598 Politics and Prospecis of Russia. [Dkc. 



But central Russia contains a dense population, in provinces produc- 

 tive of corn, wine, and oil. By the seizure of the Crimet and of Poland, 

 they have found a permanent outlet for their products ; and they are 

 rapidly growing in opulence, productiveness, and population. The 

 union of the Hospodariates with Russia will more than double their 

 value, by extending- their outlets. And the Hospodariates will infallibly 

 be united to Russia, at the first moment that she may think herself 

 secure in the feebleness or the corruption of the great countervailing 

 kingdoms of Europe. It will be no more than the continuance of that 

 policy, by which she has drawn, one by one, into her vortex, every 

 " independent" territory subjected to her treacherous alliance : Georgia, 

 Courland, the Crimea, the Chieftainries of the Caucasus, and Poland. 



The Indian trade has been, in all ages, but another name for the most 

 sudden and extraordinary accumulation of wealth in every nation which, 

 by turns, possessed its monopoly. Venice, Genoa, Lisbon, and Amster- 

 dam, were only the successors of Bagdad, Constantinople, Aleppo, and 

 Alexandria, in gains which, for the time, placed them at the head of 

 commercial cities. England alone has not derived from India the opu- 

 lence which the " golden Peninsula" had always poured into the lap of 

 the favoured nation. But the reason is obvious. Conquest has, with 

 us, superseded trade. We have expended on our costly, but magnifi- 

 cent crown of India, the gold that we might have carried away in tribute 

 to our commercial mastery. But, to Russia, the Indian trade would be 

 clear gain ; there would be no laborious and expensive voyage of 16,000 

 miles, liable to all the chances of the ocean. The whole route from 

 Surat to the mouth of the Danube would be but 3,000 miles, of which 

 2,600 would be in the smooth Indian seas, up the Persian Gulf and the 

 Tigris, a mere canal carriage ; and only the narrow interval between the 

 Tigris and the shore of the Euxine requiring land conveyance. The 

 whole of the great northern route between China, Japan, Upper Tartary, 

 and Europe, is in possession of any power which is in possession of the 

 Volga and the Don. The European merchant will not look upon those 

 extraordinary facilities with indifference. He will either transfer liis 

 capital to Russia, or connect himself with her trade. The distance be- 

 tween the Danube and the Rhine is nothing. A canal might be cut in 

 a year that would join them. The surveys for this canal have been 

 ah-ea-dy laid down. The project has been already stated among the 

 moriied men of Europe. The expense is estimated at little more than half 

 a million. ^ And this canal would give a direct and unbroken line of 

 water carriage from the tower of London to the gate of the Seraglio. 



For the general good of mankind, we should rejoice at such a facility. 

 But the first benefit, and immeasurably the greatest, would be gained by 

 Russia; and by Russia only for the power of more extended subjugation. 

 The man shuts his eyet on history, and is neither politician nor patriot, 

 who will not see that the whole spirit of the court of St. Petersburg has 

 at all times been territorial aggrandizement, and that whether with a 

 smiling face, and a lip teeming with self-denial and moderation, or with 

 the sword in her hand, and her lip pouring out hatred and fury, she has 

 incessantly urged her claims to the extinction of the feeble — that she 

 has had " More, more," written upon her heart, and that at this hour 

 she is propelled to broader and more reckless seizure by the success of 

 her arms, the weakness of her opponents, the force of her position, and 

 the superstitions of her people. There is something like an inevitable 



