It appeared by the returns that 13,000 Ruffians had fallen in the affault. It appears by an extract of a letter, faid to be written by our countrymen colonel Cobley, who commanded the difmounted huffars of the Bog in this bloody affair, that his regiment at the commencement of the ftorm confifted of 975 effective men, and by the returns next day it appeared to have loft two majors, 14 captains and fubalterns, and 600 private men; the colonel himself being likewife feverely wounded. That gentleman had the fingular fortune and honour, as it may well be confidered in fuch a fcene of horror and confufion, to preferve the lives and to protect 300 beautiful Circaffian ladies, belonging to the governor's haram, who were on the point of precipitating themselves into the Danube to escape the violation of the foldiers. As this number was too great for one haram, it is probable that the inhabitants of feveral others (perhaps of all thofe appertaining to the great commanders) had fled thither for refuge, as the terror and confufion increased. The Ruffians had a number of armed gallies, and other light veffels on the Danube, which were filled with Coffacks. The extreme avidity of that favage people for plunder, as well as the defperate Courage with which a near profpect of it infpires them, are circumftances well known. The part of the town which lay next the river was far weaker than any other, and was accordingly attacked by the Cof facks with great effect, at the fame time that the army commenced the grand affault. This attack on the weak fide, at the fame time that the garrifon was fo fully occupied and deeply involved on the other, could not but greatly facilitate the fuccefs of the affailants, if the effect even reached no farther than merely the disturbance which it caufed in the minds of the foldiers, and the general confternation and hopelessness which it could not but spread. The Coffacks burst into the town about the fame time that the grand army did, and no doubt bore a full share in the enfuing enormities.-Such was the lamentable fate of Ifmailow. The oftentatious and fantastic difplay of the bloody trophies taken at Ifmailow, which was fome time after exhibited at Petersburgh, was unworthy the greatnefs, the magnanimity, and the high character of the emprefs Catherine. The tragedy fhould have closed at the conclufion of the last act on the spot. It was attributed more to a defire of gratifying the exceffive vanity of prince Potemkin, which was not eafily fatiated, than to that of the empress herfelf. After the affair at Ifmailow, the Ruffians, under the princes Repnin, Galitzin, and other generals, frequently crofled the Danube, and continually routed the Turks whereever they could come up with them. Thefe actions were, however, of no confequence to any but the parties immediately concerned, and as tending to the attainment of the great object in view, of compelling the Turks to accept of peace upon any terms the emprefs would vouchsafe to grant them, without the interference or mediation of any European power. In the mean time the grand vizir, with his difpirited and, it may be faid, broken-hearted army, was glad to retire for shelter into the defiles and faftneffes of the antient mount Hemus. That That minifter and general having again formed a confiderable army, and met with fome fucceffes, was at length, in the course of the fummer, defeated on the Bulgarian fide of the Danube by prince Repnin. The action was only partial; for through fome circumstances in the nature of the ground, the Turkish cavalry were thrown into diforder by the Ruffian artillery, and routed, before the infantry could come up to their fupport. This misfortune occafioned fuch a panic, as ended in a general flight of the whole army. This early flight, with the extreme roughnefs of the country, prevented any confiderable lofs of men. It was nearly about the time of this defeat in Bulgaria, that a very bloody and hard fought affair took place at the city or town of Anapa, on the borders of Circaffia, in Afia. It may be prefumed that the place was of no great ftrength, as the Turks entrenched themselves ftrongly in a fortified camp for its protection. Their force is rated in the Petersburgh accounts at 10,000 Turks, and 15,000 Circaffians and Tartars; all of whom are faid to have fought with the greatest obftinacy. Other accounts make their force much lefs. Whatever their numbers were, the Ruffian general Godowitch attacked 1791. them at eight o'clock in the morning, and after a most defperate and bloody engagement, which lafted for five hours, he fucceeded in forming the camp and the town, though every foot of the ground was feverely disputed. The flaughter was of courfe great, nor could it be confined to one fide only; but we do not hear that the victory was fullied by any of thofe cruelties which fo deeply itained the Ruffian July 3d, arms at Ifmailow. A vast number of Turks, including the commanding bafha, and several other general officers, were made prisoners. Seventy-one pieces of artillery were likewife taken. Thefe were the last actions of this favage war, which with respect to carnage and cruelty exceeded any other that has been known in modern times. For the diftreffes of the Porte were now fo great, and the dangers with which the empire was environed fo imminent, that the grand fultan was obliged to fubmit to inevi table neceflity, and accept of fuch terms as the emprefs was pleased to dictate. Such were 11th Auguft. the circumstances un der which the treaty of peace at Galatz was fuddenly concluded, on the 11th of Auguft, 1791. True to the character of haughty independence, which fhe had maintained through the whole of this war, the emprefs in the very laft fcene of it feemed defirous to mortify rather than conciliate the allied powers: fuch at least was her behaviour to the British court. Mr. Fawkener had been sent as an envoy extraordinary, to aflift in the nego. ciation of the peace; and about the fame time a gentleman connected both by friendship and blood with the illuftrious leader of the oppofition party in the house of commons, arrived at the court of St. Peteríburg. Whatever was the object of his vifit, whether to collect for his friend more accurate information, fuch as a statefman ought to use all fair means of obtaining on fo great a political queftion relative to the balance of Europe, or any other purpofe lefs laudable, his prefence there was by the empress made the occafion of fhewing a marked flight to the the minister of our government. Whenever the spoke to the latter at her public court, the fo contrived as at the fame time to place the former on her right hand, in the station of honour; and on the conclufion of the peace, he gave prefents exactly of the fame kind to both, but of greater value, and with fome additional articles, to the reprefentative of Mr. Fox. Neither of these envoys, however, seems to have influenced the terms of the treaty of Galatz one way or the other; fince the articles were in fubftance what had been offered by prince Potemkin at Jafly before the opening of the campaign in 1790. Ruffia retained Oczakow and the country between the Bog and the Dnieper, with the free navigation of the latter river: the reft of her conquefts the reftored. We In all hiftories there are particular epochs, which feem naturally to divide one portion of time from another; where every man of an obferving and contemplative mind ftops almost involuntarily to reflect on many objects, which he had paffed unnoticed in his way, and to trace by fome fixed land-marks the general course of his future journey. Such an epoch is the clofe of the year 1791 it is the narrow ifthmus between two feas of blood. have just feen the final pacification of the three mighty empires, which had fo deeply died the ftreams of the Dnieper, the Niefter, and the Danube with human flaughter; and we have endeavoured to develope the political confiderations which put an end to the contentions of ambition. The league which had been formed between the emprefs Catherine and the emperor Jofeph had been diffolved by Leopold and on the other hand the Counter-league, which had been in. tended as a barrier against the views The revolutions of Poland and fell 1 fell under it. That of France refiled the hocks of invading armies; but in the fame moment met the deftruction which hung over it, during the whole of its feeble exiftence, from the reftlefs and criminal intrigues of her own internal factions; fince which time they have gone on mutually butchering each other, under various changes of republican anarchy, yet all the while adding conqueft to conqueft, and extending their dominion by the help of their principles, no less than the fword, far beyond the examples of her moft powerful and ambitious monarchs. The origin of both these invafions (of Poland and France) is by the admirers of the new political doctrines attributed folely to finister views of unjut aggrandizement in the neighbouring powers, and efpecially in the emperor Leopold. An inftrument has even been published, purporting to be a treaty of partition, figned by him at Pavia in the month of July 1791, and regulating the difmemberment of Poland and France. But it is on the face of it a coarse and clumfy forgery. The chief clamour, however, has been directed against a congrefs which certainly did take place at Pilnitz, a fummer refidence belonging to the elector of Saxony, not far from Dreiden. The emperor, accompanied by his deft fon Francis, prince of Hungary, there met the king of Prudia, and his fon the prince royal. Some few of their principal miniters and favourite generals were alio prefent. The count d'Artois, hearing of the intention, repaired to the place, with a very small and select train of French noblemen. The meeting feemed merely to be a party of pleasure, and the time, for the few days it laited, to be wholly occupied by balls, plays, and hunting. The league, or whatever bufiefs actually did there país, was kept a profound fecret; yet the treaty of Pilnitz has been as familiar in the mouths of men, as ever was the treaty of Weftphalia, the Pyrenees, or Utrecht. It has been fuppofed, like the pretended-treaty of Pavia, to have parcelled out the territories both of Poland and France, as well as to have re-modelled the circles of the Germanic empire. With refpect to Poland, every thing is furmife and fufpicion. A paper, it is true, was circulated on the continent, as containing the ftipulations actually agreed at Pilnitz; and in it there is certainly mention of Poland. But it was in no way authenticated, and has never been fubfequently owned; on the contrary, it was immediately dif avowed in an official note of the Pruffian minifter at Munich. Such, however, as these articles are on the fubject of Poland, they are utterly inconfiftent with the treaty afferted to have been figned by the emperor in the preceding month at Pavia. There (we are to believe) it was pofitively arranged that the emprefs of Ruffia thould undertake the invafion of Poland, and be allowed to retain for herself a part of Podolia; that the elector of Saxony, To the English reader a mere recital of one paffage will be fufficient. By this pretended treaty, Spain was to have Corfica and the French part of St. Domingo; and Great Britain is faid to have acce.led to this treaty as early as March 1792.No comment can be neceffary at this day. See alio fome obfervations relative to Poland, which follow a little lower in the text. fhould should be raised to the hereditary throne of Poland, which he was to tranfmit through his daughter to the defcendants of Catherine's youngest grand-fon; and in return that he fhould cede Lufatia to Frederick William, who was alfo to have Dantzic and Thorn, with the palatinate on the east, to the frontiers of Silefia. But here, a month after, we find every thing unfettled. All ftill remained to be done; for we are told that Leopold engaged only to employ his influence for the purpofe of bringing Catherine into the fcheme of fettling the Polish crown on the house of Saxony, and to use his good offices both with her and the republic of Poland to obtain Dantzic and Thorn for the king of Pruffia. This is more probable, as it is more agreeable to the views and interefts of the contracting pow. ers; it is less liable to be falfified, as it is couched in more general terms; and it is capable of an interpretation free from all injustice, as it in no cafe propofes hoftile force, and rather points in one material part to the fupport of the new conftitution of Poland, which had gratuitoufly named the elector of Saxony for the founder of a new dynasty. But neither one nor the other accords with the fact; for the emprefs of Ruffia invaded the country under the pretence of affifting a fmall faction of the nobility who claimed her guarantee of the old anarchy, and her complaint was exprefsly and particularly levelled against the fubftitution of an hereditary for an elective monarchy. Amidst thefe contradictions the only fafe clue for the guidance of the hiftorian is never to let out of his hand the line of facts which he does know, and by that help to explore his way with vigilance and caution, as well as he can, through the mazes and intricacies of political intrigue. In this manner, therefore, we shall conduc ourselves; and in our next volume prefent an uninterrupted narrative of the revolution in Poland, from its origin in 1789 to the nominal reestablishment of the former anarchical conftitution at the end of 1792, immediately previous to the first avowal of a new partition, which the courts of Petersburg and Berlin grounded on the falfe charge of a connection with the prevailing factions and doctrines of France. The affairs of France certainly did come under confideration at Pilnitz. A feparate article (if it were not in truth the only obligation there formally contracted) has been publifhed, and there is reafon to think it genuine. It relates wholly to that country. What it is, we fall in the proper place more minutely enquire; but at prefent it feems only neceflary to flate generally the question which has been raised upon it. By one party it is infifted that no cafe of interference by other powers can grow out of the internal tranfactions of an independent nation; and that the convention of Pilnitz muft neceffarily be viewed only as an unprincipled confpiracy of monarchs against liberty. They have given out" the |