FOREIGN SUMMARY. 



POLITICAL events have this year taken an extensive range ; the North and 

 South, the East and West, have successively been the theatres of their ope- 

 ration. At its dawn our attention was fixed upon Antwerp that appeared 

 to be thrown into the arena of politics, like the apple of discord, to kindle 

 the slumbering animosity of the two great parties that divide the European 

 continent. Still the storm burst not, but eastward took its course ; and even 

 there, when the lowering tempest threatened to pour desolation, and " let slip 

 the dogs of war" on those fair regions, the lightning-conductors of our diplo- 

 macy directed the electric fluid from the tapering minarets of Josambole. 

 More recently, it is on the pigmy war in Portugal, and on the congress of 

 Kings and Emperors at Munchen-Gratz, that the ardent gaze of Europe has 

 rested, on that congress which has fully proved that the object of the mili- 

 tary Sovereigns is not war, but to preserve peace till war is inevitable. And 

 now it is on Spain that we anxiously turn our regards ; the death of whose 

 Monarch has rendered still more complicated the embroglio of European 

 politics. The phraseology of politics grew up in times that are no longer 

 ours ; to their application, therefore, the words it employs have a sense 

 relative to the manners and customs of every nation, this should be kept in 

 view in considering the contemporary events of Portugal and Spain. In 

 France we have seen a revolution accomplished in three days, and regularized 

 in less than a week. But what is at present passing in Spain and Portugal 

 cannot be called a revolution, it is a civil war, such as the annals of abso- 

 lute monarchies offer so many examples of. Princes dispute the crown 

 their subjects espouse their cause, according as it may administer to their 

 passions and prejudices. Foreign governments interfere either openly or by 

 intrigue, and when the country is exhausted the two contending chiefs effect 

 a reconciliation to their own profit, while the nation is more oppressed than 

 ever. From the difference that exists, therefore, between a revolution effected 

 by popular movement, ard a dynastical civil war, we shall easily feel that the 

 results cannot be produced with the same rapidity in two situations, the ten- 

 dency of which is not towards the same object. In Portugal the mass of 

 the people, even in spite of the late success that has attended the operations 

 of the Queen's cause, still remain neutral ; for the truth is, that the civil 

 war of Portugal has been prepared in England and France by Jew bankers 

 and stock-jobbers, and carried into execution by foreign condottiere from 

 every part of Europe ; hence the inertio the political apathy of the nation 

 generally. 



A similar game will, we now predict, be played in Spain. Already a part 

 of the country is in arms in favour of Don Carlos, and his proclamation has 

 dispelled any lingering doubt of his disinclination to strike for the Crown. 

 Spain is therefore on the eve of a bloody civil war, such as no other country 

 affords such a scope for ; but while we draw this gloomy political horoscope 

 for the Iberian Peninsular, we have no fears of the peace of Europe being 

 disturbed by the Spanish contest, which is, after all, not one between libe- 

 ralism and absolutism, but between the Queen and Don Carlos between the ' 

 Salic law, as established by Phillip V., and the fundamental laws of Castille, 

 re-established by the will of Ferdinand in which not one cry for the ancient 

 liberties of Spain will be heard. But, as if the Sovereigns of Europe mis- 

 trusted the astute combinations of that very diplomacy which for the last 

 three years past have preserved peace, they are, during this interval of armed 

 tranquillity, preparing for war. In the meantime, Germany is in the iron 

 grasp of Prussia and of Austria ; Poland extinct ; Italy bristling with Aus- 

 trian bayonets ; while the Russian eagle, gloating on prostrate Turkey, is 

 already directing its fiery glance towards the rich plains of Ilindostan. When 

 the storm does burst, let us hope our India government will be found at bay. 



Baylis and Leighton, Johnson's-court, Fleet'Street. 



