XXXIV. 1839. by their troops, Djemillah, the old Roman Colonia, and CHAP. Setif, the ancient Sitifis and capital. Modern Europe could not advance in Africa but by treading on the footsteps and resting in the stations of the ancient conquerors of the world. These conquests enabled the French to extend their dominions in the south of Algeria in a line, which, going round from Constantine towards the sea, and on the other by the frontier of Tunis to the bay of Stura, 1 Ann. Hist. embraced a territory amply sufficient for the wants of the xxii. 256. colony, and easily susceptible of defence.1 threatening Oct. 1839. While the French power was in this manner consoli- 58. dating in the province of eastern Algeria, the war, in Their pursuance of the treaty of La Tafna, ceased in the west- aspect. ern provinces of Algeria and Oran. It soon appeared, however, that the Arab and the French interpretations of that treaty were very different. The Arab chief, having obtained the provinces allotted to him by it in absolute sovereignty, soon began extending his dominions, laying siege to fortresses, and establishing or dispossessing subordinate emirs, in a way which gave early and serious disquietude to the French Government. Complaints were made on both sides, and on both with much reason: the French complaining of the ceaseless encroachments of the Arabs; the Arabs declaiming on the invasion of the Giaours, and calling on all true believers to rally round the standard of the Prophet. So threatening did affairs become in the province towards the end of 1839, that the Duke of Orleans proceeded to it; disembarked at Algiers on 27th September, and made his entry into Constantine on 11th October. From thence he advanced to Oct. 11. Milah, Djemillah, and Setif, where, amidst the remains of the old Roman citadel, he received the homage of the Oct. 25. newly-subjected tribes. From thence an expedition under the command of the Prince - Royal and General Galbois was directed to the mountainous ridges of the Atlas, farther in the interior, by the awful passes styled the Iron Gates, which were passed by the French army, XXXIV. 1 Ann. Hist. 247; Cap. x. 119, 120. 59. ment of the tion. CHAP. which inscribed on the rocks the words "Armée Française, 1839." The French troops were with great vigour pur1839. suing their conquests, when, on the body of an Arab chief who had been slain, was found a letter from Abd-el-Kader, calling all the faithful to a holy war xxii. 244- against the infidels; and intelligence was received of a war on a great scale having commenced in the western provinces, where his authority was chiefly established.1 The insurrection proved to be of the most formidable Commence- description. From the Straits of Gibraltar almost to the insurrec- confines of Egypt, a secret league appeared to have been formed, and the French establishments were everywhere attacked by hordes of Arabs at the same time, and with inconceivable vigour. Several detachments were surprised by clouds of Bedouins, and after an heroic resistance entirely cut off. So sudden was the irruption, so unforeseen the shock, that the French establishments along the whole extent of the coast were wrapped in flames before it was well known that hostilities had commenced. Everywhere the French were driven back into their fortified posts, and soon reduced to the ground commanded by the guns of their fortresses. Sixty thousand Arabs, with the sword Ann. Hist. in one hand and the torch in the other, overspread the 250; Moni- colony from one end to the other, and Algiers itself beheld their tents in the plain, and their yataghans gleaming in the evening sun.2 Oct. 20. 2 Cap. X. 120, 121; xxii. 248 teur, Oct. 25, 1839. 60. Vigorous defensive At the first intelligence of these disasters, the French Government immediately took the most vigorous measures to repair them. Reinforcements to the amount of and success- 12,000 men, 3800 horses, and 1500 mules, with immense measures, es of the French. stores in ammunition, guns, and material, were forthwith directed with the utmost haste to Toulon, from whence they were hurried over to Africa. By these means the effective force in the field was increased to 40,000 men and 12,000 horses; and the effect of this augmentation speedily appeared. The Arabs retired for the most part before the formidable forces which issued from the 1 CHAP. XXXIV. 1839. Dec. 31, seaports, and in several detached actions they were worsted. In particular, on the last day of the year a body of 4000 French infantry attacked the regular infantry of Abd-el-Kader, strongly posted on the edge of 1839. a ravine which covered their front, and after a sharp 120, 121; action drove them from it with the loss of one gun 300 men slain. This success, though not on a scale, was very important as restoring the spirit of the 10, 1840. troops, and giving the turn to a long train of disasters.1 xxii. 250 and Ann. Hist. great 252; Moni teur, Jan. Princess Wurtem The royal family were plunged into grief in the course 61. of this year by the death of the Princess Maria, daughter Death of the of the King. Of a pious disposition, and endowed with Maria of every feminine virtue, she resembled those saintly charac- berg. ters which, during the violence and bloodshed of the middle ages, revealed the blessed effect of higher influences. She had been married some time before to the young Prince of Würtemberg; but she bore in her bosom the seeds of a mortal malady, which, after a lingering illness, brought her to the grave at Pisa in Italy, whither she had been conveyed for the benefit of a milder climate. This event, which was most acutely felt by the whole royal family, by whom she was extremely beloved, revealed the melancholy reality of the slender hold which the house of Orleans had of the sympathy or affections of the people. A few words only were addressed to the King by the Chamber of Deputies on the melancholy bereavement, and the funeral cortège traversed all France, from Mont Cenis to the place of sepulture at the Chateau d'Eu in Normandy, without one expression of condolence or sorrow either on the part of the legislature or the 19, 20. people.2 2 Cap. x. peers. 62. If this mournful event was of sinister augury as to the loyalty of the French people to the throne, another was Creation of equally significant as to the irrecoverable wound which twenty had been inflicted on the peerage, first, by the precedents Nov. 7. of creating peers in batches to get over particular difficulties or support a particular administration, and next, XXXIV. 1839. CHAP. from the limitation of those honours for life. On 7th November appeared an ordonnance elevating to the peerage Generals Cavaignac and Borelli, Count Jules de Rochefoucauld, and several others, nearly all of the second order of merit. It is true, as peerages were now for life only, frequent additions were necessary to keep up their number; but the creation of a number at once, which had now become a usual step with every administration, especially when, as in this instance, they were appointed for political purposes rather than personal merit, tended daily more and more to degrade the Upper Chamber, and utterly destroy its character as an independent branch of the Legislature, a check alike on the encroachments of the Crown and the vehemence of the Commons. It is not a little remarkable that a system so obviously destructive of the most important constitutional bulwarks, and found to be so in France, should on the other side of the Channel have been so earnestly pressed on the Crown, not merely by a great party as a party measure, but by political philosophers at a distance x. 67, 68. from the sphere of action, and professing the warmest desire for public liberty.1 * 1 Moniteur, Nov. 7, 1839; Cap. 63. Seeing the Upper House irrevocably degraded by the Commence- system which they themselves had introduced, the Liberal tation for a chiefs began to agitate for a great extension of the powers the suffrage, and sphere of action of the Lower. Their efforts were ment of agi lowering of directed chiefly to two objects: 1st. To obtain a great reduction of the electoral franchise, so as to let in a lower class of voters. The different sections of the Liberals, however, were much at variance as to where the line should be drawn: some, among whom were MM. Lafitte, Garnier Pagès, and Dupont de l'Eure, contending that it should be fixed at fifty francs (£2) of direct taxes; and others, numbering Odillon Barrot and the majority of the Liberals, inclining for a higher standard at a hundred francs. The Legitimists, represented by the Gazette de *See ante, c. xxxiv. § 3, note. XXXIV. 1839. France, contended that every person who had served in CHAP. the National Guard, or paid any sum, however small, of direct taxes, should have a vote, resting on the belief that democracy is the passion of the bourgeoisie, and that universal suffrage would ere long restore the old influences. In this diversity of opinion no common measure could be agreed on, and a change was not immediately to be apprehended. But the seed was sown; men began to think and speak on the subject, and the foundation of a revolution was laid, destined, at no great distance of 69, 70; L. time, to overturn the throne, and restore, by means of 439-444. universal suffrage, the Napoleon dynasty.1 1 Cap. X. Blanc, v. 64. Liberals as to the government of 2d. The second great object of the Liberal party was to obtain for its chiefs a direct control over the measures View of the of Government, especially in diplomatic affairs. By this was meant not merely that they should have the ap- the pointment of a ministry, which is the inherent principle tive. of constitutional government, but that they should have a direct control over the measures of the executive, and in the administration of affairs. In a word, they desired to erect the majority of the Chamber into a large cabinet, which was of its own authority, and at its own pleasure, to govern the country. This was the great object of the Liberal chiefs, and it was to effect it that so many combinations were made, and so many administrations of ephemeral endurance formed. M. Thiers in an especial manner was inflamed with the desire to acquire a direct control over the executive in the critical times evidently approaching, when the Eastern question was every day acquiring more colossal proportions, and France seemed to be destined to take an important if not decisive part in the conferences upon which the fate of the world was to depend. Around him, as the great diplomatic chief who was to carry the principles of the Left Centre into the affairs of nations, and open to themselves the ad- 69, 70, 125; vantages of office and power, the various shades of the 484. Liberals out of office were grouped.2 2 Cap. x. L. Blanc, v. |