perhaps nowhere better than in these volumes if carefully and intelligently read. It should be observed, however, that neither Mercy nor Maria Theresa take notice of several most important elements then at work in the social disintegration of France. They never allude to the intellectual forces which were sapping the existing order of things, or only class Voltaire with Dubarry; they do not refer to the growing strength of a public opinion outside Versailles, keen, fierce, dangerous, bold, destructive, or do so in a mere cursory way; they scarcely touch on the wretched condition of the peasantry or the lower middle class, or glance at it with contemptuous pity; their ears are deaf to the distant moaning of sounds that are soon to break out in the tempest. Omissions like these are full of significance; they fall in with the views prevalent among certainly the large majority of those in high places at this period. The Empress, however, and her informant instinctively felt, as they cast their eyes at the unnatural state of things at Versailles, that there was something rotten in the condition of France, though they did not measure the extent of the danger or perceive the quarter whence it was to come :

It is almost impossible to comprehend the disgraceful disorder of everything in this place. The throne is degraded by the shamelessness of the favourite and her partisans. Seditious cries are beginning to make themselves heard: the person of the sovereign himself is not spared by some writers; Versailles has become a seat of perfidy, malice, and revenge; intrigues and mere personal views direct everything. Every sentiment of honour seems to have left the spot. . . . My daughter, I fear, is going the way of destruction. . . . During two years I have felt the greatest uneasiness. I feel that I may yet witness great misfortunes.'

These volumes contain some curious details respecting the first partition of Poland. We have already noticed the selfish policy of Maria Theresa towards France in this matter; but unquestionably she regretted the part she had in a great national crime. The following is even more striking than the celebrated words which have been often quoted as expressing her fears and regrets on the subject:

'I do not understand a policy which lays it down as a principle that if two persons make use of power to oppress an innocent man, a third person has a right, on the grounds of provision for the future and

* The words of Maria Theresa are very curious; but, beside that she was dévote and old-fashioned in her ways of thinking, she probably disliked Voltaire for his friendship for Frederick the Great. She calls Dubarry 'contemptible,' and Voltaire an 'unhappy wretch,' in the same sentence, vol. iii. p. 99.

present convenience, to imitate and commit a like act of injustice. . . I was always opposed to this iniquitous and unequal partition; I could not bear the notion of an alliance with two monsters even at the risk of a war.'

The truth is that Frederick the Great was the real designer and author of the partition of Poland. With due deference to Mr. Carlyle, several of the documents he cites to excuse the King were carefully prepared by that astute personage, who was quite as apt in misleading opinion as others who have imitated him at the present day. The following is a sketch of Frederick the Great as he appeared, not only to Maria Theresa, but to most of the crowned heads of his time; though a caricature it is very life-like; and history will say that some at least of the qualities of the man have adhered to the policy of his House :

:

'What reliance can be placed in him or in his word? France has experienced this; hardly a prince in Europe has escaped the effects of his bad faith; and this is the personage who wishes to constitute himself dictator and protector of a united Germany! And the leading Sovereigns will not combine to prevent a calamity which sooner or later will overtake them all! During many years his despotism and his violence have afflicted Europe; he sets at nought every settled principle of right and truth, and laughs at treaties and alliances. . . . If he is permitted to add to his power, what a future will there be for our successors!'

There are several interesting passages in this book with respect to Turkey and the Eastern question, then just beginning to become formidable. The state of things in the East in 1777 had a certain resemblance to that which has been passing under our eyes for several months. Russia, with vast secret designs of ambition, had drawn Joseph II. into a hollow alliance, based on a settlement of the affairs of the Porte;' Prussia, master of the situation as regards the Continent, had joined in the league for her own objects; and the three Powers, united, sat watching each other ever meditating, without regard to France or England, how the heritage of the Sultan was to be dealt with. The partition of Turkey was considered, as it has perhaps been, on a recent occasion; but, then as now, there was a wide difference in the objects and views of Russia and Austria; and the nominal alliance soon fell to pieces. It is interesting to observe the conclusions of Maria Theresa upon this subject; they are, in the main, those which have guided the conduct of every Austrian statesman worthy of the name; and she entirely disagreed with her very inferior son :

"The partition of the Turkish Empire would be a most hazardous

us.

and dangerous enterprise on account of the probable consequences to What advantage would we gain even though our conquests should extend to Constantinople? . . . It would be an event even more unfortunate than the partition of Poland, which I regret so deeply; far more useful to my formidable neighbours than to my realm. . . . Unless it cannot possibly be avoided, I will not be a consenting party to the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire; and I hope our grandchildren will yet see the Turk in Europe.'

It is impossible to examine these volumes and not to feel that the French Monarchy had reached a period when a great change was at hand. No doubt the two personages who, so to speak, form the chorus in the drama before us, cannot interpret many of the signs of the times, and fail to perceive the true significance of much that was passing before their eyes. But as we study what they have left on record, by the light of events that were fast drawing near, the writing on the wall distinctly comes out, and in its characters we see despair and ruin. When a throne had ceased to inspire loyalty; when vice and levity were at the helm of the state; when a court had become a scene of evil; when the rulers of a people had no regard for it, and were indifferent to its wants and its intellect, in what could this moral confusion end but in the subversion of an order of things weighed in the balance of Providence and found wanting?

ART. III.-Commentaries upon International Law. By Sir ROBERT PHILLIMORE, D.C.L. Second Edition. 4 vols. 8vo. London: 1873.

HE second edition of Sir Robert Phillimore's

THE

Commenta

'ries' contains a considerable amount of valuable additional matter bearing more especially on questions of international law, raised by the wars and contentions that have broken out in the world since the publication of the original work. Having on a former occasion discussed at some length the general principles and execution of this important book, we now propose to confine ourselves to a brief examination of a single question, on which Sir Robert Phillimore may justly be regarded as the latest authority and as the champion of the principles of maritime law which, down to a recent period, were maintained by this country and which were at one time accepted without question by all the maritime Powers. We refer, of course, to the rules of naval capture, which were in force until they were

modified in 1856 by the celebrated Declaration of the Congress of Paris. An attempt has this year been made by some members of either House of Parliament and by some public writers to impugn the policy of the British Government in that transaction, and to represent the changes to which the assent of this country was then solemnly given as the unauthorised surrender of belligerent rights, essential to the security and power of Great Britain. Mr. Baillie Cochrane and Mr. Butler Johnstone have taken the lead in this attack, and the former gentleman has already given notice that he proposes to renew it in the next Session of Parliament. But Parliament has hitherto had the wisdom to turn a deaf ear to these remonstrances and to avoid a debate which could hardly have redounded to the credit of our national good faith. For, as Lord Derby briefly remarked in the House of Lords, the principles established by the Declaration of Paris have now been accepted by this country for twenty years. If Parliament intended to pass a censure upon them and to repudiate them, the time for such an expression of opinion was when they were first adopted, and when the Ministers by whom they were adopted were ready to defend their conduct. Meanwhile we have not only adopted them ourselves, and led the world to suppose that we had adopted them, but we have (in pursuance of the terms of the Declaration) urged other States to adopt them. Several wars have occurred in the interval, during which they have been scrupulously respected by the belligerents, and we, as neutrals, have had the benefit of them. to the form in which the Declaration was made, it is impossible to conceive any obligation of a more binding character than a formal and unanimous declaration of principles, bearing the signatures of the chief Ministers or Plenipotentiaries of all the great Powers in Congress assembled, and subsequently accepted by most of the Powers which were not represented on that occasion. The only important exception is that of the United States of America; but the American Government declined to accede to the Declaration, not because it is hostile to the principles embodied in it, but because it seeks to carry those principles still further, by securing to private property at sea in time of war immunity from naval capture. Indeed, we believe, that during the late Civil War, President Lincoln did offer to accept the Declaration of Paris; but it was then too late, because the belligerent rights of the old law were at that time exercised with disastrous effect against the Union by the privateers and blockade-runners of the Confederate States.

As

It appears to us, therefore, that the British Government is as

much bound by this Declaration as a State can be bound by any international engagement. For it must be remarked that this is not an engagement binding only as between this or that belligerent, which might upon a declaration of war be broken or set at nought, but it is an engagement subsisting between each belligerent and every neutral State which is a party to the Declaration. A breach of the Declaration by a belligerent, as for example, by an instruction to cruisers to stop and search neutral vessels on the high seas for the purpose of seizing enemy's goods, would justly be resented and resisted by every neutral Power. The Declaration is therefore not only morally and legally binding on every State which has agreed to it, but it has the most powerful sanction that can be given to any international engagement, namely, that every State in the world would be justified in opposing by force any infraction of it.

6

Sir Robert Phillimore has examined with his usual learning, and established beyond the possibility of doubt, the history of the doctrine free ships, free goods,' and its opposite, in the third volume of his Commentaries' (p. 302\. It is indisputable that from the earliest recorded times, perhaps as long ago as the twelfth century, and certainly from the date of the Consolato del Mar and the Black Book of the Admiralty, it was the right and practice of belligerent cruisers at sea to stop and examine the papers of every vessel, and if anything ' of suspition be found in such vessells that the goods therein 'doe belong to the enemies, the said vessells, with their masters and governors, as also the goods in them, shall be brought 'before the admirall, and if they be found there that they be 'honest merchants and friends without suspition of colour, the goods shall be restored to them without damage, otherwise they shall be seized with their goods and ransomed as the maritime law doth will and require.'* For at least four centuries the right to seize enemy's goods on neutral vessels, and consequently to stop and search neutral vessels for that purpose, was the universal practice of naval warfare, except only in the cases in which this right had been waived by special treaty and privilege. It was the practice of Franceit was the practice of Spain-it was the practice of England. France added to it the claim to condemn even neutral property when found on board an enemy's ship-a claim which this country always repudiated as illogical and unjust. I

* Black Book of the Admiralty, edited by Sir Travers Twiss, for the Collection of the Master of the Rolls, vol. i. P. 29.