and which was successful there. Nor would Her Majesty's Government, which professed non-intervention as the rule of their foreign policy, deviate from that principle now by interfering in the domestic concerns of another state. The kingdom of Poland enjoyed an absolute administrative independence. Even the department for Polish affairs in the Russian capital had been abolished. The only institution common to the two countries now was the army. The new institutions granted to Poland, alluded to above, opened a wide field of activity and material prosperity to the country. But this was not all. The Imperial Government, in restoring the educational establishments of the kingdom, had offered to the people the resources of intellectual culture and satisfaction. If to these institutions we added the guarantee by which they were all preserved, the personal character of the Emperor, who cherished an equal solicitude for the good of all his subjects, we should have a sufficient security for the future welfare of Poland, though the scheme might exclude that peculiar form of representative government applied in Great Britain, and perhaps exclusively appropriate to its condition.

With reference to the rights of England in relation to the affairs of Poland, under the treaty of Vienna, the Vice-Chancellor remarked that he had little to say on this occasion; that question had been fully and ably discussed in the correspondence which had passed between Her Majesty's Government and the Imperial Cabinet after the revolution of 1831. To that correspondence he begged to refer your Lordship.

In regard to the amnesty recommended by Her Majesty's Government, the ViceChancellor observed that a prompt and unconditional pardon could not be granted to those who were actually in arms against the authority of the Emperor. The friendly character which Her Majesty's Government had given to their representations justified him, however, in spontaneously stating that it had always been the intention of the Emperor to grant a large measure of amnesty to his revolted subjects after the cessation of resistance, excluding only the principal authors of a movement which had caused so many calamities in the kingdom.

In the course of this conversation I did not consider it to be my duty to enter at large upon any controversial matter with the Vice-Chancellor. I did, however, offer two reflections to his Excellency in the way of reservation, which I trust will be found consistent with the views of Her Majesty's Government.

When the Vice-Chancellor spoke of the

plenitude of power which had been exercised by the Emperor Alexander I., and which had been transmitted unimpaired to His Majesty's successor, I remarked that, in my opinion, and in that (I believed) of my Government, the power of the Russian Sovereign in regard to Poland could only be justly exerted within the limits, and in conformity with the prescriptions, of the treaty of Vienna. When his Excellency appeared to claim the silence of England on the ground of the principle of non-intervention professed by Her Majesty's Government, I contended that this principle could not be invoked here, for Her Majesty's Government did not here raise their voice in a question regarding exclusively the internal concerns of a foreign country, but in a question of an interior nature, with reference to which that foreign country had contracted engagements towards Great Britain; engagements which, in our opinion, had never been annulled.

In commenting upon these observations, Prince Gortchakoff again referred to the terms of the treaty of Vienna, which had constituted each of the three powers concerned in Poland, the absolute arbiter of the form of national institutions to be conferred on the portion of that country brought under its sway. His Excellency also reminded me that, desiring to deal with this question in a humane and conciliatory spirit, he had abstained from using the argument which was at his command, the argument of the right of the conqueror. After the insurrection of 1830, any limitation of the absolute authority of Russia which might have previously existed, had lapsed. The Poles had engaged in hostilities against Russia. They had been subdued by force of arms. The power of Russia had been established on a new basis.

The Vice-Chancellor concluded by saying that it had been free to him to accept my communication, to reserve the rights of his Sovereign, and to abstain from all discussion on this subject. Her Majesty's Government had, however, unequivocally declared that their communication was conceived in a most friendly spirit towards Russia; accepting this declaration, he had responded to the reflections of your Lordship, and in the course which he had taken he desired that your Lordship would recognize a proof of the amicable sentiments by which he was animated towards Her Majesty's Government.

Earl Russell to Lord Napier.

Foreign Office, April 10, 1863.

My Lord,

Her Majesty's Government think it incumbent upon them to state once more to the Government of His Majesty the Emperor of Russia the deep interest which, in common with the rest of Europe, they take in the welfare of the kingdom of Poland.

The general sympathy which is felt for the Polish nation might of itself justify Her Majesty's Government in making, in favour of the Polish race, an appeal to the generous and benevolent feelings of His Imperial Majesty, who has of late, by various and important measures of improvement and reform, manifested an enlightened desire to promote the welfare of all classes of his subjects. But with regard to the kingdom of Poland, Her Majesty's Government feel that the Government of Great Britain has a peculiar right to make its opinions known to that of His Imperial Majesty, because Great Britain having, in common with Austria, France, Prussia, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden, been a party to the treaty of Vienna of June, 1815, Her Majesty's Government are entitled to interpose with regard to any matter which may appear to them to constitute a departure from the provisions and stipulations of that treaty.

By the first article of that treaty the Grand Duchy of Warsaw was erected into a kingdom of Poland, to be inseparably attached to the Empire of Russia under certain conditions specified in that article; and Her Majesty's Government are concerned to have to say that, although the union of the kingdom to the empire has been maintained, the conditions on which that union was distinctly made to depend have not been fulfilled by the Russian Government.

The Emperor Alexander, in execution of the engagements contracted by the treaty of Vienna, established in the kingdom of Poland a national representation and national institutions corresponding with the stipulations of the treaty. It is not necessary for Her Majesty's Government now to observe upon the manner in which those arrangements were practically administered from that time down to the revolt in 1830. But upon the suppression of that revolt by the success of the Imperial arms, those arrangements were swept away, and a totally different order of things was by the Imperial authority established.

Prince Gortchakoff argues, as his pre

decessors in office have on former occasions argued, that the suppression of that revolt cancelled all the engagements of Russia in the treaty of Vienna with regard to the kingdom of Poland, and left the Emperor of Russia at full liberty to deal with the kingdom of Poland as with a conquered country, and to dispose of its people and institutions at his will. But Her Majesty's Government cannot acquiesce in a doctrine which they deem so contrary to good faith, so destructive of the obligation of treaties, and so fatal to all the international ties which bind together the community of European states and powers.

If, indeed, the Emperor of Russia had held Poland as part of the original dominions of his Crown, or if he had acquired it by the unassisted success of his arms, and unsanctioned by the consent of any other power, he could have contended that might was equivalent to right; and, without listening to the dictates of generosity and justice, he might have punished a temporary revolt of a portion of his Polish subjects by depriving the whole of them and their descendants for ever of those privileges and institutions which his predecessor had deemed essential to the welfare and prosperity of the Polish kingdom.

But the position of the Russian Sovereign with regard to the kingdom of Poland was entirely different. He held that kingdom by the solemn stipulation of a treaty made by him with Great Britain, Austria, France, Prussia, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden; and the revolt of the Poles could not release him from the engagements so contracted, nor obliterate the signatures by which his Plenipotentiaries had concluded, and he himself had ratified, those engagements.

The question, then, having arisen whether the engagements taken by Russia by the treaty of Vienna have been and are now faithfully carried into execution, Her Majesty's Government, with deep regret, feel bound to say that this question must be answered in the negative.

With regard to the present revolt, Her Majesty's Government forbear to dwell upon that long course of action, civil, political, and military, carried on by the Russian Government within the kingdom of Poland, of which the Poles so loudly complain, and to which they refer as the causes which occasioned, and in their opinion justified, their insurrection. Her Majesty's Government would rather advert to the much-wished-for termination of these lamentable troubles.

What may be the final issue of this

contest it is not, indeed, for Her Majesty's Government to foretell; but whether the result shall be the more extended spread of the insurrection, and its assumption of dimensions not at present contemplated, or whether, as is more likely, that result shall be the ultimate success of the Imperial arms, it is clear and certain that neither result can be arrived at without a calamitous effusion of blood, a great sacrifice of human life, and an extensive devastation of property; and it is evident that even if Poland shall be reduced to subjection, the remembrance of the events of the struggle will long continue to make it the bitter enemy of Russia, and a source of weakness and of danger, instead of being an element of security and of strength.

Her Majesty's Government, therefore, most earnestly entreat the Government of Russia to give their most serious attention to all the foregoing considerations; and Her Majesty's Government would beg, moreover, to submit to the Imperial Government that, besides the obligations of treaties, Russia, as a member of the community of European states, has duties of comity towards other nations to fulfil. The condition of things which has now for a long course of time existed in Poland is a source of danger, not to Russia alone, but also to the general peace of Europe.

The disturbances which are perpetually breaking out among the Polish subjects of His Imperial Majesty necessarily produce a serious agitation of opinion in other countries of Europe, tending to excite much anxiety in the minds of their Governments, and which might, under possible circumstances, produce complications of the most serious nature.

Her Majesty's Government, therefore, fervently hope that the Russian Government will so arrange these matters that peace may be restored to the Polish people, and may be established upon lasting foundations.

Your Lordship will read this despatch to Prince Gortchakoff, and you will give him a copy of it. I am, &c.

with Baron Brunnow, some parts of which were of much interest.

In a former conversation I had said to him that I could not be surprised that men driven to despair should commit wild deeds of revenge, or that the ferocious disciples of Mazzini should be guilty of assassinations; but that the acts of atrocity committed by the disciplined army of Russia excited, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, surprise as well as horror. Baron Brunnow had replied that dreadful crimes of savage cruelty had been perpetrated by the insurgents, and had given rise to acts of retaliation. He informed me yesterday that General Berg would take the command of the Russian army in Poland. He said that General Berg was an able commander, and was likely by his military arrangements to put an end to the insurrection. I replied that if General Berg was, as I believed, an officer of high repute, I hoped he would restore discipline in the Russian army in Poland, and punish these acts of insubordination and barbarous violence, which had hitherto been unrestrained. Baron Brunnow denied the truth of the stories in circulation upon this subject.

Baron Brunnow asked me some questions as to the nature of the representations about to be made at St. Petersburgh, and when I told him that the despatch of Her Majesty's Government was chiefly founded on the non-observance of the stipulations of the treaty of Vienna, he expressed some satisfaction that we still founded our demands on the basis of that treaty. But there was one question he felt he was entitled to ask, and that was, whether the communication Her Majesty's Government were about to make at St. Petersburgh was of a pacific

nature.

I replied that it was, but that as I did not wish to mislead him I must say something more. Her Majesty's Government had no intentions that were otherwise than pacific, still less any concert with other powers for any but pacific purposes.

But the state of things might change. The present overture of Her Majesty's Government might be rejected, as the representation of the 2nd of March had been rejected, by the Imperial Government. The insurrections in Poland might continue and might assume larger proportions; the atrocities on both sides might be aggravated and extended to a wider range of country. If in such a state of affairs the Emperor of Russia were to take no steps of a conciliatory nature, dangers and complications might arise not at present in contemplation.

Baron Brunnow said he could not call our former despatch an overture. The intentions of the Emperor towards Poland were most kind and benevolent. But there were projects afloat for altering the map of Europe. In these projects compensations to Russia were included. Russia entered into none of these projects; she wanted no compensation; she held by the present territorial arrangements of Europe, and he (Baron Brunnow) trusted Great Britain would do so likewise.

I said it was the wish of Her Majesty's Government to do so. But Russia herself had in some cases been active in proposing and carrying into effect territorial changes. I trusted, however, that in the present case the Emperor of Russia, by granting an amnesty to those who would lay down their arms, and the benefits of free institutions to Poland, would put an end to the insurrection.

It had formerly been said that the Emperor of Russia could not give liberal institutions to Poland while he denied similar benefits to his Russian subjects. But at the present time Russia as well as Poland might well look to the enjoy ment of representative institutions. Why should they not be granted at one and the same time to the kingdom of Poland and to the Empire of Russia?

Baron Brunnow had no information as to the intentions of the Emperor on this subject, and I did not press him further.

Lord Napier to Earl Russell. (Received April 18.)

St. Petersburgh, April 12, 1863. My Lord,

The official newspaper of this morning contains the enclosed manifesto offering a free pardon to all parties who have been concerned in the recent insurrection in Poland, saving those who shall continue in arms after the 1st (13th) of May next. The only exceptions specified are persons guilty of other crimes, or such as have violated their military duty.

The maintenance of the institutions recently granted to Poland in all their integrity is promised, and the Emperor reserves to himself the duty of developing those institutions hereafter in conformity with the wants of the times and the country.

A separate ukase offers a similar amnesty to parties engaged in the disorders within the boundaries of the Western Governments of Russia. From the

phraseology of the decree some doubt might arise as to whether the proffered amnesty be intended to apply to those who have already been delivered over to justice, or only to those who are still in arms, and who may come in before the expiration of the term of grace. One of my colleagues informs me, however, that he knows from competent authority that the amnesty is intended to apply to both classes alike.

The Imperial manifesto is conceived in a tone of humanity and clemency which is congenial to the character of the Emperor; a religious physiognomy is given to it, which we are familiar with in Russian documents of State; the sense of it is undoubtedly consistent with the interests of the Imperial Cabinet and with the wishes of Her Majesty's Government. We may regret that the discontents in Poland are simply referred to the instigations of foreign or exiled revolutionary agents a statement which cannot be sincere, even on the part of the most zealous Russian; and that no mention is made of the military recruitment, which was the proximate provocation of the late revolt. The Russian Government might have used a bolder sincerity with advantage; they might have avowed an error which they feel, and have promised a remedy which they have in view.

This act of mercy has been appropriately promulgated on Easter Sunday. How far it has been prompted by the expectation of foreign intervention, I am not able to affirm with confidence. I am inclined to think that it may have been accelerated by such apprehensions, but it is also plainly consistent with policy, as well as with the benevolent disposition of the Sovereign. I have, &c. (Signed)

(Translation.)

Imperial Manifesto.

NAPIER.

Since the first news of the disturbances which have taken place in the kingdom of Poland, we have followed the impulse of our heart in declaring that we did not consider the Polish nation responsible for an agitation which is, above all, fatal to herself. We have attributed it alone to external influences, that have long been brought to bear upon the country by certain parties who have contracted, during the long years of an adventurous life, habits of disorder, of violence, and of obscure plots, which have perverted in them the noble sentiments of love for humanity, and even inspired the idea of sullying by crime the honour of the nation.