A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year Part 8

Khurs.h.i.+d, after his defeat of Ali Pasha, marched to Larissa, in Thessaly.

Thence two armies, 50,000 strong, under Bramali and Homer Brionis converged upon the Morea. In the face of so formidable an invasion, Maurokordatos took the field himself. He mismanaged things badly. At Arta he sacrificed his choicest regiment, the famous corps of Philh.e.l.lenes, composed of foreign officers and commanded by men who had won distinction in Napoleon's campaigns. They were cut down almost to a man. Maurokordatos fell back to Missolonghi. In the meanwhile Dramalis with 25,000 foot and 6,000 horse penetrated into the Morea. The Greek Government at Argos dispersed. All would have been lost for the Greeks had Dramalis not neglected to cover the mountain pa.s.ses behind him. While he marched on to Nauplia, the Greek mountaineers rose behind him. Demetrios Ypsilanti, the acting-president of Greece, with a few hundred followers threw himself into Argos. There he held the Acropolis against the Turkish rearguard. Kolokotrones, calling out the last men from Tripolitza, relieved Ypsilanti at Argos. The mountain pa.s.sage was seized. Dramalis had to give up his conquest of the Morea, and fight his way back to the Isthmus of Corinth. Without supplies and hara.s.sed by hostile peasant forces the Turkish army became badly demoralized.

Thousands were lost on the way. Dramalis himself died from over-exposure.

The remainder of his army melted away at Corinth under the combined effects of sickness and drought.

[Sidenote: Capodistrias resigns]

A decisive turn in the Greek war for independence was reached. Europe realized that the revolt had grown to the proportions of a national war.

Popular sympathy in Russia became more clamorous. Capodistrias, the Russian Prime Minister, rightly measured the force of this long pent-up feeling.

Unable to move the Czar, who still floundered in the toils of the Holy Alliance, Capodistrias withdrew from public affairs and retired to Geneva.

[Sidenote: Suicide of Castlereagh]

[Sidenote: Canning]

[Sidenote: Iturbide Emperor of Mexico]

[Sidenote: Battle of Pichincha]

[Sidenote: San Martin retires]

[Sidenote: Battle of Junin]

[Sidenote: Ayacucho]

[Sidenote: Independence of Brazil]

In England, the suicide of Castlereagh brought Canning once more into prominence. Robert Peel was made Home Secretary. Canning's long retirement after the fiasco of his American policy, and his breach with Castlereagh, had served to chasten this statesman. As leader of the opposition, he had learned to reckon with the forces of popular feeling. When he returned to power in 1822, he was no longer an ultra-conservative, but a liberal. He now made no disguise of his sympathies with the cause of Greece, and with the struggle for independence in South and Central America. There the course of freedom had gathered so much momentum that it was plain to all that Spain could never prevail without help from others. In Mexico, upon the refusal of Ferdinand VII. to accept the separate crown of Mexico, General Iturbide proclaimed himself emperor. On May 19, he a.s.sumed the dignity. As Augustine I., he was crowned in the Cathedral of Mexico in July. At the same time San Martin and Bolivar met at Guayaquil to dispose of the destinies of South America. San Martin had just succeeded in liberating Peru, and had made his triumphal entry into Lima. Bolivar had brought aid to Ecuador, and established independence there. Jose de Sucre, whom Bolivar called the "soul of his army," defeated the Spaniards in the famous battle of Pichincha, fought at a height of 10,200 feet above the sea. When Bolivar and San Martin met on July 25, San Martin announced his determination to give a free field to Bolivar. The two men parted at a great public love-feast at which San Martin toasted Bolivar as the "liberator of Colombia." In his farewell address he said: "The presence of a fortunate general in the country which he has conquered is detrimental to the state. I have won the independence of Peru, and I now cease to be a public man." Speaking privately of Bolivar, he said: "He is the most extraordinary character of South America; one to whom difficulties but add strength." With his daughter Mercedes, San Martin retired to Europe, to dwell there in obscurity and poverty. Bolivar, with Generals Sucre, Miller and Cordova, a.s.sembled a great liberating army at Juarez. After a preliminary victory at Junin, Bolivar returned to Lima to a.s.sume the reigns of government, while his generals pushed on against the forces of the Spanish viceroy. Late in the year a decisive battle was fought at Ayacucho.

The revolutionists charged down the mountain ridges upon the Spaniards in the plain, and utterly routed them. The viceroy himself was wounded, with 700 of his men, while 1,400 Spaniards were killed outright. In these casualties the unusual disparity between killed and wounded reveals the unsparing ferocity of the fight. In Brazil a peaceful revolution was effected in September. After the return of Juan VI. to Portugal his son Dom Pedro reigned as regent. On September 7, he yielded to the demands of his American subjects, and proclaimed the independence of Brazil. He was declared const.i.tutional emperor of Brazil on October 12, and was crowned as such shortly afterward at Rio Janeiro.

[Sidenote: Discontent in Spain]

[Sidenote: Foreign aid invoked]

The South American colonies had now in great part secured independence.

Spain was thereby robbed of her best resources. As financial distress became more widespread, the spirit of discontent rose. The King's plottings with the extreme Royalists of France lost him the confidence of his subjects. In the south the triumphant party of the so-called Exaltados refused obedience to the central administration. The munic.i.p.al governments of Cadiz, Cartagena and Seville took the tone of independent republics. In the north, the Serviles, instigated by French agitators and their money, broke into open rebellion. After the adjournment of the Cortes, Ferdinand attempted to make a stroke for himself. The Royal Guards were ordered to march from Aranjuez to Madrid to place themselves under the King's personal command. The people took alarm, and several regiments of disaffected soldiers were induced to head off the guards. A fight ensued in the streets of Madrid. The guards were scattered. The King found himself a prisoner in his own palace. He wrote to Louis XVIII. that his crown was in peril. The Bourbon sympathizers in the north at once seized the town of Seo d'Urgel, and set up a provisional government. Civil war spread over Spain.

Napoleon's final prophecy that Bourbon rule would end in the ruin of Spain, and the loss of all the best colonies was near fulfilment. It was then that the Continental powers of Europe proposed to interfere on behalf of the Spanish monarchy. The death of old Minister Hardenberg in Berlin did not loosen Metternich's hold on Prussia. Emperor Alexander hoped to conciliate his army, burning to fall upon the Turk, by treating them to a light campaign in Spain. In France, the Spanish war party likewise had the upper hand.

[Sidenote: Monroe Doctrine]

Nothing could save Spain; but Spanish South and Central America presented another issue. The new republics had developed a thriving trade with Great Britain and the United States of America, which made it impossible for these countries to ignore their flags. In America, Henry Clay on the floor of Congress, had already urged the recognition of South American independence. In his annual message to Congress in 1822 President Monroe took up the question. On behalf of the United States he declared that, the American continents were henceforth not to be considered a subject for further colonization by any European power. "In the war between Spain and her colonies," said President Monroe, "the United States will continue to observe the strictest neutrality.... With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great considerations and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny by any European power, in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States."

[Sidenote: Jefferson's indors.e.m.e.nt]

[Sidenote: Canning's part]

[Sidenote: Fyffe's comment]

It was the famous Monroe Doctrine, a doctrine that in its substance, if not in words, had already served as the guiding star of Thomas Jefferson's and Madison's foreign policy. It is related that President Monroe, applying to Thomas Jefferson for his opinion on the matter, was surprised at the positive nature of the reply which he received. "Our first and fundamental maxim," said Jefferson, "should be never to entangle ourselves in the broils of Europe; our second, never to suffer Europe to intermeddle with cis-Atlantic affairs." At the same time that America thus flung down her gauntlet to Europe, Canning, on behalf of the British Ministry, proposed to inform the allied Cabinets of England's intention to accredit envoys to the South American republics. a.s.sured of the support of the United States, and of Great Britain as well, South America could feel free to work out her own destiny. This was the master-stroke of Canning's career. When brought to bay afterward in Parliament, he could proudly boast: "I called the New World into being, in order to redress the balance of the Old." To Americans Canning's boast has ever seemed to rest on a flimsy foundation. As Fyffe, the English historian of modern Europe, has justly said, "The boast, famous in our Parliamentary history, has left an erroneous impression of the part really played by Canning at this crisis. He did not call the New World into existence; he did not even a.s.sist it in winning independence, as France had a.s.sisted the United States fifty years before; but when this independence had been won, he threw over it the aegis of Great Britain, declaring that no other European power should reimpose the yoke which Spain had not been able to maintain."

[Sidenote: Death of Sh.e.l.ley]

At the time that Canning made British liberalism respected abroad, literary England suffered another irreparable loss by the death of Percy Bysshe Sh.e.l.ley. The last few weeks had been spent by Sh.e.l.ley in Italy in the company of Trelawney, Williams and Lord Byron. Before this Maurokordatos, now battling in Greece, had been their constant companion. In June Leigh Hunt arrived. Sh.e.l.ley and Williams set out in a boat to meet him at Leghorn. The long parted friends met there. On July 8, Sh.e.l.ley and Williams set sail for the return voyage to Lerici. Their boat was last seen ten miles out at sea off Reggio. Then the haze of a summer storm hid it from view. Ten days later Sh.e.l.ley's body was washed ash.o.r.e near Reggio. It was identified by a volume of Sophocles and of Keats's poems found on his person. In the presence of Byron, Trelawney and Leigh Hunt, Sh.e.l.ley's remains were cremated on the sh.o.r.e. His ashes were buried in the same burial ground with Keats, hard by the pyramid of Caius Cestius in Rome.

[Sidenote: Lyric quality of his work]

[Sidenote: Sh.e.l.ley's career]

[Sidenote: Sh.e.l.ley's threnody]

Sh.e.l.ley's poetry belongs primarily to the Revolutionary epoch in modern history. Though he wrote several long narrative poems and one great tragedy, he was above all a lyric poet--according to some the greatest lyric poet of England. His life, like his poetry, was almost untrammelled by convention. Both gave great offence to the stricter elements of English society. In some respects Sh.e.l.ley was peculiarly unfortunate. At the age of eighteen, after his expulsion from Oxford University, he married Harriet Westbrook, a girl of sixteen, and then found himself unable to support her. Later he abandoned her and eloped with Mary Wollstonecraft G.o.dwin.

Within a year his first wife committed suicide, and, three weeks later, Sh.e.l.ley married Mary G.o.dwin. The tragedy stirred up much feeling among his friends. Among others the poet-laureate, Southey, remonstrated with Sh.e.l.ley. Sh.e.l.ley replied: "I take G.o.d to witness, if such a Being is now regarding both you and me, and I pledge myself, if we meet, as perhaps you expect, before Him after death, to repeat the same in His presence--that you accuse me wrongfully. I am innocent of ill, either done or intended."

Next came Sh.e.l.ley's trouble with the Chancery. Lord-Chancellor Elden refused to give to Sh.e.l.ley the custody of his own children on the ground that Sh.e.l.ley's professed opinions and conduct were such as the law p.r.o.nounced immoral. Sh.e.l.ley replied with his famous poetical curse "To the Lord Chancellor." While the poem stands as a masterpiece of lyric invective it did not mend matters for Sh.e.l.ley in England. In many of his other poems his detractors saw nothing but the glorification of revolution, incest, and atheism. When he wrote a satirical drama on so delicate a subject as the unhappy affairs of Queen Caroline, even his publisher turned against him.

Yet the charm and beauty of Sh.e.l.ley's purely lyric pieces was such that he must ever stand as one of the foremost poets of England. Either his "Adonais" or the beautiful "Ode to the West Wind," would alone have perpetuated his name in English letters. One of Sh.e.l.ley's most exquisite pieces, written shortly before his death, has come to stand as the poet's own threnody:

"When the lamp is shattered The light in the dust lies dead-- When the cloud is scattered The rainbow's glory is shed.

When the lute is broken, Sweet tones are remembered not; When the lips have spoken, Loved accents are soon forgot.

As music and splendor Survive not the lamp and the lute, The heart's echoes render No song when the spirit is mute, No song but sad dirges, Like the wind through a ruined cell, Or the mournful surges That ring the dead seaman's knell."

[Sidenote: Revival of letters]

[Sidenote: Golden age of music]

During this same year Thomas de Quincey published his "Confessions of an Opium Eater," a masterpiece of balanced prose. In other parts of the world, likewise, it was a golden period for literature. In France, Victor Hugo published his "Odes et Poesies Diverses," a collection of early poems which contained some of his most charming pieces. The rising Swedish poet, Tegner, brought out his "Children of the Last Supper." In Germany, Heinrich Heine, then still a student at Bonn, issued his earliest verses. For Germany this was no less a golden age of music. Beethoven, though quite deaf, was still the greatest of living composers. His great Choral Symphony, the ninth in D minor, was produced during this year, as was his Solemn Ma.s.s in D major. As a virtuoso he was rivalled by Hummel, who at this time gave to the world his famous Septet, accepted by himself as his masterwork. Two other German composers so distinguished themselves that they were invited to London to conduct the Philharmonic accompaniments.

They were Carl Maria von Weber, who had just brought out his brilliant opera, "Der Freischutz," and Ludwig Spohr, who performed in London his new Symphony in D minor. Of other composers there were Franz Schubert, whose melodious songs and symphonies won him the recognition of the Esterhazys and of Beethoven. Among those whose career was but beginning were Jacob Meyerbeer, a fellow pupil with Weber under Abbe Vogler at Vienna, and Felix Mendelssohn, the precocious pupil of the famous pianist Moscheles.

[Sidenote: Death of Herschel]

Sir Frederick William Herschel, the greatest modern astronomer, died at Slough in England. Herschel was born in 1738 at Hanover. He was a musician of rare skill and a self-taught mathematician of great ability. In 1757, he deserted the band of Hanoverian Guards in which he played the oboe, although a mere boy, and fled to England, where he taught music and achieved success as a violinist and organist. His studies in sound and harmony led him to take up optics; and from optics to astronomy the step was short. Dissatisfied with the crude instruments of his time, he made his own telescopes; for it was his ambition to be not a mere star-gazer, but an earnest student of the heavens. By day, he and his brother and sister ground specula; by night he observed the heavens. His astronomical work includes a careful study of variable stars; an attempt to explain the relation of sun-spots to terrestrial phenomenae; the determination that the periods of rotation of various satellites, like the rotation of our own moon, are equal to the times of their revolutions about their primaries; and the discovery of the planet Ura.n.u.s and two of its satellites, and of the sixth and seventh satellites of Saturn. His greatest work was his study of binary stars and the demonstration of his belief that the law of gravitation is universal in its application. His labors were invariably systematic, and were characterized by dogged, Teutonic perseverance. His discoveries were never purely accidental, but were made in accordance with a well-conceived plan.

[Sidenote: Death of Canova]

Late in the autumn news came from Venice that Canova, the celebrated sculptor, had died. Antonio Canova was born in 1757 at Pa.s.saguo near Treviso. He was first an apprentice to a statuary in Ba.s.sano, from whom he went to the Academy of Venice, where he had a brilliant career. In 1779 he was sent by the Senate of Venice to Rome, and there produced his Theseus and the Slain Minotaur. In 1783, Canova undertook the execution of the tomb of Pope Clement XIV., a work similar to the tomb of Pope Clement XIII. His fame rapidly increased. He established a school for the benefit of young Venetians, and among other works produced the well-known Hebe and the colossal Hercules hurling Lichas into the sea. In 1797, Canova finished the model of the celebrated tomb of the Archd.u.c.h.ess Christina of Austria.

Napoleon called the rising sculptor to France, and he there executed the famous nude portrait of Napoleon now preserved in Milan. After his return to Italy he fas.h.i.+oned his Perseus with the Head of Medusa at Rome. When the Belvidere Apollo was carried off to France, this piece of statuary was thought not unworthy of the cla.s.sic Apollo's place and pedestal in the Vatican. Among the later works of Canova are the colossal group of Theseus Killing the Minotaur, a Paris, and a Hector. After Napoleon's second fall in 1815, Canova was commissioned by the Pope to demand the restoration of the works of art carried from Rome. He went to Paris and succeeded in his mission. At his return to Rome in 1816, the Pope created him Marquis of Orchia, with a pension of 3,000 scudi, and his name was entered into the Golden Book at the Capitol. His closing years were spent in Venice. There he died October 13, 1822.

[Sidenote: Congress of Verona]

[Sidenote: England slighted]

Upon Canning's accession to the Ministry in England, Wellington was appointed representative of Great Britain at the Congress of Powers convened at Vienna. The unsettled state of public opinion kept Wellington in England and later at Paris. He did not join the Congress until after its adjournment to Verona, to dispose of purely Italian affairs. Thus it happened that the supplementary meetings at Verona became the real European Congress of 1822. With the Neapolitan problem practically settled, and the Greek war with Turkey at a standstill, the situation in Spain was the most vital issue. The Czar of Russia and Metternich were determined not to tolerate the Const.i.tution of the Spanish liberals. Alexander hoped to make good Russia's non-intervention in Greece by marching a victorious army into Spain. The extreme Royalists of France, on the other hand, were so bent on accomplis.h.i.+ng this task themselves that they were resolved not to permit any Russian troops to pa.s.s through France. With the spectre of a general European war thus looming on the horizon, England endeavored to hold the balance for peace. Acting under the instructions of Canning, Wellington declared that England would rather set herself against the great alliance than consent to joint intervention in Spain. In his despatches to Canning, Wellington expressed his belief that this would result in a decision to leave the Spaniards to themselves. The only result was that England was left out of the affair altogether, as she had been in the case of Naples.

It was partly owing to this international slight that Canning put his foot down so firmly in behalf of Portugal and the South American colonies.

[Sidenote: French att.i.tude toward Spain]

At the Congress of Verona, Metternich once more won the day. With this backing, the French envoys, Montmorency and Chateaubriand, in defiance of their home instructions, committed France to war with Spain. An agreement was reached that, in default of radical changes in the Spanish Const.i.tution, France and her allies would resort to intervention. On the part of England, Wellington rejected this proposal, but all the other powers consented. When the French Amba.s.sadors returned to France, their Prime Minister, Villele, vented his dissatisfaction by repudiating his envoys. He addressed himself to the foreign Amba.s.sadors at Paris with a request that the allies' demands on Spain be postponed. Montmorency at once resigned. No notice was taken of Villele's request except by England. The King himself went over to the war party and appointed Chateaubriand his Minister of Foreign Affairs. Great Britain's tentative offer of mediation was summarily rejected by France. To Villele, King Louis XVIII. thus explained his att.i.tude: "Louis XIV. destroyed the Pyrenees; I shall not allow them to be raised again. He placed my house on the throne of Spain; I shall not allow it to fall."