THE battle of Aspern was followed by a long interval of suspense, during which both parties collected all their force for a second and more decisive trial. Meantime a prospect of brighter hope than the victory of Austria could promise, opened for a moment ■pon Germany.

A Prussian officer, by name Schill, during the campaign of 1806 in Poland, when so many of his countrymen were displaying the foulest treason or the rankest cowardice, distinguished himself most honourably, and in particular by a number of sallies from Colberg. He was promoted for his good conduct to the command of a regiment, and became 80 popular in consequence, that the milliners at Berlin had their fashionable articles, a la Schill, for the ladies, and Schill snuff-boxes were manufactured for the men. Throughout the north of Germany, Sehill was the idol of the people,-tales of his courage, of his generosity, and of his famous exploits, were in the mouth of every one. Such a man could not bear to remain in inaction, while the

fate of Germany was upon the hazard. His own unfortunate court was kept passive by its weakness and its fears. But the history of Germany had shown him that individuals, neither greater nor braver than himself, had raised armies and shaken empires to their foundation, and in such times, he might well hope to become another Wallenstein in a better cause. One evening, in the middle of April, having ta- April 16. ken his regiment a little way out of Berlin to exercise as usual, he told them of his purpose, and asked who were willing to follow him. About 400 declared themselves ready for any service to which he would lead them, and they took the road for Saxony, scattering proclamations over the country.

"Germans,” said this heroic Prussian, "brethren who are groaning under a foreign yoke, the moment is arrived to break your chains, and again to establish a constitution, under which you have for centuries lived happy, till the boundless ambi. tion of a conqueror has spread these

immeasurable miseries among us. Listen to me, and we shall be what once we were. Sound the alarm bells, and let the terrible sign of conflagration kindle the pure fire of patriotism in your hearts. To arms! to arms! the pike and the scythe will become deadly weapons in a brave man's grasp, till English weapons can supply their place. Let every one share in the glory of delivering his country, and win in battle repose and happiness for himself and his children. Let the coward who shrinks from this honourable call, be branded with extreme shame and detestation! to such a traitor, no German woman will ever give her hand! God is with us and our cause. The prayers of the aged will call down blessings on us. Austria is advancing; the Tyrolese have delivered themselves; the Hessians are in arms; I too am hastening towards you, at the head of tried and determined soldiers. The just cause will soon be triumphant, and the former renown of our country will be restored. To arms! hasten to arms!" He was soon joined by considerable numbers, partly consisting of deserters from the different armies, wretches caring for nothing but plunder, and well pleased to follow a commander who must necessarily subsist by plunder, and whom they could at any time abandon when it suited their own safety; but his other followers were conscripts who fled to his standard, that they might shed their blood for the deliverance of Germany, rather than in fighting the battles of her enemy, and volunteers, high-minded youths and resolute men, some desperate because they had been deprived of all, others who abandoned all from a sense of duty.

The people of Saxony were in that

state of mind, that upon the slightest success great numbers would have joined him: their king, who from pusillanimity rather than inclination, had betrayed the cause of Germany, had taken up his abode at Leipsic, lest Dresden should be attacked, though he hoped and imagined that his country would not become the seat of war. The city was illuminated in honour of the victory of the French at Echmuhl, and so little were these rejoicings in accord with the popular feeling, that the windows of the pa lace in which he resided were broken that night. But it was among the inhabitants of the new kingdom of Westphalia, that Schill expected to find most adherents; even the Hessians, though they had been sold by their former princes like bullocks, were indignant at the manner in which their government had been usurped, and Colonel Van Dorenberg, following Schill's example, raised the standard of insurrection among them.

The seizure of the electorate of Hesse, by Buonaparte, has past almost without notice among the more extensive usurpations of that atrocious Cor. sican; it was, however, an act of consummate perfidy and injustice. Immediately after the battle of Je na, the French government demanded of the elector, whether he would remain neutral in the Prussian war, and required as a pledge of neutrality that he should disband his army, which at that time consisted of 40,000 men. The elector being in no condition to refuse, complied, notwithstanding his attachment to Prussia, and retained only an establishment of 4000, who were dispersed through the country. A few weeks afterwards, 30,000 French and Dutch under Mortier and Louis Buonaparte, entered Hesse, proceeded towards Cassel, and

requested permission of the elector to pass through the town on their way to Hanover. No danger was apprehended; the next day was appointed for their passage, and their appearance was expected as a spectacle. They advanced in great numbers, the people high and low, and the elector himself among them, went out to see them march. Farther leave was requested, that they might encamp before the town that night; this also could not be denied, and the inhabitants were ordered to furnish the soldiers with whatever they wanted. Nothing which could in the slightest degree excite suspicion had occurred, and the astonishment of the people may be conceived, when day broke, and they perceived that the French had spent the night in erecting batteries and planting artillery against the town. An officer was soon sent to the elector, commanding him to disarm his soldiers immediately and surrender his capital. It was in vain that he protested against this infamous usurpation. Mortier replied, he had received orders from his sovereign to take possession of Hesse, and disarm the Hessian troops; that on the least demurral, he should proceed to enforce his orders; that the elector himself had seen how well able he was to execute the service on which he was sent; that three hours were allowed him to form his resolution, and that the French general expected he would leave Cassel before that term should elapse. What could be done? there were only 1800 troops in the city, the elector left his capital and took the road towards Holstein, where his brother was governor, and the French entered as conquerors. But the indignation of the Hessian soldiers was excessive; they ran through the

streets weeping for rage and shame, and exclaiming, that their prince did not think them worth being shot for him. The greater part of the cavalry mounted their horses, and resolutely left the city, determined to cut their way through the French, or die in the attempt, rather than submit to be disarmed. At this time, the French themselves had not yet lost all sense of honour or humanity; it was the first service of impudent and naked villainy upon which they had been employed; they seem. ed ashamed of the vile business on which they were employed, and made scarcely any attempt to impede the passage of men, whose honourable feelings they could not but regard with envy. The foot soldiers could not escape in like manner; most of them, however, destroyed their arms. When the French came to the castle gate, to dismiss the guard and occupy their post, the subaltern officer of the guard, who was a venerable old man, stept forward," I have ventured my life for my prince," said he, and the tears burst from him as he spoke, "and I never yet surren dered my arms. You are the last who should have them." With that he dashed his sword upon the stones and broke it in pieces, and in a moment every soldier of the guard did the same. About a week afterwards, four millions of dollars were levied upon the town, the pictures and the museum were transported to Paris, the elector's palace gutted, and all effects that were not thought worth sending into France sold by auction.

The character of the puppet King of Westphalia, was not such as would reconcile an indignant people to their change of masters. Without virtue to resist the will of his brother like Lucien, and without ambition te

make him heartily co-operate in the nefarious career wherein he was engaged, Jerome Buonaparte abandoned himself to every species of licentiousness. This course of life had so wasted his constitution, that it was currently reported, he was ordered by his physician to bathe every morning in a tub of claret. The Brunswickers compared this wretch with their late prince, (a man excellent in all things, and void of blame, if his wretched manifesto could be blotted from remembrance)-they hated him for the contrast, and even the very peasants of those provinces where vassalage had been abolished by the revolution, despised the upstart. Dorenberg laid a plan for surprising and carrying him off; it failed, and Dorenberg finding that the people did not join him, and that the English, who were expected and earnestly hoped for in the north of Germany, did not appear, consulted his own safety by escaping as quietly as he

could.

The accounts which have yet appeared of these important transactions are exceedingly defective. It is only known that Schill entered Wirtemberg, Dessau, Halberstadt and Halle, and many other places, seizing the public chests, stores, and arms whereever he could find them; that he traversed Saxony, Hesse, and Hanover, reached Lunenberg, and then hoisted the arms of Great Britain. But his hopes that a British force would land were disappointed. Buonaparte, fully aware how dangerous such an enemy might prove, ordered 60,000 troops to march against him from all quarters; and Jerome issued a proclamation, declaring that as he acted without any authority from his own sovereign, he was in the situation of a pirate at sea, and setting a price up

on his head. From all quarters the troops of the various states of the confederacy, Dutch and Danes, the vassals and the more degraded people who cloaked their vassalage under the term of alliance, pressed upon him. After keeping the whole north of Germany in alarm, he was at length, with about 4000 men, compelled to recross the Elbe; he then overran Mecklenburg, took possession of Wiomar and Rostock, and at those places embarked his sick and wound. ed, meaning, as it appears, to put to sea, and secure himself in some island of the Baltic till the English should relieve him. But he was now closely pursued by a superior force of Dutch, under Gen. Gratien, and of Danes,a brave and noble-minded people, doomed thus again to disgrace themselves, and serve the cause of the arch tyrant. After many skirmishes, in all of which he displayed his great military talents, he appeared before Stralsund, and May 25. overcoming the French and Mecklenburgers who were in garri son there, forced his way into the town. He has been reproached by the enemy with cruelty toward some of these men; the fact is, that a body of four or five score artillerymen, who had entrenched themselves behind their cannon, offered to parley on his advance. Accordingly he sent two officers to them: when these officers were half way up the street, they were treacherously fired upon and killed. Upon this Schill rushed to the cannons' mouth, and put every one of the party to the sword.

The fortifications of Stralsund, towards the formation of which considerable sums were contributed by Great Britain but a few years since, had been totally demolished by Buonaparte: six thousand labourers were

employed for several months in destroying them. The place had not been defended by Sweden as it ought to have been, and the evil of abandoning any defensible hold to the enemy was now severely experienced. Schill had little time to fortify himself, but he made the greatest exertions in what little was afforded him. There remained a deep ditch, and the ordinary walls and gates, such as served rather for the purpose of police than of defence. He cut trenches, planted batteries, and prepared to make as resolute a stand as the glorious Palafox. The combined Dutch and Danish troops arrived on the 31st, and forced an entrance through the Knieper gate. Schill's excellent companions formed in the town, and defended every street, fighting with a courage worthy of their cause against overpowering numbers: those numbers perhaps would not have been successful, if Schill had not fallen. Part of his corps escaped, some to the Isle of Rugen, others to the Isle of Usedam. An English frigate, had there been one at hand, might have saved them; but the English flag was not in sight, and they were pursued to their places of refuge and made prisoners. All the officers who were taken were delivered over to Buonaparte's bloody military tribunals, notwithstanding they had surrendered upon capitulation,-not at discretion. Not one was spared. Buonaparte knows that no new murders can heap additional damnation upon his head, and he never spares. Eleven of these brave men, some of them the flower of the Prussian nobility, were put to death as robbers at Wesel. They met their fate with an intrepidity worthy of the cause for which they suffered, waving their hats as they went to the place of martyr

dom, and dying with exclamations of devoted and passionate patriotism. About twenty were in like manner murdered before the gates of Brunswick. During the night sandhills were heaped over their graves, and oftentimes, at morning, garlands were found lying there, and epitaphs expressing love and admiration of the dead, and invoking the vengeance of God and man upon the detested Corsican, and that degraded nation, which, submitting to slavery itself, became the willing and guilty instrument of enslaving others.

By the death of Schill, who, in the present ignominious state of Germany, might almost be called the last of the Germans, Buonaparte was delivered from the most formidable of his enemies. If only ten thousand English had arrived in the Elbe while Schill was in arms, the whole of Hanover, Hesse, and Brunswick would have risen upon their oppressors. The French well know how soon recruits may be made good soldiers, even when torn from their homes by violence, and marched in chains to the army: a month's discipline, with a man like Schill at their head, would have enabled men whose hearts were in the cause to have met the best troops in the field. Great Britain had let one favourable hour go by; another presented itself, and that also was lost. The Duke of Brunswick Oels had made a convention with Vienna when that court was preparing for hostilities, according to which he was to raise a corps of 1000 foot, as many horse, and 125 horse artillery, at his own expence, as a prince of the German empire, while the court of Vienna pledged itself to support him as an ally. He was offered rank in the Austrian army; but this he declined, in order that he might main