjoy East Lynne and about three thousand pounds per annum. I gave these details in the letter which appears to have miscarried."

The earl made no immediate reply: he was absorbed in thought. "Your lordship perceives, I hope, that there has been nothing clandestine' in my conduct to Lady Isabel."

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Lord Mount Severn held out his hand. "I refused your hand when I came in, Mr. Carlyle, as you may have observed; perhaps you will refuse yours now, though I should be proud to shake it. When I find myself in the wrong, I am not above acknowledging the fact: and I must state my opinion that you have behaved most kindly and honourably."..

Mr. Carlyle smiled and put his hand into the earl's. The latter retained it, while he spoke in a whisper.

"Of course I cannot be ignorant that, in speaking of Isabel's ill-treatment, you alluded to my wife. Has it transpired beyond yourselves ?" "You may be sure that neither Isabel nor myself would mention it: we shall dismiss it from amongst our reminiscences. Let it be as though you had never heard it: it is past and done with."

"Isabel," said the earl, as he was departing that evening, for he remained to spend the day with them, "I came here this morning almost prepared to strike your husband, and I go away honouring him. Be a good and faithful wife to him, for he deserves it."

"Of course I shall," she answered, in surprise.

Lord Mount Severn steamed on to Castle Marling, and there he had a stormy interview with his wife: so stormy that the sounds penetrated to the ears of the domestics. He left again the same day, in anger, and proceeded to Mount Severn.

"He will have time to cool down before we meet in London," was the comment of my lady.

THE POLICY OF ANNEXATION.

AT the beginning of the past month, Louis Napoleon was kind enough to inform the King of the Belgians that the question of "natural frontiers" was not applicable to his dominions, and that it would be a waste of money on his part to make any defensive demonstrations, which might offend the pride of his gallant, disinterested, and unselfish ally. Those ill-natured persons, however, who persist in attributing to Louis Napoleon every possible breach of faith by which he may hope to be benefited, read in this announcement a species of proclamation to the French nation, a sign-post pointing to the coming trail of annexation. Under such circumstances, we cannot do better than see how matters really stand between Belgium and her overshadowing frontier friend.

"The

Every newspaper reader will remember the exciting debates in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives during the summer of 1858. A liberal cabinet had raised the question of the national defences, more especially the fortification of Antwerp, and was beaten by a considerable majority. This vote, and the question connected with it, was misinterpreted, and purposely so, in various quarters. The Patrie, to whom the subject appeared a critical one, hastened to give the most false explanation of the motives that had instigated the majority. Belgian parliament," we read, "has just displayed the most admirable sagacity. It understood that the best, the only guarantee of Belgian independence is found in the neutrality consented to by the Great Powers. By refusing to fortify the country materially, the parliament fortifies it morally. Belgium can doubtlessly have its fortress and army, but, speaking correctly, these are mere objets de luxe. It cannot be sufficiently repeated that Belgium's strength lies in its weakness." The impertinence of such remarks can hardly be exceeded. The French regard the Belgian army and fortresses as a plaything which may be granted that country, as it holds a conventional place among the European states. But it would be absurd to talk of real fortification, of enduring a French blockade, of a battle between the grande armée and these Nüremberg toy-soldiers. It was absolutely the same cry as in 1848, 1830, under Napoleon, and in 1792. In 1848 a French general proposed to the Provisional government to seize Belgium "with one division ;" and M. Armand Marrast, the father of the constitution, called Belgium "a small kingdom, situated in the vicinity of Liége."

The Belgian Emancipation, which was bought over so suddenly after the coup d'état, and at one turn converted "Cartouche and Mandrin" into an Augustus, had the audacity to make itself the echo of the French press "Rightly or wrongly, Belgium has accustomed herself to feel strong through her weakness, to seek the conditions of her existence in her neutrality, which is kept up by the rivalry of those nations who thirst for the Belgian territory. The system of defending a small country by arms was excellent at a time when the public right of Europe was in a state of confusion; but now it is no longer so.' And with this consolatory view of a "public right" which was never based on force upon one side May-VOL. CXIX. NO. CCCCLXXIII.

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and timidity on the other more than at present, this Catholic rendered fatherland, independence, and freedom!

paper surIf possible, this moral corruption rose higher in an address from the fifth section of the city of Antwerp, whose deliverers the king politely showed the door : "Our heroism will not serve us, so soon as Europe considers our existence no longer necessary. Were a defeat to force us beneath the yoke of the victor, the protestations of our oppressed nationality would then be heard. Some day or other, the allied Powers would restore us our independence, our laws, and our free institutions; and the dynasty would return to Belgian soil with greater veneration the fewer ruins it has left behind it." These gentlemen already saw their roi vénéré running away; then, he would return by the aid of foreign bayonets, and his people would love him in proportion to the smallness of the sacrifices he had asked from them. So great, then, is their love for their nationality, whose emblem their monarch is. When the ministerial bill was rejected by the Chambers, Burgomaster Loos, of Antwerp, the most zealous opponent of the government, received the cross of the Legion of Honour from Louis Napoleon. This appears to indicate that the French had a certain degree of interest in the fortification of Antwerp.

The abstract free traders were equally unfortunate in their appreciation of the vote of the Chamber. M. Adolphe Lehardey simply uttered a falsehood when asserting that the majority was of opinion that "Belgium would do without the onerous renown which was promised it." What Antwerp required was not fortresses, but docks, basins, free entrepôts, railways, and so on. The city was in a condition to create all this for itself, but the ministerial project so fortunately rejected would have prevented it. "Three hundred thousand inhabitants: they are the garrison which will protect Antwerp against all foes, especially if care be taken to foster that right spirit of commerce which, provided with large capital, can defy foreign rivalry, and equip fleets of steamers and sailing vessels which are requisite for a great commercial port."

Why, we may ask, does free-trade England at this moment dot all her coasts with Armstrong batteries if London and Liverpool have a sufficient garrison in their population? M. Lehardey renders the national defence remarkably easy, by summoning the entire population under arms— seven hundred and fifty thousand powerful men capable of fighting, instead of a forced army of eighty thousand-by organising the youth of the country in companies, battalions, regiments, brigades, and divisions, armed with the best Liége rifles, and leaving the soldier thus in the bosom of his family. We may only hope that the fifth section of Antwerp may not form the advanced guard of M. Lehardey's patriotic army! What that gentleman understands of military tactics in a flat country will be seen in the passage: "When each canton has its battalion of chasseurs or line, its company of sappers, and its military train, always organised, ever ready-and all that for nothing-it will be difficult to attack us, more difficult to conquer us."

Fortunately for Belgium, all her citizens do not entertain these selfish views. Captain Brialmont, so well known to us as the author of the best "Life of Wellington" yet written, is better known at home by his "Considérations Politiques et Militaires sur la Belgique." In this

splendid work he points out all the dangers to which Belgium is exposed by the French policy of centralisation. The first Napoleon, he warns his countrymen, invented the expression "natural frontiers." (Possibly the expression, but the idea is as old as France.) Ostend and Antwerp were his two fixed ideas, as witness his letter to the Duc de Vicenza of 14th of January, 1814. He stated to King Louis of Holland, in 1810, that "the mouths of the Meuse and the Rhine must be mine; the Thalweg of the Rhine, that is the fundamental principle." Even so late as November, 1813, Metternich and Nesselrode regarded the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees, as the "natural frontiers" of France.

In burning words Brialmont proceeds to describe the happiness of the Belgians in forming an integral portion of France. In 1794 twentynine waggons, laden with money, arrived in Paris from Belgium, and excited no slight sensation. Are these waggons to be sent off once again? Belgium was never other to France than a fat farm. In 1747 and 1748, after the conquest by Marshal Saxe, the Catholic Netherlands sent forty-three millions each year to Paris. The decree of 30 Messidor, an II., laid on the nine Belgian departments 81,683,875 livres, leaving out of sight sixty millions forced loan and the sale of the national estates, which produced in one year (26 Brumaire, an III., to 1 Frimaire, an IV.) 26,056,886 francs. "And," the members of the Convention, Pérès and Portiez, added in their report, "there are still several milliards left in landed property to compensate the republic for a war which tyranny entailed, and which would restore her exhausted finances."

The treaty of November 15th, 1831, declared Belgium an "independent and permanently neutral state;" but, Brialmont adds, this neutrality must be powerful and armed: it has never been understood otherwise. This is most important for the interests of Belgium, for unimpeded invasions cost heavy sums: that of 1792 alone cost more than a milliard. During the War of Succession two hundred thousand soldiers were encamped for eight years on Belgian soil, and at the expense of the country. In the seventy-six years from the death of Isabella, Belgium was five times dismembered, and suffered from fifty-three years of war; from the time of Maria Theresa it underwent twelve changes of dynasty. Would this have been possible had Belgium possessed a powerful military organisation? The man who spares at the wrong moment must eventually pay for it suddenly and heavily. Thus Holland disorganised her army under the brothers De Witt, and in 1672 was forced to break up the dykes, and sacrifice hundred-fold the amount of her savings. Hence it is profitable and advisable that a neutral state should always be well armed. In addition, the military organisation of Belgium is the duty of the country according to treaty, for on that self-same 15th November, 1831, when the great powers guaranteed the existence of Belgium, they made a special convention with King Leopold that he must keep the Belgian fortresses permanently in good condition. As Brialmont justly remarks, "the Belgian loves liberty without being a Frenchman. It is an old and true saying, that 'so soon as they are called upon to fight the Gaul, Walloons and Flemings lay aside their quarrels.'

To the fortification of Belgium our author devotes special attention. We find that of the seven hundred million francs paid by France as a

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war contribution in 1815 to the allies, one-fourth was laid out on the Belgian fortresses, built by Holland under the direction of the Duke of Wellington. The duke himself remarked: "The actual object is to guarantee the communication with England and North Germany, more especially with Breda and Bergen-op-Zoom, and the places on the Lower Meuse and Lower Rhine." The French understood this plan perfectly, for Paixhans writes: "Through the situation of the fortresses the allies are building in Belgium, they have laid a base of operations in a circular form, equal to a first parallel on the march to Paris." The second line was formed by the fortresses on the Meuse and Scheldt, and, indeed, flanking fortresses are more valuable for defensive operations than a second line. As Jomini tells us: "It is never good for a defensive army to offer resistance at the front, for in that case the danger of a decisive action is imminent, which the invader desires; but this enemy may be attacked advantageously on both flanks and the rear."

The most important strategic part of Belgium lies between the Meuse, Scheldt, and the southern fortresses. In this circle all the decisive actions have been fought, and every dispute in which Belgium becomes engaged must be voided here. All the rest of the country is wood water, strategically unimportant or difficult to hold. The Meuse is the natural line of defence against Germany, the key of the country. To quote Jomini once more: "It is very evident that he who is master of the course of the Meuse has incalculable advantages over his opponent, for the latter, enclosed between the Meuse and the German Ocean, could not accept battle in a line running parallel with the sea without risk of utter annihilation." Of course this has no reference to any English force which would rest on Ostend and Antwerp. The southern fortresses are the support of a defensive army against France; the English and German auxiliary troops would in such an event occupy the Scheldt and Meuse, and have their communication through these fortresses.

Through the territorial arrangements of 1831 and 1839, we allow that Belgium lost the left bank of the Scheldt, and Venloo and Maestricht became two open doors for Holland and Prussia. Fortunately, however, the danger does not press from that side; on the contrary. Dumouriez declared long ago that the Catholic Netherlands were utterly untenable without Holland or its absolute neutrality. In the face of these barriers on the flanks and front of strategic Belgium, France would think twice about invading that country, and thrice, if the Belgian army were fully equipped for war, and properly divided between the forts. These barriers, which Wellington erected in favour of the newly-created kingdom of the Netherlands, have retained their full value in behalf of neutral and independent Belgium, the more so through the friendly relations existing between that country and Holland.

It is more than probable that in the event of a war France would cross the Upper Rhine, say between Basel and Mayence. The French have only invaded Belgium when an enemy stood there, but when they had a free choice they rushed upon the Upper Rhine. The last necessity for the defence of Belgium, Brialmont considers to be a central fortress with an entrenched camp, in which the army can be collected, and choose its own time for fighting. For some few Brussels was regarded as the years firm asylum of Belgian independence, but Brialmont rejects the idea,