Where ev❜n the peasant with a liberal air, Though born a fufferer of the human race. Through lengthened years, where fcience too had reign'd, Britons! furvey the change with trembling eyes, Once ye were told, for fo their poets fung, The Age of Reafon call ye this; for shame See ruddy youth! the peafant's harmless fon, A fhort proportion of man's little race. Poor penfive boy! his bofom perhaps has heaved Yes, fad diftraction will her bosom tear; See favage hands imbrued in female gore, With every cruel mark of mifcreant scorn. A wretched woman doomed by Nature's law, No reverence paid to either fex or age, Mingles his forrows with an infant's tears. A Monarch milder than the fummer's gale, He bent his head in meeknefs to the ftroke, Faithlefs they lived, and without hope they died; To men who can a Saviour's power deride. Ye fons of fcience, fee in ruins laid, What havock rude barbarian hands have made; In fearch of freedom o'er the boisterous main. May Heaven, attendant on the patriot's prayer, Then fhall fair freedom flourish with her train, HISTORY. SUMMARY OF POLITICS. LONG deftined, as we have been, to record the astonishing progrefs, and dreadful fucceffes, of vice combating against virtue, regicide against loyalty, and anarchy against order; to behold the triumphant banners of atheifm and treafon floating on facred fanes and and regal palaces; and the whole civilized world threatened with In our la political retrofpect we expreffed a hope that the victorious No driven in all his out-po's, refolved to attack him. Accordingly, on the morning of the 27th of April he forced the pailage of the river, at different points, attached the french in their entrenchment, and, after a mo defpera e action, obtained a complete victory, The French left fix thousand men on the fieid; and upwards of five thousand prifoners, including four Generals, fell into the hands of the allics, together with eighty pieces of cannon. The confequence of this action was the total expulfion of the French from the Milanese. The Trong fortrefs of Pechiera, on the lave of Garda, has been reduced; Novara, and Paria, and the cattle of Piacenza have been evacuated, and even Porcell, a town in the Piedmontefe. The French feem to be panic-ftric en; they fly on all fides, with the utmoft precipitation, no longer daring to op pofe the combined forces. The polition ta en by SUWARROW to the right and left of the Milanje, is calculated alike to prevent the junction of the difperfed relics of MOREAU' army with MasSENA in Switzerland; and the efcape of MACDONALD's army from Naples, where the loyal inhabitants of the country are in very great force, and in daily expectation of being joined by confiderable reinforcements from Sicily, and by a large body of Ruffians and Turks from Corfu. The Emperor has wifely published a general amnefty, for his revolted fubjects in Italy, and the beneficial confequences of this proceeding have been already made manifeft. The people have received their deliverers, with open arms, and fatiated, no doubt, with Gallic freedom, fubmit with joy to the tenperate authority of their lawful Sovereign. The Piedmontefe officers who have been taken, have, under the influence of SUWARRow, iffued a ftrong proclamation, inviting their countrymen to fly to the standard of royalty, and join them in reftoring their exiled monarch to the throne of his ancestors. Meanwhile Marthal BELLEGARDE has fucceeded in his efforts to expel the French from the Engadine; and the oppreifed inhabitants of the fmaller cantons of Switzerland, encouraged by the hope of affiftance from the allies, have rifen upon their tyrants and put a number of them to the fword. Indeed, a fimilar difpofition prerails from the fhores of the Adriatic to the German ocean; fo anxious are the inhabitants of every country that has experienced the effects of French liberty, to thake off its fetters! Amidit thefe important tranfactions, which reflect fo much honour on the fovereign by whofe means they have been effected, the inquifitive politician naturally directs his attention to thofe cabinets which ftill perfift in a fhameful and difhonourable neutrality. Of thefe the KING of PRUSSIA ftands foremoft;-a monarch on whose public conduct we have had too frequent occafion to animadvert. The crooked policy of the cabinet of Berlin fill fets at defiance every maxim of reafon, every dictate of wisdom, and every impulfe of fafety. How long a conduct which, from its effects on the general flate of Europe at this critical period is an object of public concern, will be continued, the utmost fagacity is infuthcient to determine. But the fpirit and magnanimity, which the EMPEROR of of RUSSIA has hitherto displayed, leads us to entertain a hope that his interpofition will be exerted to produce its speedy termination, The ARCHDUKE CHARLES ftill retains his fituation on the Banks of the Rhine, from Schaffhaufen to Bafil; he has received confiderable reinforcements, and, from the prefent fituation of affairs, it is probable he will very foon be enabled to act in concert with the troops in the Tyrol, and the victorious army in Italy, for the expulfion of the French from Switzerland. The affaffination of two of the French Envoys at Raftadt, ROBERJEOT and BONNIER, has given rife to as many differtations as if the fate of Europe had depended on their existence. The violation of the Divine mandate to commit no murder certainly calls for reprobation and requires punishment. Accordingly no fooner was the Archduke CHARLES, whofe humanity, juftice, and courage are alike confpicuous, apprized of this event, than he put the commanding officer under arreft, ordered an enquiry to be immedi ately infiitted, and proclaimed his refolution to make a fignal example of the offenders. This was all that man could do. But the Directory, it feems, chofe to think otherwife; they converted this private act of a few defperate individuals into a meafure of public policy; as if the death of thefe two wretched mifcreants were of confequence to the enemies of the Great Nation; openly accused the Archduke of being inftrumental to the murder; denounced it to France and to Europe as a flagrant violation of the Law of Nations; as an act of the greateft atrocity that ever stained the annals of mankind; and called for fignal vengeance on the heads, not of the affaflins, but of the Emperor and his minifters! 'Tis truly curious to hear a gang of regicides, who have committed, in the fpace of the laft ten years, more murders than had blotted the page of hiftory for centuries before; a body of plunderers who had given the folemn fanction of their mock legiflature to the annihilation of all public law, and whofe conduct had been invariably regulated by fuch principle, proclaiming themfelves the champions of justice, and the guardians of the rights of nations! Do thefe vile impoftors fuppofe that the people of Europe have already erafed from their memories the daily proceedings of Republican France fince the ara of her regeneration; the proclamations of her rulers; the conduct of her committees; the refolutions of her Generals; and the acts of her Proconfuls? That they have forgotten the maffacres of September, 1792, committed under the eyes of the Legislative Affembly, and by the exprefs orders of its leading members? That they have forgotten the murder of Louis XVI. and the annual act of commemoration, ftill more atrocious than the deed itself? That they have forgotten the private affatlination of Beauvais, a member of the Convention, in the autumn of 1793, by order of the Committee of Public Safety? That they have forgotten the flaughtered myriads, whofe biccd literally dyed red the polluted fireams of the Loire, and whofe matfacre received the repeated applaufe of the Legiflature? That they have forgotten the public orders of BUONAPARTE to his troops (13th Fructidor 4th year) |