SUPPLEMENT
TO
*pertator
No. 1801.]
FOR TILE
WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 1863.
{
UNSTAMPSD, STAMPED
THE ROYAL FAMILIES OF EUROPE.
Tax union of all the royal families of Europe into one great royal class, or caste, is one of the most remarkable facts in }modern history. Royalty has realized already the cherished dream of poets, of the alliance of nations and the brotherhood of man- kind. The sovereigns of the civilized world have ceased to belong -to any particular nation, race, or tribe. They are all brothers and sisters; they address each other "Monsieur mon frere," regard- dess of rank and dignity ; and they acknowledge all within the -sacred circle to be ebenbiirtig, or equal by right of birth. That they -should exclusively marry within their own family circle ; acknow- ledge no other matrimonial alliances than these to be "legitimate," and stigmatize the rest, however lawful according to the law of the land, as "morganatic," is but the natural consequence of the -system of caste soproduced. From the philanthropic and philo- -eophic point of view, this system appears very unlovely, barbaric, and, as some would say, devoid of "progress ;" practically, how- -ever, it has undeniably its great advantages: To compare loss and :gain, as well as to analyze the present position of royalty, the vfollowing essay may Serve. There are at this moment forty 'inde- pendent sovereigns in Europe, including the Sultan; but exclud- ing the Pope ; and of these foity members of the royal' family no less than thirty-four are German either by birth or origin, and three moie'are semi-Teutonic by relationship. This is a striking Tact, and may possibly have some influence on the future history of the Old World, which has adopted, by almost universal con- -currence of opinions, the monarchical as the best, because freest -and most elastic form of government.
Passing in review the forty crowned heads of Europe—all .equal in rank and birth, according to princely law and etiquette —the only possible order, the alphabetical, gives the first rank to
AUSTRIA.
The Empire of, Austria is an extraordinary instance of the process of state formation which has been going on in Europe since the Middle Ages. The formation was not an -organic coalescence, effected by the mutual attraction of kindred tribes and nationalities ; but. the only centripetal force ex- :ercised was that of a single ruling family, around which the most adverse elements in race, language, and religion, were made to group themselves, exactly in the same way as private property is gathered in ordinary life. The foundation of the empire was laid by Charlemagne, who, after many victories against the Magyar invaders, established his rule all along the Danube, as far as the river Raab. At the breaking up of the imperial authority, the dukes of Bavaria took possession of .0stirrichi, the Realm of the East ; but unable to hold it against the impetuous Hungarians, made it over to the princely Baben- berg family, from which_ it came to the kings of Bohemia. Austria was ruled by Ottokar H. of Bohemia, when Rudolf of Hapsburg was chosen emperor of Germany, in 1273. A poor count, with no other possessions but an old castle and a few acres of ground in Switzerland, he was elevated to the throne chiefly on account of his supposed weak:. mess. True to the principle which had guided his' election, Rudolf did not interfere with the 'princes engaged in parcelling out the Germanic empire into small sovereignties; but, imitating them, he went to the eastern frontier of the realm, there to lay the foundation of a kingdom for his own family. Ottokar of Bohemia refusing to do homage to the empEror, he was attacked by Rudolf of Hapsburg, end, conquered in two battles, lost his crown as well as life. Rudolf then took possession of the duchy of Austria, as well as of Styria and Carinthia—a territory of about 25,000 square miles, which thus became the nucleus of the great Austrian empire. The growth was fostered at the commence- ment much more through 'gold than any other means. The descendants of Rudolf, a thrifty race, accumulated vast treasure, with which they purchased land in -*all directions. Albert
bought the Tyrol from Margaret Maultasch for a life-rent or 6,000 marks of gold; and for an additional 116,000 golden florins the same princess renounced her claims on Bavaria. In 1365, Leopold III. bought the territory of Feldkirch for 40,000 florins, and soon after the flourishing province of Brisgau, in Suabia; was purchased front the COunts of Fiirstenberg for 55,000 florins. The successor of Leopold acquired part of Carniola and the Windisch-Mark from the heirs of the last Count of Gorz for 70,000 florins; and his successor got possession of the impor- tant city of Triesfe, by the skilful expenditure of a large sum of money and a few troops, in 1382, during the war between Hungary and Venice. Previously, the two governments of Upper and Lower Suabla had been pledged to Austria for 40,000 florins by Kaiser Wenceslas, and money being always scarce in the imperial exchequer, the province had to be redeemed by 'the' grant of various principalities on the Upper Danube.
The territory of the Hapsburg family—split at first into nu- merous branches, which, however, came to be gradually united
into 'one—had ROW grown to' the size of a kingdom, and to en-
large- this still -further the members entered into a series of speculative -matrimonial alliances. Ferdinand I., by his mar-
riage with Anna, Oster of Louis IL, who was killed in the battle
Of Mohacs, acquired the kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia, with the appendages of' Moritvia, Silesia, and 'Lusatia. Ferdinand was crowned King of Hungary, November 5, 1527, and -though an opposing party of Magyars refused to 'acknowledge him, and even called in the aid of the Turks, the new monarch maintained
his position, by buying off the warlike Sultan with an annuity of 30,000 ducats. This immense addition to the Power of the house of Hapsburg was preceded by two other matrimonial alli- ances, leading to a still more gigantic increase of territory. In 1477, Maximilian I. espoused the heiress of the Netherlands, Maria of Burgundy, daughter Of Charles the Bold ; and he after- wards married his son to Joanna', of Spain, who brought in her
lap the crowns of Aragon and Castile, together with the empire. of the New World. The offspring of the latter union- was the famous Emperor Charles V., in whom culminated the poweieif the Hiles-.
burg family. Charles V., at the age of six, inherited he Nether- lands and the Franche-Comte; at sixteen be became ruler of Spain and the Indies, with the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily as appendages; and at nineteen he was crowned emperor of Ger- many and king of Rome. During his reign the house of Hapsburg possessed a tract of country in Europa extending over 360,230 square miles. All this had been acquired in less than two centuries and a half : from the year 1273, when Count Rudolf left his lonely castle in Switzerland, to the accession of Charles V., in 1519.
Charles V., aiming at universal empire, was doomed to failure, and from this period began the decline of the power of Hapsburg.
The war of the Spanish succession and subsequent events reduced the possessions of the family to nearly one-half the former size, and they amounted in 1708 to only 191,621 square miles. With
the death of Charles VI., October 20, 1740; the direct line of Rudolf von Hapsburg came to an end ; and for some years after it seemed as if the whole mighty' empire was falling to piece's. However, the danger passed after a While, and the new monarchs of the house of Hapsburg- Lorraine even- succeeded in increasing'
the boundaries of their possessions to some extent. In 1780 Austria embraced 234,684 iquire miles, and in 1801 it had risen to 253,100. In the two treaties of Pressburg and of Vienna,
1805 and 1809, Napoleon reduced Austria to a second-rate power, but the great Congress of 1815 restored the former limits of the
empire. After the recent loss of Lombardy, in 1859, the heritage of the Hapsburg-Lorraine family' has once more been'reduced: to 241,000 square miles; or 12,060 square milesz--the size of Belgium —less than it was at the beginning of the century.
The two list soveieigns of Austria were notoriously of weak mind ; but the present emperor, Francis Joseph L, seems to be gifted, if not with extraordinary, at least with average intel-
Speeches, dm, of the Prince Consort. Mrs. Browning's Lest Poems.
Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church. Ten Days in Athens, by Dr. Corrigan.
Remains of Arthur Hemy Hallam. Campbell's Thoughts on Revelation.
Robertson's Anal sin of "In Memoriam."
A Summer Tour in the Grisons, by a Lady.
alayne's Residence in British Columbia. Walter Langley, by the Hon. C. S. Smile.
The Common Place Philosopher, by Gleig's Life of Wellington.
" A. K. H. B." Dixon's Story of Lord Bacon's Life.
My Diary North and South, by W. H. Russell Goblin Market, by C. G. Rossetti.
Roundabout Papers, by W. H. Thackeray. Beodie's Psychological Inquiries.
Campbell's Adventures among the Afghans. Saturday Sterne, by J. E. Heade.
Through Algeria, by Mable S. Crawford. Mountaineering in 1861, by John Tyndall.
Life in Nature, by James Hinton. [ease." Kangaroo Land, by the Rev. A. Polehamp Countess Kate, by the author of "Hearts' ton.
A Foggy Night at Offord, by Mrs. H. Wood. The Luggie and other Poems, by David Murray's Missions in Western Polynesie. Gray.
Haldmin's Travels in Africa. The Auckland Correspondence.
David Elginbrod, by George Macdonald. St. Clement's Eve, by Henry Taylor.
St. Winifred's ; or, the World of School. A Winter at Mentone, by A. J. C. Hare.
Conningham's Historical Theology. Sandford's Hampton Lectures.
Mitchell's Residence iu the United States. Essays, by Sir Henry Holland.
The Poet's Journal, by Bayard Taylor. Willie Atherton.
No Name, 14 Wilkie Collins. " The Henwife, by Mrs. Fergusson Blair.
The Scapegrace Al Sea. Sketches of the Life of Major Rauken.
GordonaResidence in China. York House, by W. Platt.
Life in Normandy, by an English Resident. Poems and Songs, by David Wingate.
alauriee's Dialogues on Family 1Vorship. Tracts for Priests and People.
New Volume of Sermons, by the Bishop of Mothers in Council.
Oxford. The Anglo-Saxon Home, by John Thrupp.
Thalatta; or, the Great Commoner. Ancient History, by Elie. al Sewell.
Recollections of Simeon's Conversation The English at Home, by Esquires.
Myself and My Relatives. [Parties. Stanley's Bible in the Holy Laud.
Selections from the Poems of R. Browning. The White Rose of Chayleigh.
The Duchess of Trajetto. Ludlow's American History since the Union Life and Labours of George W. Walker. Ihimpden's Fathers of Greek Philosophy.
Brine's Narrative of the Taeping Rebellion. Orgauization in Daily Life.
Something of Italy, by W. Chambers, Leigh Hunt's Correspondence.
The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson. Ludy Herbert's Gentlewoineu, by " Silver Mrs. Halliburton's Troubles, by Mrs. H. pen."
Wood. . Why we Live in Canada, by Mrs. Copleston Mistress and Maid, by Miss Mulock. The Duke of Buckinglitou's Diary.
Wild Wales, by George Borrow. Red, White, and Blue.
Normanton, by A. J. BerrowelitTe. Memoirs of Queen Hortense.
Greece and the Greeks, by Fredric:a Cromer.
The Cloister and the Hearth, by C. Heade.
On the Romance Languages, by Sir G. C. Thornbury's Life of Turner.
Lewis. Lovel the Widower.
Eyes and Ears, by Henry Ward Beecher. Spence's American Union.
Seeman's Mission to the Fiji Islands, Catlow's Sketching Rambles in the Alps.
The Slaves of the Ring. Blunts Essays from the 'Quarterly."
Ragged Life in Egypt, by M. L. Whetely. Jeaffreson's Book about Doctors.
Pre-Historic Man, hy Daniel Forbes's Travels in Iceland.
Parish Papers, by 1./r. Norman Macleod. Forest Creatures, by Charles Boner.
Les Misarablee, translated by Wraxall. Sketches in RUSSIA, by Lady C. Pepys.
A Sailor Boy's Log-Heel:allied by W.White. Memoirs of Admiral Sir C. Napier.
Life of Professor Wilson, by Sirs. Gordon. The Home at Rosefield.
English Women of Letters, by Julia Kaya• Ohnsteads Cotton Kingdom.
Venn's Life of Francis:Xavier. Dumb. Berlepsclis Nature iti the Alps.
A Painter's Camp in the Highlands. A Romance of a Dull Life The Counsels of an Invalid, by Dr.G.Wilson Adam's Memorable English Battles.
Collected Papers, by Mrs. Grote. Barrington, by Cluirles Lever.
Speaking to the Heart. by Dr. Guthrie. Rawliuson's Great Monarchies.
Lempriere's Notes on Mexico. History of the Madras Free Church Mission.
Smiles's Lives of the Engineers. 13ellew's Mission to Afghanistan.
English Nonconformity. by Dr. R.Vaughau. Goodrich's Story of his own Life.
I turn's Agricultural Tour in Belgium. A Prodigal Son, by Dutton Cook.
The Ganges and the Seine, by S. L. Man, chard. The Neapolitan Commander.
Gervinus's Commentary on Shakespeare.
Our Last Yearg in India, by Mrs. Spell. Two Friends, by Dora Greenwell.
Winifred's Wooing, by Ccorgiana Craik. Hooper's History of the Waterloo Campaign Preying and St taking in Germany. England under God,by Archdeacon Evans.
The Australian Expedition,by O'Hara Burke A Journey in Umbria, by T. A. 1 rollope.
The Old Lieutenant and His Sun. Memorials of Thomas Boaz, D.D.
Rattray's Vancouver Island. Servia and the Servians, by Rev. W.Denton.
Studies in Animal Life, by G. II. Lewes. alsrkham's Travels in Peru.
-Reasons of Faith, by 0. S. Drew.
Gongora, by Archdeacon Churton.
The Two Catheriues, The World in the Church, by F.G.Trafford.
A had Beginning. The Pentateuch Examined, by Bishop Co- Sanby's History of the Royal Aealemy. Marion Leslie, by Rev. P. Beaton. penes.
Poems, by Arthur Hugh Cough. The Ruined Cities of Numitlia, by Dr.Davie
Iloyd s Lila of Sir 1 Int ip Sidney.
f he 1 rophee), by ...tidy lisesel Butler.
The Qneen's Manes, by G. .1. Whyte Melville The Double Prophecy, by W. Carleton.
Civilizing Mountain Men, by Mrs. Mason. Life of Frederick 11., by T. L. hington.
ThaekersyS Adventures of Philip. Pastoral Life, by Rev. Edward biome.
'feminine ; a Romance.
ihwy Farm,,by Anthony 1 rollope.
Our Holiday in Scandinavia. Aleirds Sermons on Christian Doctrine.
Lucille, by Mrs. Macdonald. Lady Audley's Secret.
Italy in 1862, by Count Arrivabene. Memoirs of Lady Merger'.
Winslow's Sympathy of Christ with Man. Bungener's Life of Calvin.
Can Wrong be Right? by Mrs. S. C. Hall, Katie; or, the Simple Heart.
A Family Tour Round Spain, by Lady Dun. Essays by a Barrister.
bar. Raising the Veil, by John Pomeroy.
The Church and the Churches, by Dr
Denmaik and Sweden, by C. A. Gosch.
DUIlinger. Cumming's Things Hard to be Understood.
Prince Albert's Golden Precepts. The Maroon, by Capt. Mayne Reid.
A Loss Gained, by Philip Cresswell. Keilitations on Death and Eternity.
The Ladies of Lovel.l.eigh. Milinan's Memoir of Lord Macaulay.
Unto this Last, by John Baskin. The Lord Mayor of London.
Marietta, by T. A. Trollope. INillinger's Gentile and the Jew.
Owen ; a Waif. Linton's Vestiges of the Older Nations- 2lleudelssohn's Letters from Italy. MeCaul on the luspiration of Scripture.
Biographies of Good Women. Owen on a National Museum.
Mrs. Blake, by Mrs. Newton Crosland. Melebior's Dream, by J. H. U.
Brinekmen's Expedition in Cashmere. Reithmillier's Life of Frederick Lucas, The Chanuings, by Mrs. Henry Wood. Ten Years of Imperialism in France.
The Cotton Lord, by Herbert Glyn. Macdouald's Account of British Columbia.
The BookHunter, by J. H. Burton. Jefferson and his Times, by C. De Witt.
Garibaldi at Caprers. by Colonel Vecebj. Thoughts of the Emperor Antoninus.
Essays, by Hugh Miller. One Story by Two Authors.
Renal° Cheinici, by George Wilson. John Arnold.
Chorley's Musical Recollections. Herzegovina, by Lieut. Arbuthnot.
Autobiography of Mrs. Delany. Footsteps behind Him, by W. J. Stewart.
Troublous Times, by Jane Homing Crouch Autobiography of Charles the Fifth.
Stoughton's Church and State in 1862. Measure for Measure.
LIST OF SOME OF THE PRINCIPAL
NEW AND CHOICE BOOKS
IN CIRCULATION AT
MUDIE'S LIBRARY New Oxford Street, London.
These Lists, be it remembered, represent the main sources of the general information now in vogue.
Lennard's Travels in British Columbia. On Matter and Ether, by T. R. 134.1.
De Tocaueville's Democracy in America. Phaulcan the Adventurer.
Havenshoe, by Henry Kingsley-. Alexander's Sermons on Christian Faith.
The Physician's Daughters. Whartou's Literature of Society.
The Valley of the Maude, by Mrs- Stewart. Cox's Tales of the Gods and Heroes.
Howsonat Essay on Deaconesses. Herbert Percy; a Tale.
Adventures of Baron Wratislaw. China, by a Miesionaty's Wife.
Impreihions of Rome, by Elie. H. Sewell. Arnold's Manual of English Literature.
Abel Drake's Wife. Stirring Times under Canvas.
Rhinds Excavations in Thebes. Cache-Cache, a Poem, by W. D. Watson.
Memorials of Bishop Bowen. Three Years la Melbourne,by OLaraAspinall.
Agnes of Sorrento, by Mrs. Stowe. Rees Garland.
Cunningham's Lives of the Reformers. America before Europe, by de Gaspariu.
The Lieutenant and Commander. A Noble Purpose Nobly Won.
La Belle Marta An Old Man's Thoughts About Many Things.
Memoirs of the Rev. Joseph Sorban. Anstetlai Short Trip in Hungary', , Secret History of the Court of Louis XV. Recreations of a Country Parson.
Good for Nothing, by Capt. Whyte Melville, De la five's Reminiscences of Cavour.
Dixon's Personal History of Lord Bacon. ()mason on the Canon of Scripture.
Tom Brown at Oxford. Recollections of a Country Clergyman.
Ravenstein's Travels on the Amur. Waste Products, by P. L. Simmonds.
Autobiography of Cornelia Knight. Herbert Lovell, by F. W. B. Bouverie.
The Souris Exodus, by Baldwin Brown. Northeote's Financial Policy.
Rossetti's Early Italian Poets. Rose Leblane, by Lady G. Fullerton.
Alison's Lives of the Castlereaghs. The Pearl of Urn's Island, by Mrs. Stowe. .
Hullah's History of Modern Music. North America, by Anthony Trollope, Bremer's Travel's in Palestine. A Cruise upon Wheels, by C. A. Collins.
Chester's Life of John Rogers. Darwin's Notes on Orchids.
Mrs. Gatty's Tour in Ireland. Ellice, a Tale, by L. N. Comm.
Autobiography of Alex. Carlyle.
Works of Thomas Hood. Ent° Edition.
Turner's Residence in Polynesia. Memoir of Count Arrivabene.
Palleske's Life of Schiller. Life of Washington Irving.
Hutchinson's Wanderings in Ethiopia.
Life of Edward Irving, by Mrs. Oliphant
Burton's Visit to Salt Lake City. Sketches of Faroe, by A. J. Symington.
The Young Stepmother, by Miss Tango. Reminiscences of Thomas Hartwell Home.
East Lynne, by Mrs. Henry Wood. The Leadbeater Papers.
Autobiography of Alexis de Tocqueville. Guizot's Embassy to the Court of St.James's.
Thornbury's Lives of Britsh Artiste, Time Sandwich Islands, by Manley Hopkins.
Berkeley's Travels in the Western Prairies. Female Life its Prison.
Safeguards, by the Bishop of London. Gravenhurst, by William Smith.
Paul the Pope and Paul the Friar. Secalarie ; Essays, by Samuel Lucas.
Court Life at Naples. Life of Robert Story of Rosneath.
Tristram's Travels in the Great Sahara. A Chaplet of Verses, by Adelaide Procter, Across the Carpathians. Smyth's Three Cities in Russia.
Underhill's Visit to the West Indies. Sayer's History of Gibraltar. si La Beata, by T. A. Teollope. Churton's Life of Joshua Watson.
Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, Bryanston Square, by Noel Radecliffe.
Motley's History of the Netherlands. Roads and Rails, by W. B. Adams, The Valley of a Hundred Fires.
How-we Got to Pekin,by the llev.R. M'Ghee.
Galtou'a Vacation Tourists. Two Lives, by Blanchard Jerrold.
Trench's Seven Churches of Asia. rite Uses of Animals, by Dr. Lankester.
Hodgson's Residence in Japan. Convent Life in Italy.
PalgraveS Golden Treasury. Relies of Percy B. Shelley.
Warp and Woof, by Holine Lee, Burgon's Sermons on Inspiration.
Andersson's Travels on the Okavango. Scott's Gleanings from Westminster Abbey.
Wilson's Life of Edward Forbes, Carr of Carrlyon, by Hamilton Aide.
Bishop Smith's Visit is Japan. Kohl's History of Discovery in America.
Autobiography of Mrs. Piozzi. fytler's Papers for Thoughtful Girls, Du Chaillu's Adventures in Africa. Mullens's Life of the Rev. A. F. Lacroix Life and Times of Thomas Somerville. Marsh's Manual of Use English language.
The Silver Cord, by Shirley Brooks, The Fire Ships, by W. II. G. Kingston.
Lockhart's Residence in China. Cot's Tale of the Great Persian War.
Lainont's Adventures in the Northern Sens, Amongst the Tartar Tents, Dasent's Story of Burnt Nj al. The Russians at Home, by Sutherland Dicey's Memoir of Cavity. Scripture Laud, by Rev. G. S. Drew, Edwards.
KrepTs Travels in East Africa, The Eagle's Nest in the Valley of Sixt. Atkiuson's Travels in Amoor.
Market Harborough. White and Black.
The Oxonian in Iceland. Roman Candles (Sketches of Life in Rome).
Edwards's History of the Opera. The Seven Sons of Mammon.
One Year in Sweden, by Horace Marryat The Field of Life.
The Mdleuuitil Rest, by Dr. Cumming. Domestic Life in Palestine, by M. E. Rogers, Drayeon's Common Sights in the Heavens. Norman Sinclair, by W. E. Aytoun.
Patterson s Essays on Art. Chambers's Handbook of Astronomta Maurice's Modern Philosophy. Marryat's Residence in Jutland.
The Dutch at Home, by Alphonse Esquires. The Last of the Mortimers.
Paul Footer's Daughter, by Dutton Cook. French Women of Letters, by Julia Ka- Life of John Clay (the Prison Chaplain), vanagh.
Lord William Leunox's Recollections. Lives of the Archbishops, by Dr. Hook.
A Dream of a Life, by Lady Scott, Hodder's Memories of New Zealand Life.
The Lady of La Garaye. Burgon's Letters from Rome.
Life of Sir Samuel Bentham. Life of Sir blare I. Brunel, Olive Blake's Good Work. Lord Orauborne'd Historical Essays.
The Cost of a Seeret. Life of the Rev. E. T. March Phillipps.
Niecolo Marini; or, the Mystery Solved, Notes from Past Life, by Rev. F. Trench.
The Mistakes of a Life, by Mrs. Hubback. Collyn's Chase of the Wild Red Deer.
Sisterhoods its the Church, by M. Goodman Beaten Paths, by T. C. Grattan.
Problems in Hiunan Nature, Down South, by S. Phillips Day.
Tullongbo's Journey in search of Ogres. The St. Aubyns of St. Aubyn.
The Nest litintens by William Dalton. Aids to Faith, by various Writers.
TheWeather. Book, by Rear.Admiral Fitzroy Replies to" Essarand Reviews" The Golden Lsdder. Leisure Hours in Town, by" A. K. H. B."
A llfaideu of Our Own Day. Life of Arthur Vaudeleur, by Miss 14iarsh, Devey's Life of Joseph Locke. Godwin's Lectures on Christian Faith.
Blekiston's Five Months on the Yang Teze, Taub's Anecdotes of Humourists.
Wars of the 19th Century, by Sir IS, Cust, Buckingham's Court of Victoria.
Cragstone Cottage, by H. A. Haling. Said and Done !
Studies in Raman Law, by Lordnickenzie. No Church, bytheAuthor of " HighChurch."
The Three Merles. by Rev. A. Moody Stuart. The Castle and the Cottage in Spain.
The Second Mother, by Mrs. Geldert. Lady Elinor Mordaunt. by Mrs. Gordon.
Rachel Noble's Experience. Pethenck s Travels in Egypt.
Clarissa, by Anne Bowman. Travels its Egypt, by EmilyBeaufort.
The Duties of Man, by Joseph Mazzini. The Castleford Case, by Frances Browne.
Rose and her Mission, by Mrs. If. Lynch.
Memoir of George Wilson, by his Sister.
Lectures on the Philippians, byDr Vaughan. Burton's Travels in Central Attica.
Bollantyne's Wild Man of the West. Davis's Researches in Carthage.
My Good.for.Nothing Brother. Memorials of Admiral Gambier.
Calvin's Institutes, translated by Beveridge Autobiography of Lord Duudonald.
Eighteen Sermons, by St. Leo the Great. Reminiscences of a Fox Hunter.
Gala Glory in the Heavens, by Dr.Leitcdi
Montalembert's Monks of the West.
The South Vindicated, by Hon. J. Williams.' Lord Elgin's Mission to China and Japan Stern's Wanderings in Abyssinia.
All the best New Works continue to be added to the Library in large numbers as they appear. spent in the creation of a network of railways, which are entirely state property. The reigning Grand Duke Frederick is married to a daughter of the present King of Prussia, and his eldest sister is the wife of Duke Ernest of Saxe-Coburg, brother of our late Prince Consort, while his youngest sister has been united to Grand Duke Michael of Russia, brother of Czar Alexander I. Other mem- bers of the grand ducal family have contracted morganatic mar- riages —Princess Maria having given her hand to the Scotch Hulce of Hamilton and Brandon, and Princess Amelia to a Prus- sian nobleman—so that the house of Baden has come to form a singular link between the British and German aristocracy and some of the most powerful sovereign families in Europe.
BAVARIA.
Bavaria—the country of the Boii, subsequently called Baioarians —was not formed into an organized state till the middle of the: twelfth century, when Count Otho of Wittelsbach, the founder of the still reigning dynasty, made himself the master of a number of feudal lords in the valleys of the Lech and the Isar. Otho died in 1183, and his successor, Louis I., enlarged the territory of the • family in various directions, and finally, by advancing money to Kaiser Frederick II., obtained the grant of the fertile and flourishing palatinate on the Rhine. This was the basis of the fortunes of the house of Wittelsbach. The descen- dants of Louis I. spread themselves all over Germany, and by means of purchase and of matrimonial alliances, got possession of the provinces of Brandenburg, of Holland and Zealand, of part of Tyrol, and other territories. At the same time, however, the line split into numerous branches, and in order to unite the scattered territories Duke Albert II., the chief of the house, assembled in 1506 a family council, and with the consent of most of the members passed a Pragmatic Sanction, introducing the law of primogeniture, and fixing the allowance of the younger sons. The Emperor Charles IV., in his famous Golden Bull, had established primogeniture in the electoral states moreithan a century before this period ; but the Imperial law was universally disregarded, and this Bavarian family pact was one of the first real attempts to carry the principle into action. The success was
not very great at first. Albert II. was no sooner dead, when his three sons, who had all sworn to the Pragmatic Sanction, began fighting for the territories of the house, and ended by dividing them again. It was not till the end of the sixteenth century that the Wittelsbach family, together with the majority of the German princely houses, acknowledged the right of the first-born to succeed to the throne, to the exclusion of other relations.
in the great Thirty-years' War, the Bavarian princes played an i;Iportant part as the foremost champions of Roman Catholicism. Luke Maximilian I. of Bavaria was the soul of the League directed against the Protestant Union, and in recompense was invested, in 1623, with the electoral dignity. The intimate friendship with Austria at this time did not, however, prevent Maximilian's succes- sor, Charles Albert, from attacking the possessions of the Hapsburg family, at the death of Emperor Charles VI. In concert with France and Frederick the Great of Prussia, the elector fell into Bohemia, in 1741, and having captured Prague, allowed himself to be crowned King of Bohemia. The regal dream was short, for the troops of Maria Theresa soon after not only drove him out of Bohemia, but captured his own Munich, forcing him to seek an asylum at Frankfort-on-the-Main. Nevertheless, for a long while after, the rulers of Bavaria called themselves arch- duk, of Austria. By attaching himself to the ascendant star of Napolet,..1, Elector Maximilian I. was finally made a king by the grace of the French Emperor, at the peace of Presburg, in 1805. At the same time the new king obtained an increase of territory, which now amounted altogether to about 22,000 square miles, with two millions and a half of inhabitants. The Congress of Vienna, in consideration of the King of Bavaria having left the French alliance as quickly as he had become attached to it, added some further territories to the country, giving it its actual shape of two detached provinces, with an area of 29,637 square miles, and about four millions and a half of inhabitants.
The present King of Bavaria, Maximilian II., has the reputation of being a rather liberal prince, not unwilling to acquisce in con- stitutional government. He has a civil list of 2,350,580 florins, or 192,550/., which, however, is far from sufficient to cover the expenditure of the royal family, and has to be largely sup- plemented from private and other sources. The still living ex-king Louis J. got at various times into violent conflict with the chambers, for having made use, for his own purpose, of sums voted for
general objects. Originally the Wittelsbach family possessed a vast private fortune ; but this is supposed to leave become con- siderably diminished of late, particularly through the extravagant building schemes of King Louis, who aimed at being a little Louis XIV. The Greek-Bavarian throne, recently vacated by Otho I., has also been a most expensive possession to the royal family as well as the country. According to a journal of Augsburg, the crown of Hellas has cost, at the lowest calculation, some fifty million florins, or considerably above four millions sterling, in annual subventions and loans never to be recovered.
The royal Bavarian family is intimately related to the house of Austria, and more or less to the reigning families of Saxony, Prussia, and Spain, and the deposed monarchs of Naples, Modena, and Tuscany. Some extraordinarily brilliant matrimonial alliances have been made by Bavarian princesses within the last thirty or forty years. The late King Maximilian I. had twice twin daughter!, all four of which married either reigning sovereigns or heirs to great thrones. At this moment, the house of Bavaria counts among the members of the family no less than two em- presses, three kings, and six queens, besides a goodly number of grand dukes, archdukes, and smaller princes. This is inclusive, however, of the king and queen of Greece, absent on leave ; and the queen of Naples, who is said to have expressed her determi- nation not to return to Francis II., but either to become a nun or to obtain a divorce, so as to be enablei to unite herself to a prince of Holstein. Such "romantic" incidents as the one here rumoured of are not at all rare in the annals of the royal Bavarian family. King Louis I., in 1848, preferred to give up his crown to parting with fair Lola 3Iontez ; and the ex-king's only brother, Prince Charles, chose for consort a Miss Bulky, the daughter of a French refugee, instead of a rich Austrian archduchess, offered by his father. The Miss Bolley lot g since has become a Baroness von Beyersdorf, and she and her husband are living in great retirement in a secluded little chateau on the banks of the lake of Tegeru, in the Bavarian Ali s. More ex- clusive than the imperial house of Austria, the royal Bavarian family have as yet not acknowledged morganatic marriages.
The budget of the kingdom of Bavaria is always voted for the long period of six years. The income and expenditure are kept toler- ably well balanced, each amounting annually to nearly four mil- lions sterling, one-fourth of which goes for the maintenance of an-
army of 86,000 men. The Bavarian Chamber of Deputies exer- cises a remarkably vigilant supervision over the budget of the state, even in its minutest details. Some years ago, when it was discovered that King Louis I. had taken sums amounting to 1,529,000 florins, or 127,4001., from the public exchequer, with- out accounting for them, a storm of parliamentary indignation arose, and the king was actually forced to return the whole of the money from his private purse. The incident is as unique as it is- characteristic in the modern life of German royalty.
BELGIUM.
The family of King Leopold I., of Belgium, has no history in. connection with the country over which it presides, and for its genealogy the duchies of Saxony, and Saxe-Coburg Gotha es- pecially, must be referred to. The new royal house at present consists only of seven members, namely, the king, his three children, his daughter-in-law, and three grand-children. The Duke of Brabant, heir to the throne, has married an Austrian arch- duchess ; and King Leopold's only daughter, Princess Charlotte, has given her hand to Archduke Ferdinand, brother of the Emperor Francis Joseph I. This family alliance with the house of Hapsburg is not looked upon very favourably in Belgium, except by the Ultramontane parties ; yet it is, nevertheless, generally agreed upon that the double union is a wise one in many respects. The chief argument is that a Protestant king, ruling a Catholic country, &mild not well marry his children into another Protestant family, Besides, the archduke, and archduchesses of the house of Haps- burg-Lorraine are very rich—a circumstance of some importance to a new dynasty in so difficult a position as that of Belgium.
The civil list of King Leopold is set down in the budget for 1862 at 2,751,323 francs, or about 111,0001. ; and the expenses of the court altogether at 3,401,323 francs, or 160,000/. This is a royal salary comparatively smaller than that of any other European sovereign, and may go far to explain the matrimonial alliances of the house of Coburg-Belgium. The whole public expenditure of Belgium in 1862 amounted to 146,000,000 francq, or 5,840,0001., of which 33 millions of francs, or 1,320,0001, went for the maintenance of the army. The government of King Leopold, however, spends a proportionately larger sum than any other European administration, for public works as well as public
education, the former item being nearly as large as that of the war department, and the latter many times the amount of the civil list. In laying the budget of 1862 before the chambers, the Belgium premier, with some justifiable pride, remarked that since 1830 the government had spent 42 million francs for art and science ; 14 millions for churches and schools ; 54 millions for public instruction ; 89 millions for roads; 128 millions for canals ; and 191 millions for railways. The minister on the occasion well succeeded in proving his thesis, which was that monarchy has proved a cheap form of government for Belgium.
BERNBURG AND DESSAU.
The two principalities of Anhalt-Bernburg and Anhalt-Dessau- C6then are a remnant of the three hundred independent states which existed in Germany previous to the French Revolution, but were partly annihilated by Napoleon and partly" mediatized" by the Congress of Vienna. Awaiting the inevitable doom of future mediatization , the two Dukes of Anhalt continue to count among the forty sovereign rulers of Europe. They trace their lineage to Bernhard, son of the celebrated Albert the Bear, who first obtained the title of Prince of Anhalt. On his death, in 1211, the territory was divided between his two sons, and again sub-divided in the course of the following century. The numer- ous members of the family finally settled down in three lines—of Anbalt-Bernburg, Anhalt-Cothen, and Anhalt-Dessau, the two latter of which more recently fell into one, called Anlialt-Dessau- Cothen. In 1806, the Princes of Anhalt took the title of dukes, ou joining the Confederation of the Rhine. During the reforma- tion the Anhalt family warmly espoused the cause of Luther, and several members greatly distinguished themselves in the field and the cabinet ; but more recently the fame of the house went quite the other way. A prince of Anhalt sold 1,160 of his sub- jects to England, in the American War of Independence, with the stipulation that he should receive 44 thalers for every man killed—three wounded to be reckoned as one killed. This busi- ness-like arrangement rut a good round sum into the pockets of his serene highness during the years 1778 to 1781.
The family of the present Duke of Anhalt-Bernburg is very
small, consisting of only himself, his wife, a Princess of Schleswig-Holstein, and a sister. Although possessing but a territory of 318 square miles, with 58,000 inhabitants, he has a civil list of nearly 5,0001., besides a much larger private income, from domains in Silesia and Southern Russia. The latter, com- prising an acre of 230 square miles, were given to the family by the Empress Catharine II., a born princess of Anhalt-Zerbst, which line died out. in 1793. Of somewhat greater extent than Anhalt-Bernburg is Anhalt-Dessae-Cothen, the reigning duke of which has a very large family, related to the house of Prussia, and various smaller German states. The budget of the dukedom
-amounts to 1,900,000 thalers, or about 280,000/., nearly one
seventh of which is devoted to the expenses of the court. The duke has his master of the horse, his court marshal, his grand- -veneer, grand-ecuyer, and other high court functionaries, exactly the same as whilom Louis XIV. of France. To cover the cost of such supreme magnificence, the grants of the civil list, as well as the considerable private income of the duke from domains, are quite insufficient, and the predecessor of the present duke, in
-order to pay his debts, had to sell the principality of Pleas. Hopeful rumours that the whole of the two duchies of Aulialt may be sold off one day for cash, to the King of Prussia, have been more than once life in Germany.
BRUNSWICK.
The ducal house of Brunswick, which is now on the point of becoming extinct, is one of the most ancient and illustrious of the
Teutonic confederation. Its ancestor, Henry the Lion, possessed, in the twelfth century, the united duchies of Lower Bavaria and Saxony, with other territories in the north of Germany; but having refused to aid the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in his wars with the Pope, he was, by a decree of the Diet, deprived of all these provinces, with the sole exception of his alledial domains, the principalities of Brunswick and Liineburg. These possessions were, on the death of Ernest the Confessor, divided between the two sons of the latter, the elder taking Brunswick-Wolfenbiittel, or Brunswick, and the younger, Bruns- wick-Luneburg, or Hanover. There continued an intimate family connection between the two countries, up to and even after the accession of the house of Hanover to the throne of Great Britain. Duke Charles William of Brunswick, who was mortally wounded in the battle of Auerstiidt, in 1806, where he commanded the Prussian troops against Napoleon, was married to a daughter of George III.; and this alliance, quite as much as the duke's _ political activity, made the French emperor confiscate the duchy, to be incorporated with the new kingdom of Westphalia. The son of Charles William, Frederick William, stood up likewise with extreme energy against the Napoleonic rule, and fell fighting at Quatre Bras at the head of his troops. Frederick William's eldest son, Charles, being a minor at the time, was placed under the tutelage of George IV., then prince regent, till the year 1823, when he entered on the exercise of his authority. His acts, how- ever, were so despotic, that the people drove him from the throne in September, 1830.
The ducal family of Brun,w:ck consists at this moment of only two members, the ex-Duke Charles, and his younger brother, Louis, the reigning prince. Both are unmarried, and, at the death of Duke Louis, the duchy, in conformity with an old family pact, must fall to Hanover, unless, indeed, Prussia takes forcible possession of it, under an assertion of nearer family relationship. The latter event is much spoken of, and not at all improbable. Attached to the ducal possessions of the house of Brunswick is a very large private fortune, which much must go to the heirs, although Duke Charles is said to spend his own part in the rapidest possible manner. Curious stories are told about the sin- gular career of this ex-sovereign. He resides partly in Paris and partly in London, and often crosses the Channel in a balloon, instead, as ordinary mortals would do, in a vessel. In 1848, his highness purchased some 10,000 stands of arms and accoutrements, to be used in the re-conquest of his duchy ; which failing, the guns and uniforms were labelled traitors, and put away to decay in a ducal storehouse somewhere near the classic gardens of the Nevr road, Marylebone. Like his valiant father and grandfather, the duke makes war on the French, but only on newspaper editors. He had some years ago a number of these unfortunates brought up before the tribunals of Paris, for stating that he played chess at the opera. His highness ind gnantly repudiated the idea of having played chess, but affirmed, on his royal honour, that the game had been backgammon.
In the budget of Brunswick, amounting to about 800,0001., income and expenditure, for the three years 1861-63, there is no mention of a civil list. The large expenses of the court are defrayed from special sources of revenue, particularly the income of vast allodial domains. These do not include, however, a number of "mediatized" possessions of the ducal family, comprising an area of eight hundred and sixty square miles, and chiefly situated in Silesia. The right of property to these immense estates, after the death of the present duke, will probably give fruitful occupation for the next hundred years to the German courts of chancery.
DENMARK.
The crown of Denmark was elective from the earliest times.
At periods it became hereditary by usage in certain families, bui seldom long, and the people, whenever occasion offered, made use of a right given to them by their national charter. After the extinction of the old native dynasty of the Princes of Skiold, in 1448, the Danish Diet elected to the throne Christian I., Count of Oldenburg, who thus became the ancestor of the still reigning dynasty. In 1460 Christian succeeded likewise to the crown of the united duchies of Schleswig-Holstein, and by a solemn oath, promised that they should ever remain together : ewig zusammen bleiben sollen ungetheilt. This was the foundation of that sad Schleswig-Holstein business which is hanging over Europe like a nightmare, and has kept all the able editors of Germany sleep- less for the last fifty years and longer. By the terms of election by which the counts of Oldenburg had come to the Danish throne, their prerogatives were so restricted that they seemed rather the head of the royal council than sovereign kings, and in many respects had less influence than the leading noble families. But it was in vain that the new German sovereign tried to alter the constitution in their favour ; in this Christian I. was unsuccess- ful, as well as his son, and the attempt even cost the grandson, Christian II., his crown, which was transferred to his uncle, Frederick I. Finally, however, Frederick III., having formed a large army and gained considerable influence through a lengthened war with Sweden, succeeded in annihilating the ancient charter of Denmark, and, with the forced assent of the Diet, proclaimed the country an absolute monarchy and the crown hereditary in the male line. This coup d'elat was the signal for the inauguration of the wildest despotism, which, under more or less severe forms, lasted till the year 1814, and had the consequence, among others, of throwing Denmark into an almost incurable financial disorder. The budget was made public for the first time in 1835, and since this period, and the gradual working of' constitutional govern- ment, the country is making steady progress. The present king of Denmark, Frederick VII., will in all pro- bability be the last sovereign of the direct line of the ancient Counts of Oldenburg. His Majesty, though thrice married, has no children, and at his decease and that of his uncle, Prince Frederick Ferdinand, aged 70, the crown will fall, according to the law of succession voted by the Danish Chambers in 1853, to Pri. ce Christian of Schleswig-Holstein Sonderburg-Ghicksburg, who was selected, in preference to nearer relations of the royal house, in consequence of his sympathies for the Danish cause, shown during the Schleswig-Holstein war of 1848-9. There is, however, a large party in Denmark, whose aim is to bring about a union with Sweden and Denmark, under the sovereign of the latter country. King Frederick VII. himself is believed to be very favourably inclined towards this project, and still more so his consort, the Countess of Danner, whose influence in the councils of the state has been very great for the last four or five years. The Countess Danner, born in 1815, the daughter of very poor parents, was originally a dressmaker, became then an actress, and going to Copenhagen and attracting the attention of the king, soon rose to be the royal favourite, and had a palace built for her own use. His Majesty had been divorced in 1837 from his first wife, a Danish princess ; and, in 1846, he obtained a separation also from his second consort, a duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and began to live openly with the Countess Danner, née Miss Rasmussens. Her influence increasing, the king was induced to be united to her in the bonds of matrimony, August 7, 1850, since which time the countess resides in the ancient palace of the sovereigns of Denmark, and is treated in all respects as a reign- ing queen, which she is indeed to a superlative degree.
As chosen heir to the Danish throne, Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein Sonderburg-Gliicksburg is commonly counted among the members of the royal family, though in reality he has no claim to the title. The next heir by blood relationship to the crown of Denmark is Duke Christian of Schleswig- Holstein Sonderburg-Augustenburg ; and at his decease, his eldest son, Prince Frederick, married to a princess of IIohenlohe, a relation of Queen Victoria. However, by the law of succession of 1853, the Danish Chambers have only asserted their ancient right of choosing the king of the realm, and therefore, unless the union with Sweden and Norway is preferred by the majority of the people, Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein Sonderburg- Ghicksburg will be the next sovereign of Denmark. The prince, married to a daughter of Landgrave William, of Hesse-Cassel, has six children, three sons and three daughters, and it is the eldest of these daughters, Princess Alexandra, born December 1, 1844, whom our Prince of %Vales has chosen to be his consort. It is rumoured that the eldest son of nince Christian, Prince Frederick, born June 3, 1843, is to be united to the only daughter of the king of Sweden and Norway, with the view of facilitating the Scandinavian union ; but this project is rather vague, both because the princess is only eleven years old, and because the Scandinavian crown does not fall to her, but to the king's brother, Oscar, an able and energetic prince, who has no less than three sons.
Though the finances of Denmark have of late much improved, they are as yet far from being in a flourishing state. The annual revenue of the kingdom is 16,600,000 rim- dollars, or 3- millions sterling ; but the expenditure in considerably more, the deficit increasing from year to year ;—though the whole debt has dimi- nished in the last fifteen years. The civil list of the king amounts to about 100,0001., and another 50,0001. is set aside in allowances for members of the royal family. His Majesty's private fortune is not very considerable, the whole of the royal domains having been sold long ago, with the exception only of some large forests. In 1814 the government, in its distress, went so far as to sell Swedish Pomerania—which had been received in compensation for the loss of Norway—to the king of Prussia, for the little duchy of Lauenburg, and one million rix-dollars in hard cash.
FRANCE.
The present sovereign of France forms an exception to the rule which peoples Europe with kings of German lineage. A successful attempt to enter the great family of Teutonic princes was made by the first Napoleon ; and the same was repeated, with still more effect, by the younger branch of the Bourbons, who filled the French throne for eighteen years ; but the third Napoleon as yet has failed to form the much-desired bonds of royal alliance, although he has spared no means to effect this object. It is generally understood that in the spring of 1852 offers of marriage were made by the Emperor to three German princesses, but were politely declined in every instance. The first of these offers was
to the Princess Mary of Baden, daughter of the then reigning grand duke, who, being himself the offspring of a " morganatic " marriage, could, as it was thought, make no serious objection to the match. His Lighness, in fact, did give his consent ; but his death occurring on the 24th of April, 1852, his son and successor threw obstacles in the way, and as the princess herself showed no great desire to occupy the French throne, the negotiations were finally broken off. The hand of a princess of Hohenzollern having been likewise refused to the Prince-President of the French republic, a last offer of marriage was made to Princess Frederica of Oldenburg, aged thirty-two, the sister of the Queen of Greece. Princess Frederica, it is said, was excessively anxious to wear the imperial diadem, then already within the grasp of Napoleon III. But her relatives, particularly the Grand Duke Peter, strongly objec:ed, and consequently this proposal likewise came to nothing. The poor Princess of Oldenburg soon after, in despair of getting the right husband, or any husband at all, committed a morganatic alliance, giving her hand to one Baron de Washington Not choosing to submit to further indignities, Napoleon III., now emperor, determined to seek for a wife at home, and having met one evening at the house of a literary acquaintance, M. Prosper Merimee, Mademoiselle Eugenie Maria de Guzman, Countess of Teba, His Majesty offered at once his hand and heart, was accepted, of course, and married a few weeks after, on the 29th of January, 1853. The event somewhat took the public by surprise, the official announcement of it having been made only seven days previous to the ceremony, on the 22nd of January.
The Empress of the French is the second daughter of the Count of Montijo and of Maria Manuela Kirkpatrick de Closeburn. On the paternal side Her Majesty descends from the old Italian house of Porto-Carrero, which emigrated in the fourteenth century from Genoa to Estremadura ; and on the maternal side she belongs to a Sc ttish family professing the Roman Catholic faith, some members of which went abroad with the last of the Stuarts. The great-great-grandmother of the empress was born in the old mansion of Couston, near Bathgate, part of which is still standing. She was named Isabel Sandilands, being the elder daughter of the Hon. William Sandilands, of Couston, third son of John, fourth Lord Torphichen. This lady was married to Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick, of Closeburn, whose name still survives in connection with that of the empress-mother. Eugenie received her education partly in France and partly in this country, and subsequently went travelling with her mother over the greater part of the Continent, under the name of Countess of Teba, the second title of the family. In the course of these travels the Countess of Montijo, the mother, made the acquaintance of M. Prosper likrimee, member of the French Academy and author of numerous works of art, whom she followed to Paris. It was, as already mentioned, in the house of M. Meritnee that the emperor made the acquaintance of his future consort, and struck by her beauty offered his hand after a very short courtship. M. Merimee was made soon after a senator, and the Countess de Montijo settled and continues to reside at Paris.
Prince Napoleon, more fcrtunate than his cousin, and thanks to the diplomatic abilities of Count Cavour, succeeded in getting a " legitimate" princess for consort, and this is at present the only link which connects the new imperial family of France with the old-established royal houses of Europe. Should the imperial family remaiu on the throne, there is no doubt that, in another generation, the members may choose at their own pleasure among the Teutonic princes and princesses, without fear of refusal. According to recent experience, in the case of the Scandinavian house of Bernadotte, it seems to take about a score of years for a new family to become "legitimate," so as to be able to form matrimonial alliances on even terms.
Though not yet quite en rejle in point of legitimacy, the ruler of France is the beet paid of all European sovereigns. His civil list amounts to 25 millions of francs, or more than twice that of King Louis Philippe, besides which there are numerous other sources of income. The crown domains—a part of them taken from the Orleans family—bring about 12,000,000f. annually, the whole of which goes into the private exchequer of the emperor. His Majesty has further the use of numerous chateaux, mansions, country-houses, and villas, all furnished and kept in order at the expense of the nation, who has to pay also handsomely for the "dotations," of imperial princes and princesses, and for such extra items as births, marriages, and other fres. The nuptials of Prince Napoleon alone were set down in the budget for 1859 at 800,000 francs. It is calculated that altogether the imperial court 'costs no less than from 40 to 42 millions of francs, or from
1,600,000, to 1,680,000 pounds sterling annually. Whatever other advantages Imperialism may have for France, it cannot be said that it is cheap.
GREAT BRITAIN.
German antiquarians have been very busy in tracing the ancestry of the reigning houses of Great Britain and Hanover. One Herr Kohler has devoted three formidable folios to prov- ing that the family descends directly from Alexander the Great ; while a still more learned man, ancient professor of the ancient university of Rostock, has established, by diagrams and other- wise, that the genealogy reaches up to Noah and the Deluge. Our own Gibbon, joining the great antiquarian hunt, traces the family to Charlemagne ; while Muratori and Leibnitz hold to the opinion that the ancestry cannot be brought with safety further back than to the Italian house of Este, which flourished in the tenth and eleventh centuries of our era. In the later period—date of month and year uncertain—one Marquis of Este is said to have married a certain Cuniza or Cunegonda, the heiress of a princely family in the land of the Boil, and for the love of her and her broad acres to have crossed the Alps and settled somewhere near the Danube. The offspring of this union was a son who received the name of Guelph, an appella- tion destined to be famous in the history of Europe. Guelph's grandson, Henry the Black, and his son, Henry the Proud, got by sundry conquests and marriages into the possession of extensive territories on the banks of the Elbe and the Weser, in the present Saxony and Hanover ; and liking the country, and the tithes therein, settled down there with their families. Henry the Proud's successor was Henry the Lion, already mentioned as first Duke of Brunswick, one of the most powerful princes-of the age. He was twice married, and by his second wife, Maud, daughter of Henry II. of England, be left a son, William, whose children became the ancestors of the reigning houses of Great Britain, Hanover, and Brunswick. It is through Maud in the first instance that the Hanoverian dynasty can lay claim to the crown of Eagland, more even than through subsequent relationship. The direct line of Brunswick-Liineburg, subsequently called Hanover, was founded in 1535, by the younger son of Ernest the Confessor ; but his descendants again divided and subdivided the territory, until Duke George William estab- lished, in 1680, tbe law of primogeniture. Previous to this epoch, in 1613, the important marriage of Frederick, elector palatine and " winter king" of Bohemia, with Princess Elizabeth of England, -took place, by which event the crown of Great Britain was brought to the house of Hanover. It was a sort of accident which made the romantic elector demand the hand of the daughter of James I., her portrait having been shown to him by a stranger whom he met on a journey. Frederick was only eighteen at the time of his nuptials with Princess Elizabeth, and in all probability he had not the faintest expectation that his marriage would be productive of any greater consequences than giving him a nice little wife, and, perhaps, a small supply of very needful cash from his very learned father-in-law.
The act of succession, passed by Parliament in 1700, which settled the crown of England on Princess Sophia, youngest daughter of the elector palatine and Princess Elizabeth, brought protests from more than a score of Continental sovereigns, all of whom proved, or tried to prove, that they had nearer claims to the throne than the house of Hanover. Most persevering in her demands was the Duchess of Savoy, who ordered her ambassador, Count Maffei, to enter a solemn remonstrance before both Houses of Parliament, in her name, against all resolutions and decisions con- trary to her title to the British crown, as grand-daughter of Charles I. It was with some difficulty that Mr. Harley, the Speaker of the House of Commons, could make the noble count understand that it was not merely a question of direct lineage, but still more one of religion, the English people being deter- mined to have no more Roman Catholic kings or queens. Officially the Parliament took no notice whatever of the duchess's remons- trance, although Count Maffei sent his protest with some pomp, by special messengers, to the Lords and Commons, employing a public notary to certify the delivery.
It is somewhat curious that in a practical nation like our own— a "people of shopkeepers," to use a celebrated phrase—the regular income of the sovereign of the realm should never have been satisfactorily settled. When George I. ascended the throne, the Commons granted him, with much show of loyalty, "the same civil list which the queen had enjoyed," which amount, on investigation, it was found difficult to determine. At the accession of Queen Anne a bill was passed, granting Her Majesty-the sum of 300,000/. for life ; but, when 'this hill received the royal assent, Anne assured her ministers that one hundred thousand pounds of this revenue should be applied to the public service for the cur- rent year, which made it doubtful afterwards how much the sovereign had really "enjoyed." Moveover, a separate settle- ment was subsequently made on Prince George of Denmark, and it seemed uncertain whether this too was to be included in the
civil list or not. The matter was got over by a little extra liberality on the part of the pursekeepers of the nation ; but the difficulty occurred again and again in subsequent reigns, and was not even settled at the accession of her present Majesty. To decide upon the amount of income of Queen Victoria, the cabi- net instituted an inquiry into the expenses of the previous royal household, going into the minutest details. The heads of the three departments of the court, the lord chamberlain, the lord steward, and the master of the horse, had to send in full particu- lars of the outgoings of their various establishments, specifying the smallest item. It was thus ascertained that 150/. was spent at court for chimney-sweeping ; 479/. for soap ; 201/. for " China- men ; " 25/. for tailors ; 14/. for hatters ; 9,472/. for butcher's meat ; 679/. for tallow-candles ; 46/. for whips ; 3,130/. for wash- ing: 2,811/. for ale and beer ; 4,850/. for wine ; and 2,0501. for bread. All these items, with a hundred of others, having been proved by documentary evidence, the total was cast, and was found to be 385,000/. within a few pence. Accordingly an act of Parliament was passed, and received the royal assent on Decem- ber 23, 1837, by which an annual grant of 385,000/. was con- ferred upon Her Majesty. To this was added a " privy purse" of 60,000/., under the absolute control of Her Majesty, which grant occasioned a little debate, but was assented to on the showing of the committee that a like sum had been allowed "for upwards of half a century." Consequently Queen Victoria has now a civil list of 445,0001., which, though it contrasts very favourably with the forty millions of francs allowed by la grande nation, yet seems almost too small a sum for an empire in which the sun never sets. But in this, of course, no account is taken of the ap- panages of various members of the Royal Family, as, for example, of the Prince of Wales.
Queen Victoria is more intimately related to the majority of the reigning sovereigns of Europe than any other royal or princely family. On the paternal side Her Majesty claims kindred with the houses of Hanover, Brunswick, Oldenburg, and other Pro- testant states in the north of Germany ; through her mother and the late Prince Consort she is related to Saxony, and the great Coburg family, branching off into Portugal and Italy ; and through her uncle, King Leopold, she is connected with the houses of Austria and Bavaria ; and through her two eldest daughters with the lines of Prussia, Russia, Holland, the princi- palities of Hesse, and nearly all the rest of crowned heads of central Europe. The forthcoming marriage of the Prince of Wales with a daughter of the old German house of Schleswig-Holstein- Sonderburg.Glucksburg, scarcely increases the number of Her Majesty's relations, unless in the direction of Hesse-Cassel, and various mediatized and morganatic families of the Confederation, Princess Alexandra is already nearly related to our Queen through her maternal grandfather, Landgrave William of Hesse, who is a brother of the Duchess of Cambridge. Prince Christian, the father of Princess Alexandra, has but a very small fortune, as the limited domains of the house of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonder- burg-Gliicksburg are still in the hands of his father, Duke Charles, who has eight children, of whom he is the fifth. It is probably owing to this want of fortune that several mrmbers of the family have contracted morganatic alliances, Prince Christian's eldest sister being married to a Count of Hohenthal, and his aunt to a Baron Richthofen. On the other hand, the Landgrave of Hesse, the grandfather on the maternal side of Princess Alex- andra, is possessed of considerable wealth, consisting chiefly of landed property in Nassau, and the grand duchy of Baden. It is stated in some of the German papers, that the worthy old Landgrave intends to present one of his pretty little chateaux on the banks of the river Main as a wedding-gift to the Princess of Wales.
HANOVER.
The separation of the crowns of Great Britain and Hanover at the death of William IV., in 1837, beneficial though it was to this country, was not by any means so to Hanover. Under the liberal rule of the Duke of Cambridge, the country was one of the' best governed of German states, while under the sway of the Duke of Cumberland, who ascended the throne as King Ernest Augustus, it was brought to the condition almost of a Turkish pasbalik. The first act of the new sovereign was to abolish the
constitution of -1833, and to begin the government of the country on the old maxim, retat c'est moi. Seven professors at the University of Gottingen, among them the Brothers Grimm, Dallimann, Gervinus, and other great names, when they protested against the arbitrary measure, were not only suspended from office, but driven out of the country like malefactors. Accus-
tomed as the Hanoverians were to be arbitrarily governed, this conduct proved a little too much for their patience, the more so as it also affected their pockets. Ernest Augustus raised all the old taxes, and created a good many new ones, with the one great view before him of increasing his own income. By the terms of the Constitution of 1833 the Sovereign was to have a civil list of 500,000 thalers, or about 75,000/., in return for which all the former royal domains were given up to the state. The King at once overthrew this arrangement, and while keeping the civil list, took the allodial possessions into his own hands, returning a -certain sum of the income to the public exchequer. This left His Majesty a clear annual profit of about 300,000 thalers, which was increased by other items, such as the confiscation of the interest of a sum of 600,000/. sterling, invested by the Hanoverian Chambers in English stocks, in the years 1784 to 1790, and that of the contents of a State Treasury, consisting of the savings of former Governments during a series of prosperous years. With the means thus obtained, the King improved the
-army, paying great attention to dress and drill. Ernest Augustus seemed never happy but when reviewing his 20,f 00 troops. The -most flagrant despotism was brought to bear upon all civil affairs, so as to occasion the mot of a Coburg prince, "It was a pity the Hanoverian electors should ever have gone to England, and, -once gone, should ever have come hack again." It was a sin- gular fact, too, that as King George I. never learnt English, so King Ernest Augustus I. never knew German; to his ministers he talked in French and swore in English.
The present sovereign of Hanover, George V., only son of Ernest Augustus, is unfortunately afflicted with total blindness. It is said of him that he is a very bad king, but a very good musician; but the remark is unjust either way. As monarch he is not bad, but only feeble, and entirely in the hands of the feudal aristoe- acy of the kingdom, a body more ignorant than even the Prussian noblesse ; and as musician he is an honest plagiarist, living -upon Mczart, Beethoven, and Mayerbeer, and fancying that he is -original when he is jumbling all forms and styles of art together. His Majesty, however, is very proud of his musical achievements, particularly his sacred compositions. Only a few weeks ago, on • the 1st of December, he celebrated with great pomp the twenty- fifth anniversary of his career as a musical composer, based upon the event of the first of his compositions being dated December 1, 1837. In these twenty-five years, King George V. has, it is said, -composed more than two hundred grand musical works, besides innumerable smaller pieces, the product of the leisure hour. Nearly all these compositions have been performed at Hanover —
• with-the greatest success, as a matter of course. Somebody pro- Tosed, a short while ago, that His Majesty should set the new Hanoverian catechism to music, to make it more popular among
subjects ; but this idea, it seems, has not been acted upon as yet. By a law promulgated by Ernest Augustus, in 1841, every
signature of the king must be attested by two persons, acting by rotation from out a number of twelve appointed by the ministry. The latter, consisting entirely of noblemen of ultra-conservative views, are all-powerful, governing the land in the seventeenth- century fashion. However, under the pressure of the revolu- -tionary agitation of 1848 and the following years, many of the slespotic ordinances of the former king have been overthrown, .among ethers, the disposition of the royal domains. They are now once more state property, adding no less than 247,592/. :sterling annually to the revenue of the country. The whole -budget of Hanover is about three millions sterling, and the civil list of the king amounts to rather more than 100,0001., exclusive -of extraordinary grants, such as a recent one of 110,000/. for a new royal residence—with the latest improvements in acoustic
-concert rooms—near Hanover, to be called Monbrillant. The king's family is very small, consisting of but his consort, a daughter of the Duke of Saxe-Altenburg, and three children, a son aged seventeen, and two daughters. The succession to the -crown therefore lies in a single life, and should it fail, one of the children of Queen Victoria will have claim to Hanover as well as t o Brunswick.
HESSE.
The family now ruling the three independent states of Hesse- 'Cassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Hesse-Homburg, is descended from
Henry I., surnamed the Child, who through his mother, a duchess of Brabant, inherited a small territory, the centre of which was the town of Cassel. Under his successors, the country increased through purchase, inheritance, and matrimonial alliances, until it reached very nearly its present size. Meanwhile, however, the family split into numerous branches, each possessed of its own separate terri- tory, and the evil was not put a stop to till 1628, when Landgrave William V., the head of the chief line, a valiant defender of Protestantism, and friend of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, pro- claimed the law of primogeniture. Previous to this, in 1567, the country south of the river Main, now known as Hesse-Darmstadt, had h€en separated from the rest by a son of Philip the Generous ; and another fraction was partitioned off, in 1596, as Hesse-Hom- burg. The main portion remained with the descendants of Wil- liam I., who developed the martial spirit of the people in a very unfortunate manner, so as to make the name of "brave Hessians" a byword all the world over. During the Thirty-years' War, in which the margraves lent good aid to the Protestant cause, a comparatively large army was raised in the territory of Hesse, and to get rid of the unwelcome burden, after peace had been proclaimed, William VII. conceived the idea of lending his troop to foreign princes. The bargain proving uncommonly profitable to the exchequer of the Landgrave, he continued to levy troops at a high rate, so that before long the whole of the country became one great recruiting depot. Great Britain being the best pay- master in these transactions, the succeeding margraves after a while devoted themselves exclusively to the task of raising Hessian valour for the English market, at so much per head. The business became highly flourishing during the American war of Independence from 1776 to 1784, when Landgrave Frederick II. sold no less than 22,000 of his subjects at one swoop, pocket- ing more than two millions sterling by the transaction. The wealth thus honourably gained, enabled his serene highness to build a little Versailles, called Willtelnz.sJ&Olie, near Cassel, with splendid fountains, water-works, and picture-galleries, and otherwise luxurious in the manner of the great Louis of France. His son and successor, William IX., continued the profitable commerce, but was unlucky in his speculations. Having sold a well-drilled army to England, he was desirous of doing a little business likewise with the rising ruler of France, and for this purpose offered 20,000 men to Napoleon. The emperor expressed his thanks for the offer, adding, however, that he could not afford to pay cash for the loan, but would give a title in return, making the margrave an elector. The title was accepted, Landgrave William IX. be- coming Elector William I.; yet the business did not seem to give entire satisfaction to his highness. During the war of Napoleon with Prussia in 1806, the 20,000 Hessians were posted along the frontier of the country, without taking part in the struggle, the elector watching the movements of the great armies carefully from his Withelmslaihe, to see which way the balance might in- cline. His private notion was that Prussia would win the day, and he wrote as much in strict confidence to his ambassador at Berlin, promising his faithful 20,000 to King Frederick William III. "in case of victory." Unfortunately the note fell into the hands of Napoleon, who, without much ado, and superseding the diplomatic custom of asking for further explanations, issued a decree con- fiscating Hesse-Cassel, coupled with an order for putting his highness the elector into gaol. The same day, Nov. 1, 1806, the French troops moved into the electorate, occupying Cassel and beautiful Wilhelmshohe, and driving the elector before them with high speed. Napoleon's youngest brother, merry Jerome, was installed as King of Westphalia at Cassel, making himself ex- ceedingly ccmfortable at the little Versailles, built regardless of expense. Brother Jerome liked the country so much that he actually learned two words of the language of the natives—the words limner Wag, by which the memory of His Majesty is known to the present day.
Elector William I., after he had eaten the bread of exile for seven years at Camberwell and Putney, returned to his subjects in 1813. He arrived at his capital on the 25th of November, and was received with the clue honours, but at once got into a violent rage on seeing that his troops had lost their tails : they had mous- taches, and dropped the other appendage. In terrible indignation, the elector at once dictated a decree, re-introducing the tail, as also three-cornered hats, hair-powder, and sticks, the latter not for ornament, but use, in the bands of the non-commissioned officers and on the backs of the privates. By another decree, his highness ordered that the seven years of French rule should be regarded as non-extant, in law as well as equity, particularly as regarding the sale of the electoral domains. This last order created oppo- sition; the people who had stood the resurrection of the tails, could not calmly look at the disappearance of their property.
Federal law from Frankfort-on-the-Main was thereupon called in aid, and the German high courts of chancery began discussing the matter. They are still discussing it after thelapse of halfa century, and the probability is that they will discuss it for another hundred years, till even Hessian tails have disappeared from the earth.
Elector William I. died in 1891. The Congress of Vienna offered to change his title into that of grand duke ; but he was obstinate to remain an elector, although there was nothing more to elect, the Holy Roman Empire having gone time way of all flesh. He was succeeded by his son, William II., who introduced morganatic marriages into the family, by uniting himself to a Madame Ortlopp, the wife of a Prussian dragoon. Madame was made a Countess of Reichenbach, and got the appointment of ministers into her own hands, in the exercise of which function she appointed herself chancellor of the exchequer. This again createdgreat dissatisfaction, and in 1830, the good people of Cassel broke out into open revolution. The elector ran away, but came back again when all was quiet, and the countess followed imme- diately after. New troubles were the consequence, ending in a partial abdication, and the appointment of the heir apparent as regent, September 30, 1831. The change, as the people soon found, was not for the better. Following his father in the mor- ganatic line, Frederick William I. gave his hand to a woman of the name of Gertrude, metamorphosed into a Countess of Schaum- burg. She, too, like her predecessor, took the helm of the state, making Hesse-Cassel the incomparably worst-governed country in Europe, It is in this state that things remain at present. The story of the chief branch of the house of Hesse is a long one ; but it may serve to explain certain phases of German royalty, as well as the much discussed "question of Hesse," now pending before the tribunal of Europe.
The line of Hesse-Darmstadt, founded in 1567, by Landgrave George I., youngest son of Philip the Generous, has held little intercourse with the Hesse-Cassel family in recent times. Never- theless, time grand dukes of Darmstadt are not by any means dis- tinguished for liberal ideas. Grand Duke Louis HI., the present sovereign, has the repute of being rather feudal in his aspirations, and somewhat of a martinet in discipline. One of his orders is to the effect that every person who holds office in or under the government of Hesse-Darmstadt must appear in uniform, from the prime minister down to the night watchman and the village schoolmaster. The grand duke is a widower and has no family ; his wife, a Roman Catholic princess of Bavaria, died a year and a half ago. Heir to the throne is his eldest brother, Prince Charles, aged fifty-three, and after him his son, Prince Louis, married to our Princess Alice. The rest of the family consists of two bro- thers and one sister of Prince Louis, and about half a dozen uncles, aunts, and other relations. The youngest brother of the grand duke has entered into a morganatic union with a West- phalian Countess Hauke, the children of which marriage—first cousins of Princess Alice—have the title, not of princes and prin- cesses of Hesse, but of Battenberg, from the name conferred upon the mother. The youngest sister of the grand duke, Princess Maria, is married to Czar Alexander II. of Russia, and has gone over to the Greek faith ; while an aunt, Princess Caroline, has become Roman Catholic. So that all the divisions of the Chris- tian religion, the tenets of Luther, the Papal faith, the Church of England, Greek catholicism, and Calvinism, are represented in the house of Hesse-Darmstadt.
The civil list of the grand duke is fixed at 631,000 florins, or about 52,6001., exclusive of the appanages of the princes and princesses of the family. The allo.vance seems not to be suffi- cient for the wants of the royal family, for the civil list has got into debt repeatedly ; the last time in 1855, when the Chambers were called upon to pay off debts to the amount of one million of florins, which was done, but not without great opposition and general discontent. Hesse-Darmstadt, with its population—ac- cord.ng to the census of 1861—of 856,808 souls, has a budget of only nine million florins, or 750,000/., with a small annual deficit, so that the grand duke's allowance seems comparatively large, even without the supplementary account for debts.
The sovereign house of Hesse-Homburg, the smallest of the lines of Hesse, is also one of the smallest and most insignificant in Germany. The head of the family, Ferdinand, who has retained the old title of landgraf, rules a territory of only 200 square miles, with a population of about 25,000 souls. Out of this tiniest of sovereignties, the total revenue of which amounts to only 410,000 florins, or 34,000/., the landgraf draws a civil list of 150,000 florins, or 12,500/. A great part of this royal stipend, however, is furnished, not by the subjects of the landgraf, but by birds of travel of all nations who visit the gaming-tables at Homburg, where they are made to pay a just tribute. It has been several times proposed at the German Diet to do away with these gaming-tables, and last year a resolution waa even carried prohibiting them for ever. But as the landgraf is a sovereign ruler within his own realm, the law cannot touch him, except through Prussian or Austrian bayonets, which are not likely to be used in this matter. To express his- own opinion on the subject, the landgraf, in 1861, granted a neva lease to the farmers of the gaming-tables for ten years, ending April 1, 1871. So that up to that period rouge et noir is quite safe at Homburg.
Landgraf Ferdinand is now nearly eighty, and has no make heirs. His family consists only of his sister and two female cousins, all buried in seclusion at the old Schloss of Homburg.. In case of the death of Landgraf Ferdinand, which in all pro- bability must take place before long, he being the oldest sove- reign in Europe next to the King of Wrirtemberg, the territory will fall to Hesse-Darmstadt, to be ruled one day by the husband, of Princess Alice, of Great Britain. In wise foresight of coming events, the proprietors of the gaming-tables at Homburg have- already built an English chapel close to the Kurhaus, where, as the- advertisements state, "service is held three times on Sundays. and twice in the week, according to the ritual of the Church oh England."
ITALY.
At the beginning of the eleventh century, a German noble- man, Count Berthold by name, coming up from the lowlands of Helvetia, established himself on the northern slope of the Alpsr between the waters of Lake Leman and the towering ridge of Mont Blanc. It was but a rough country to dwell in, full% of rocks, and with only small patches of fertile land ; but the inhabitants, though poor, were bold and warlike, and strong as the granite of their mountains. Bravely assisted' by their new subjects, the descendants of Count Berthold soon,. enlurged their little term itory, adding to it the land of Wallis, on the Upper Rhone, the Canton oTG eneva, and part of the decaying kingdom of Bourgogne. More was acquired by purchase, and stilt more by fortunate matrimonial alliances, and the whole edifice of state received its crowning arch by the wise disposition of Count Amadeus I., who, in 1383, proclaimed a fundamental statute, making the country one and indivisible, to be governed as a monarchy, according to the law of primogeniture. As a con-- sequence of this disposition, while nearly all the other princely territories in Helvetia and Germany got split up into smaller and smaller fractions, Savoy continued increasing from genera- tion to generation. In 1388, the principality of Nice was added to the possessions of the family ; and in the subsequent wars of the empire in Upper Italy, the shrewd rulers of Savoy manage& their own affairs with such consummate diplomatic skill that, in 1418, Piedmont was ceded to them. Time Counts of Savoy now. became Dukes of Piedmont, and, having lost meanwhile their possessions in Switzerland, in the war of independence of the. peasants, they attempted with all their might to extend their territory in the other direction, along the southern slope of the- Alps, into sunny Italy. It was a dangerous game, in the midst of so many powerful neighbours; but it succeeded to perfection.. The Savoy princes throughout were by no means scrupulous in, the selection of their means to gain the desired end. To please the Romish hierarchy, they attacked the poor Protestants of the Alps, the Waldenses, with fire and sword, making war upon them in an almost ferocious manner; and whenever it suited their- policy afterwards, they became Guelphs or Ghibellines, changing sides sometimes more than once in the course of a single year.. Inthe last grand struggle between France and the German Empire, the war for the Spanish succession, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, this policy became one of exceeding diffi- culty, the forces of the opposing powers being most evenly balanced, and the ultimate victory of either extremely doubtful... DukeVictor Amadeus at first held to France, as the nearest neighbour ; but Prince Eugene having had the upper hand in. several encounters, he suddenly wheeled round, in 1703, against Louis XIV., and joined the Northern league. At first, the. success of this appeared more than problematical ; but it was justified in the end by Marlborough's victories, and the all but complete humiliation of the French king. Owing principally .t.e. the warm assistance of England, the House of Savoy obtained at
the peace of Utrecht a splendid range of fortresses as a barrier against France, several slices of territory in Central Italy, and, last, not least, the Island of Sicily, with the title of king. To the new kings, moreover, was granted the succession to the crown of Spain, in case the family of Philip V. should become extinct. The latter clause of the treaty, little noticed in modern times, may possibly yet occupy the Cabinets of Europe.
The peace of Utrecht to some extent foreshadowed the future greatness of the house of Savoy. Though the crown of Sicily had to be exchanged seven years after, in 1720, with that of Sardinia, it became evident to all far-seeing politicians, that the rulers of the warlike race in Upper Italy would one day become the leaders of Italian unity and, in case of success, the sovereigns of the peninsula. The bad internal administration of the first Sar- • dinian kings, as well as the outburst of the French Revolution, and the meteoric rise of its great commander, for a time checked these aspirations, but were powerless to destroy the current of -events. The same force which expanded the little territory on Lake Leman into Savoy, Savoy into Piedmont, and Piedmont into Sicily and Sardinia, could not but lead, in the end, to the organization of a kingdom of Italy. Victor Emanuel ex- pressed this in very simple and truthful language when replying to the vote of the Chambers of March 17, 1861, which made him 2.€
Xing Victor Emanuel is closely related to nearly all the royal tfamilies.ef Europe. His mother and his wife, who died in 1865, 'were Archduchesses of Austria ; his eldest daughter is married to Prince Napoleon, and his youngest to the King of Portugal, while • his sister-in-law, witlew of his only brother -Ferdinand, is a • daughter of the King of Saxony. Through these alliances His .Majesty is more or less intimately connected with the Catholic .sovereigns of the Continent, and a rumoured union of the heir apparent, now nearly nineteen, with a princess of Hohenzollern, may draw these bonds of relationship still closer in a direct ?manner with the great Protestant houses. The family of the acing at the present moment consists of but nine members, namely, his five children, sister-in-law, nephew and niece, and two cousins, the latter belonging to the branch line of Savoy-Carignano,
• children of the Chevalier de Savoy, who died in 1825. The 4elvil list of the king is comparatively small, amounting in the budget of 1861 to only ten and a half millions lire, or 420,000/., while the expenses for the whole court are set down at fourteen mil- lions lire, or 560,000/. Compared with the income and expenditure the country, the cost of the court of Victor Emanuel is less, than that of any other sovereign in Europe, with the exception of Queen Victoria's establishment. According to the budget of the kingdom of Italy, as laid before the chambers in March, 1862, the income of the country, ordinary and extraordinary, amounted to Z31,285,004 lire, and the expenditure to 840,131,376 lire, leaving A deficit of 308,846,372 lire, or rather more than twelve millions *teeing. Taking the income for basis, the war department cost 56.49 per cent. of the whole budget ; the interest on the public debt, 3033; and the court, 2-63. With regard to the expenditure, the figures are 35 70 for war, 19-17 for public debt, and only 1-66 for court. The private domains of' the royal family, which have been made over to the state, bring an annual revenue of twenty- five millions lire, or 6.34 per cent. of the whole income.
In the constitution for the kingdom of Naples, decreed by Napoleon I., in 1808, the civil list of the sovereign was fixed at 1,032,000 ducati, or 175,000/. As the whole revenue of Naples at that time amounted to only 5,700,000 ducati, the new king .drew 18 per cent. of the whole. These figures may serve to Illustrate past and present in the history of Italy.
LICHTENSTEIN.
European royalty reaches its minimum in the principality of Lichtenstein, a monarchy formed entirely on the homceopathic principle. The state, as independent a country as any in the world, has an area of forty square miles, with a population of 7,150 souls, and a budget of 55,00 florins, or 4,250/. sterling. The present sovereign is Prince John II., the descendant of one of the oldest royal families in Europe. According to the genea- logical researches of Herr Kfihler—ubi supra—and other learned Germans, the house of Lichtenstein derives its origin, together with the reigning families of Great Britain, Hanover, and Bruns- wick, from the Longobard Marquis of Este, who married Cunizza, a Suabian heiress, and whose descendants settled north of the Alps. One of the sons of this Cunizza, born at a late period of her union, built himself a castle in the valley of the Upper Rhine, on the highroad to Italy, and, by conquest and purchase successively formed a small territory around. His descendants having become numerous, they split into two branches, Lichten- stein-Murau and Lichtenstein-Nicholsburg, and both acquired large possessions in Styria and Moravia, partly possessed by the family to the present d iy. During all the con- vulsions of the Holy Roman Empire, the Thirty-yeam ' War, and other afflictions, the Lichtenstein princes kept very quiet, devoted to the one great task of making money. Not unfrequently the Kaisers themselves applied for loans from the rich family, which were always granted, but on good com- pensation. When, in 1815, at the Congress of Vienna, between two and three hundred German sovereigns were " mediatized," Prince John Joseph of Lichtenstein was allowed to retain his sovereignty, owing, as was said, to the particular favour of Priueo Metternich. John Joseph I. died in 18:36; and his son and successor, Aloys, in 1858. The latter left nine children—seven daughters and two sons, the eldest of whom is the present sove- reign.
Prince John II., though ruling the smallest state in Europe, is one of the richest sovereigns of the world. His private fortune is variously estimated at from four to five millions sterling, pro- ductive of an annual revenue of about 225,000/. The property consists mostly in large landed estates in Moravia and Upper Silesia, capable of immense improvement through increased means of communication and better cultivation, to which the present owner is said to have devoted himself. John II. is a young man of twenty-two, Unmarried, but the bead of a family, consisting of no less than forty-three members—brother, sisters, uncles, aunts. and cousins, It seems rather strange that not one individual of fiiñy hag married into a royal house, but that ally without exception, have cont:::_ied morganatic alliances. The explanation of the matter lies in the fact that rum..11ftenstein. family is Roman Catholic. There is little demand for RofflArt Catholic princes and princesses in Europe, for they themselves often marry into Protestant families, whereas the contrary is very rare. The great family of the Czar, so important to marriageable princes and princesses, sets the example by only concluding alli- ances with Protestants. At the present moment there are more than a hundred princesses adhering to the Romish faith, in want of suitable partners, whereas the number of Protestant fair ones is exceedingly limited. It is well known that even the Prince of Wales had only the choice of seven partners. This is a curious fact, not without consequences for Roman Catholic royalty in general, and the princely house of Lichtenstein in particular.
LIPPE.
The two principalities of Lippe-Detmold and Lippe-Schaum- burg are sovereignties not much larger than Lichtenstein, and far less fortunately situated in respect to their crowned heads than the latter. In Lichtenstein it has happened more than once that the land has borrowed money from the prince, whose functions, moreover, are honorary ; but in the two monarchies of Lippe the case is entirely vice versa. -Lippe-Detmold comprises an area of 438 square miles, with a population of 107,615 inhabitants ; while Lippe-Schaumburg consists of but 207 square miles, with 30,144 souls. The budget of the former state amounts to about 33,000/., of which the exigencies of the court demand one-half; while the smaller Lippe-Schaumburg produces nearly 25,0001., giving to the monarch three-fourths of the amount. The princely domains, moreover, are encumbered with a debt of nearly three millions of thalers. Lippe-Detmold, too, suffers under severe financial distress, which has led already to the sale of a small part of the territory, the Lippstadt, to the King of Prussia, by a treaty signed May 17, 1850. The price paid by Prussia is an annual stipend to the prince of only 9,000 thalers, or about 1,300/.
The ancestors of the two reigning families of Lippe were reckoned, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, among the" Pri- mates Westphalorum," the hereditary possessors of extensive estates. Bernhard VIII., who died in 1563, was the first who called himself Count of Lippe, from the river Lippe—the English word lip —on which the chief town was built in the twelfth century. The sonof Bernhard, Simon VI., divided his possessions among histhree sons, of whom Simon VII. founded the line of Detmold, Philip that of Biickeburg, afterwards called Schaumburg, and Otho that of Brake. The last-named line became extinct in 1709, and there was great dispute about its possessions between Lippe- Detmold and Lippe-Schaurnburg, which led first to fighting, and then, more unreasonable still, to a suit before the Imperial Aulic Council, which lasted half a century, and gave poor Lippe- Brake up to the German lawyers. In 1807, the two princes of Lippe-Detmold and Lippe-Schaumburg became independent rulers of their estates by espousing the cause of Napoleon I , and forming members of the Rheinbund ; and the Con- g. CS3 of Vienna left them sovereigns, to prevent the terri- tory being added to Prussia. The now reigning Prince of Lippe-Detmold, Leopold I., married to a daughter of the sovereign of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, has no children ; but is head, nevertheless, of a family of nearly eighty members. The matrimonial alliances lie chiefly among the petty princes of Germany, partly because the sovereigns of Lippe are anything but wealthy, and partly on account of the Calvinistic faith to which they as well as their subjects have adhered since the Refor- mation. One Princess of Schaumburg-Lippe, however, is, united to a Duke of Wiirtemberg, while another has became the consort of Prince Frederick of Schleswig-Holstein- Sonderburg-Gliicks- burg, uncle of Alexandra, future Princess of Wales.
MECKLENBURG.
The house of Mecklenburg is said to be the oldest reigning family in Europe—perhaps in the world. It claims to be descended from Genseric, king of the Vandals, who ravaged Spain and the west of Europe in the fifth century of our era, and, going over to Africa, took Carthage in 439. Genseric, who died in 477, was suc- ceeded by his son Hunneric, whose descendants settled on the southern shores of the Baltic, and became princes of the land. To one of them, Heinrich Burewin, son of Pridislatts, Henry the Lion gave his daughter Matilda in marriage, whereupon he was enrolled among the princes of the Holy Roman Empire. These princes received the ducal title from the Emperor Charles IV. in 1340, and assumed that of grand duke on joining the German confederation of sovereigns in 1815.
Mecklenburg is very unen.:_t1.74 divided between the two grand present rulers. While Mecklenburg-Schwerin has an area of 4,924 square miles, with a population of rather more than half a million ; Mecklenburg-Strelitz—separated from the former in 1701, in favour of a younger son of the reigning duke—con- sists of but 764 square miles, with about 100,000 inhabitants.
• Notwithstanding this small extent of territory, the two families of Mecklenburg are intimately connected with the greatest and most powerful of the reigning houses of Europe. The mother of Frederick Francis, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, is a sister of the King of Prussia; one aunt, a granddaughter of Czar Paul of Russia, and another the widow of the Duke of Orleans, elder son of Louis Philippe. The Royal Family of Eng- land for a century has been closely allied to the house of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. King George III. married Charlotte, a daughter of the duke, in 1761; their son, the Duke of Cumber- land, afterwards King of Hanover, united himself to Princess Frederica Caroline, the daughter of another duke, in 1815; and Princess Augusta of Cambridge gave her hand, in 1843, to Grand Duke Frederick, the present sovereign of Mecklenburg- Strelitz. The issue of the latter union is a son, born in 1848.
The two duchies of Mecklenburg are the only states of Germany which still possess a feudal constitution. A large part of the country is ruled over by a noblesse possessing immense privileges, and acknowledging the suzerainty of the grand dukes but in a very limited sense. The nobles are all but absolute rulers on their own estates, which comprise nearly two-thirds of the whole territory. Mecklenburg knows no budget, no civil list, nor anything amounting to an account of public income and expenditure. The grand dukes are the first nobles of the land, living on the income of their own domains, and on whatever sur- plus may be produced by a system of taxation which varies in every town and village. Besides the residence of the grand duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, there are but two cities with above 10,000 inhabitants in the whole country—namely, Rostock, an old Hanse town, which went under ducal protection in 1788, and 'Wismar, which the duke bought from Sweden, or rather took in pawn, in 1803. This curious bargain was made on the following terms :—Sweden being in great want of cash, engaged to make over the town of Wismar, with a territory of about ten square miles, and some 12,000 souls, to the Duke of Mecklenburg. Schwerin, on payment of a sum of 1,628,000 thalers, or 244,200/., and on condition that it might be redeemed at the end of a hundred years, after payment of the capital with compound inte- rest. Consequently, the King of Sweden has the right to take his Wismar back in the year 1903, if he chooses to pay a sum of twenty-nine million thalers, or 4,350,000/. Another curious politico- commercial transaction took place in 1819, between the Grard Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz and King Frederick William III. of Prussia, when a detached piece of ducal possessions on the left bank of the Rhine, consisting of three parishes, with 10,000 "souls," was made over to Prussia for one million thalers, or exactly one hundred thalers per soul. The annual income of the two grand dukes, from their domains and other sources, is variously estimated at from 200,000/. to 250,0001.; but these sums are entirely approximate. Certain it is, however, that these princes, and particularly the sovereign of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, are very wealthy, the latter possessing one of the most splend'd royal residences in Europe—a sort of Windsor Castle built on an island in the Lake of Schwerin. A sad contrast to this magnificence- is that the population of the country is actuallydecliningin num- bers, through emigraion ; and also that the number of illegitimate- children is larger than even in Sweden and Norway. According to- the census of 1861, there were two hundred and sixty parishes-in the- country, in which one-third of the births were illegitimate; two- hundred and nine, in which one-half were in the same condbion ;- and seventy-nine districts in which there were no legitimate children at all. The picture of Mecklenburg is completed by the sketch of the author of" Germany and Germans," who, writing- in 1835-36, says," As Germany supplies Europe with princes and princesses, it would appear as if Mecklenburg alone were suffi- cient to furnish it with nobles. It is reckoned that the nobility include one-half of the population ; but the possessions of six- eighths of these dignified persons is limited to their genealogical trees. During my progress through the country I met with a, Herr Baron who exercised the profession of relieving men's- chins of what is sometimes considered an incumbrance ; and at one of the inns I found a Herr Graf, or count, for a landlord, a Frau Grafinn for a landlady ; the young Herren Grafen filled the- places of ostler, water, and boots, while the fair young Fraalein Grafinnen were the cooks and chambermaids. I was informed that in one village the whole of the inhabitants were nob' e except four, and these were married to noble Frauleins."
NASSAU.
The illustrious house of Nassau, which has given kings to thd Netherlands, as well as one great sovereign to England, is descended from Otho, brother of the Emperor Conrad 1., who reigned from 911 to 918. Ono's son, Walrarn, augmented the territory received in fief from the Kaiser by several important districts, and his grandson, Walram III., was the first to accept the title of Count of Nassau, from a castle of the same name which he built in 1101, on the river Lahti, the ruins of which still over- hang the capital of the duchy. During the fourteenth and fif- teenth centuries the family split into many branches, the head of one of which, Count Engelbrecht, married, in 1404, Joanna of Polnen, who brought him the county of Breda, in Holland, and with it the first important position which the house obtained in the Netherlands. One of his descendants, Count Henry of Naso- sau, became a great favourite of the Emperor Charles V, who OM one occasion sent him to France, to do homage to the king, in his name, for Flanders and Arto:s. While at Paris, Henry fell in love with and married the only sister of Prince Philibert of Orange, Count of Chalon, at whose death he came into possession of the flourishing principality of Orange, in the south of France, near the river Rhone. The offspring of this marriage 'was a son, Count Renatus of Nassau-Orange, whom Charles V. appointed Governor-General of the Netherlands, which high position re- mained hereditary in his family for several generations. The main branch of the house of Nassau in the meanwhile split into- many lines, and, in the absence of a law of primogeniture, the- territory was divided into the smallest possible fractions, and. separated again and again into little states up to the be- ginning of the present century. The wars of this period, to- gether with French confiscation, led to a reunion of sovereign, power; and the last two heads, Frederick Augustus, of Nassau- Usingen, and Frederick William, of Nassau-Weilburg, agreed to reign in common, and did so accordingly from 1806 to 1816. Frederick Augustus, who died in 1816, left no heirs, so that the dukedom remained with the line of Nassau-Weilburg, whose pre- sent representative, Duke Adolphus, fills the throne since 1839.
The duke has two sons from his second marriage with a prin- cess of Anhalt-Dessau ; his first marriage, with a daughter of the- late Grand Duke Michael of Russia, having proved childless. Of his four sisters, the eldest is united to Prince Peter of Olden- burg, cousin of Czar Alexander II., and the youngest to Prince' Oscar, heir apparent of the crown of Sweden and Norway. The income of the duke is very large, amounting to more than one- fourth of the revenue of the country. For many years an em- bittered struggle has taken place between the Chambers and the- duke for the possession of the domains, including the large duties leviedupon mineral springs situated within this property.. On an annual average, 0,800/. is raised in Nassau from the tax on bottled Seltzer-Wasser and other waters, and 8,9001. from that on baths. His highness claimed all this besides the net in- come of the domains, and, moreover, an annual rent of 140,000 florins, or 11,6661., as compensation for the abolition of serf- dom on his estates, which took place more than half a century ago, in 1808, when there was no question whatever of compensation. Finally, after protracted negotiations and constitutional battles— leading at one time to the exclusion of a liberal majority of 16, by a ducal minority of five members, the five representing for a while the united parliament of Nassau—the duke consented to give up the serf-compensation on being allowed to keep the domains, under the condition of delivering an account of their management, and giving the surplus, that is, the sums not re- quired for court, &c., up to the public exchequer. This notable arrangement was not exactly adopted by the Chambers, but consented to nem. con. However, that a " surplus " should ever occur, there does not seem to be the slightest chance. The duke, in spite of his large income, is known to be deeply in debt, occasioned by his adherence to ultra-loyalistic principles. Very large sums went from Nassau to Spain during the insurrection of Don Carlos, to assist the cause of the latter ; and still larger funds were swallowed up in the attempted establish- ment of an Adelscolonie, or colony of nobles, in Texas, which, as might have been foreseen, ended in the utter ruin of all con- cerned. In 1837 the house of Rothschild lent the house of Nassau 7,100,000 florins, on the security of the domains, at three- and-a-half per cent.; in 1853, another loan of 1,200,000 florMs, at four per cent., was raised on the same basis ; and in January, 1862, the Duke negotiated one more loan of 1,600,000 florins, this time at four-and-a-half per cent. But the last loan, as pub- licly notified at Frankfort, was not any longer from the house of Rothschild, but through the house of Rothschild, which seemed to imply a censure of the house of Nassau.
NETHERLANDS.
The accession of the house of Nassau-Orange to the throne of the Netherlands, though dating only from 1815, belongs really to the far more remote period when the " governors " of the same house took the part of the oppressed nation, and boldly staked their life in the cause of Dutch liberty and independence. For a long time the princes of Nassau-Orange filled the unique posi- tion in Europe of being nominally the presidents of a republic, yet in reality on the same level with kings and emperors, who acknowledged this position by freely entering into matrimonial alliances with the family. Even before the principality of Orange had been ceded to Louis XIV., at the peace of Utrecht, the mem- bers of the house settled entirely in the Netherlands, becoming the de facto, if not de jure, sovereigns of the United Provinces. The marriage of Count William IL, of Nassau-Orange, with a daughter of King Charles I. of England, gave the crown of Great Britain and Ireland to his son and successor, and a hero to Macaulay ; but it scarcely improved the position of the family among the jealous citizens of the powerful republic. The tenure of the stadhouders became very precarious towards the latter end of the eighteenth century, and when General Pichegru and his sans-culotte army approached the frontiers of the Netherlands, William V. himself felt that he had no hold upon the country, and thereupon fled to England almost without resistance. Even eighteen years of French rule might not have renewed the sympathy of the people for the old valiant house to whom, in great part, their independence was due, had it not been for the incessant diplomatic activity of the Nassau family. While some of the friends of the house, among them the energetic Count Hogendorp, were agitating the masses at Amsterdam, other agents were at work at Vienna, and the consequence was that on the 31st of May, 1815, Prince Metternich and his coadjutors signed a protocol establishing a kingdom of the Netherlands, and appointing William VI. of Nassau-Orange to be the first king, under the title of William I.
The new kings up to the present sovereign, have never been very popular with their subjects, though some of them well deserved it. William I., at the commencement of his reign, gained many admirers ; but his supposed inclination towards Roman Catholicism, and his intercourse with the hated Countess Henrietta d'Oultremont, created a host of enemies, who at last forced him to abdicate the throne in 1840. His son and suc- cessor, William H., was scarcely as much appreciated for his many sterling qualities as he deserved ; but the antagonism of a large number of the people pursued him during the eight years of his government on account of his having been the first to sign, in a moment of irresolution, the act of independence of " seces- sionist" Belgium. Very peculiar has been the fate of the p:csent, sovereign, William III., who ascended the throue. in During the early part of his reign he was intensely disliked by a great majority of his subjects ; but in 1854, and again in 1859, when many portions of the country were inundated on the break- ing up of winter, the king, on a sudden, became a popular hero. His Majesty, on these occasions, always was foremost iu the place of danger, " roughed it" like a Dutchman, and, more than this, by a liberal expenditure, by wise counsel, and active measures of practical utility, alleviated the distress and misery he beheld everywhere around him. His humane conduct on these occasions won him golden opinions among all classes of his subjects; which found vent in the first flush of excitement in pentameters and hexameters, orations, dramas, pictures, and plaster of Paris busts, inscribed, " William the Good." After the lapse of several years the enthusiasm has now somewhat cooled down, but enough remains to leave William III. still a really popular king. His Majesty is on terms of intimate friendship with the Emperor of the French, and, it is thought, often visits him incognito.
In the budget for the Netherlands for the year 1863, as ac- cepted by the States-General in December, 1862, the expenditure of the royal household is settled at 900,000fl., or 75,000/. sterling. This sum is divided into the king's civil list, set down at 600,00011., or 50,0001.; the income of the queen dowager at 150,00011., or 12,5001.; that of the Prince of Orange at 100,000fl., or 5,3331.; and the sum allowed for the maintenance of the royal palaces at 50,000fl., or 4,166/. The whole budget of the Netherlands for 1863 is to amount to 98,925,118fl. income, and 98,188,126fl. expenditure, thus leaving a calculated surplus of some 60,0001. sterling. A notable item in the income is the sum of very nearly- two millions sterling—exactly 23,871,48011.—for what is called "colonial balance," that is, the amount of profit on the mercantile transactions of the government with the colonies. The late king himself was an active trader, and one of the most energetic part- ners in the colonial Maatschappy, by which he amassed a private fortune of not less than 150 millions of flmins, or twelve and a half millions sterling. Prince Frederick of the Netherlands, the uncle of the present king, born 1797, and married to a sister of the King of Prussia, also has the reputation of being one of the wealthiest princes of Europe. He is a liberal patron of arts and sciences, and devotes a large portion of his wealth to chari- table purposes. His eldest daughter is the Queen of Sweden ; but his second daughter, and only other child, is as yet unmar- ried, though twenty-one--which is really to be wondered at. The royal family of the Netherlands altogether consists of twelve persons, closely connected by ties of blood relationship with the sovereign houses of- Russia, Prussia, Saxony, Wiirtemberg, and Sweden.
OLDENBURG.
The Counts of Oldenburg, owners of a small territory on the borders of the German ocean, are scarcely mentioned in history before the twelfth century, when, after the fall of Duke Henry the Lion, they became princes of the Holy Roman Empire. The family soon split into numerous branches, all remaining poor and powerless until the election of the head of the main line, Count Christian VIII., to the throne of Denmark, in 1448, and not long after, in 1460, to that of Schleswig-Holstein. Subsequently, the Oldenburg branch lines became extinct one after the other, and at the death of the last of the house, Count Anthony Gunther, in 1667, the territory of the family fell to the King of Denmark, who made it over to Grand Duke Paul of Russia, in exchange for his claim upon Holstein. The grand duke then gave Oldenburg his cousin, Prince Frederick Augustus, of Ilolstein-Gottorp, with whose descendants it remained till December, 1810, when Napo- leon incorporated it with the kingdom of Westphalia. But the Congress of Vienna not only gave the country back to its prince, but, at the urgent demand of Czar Alexander I., added a territory of some four hundred square miles, with 30,000 inhabitants, together with the title of grand duke. Part of the new territory, the principality of Birkenfeld, on the left bank of the Rhine, close to the French frontier, and many hundreds of miles from Olden- burg, was evidently useless to the petty grand duke, and was held to be at Vienna as destined for a "post of Cossacks."
The present grand duke, Peter I., is a prince of very simple manners, and much liked by his subjects. His family is related chiefly to the houses of Russia, Saxony, Bavaria, and Nassau, and has furnished a queen to Greece, or rather a female king. The consort of the ex-Hellenic Otho I. is half-sister of the grand duke, being the daughter of a first marriage of the preceding sovereign. Another distinguished member of the family is the grand duke's uncle, Prince Peter, cousin of Czar Alexander If., president of the imperial senate, general of infantry in the service of Russia, and, to crown all, Doctor lionoris jurrs civilis." The Grand Duke of Oldenburg has no civil list, but draws about 27,000/. from the domains, having besides an income of seme 6,000/. from private estates of the family in Holstein. The whole budget of Oldenburg amounts to very nearly 270,0001., income and expenditure being equal. Very recently the grand duke, with the consent of the chambers, sold the port of Jalide to Prussia for the stun of 75,0001, to be converted into a great harbour for the new Germanic fleet.
PORT ETGAL.
The reigning dynasty of Portugal belongs to the house of Bra- ganza, which dates from the fifteenth century, when Affonso, a natural son of King Joao, or John 1., was created by his father Duke of Braganza and Lord of Guimaraens. When the old line of ' Portuguese kings became extinct by the death of King Sebastian in Africa, 1578, and by that of his successor, Car- dinal Henriqtte, 1580, Philip II. of Spain, whose mother was a Portuguese princess, claimed the throne, and enforced his demand by an army commanded by the Duke of Alba. The Portuguese submitted to force ; but looked upon Philip and his successors as usurpers, inasmuch as the fundamental laws of the monarchy, passed in the Cortes of Lameg,o, in 1139, excluded all foreign princes from the succession. After bearing the Spanish yoke for snore than half a century, the people of Portugal re- volted, and proclaimed Don Joao, the then Duke of Braganza, as their king, he being the next heir to the crown, though of an illegitimate issue. The duke thereupon assumed the title of King Jolio IV., to which Portuguese historians appended the title "the fortunate."
John IV. was succeeded by his son Affonso Henrique, who, 'however, was dethroned in 1668 for misconduct, when his brother Pedro assumed the crown. Pedro was succeeded in 1706, by his -son Joito V., who, dying in 1750, the crown devolved upon his son, Joseph I. Joseph was succeeded in 1777 by his daughter, Donna Maria I., who afterwards becoming insane, her son, Dom Jcdo, was made prince regent in 1792, and at the death of his mother, in 1816, he assumed the title of JoAo VI. He married a Spanish princess, by whom he hid two sons, Pedro and Miguel, and several daughters. In 1822, his eldest son, Pedro, was pro- claimed constitutional emperor of Brazil, which became thereby independent of Portugal. In 1826, King John VI. died at Lisbon, and his son Dom Pedro being considered a foreign sovereign, Dom Pedro's infant daughter Donna Maria II., was proclaimed a regent of Portugal in the name of her father. Not long after, Dons Pedro, having granted a liberal constitution to Portugal, surrendered the country entirely to his daughter, on condition of her marrying her uncle, Dom Miguel. The latter agreed to this arrangement ; but secretly resolved to overthrow the constitu- tion, and to become absolute King of Portugal. Favoured by the ultra-conservative and priestly parties, he made repeated -attempts to this effect, which distracted the country for more than ten years. Partial peace having been restored, the queen gave her hand in 1835 to Prince Augustus of Leuchtettberg, who, however, died at the end of a few months. The year after, April 9, 1836, Isabella Jr. married the Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, who obtained the title of king the year after. The offspring of this union were seven children, the eldest of whom ascended the throne at the death of his mother, in 1853, as King Pedro V., remaining for two years under the guardianship of his father.
A strange fatality, if not more, followed the accession of Pedro
V., the first king of the line of Braganza-Coburg. In May, 1858, he married Princess Stephanie of Hohenzollern-Sigmarin- gen, and in July, 1859, the young and lovely queen was laid in her grave, carried off by a mysterious disease. Soon after the king himself fell dangerously ill, but recovered ; yet only to be struck down once more in the autumn of 1861. Dom Pedro and his two brothers, Dom Joio and Dom Fernando, in October, 1861, went upon a hunting expedition, in the course of which they had occasion to ask for some drink at a convent. Returned to Lisbon, they all three fell ill—of typhoid fever, according to the faculty ; of poison, according to the rox populi. All efforts and cares of Ring Ferdinand and the rest of the royal family were in vain, and the three strong and youthful sons of Queen Isabella died one after the other. First, Prince Fernando expired on the 6th of November ; then the king, Dom Pedro, on the 11th of Novem- ber; and then his brother, Dorn Jorto, on the 28th of December.
The next surviving brother, Dons Louis, who now took possession of the crown, fell likewise ill, as well as his brother, Dom Agusto. Both fortunately, though narrowly, escaped death, leaving only two lives between the throne of Portugal and Dom Miguel, the idol of the Romish priesthood. Whether the result of crime or of accident, the ravages of death in the royal family of Portu- gal are unexampled in modern and peaceful times.
The present king, Louis I., like his late brother and all his family, is distinguished for great liberality of ideas, a striking nobleness of mind, coupled with the kindest and most benevolent disposition. He Ins a civil list of 365,000 milreis, or about 82,0001. sterling ; but returns regularly 70,000 milreis to the public exchequer to be employed for educational purposes. The expenses of the whole court, including the dotation of King Ferdinand and the princes, amount to 675,000 milreis; but the princes, like the king, give back annually 70,000 milreis to the purse of the nation. On the recent marriage of the king on the 6th of October last, to Princess Pia, daughter of Victor Emanuel of Italy, Dom Louis settled upon his consort 60 contos of reis, or 14,0001. from his own civil list, without appealing to the Cortes. His Majesty's father, King Ferdinand, is spending his days in great retirement at his modest residences at Cintra or Junqueira, never interfering in Portuguese politics, but devoting himself to scientific studies. King Ferdinand is a man in many respects like our late Prince Consort, but those who lately proposed him a candidate for the Hellenic throne have found him unwilling to accept it. In striking contrast to the civil list of the King of Portugal stands the income of the clergy of the little kingdom. The upper hierarchy of the church draws annually three and a half millions of milreis; and another half a million goes as tribute to Rome. After much clearance of con- vents and monasteries, Portugal still possesses 11,484 monks and nuns.
PRUSSIA.
The genealogy of the Prussian dynasty is commonly pushed up the stream of history as far as the year 800, when one Count Thassilo, of Zollern, is believed to have been present at the great Christmas ceremony at Rome, which restored the empire of the Csasars in the person of Charlemagne. However, Count Thassilo is decidedly mythical, and the first flesh-and-blood Zollern met with in authentic documents is Count Frederick I., who, in 980, built himself a strong castle on a hill, called Hohenzollern, or High-Zollern, the ruins of which may still be seen near the city of Sigmaringen. His descendants—probably by doing a good deal in the Raubritter line, as was the fashion in those days— flourished amazingly, so that the second, third, and fourth Fredericks were enabled to lend money on good interest, among others to the Imperial Majesty of Germany. The service was requited by the appointment of the Zollern family to the Burgraveship of Nuremburg, a rather lucrative post in a wealthy city, the Birmingham of the Middle Ages. Here the Counts Zollern came into useful contact with the rising people of the age, the enterprising merchants of the Hanse Towns, bent on building up a tiers eta in the Holy Roman Empire and extinguishing Raubritter and other enemies. It was by the lessons learnt at Nuremburg that the Zollerns were enabled to construct for themselves a great kingdom in the north of Germany ; which fact, however, is not generally acknowledged by modern physical-force historians, who can see nothing in the annals of the world but swords and cannon. After three or four Counts of Zollern had been Burgraves of Nuremburg, making still more money and lending still more to the ever needy emperors, one of them, Count Frederick VI., was invested by Kaiser Sig,is- mund, in 1411, with the fief of the province of Brandenburg, and six years after made an elector. The family now rose rapidly in power and dignity, chiefly by making its chief rule of action to protect the rising middle classes against feudal oppression, and encouraging trade and commerce to the utmost. Little gifted as the flat and sandy plains of Brandenburg were by nature, they now became the seat of a thrifty and industrious race of men under whose step the marshes were changed into fruitful fields, and the baronial thieves' castles into flourishing towns and vil- lages. In 1511, the Teutonic knights, owners of the large province of Prussia, on the Baltic, elected Margrave Albert, of Brandenburg, a younger member of the electoral family, to the post of Grand Master ; and he, following the policy of his house, after a while declared himself hereditary prince, and openly made cause with the industrial middle classes against the rule of the knights. The latter broke out into insurrection against their elected chieftain ; but were powerless against the new enemy, and Albert and his de-
ecendants remained sovereigns of Prussia. The extinction of this line brought the large realm of the Teutonic knights to the electors of Brandenburg, whose own territorities meanwhile had been greatly enlarged by the valour and wisdom of Frederick Wilhelm, " the Great Elector," under whose fostering care arose the first standing army in central Europe. The Gre:t Elector, dying in 1688, left a country of one and a half millions, a vast treasure, and 38,000 well-drilled troops, to his son, Frederick HI., who, on the strength of these three items, put the kingly crown on his head at Konigsberg, on the 18th of January, 1701, and, com- mencing once more afresh in the list of Fredericks, called himself King Frederick I. of Prussia.
The first king of Prussia did not do much to increase the territory left to him by the Great Elector ; but his successor, Frederick William I., by economy and thrift pushed to its utmost limits, acquired a treasure of nine millions of thalers, bought family domains to the amount of five million thalers, and raised the annual income of the country to six millions, three-fourths of which sum, however, had to be spent on the army. He also attempted to raise the stature of Prussian soldiers, by importing the biggest men of all nations and marrying them to the tallest women in Prussia ; but in this attempt at the improvement of the species by means of al tificial selection he was doomed to fitilure. After adding part of Pomerania to the possessions of the house, he left his son and successor, Frederick IL, "called the Great," a state of 47,770 square miles, with two and a half millions inhabi- tants. Frederick IL added Silesia, an area of 14,200 square miles, with one and a quarter million of souls ; and this, and the large territory attained in the first partition of Poland, increased Prussia to 74,340 square miles, with more than five and a half million of inhabitants. Under the reign of Frederick's successor, Frederick William H., the state was enlarged by the acquisition of the principalities of Anspach and Baireuth, as well as the gigantic spoils gathered in another .partition of Poland, which raised its area to the extent of nearly 100,000 square miles, with about nine million of souls. Under Frederick William III., -exactly one-half of this state and population was taken by the French conqueror ; but the Congress of Vienna not only restored the loss, but added part of the kingdom of Saxony, the Rhine- lands, and Swedish Pomerania, moulding Prussia into its present form, as consisting of two separate pieces of territory, of a total area of 107,300 square miles, with ten million inhabitants. Ac- -cording to the census of 1861, the population now numbers 18,497,458 souls, or is but slightly inferior to that of England -and Wales.
Up to within a very recent period, the kings of Prussia enjoyed the whole income of their domains, amounting to about a million -sterling per annum. Since the establishment of the new con- stitution, this state of things has been changed, and the domains 'have become partly public property, in so far as a certain amount of the income is paid into the public exchequer. As yet, how- ever, the civil list of the sovereign does not figure in the budget, but a sum of 2,573,000 thalers, or 384,6401., is deducted directly from the produce of the domains, under the name of Krondotation or crown allowance. Whether this income accurately represents the civil list of the monarch, with the expenses of the court, is by no means certain. Prussian finance has been hitherto under rather mysterious clouds, as evidenced by the fact that before the year 1848 the sovereign, or the government, possessed a "crown 'treasure" variously estimated at from one to one and a half millions sterling, which disappeared on a sudden, and of which no account whatever has been furnished. From very recent explanations of the ministers it would appear that the total amount of the Kronclotation at present reaches the sum of 3,073,099 thalers, exclusive of the cost of building and repairs of royal palaces, and similar items of expenditure.
The royal dynasty of Prussia is more intimately related with -all the great and little sovereign houses of Europe than any other reigning family, with the exception of that of Queen Victoria. Formerly, the house of Hoheuzollern connected itself almost exclusively with Protestant lines ; but of late this tendency has been changed, and repeated matrimonial alliances with Roman Catholic families have taken place, particularly with Bavaria. Morganatic marriages, as a rule, are rare in the house of Prussia ; but there is a striking instance of the contrary in the union of Prince Adalbert, first cousin to the king, who united himself, in 1851, to Mademoiselle Therese Ellsler, sister of the celebrated dancer, Fanny Ellsler.
Rzuss.
The two sovereign families of Reuss-Schleiz and Reuss-Greiz
are distinguished in the circle. of European royalty by the fact that they have perpetuated the same Christian name for more than eight hundred years. Ever since the commencement of the eleventh century, the rulers of Reuss have been called Henry, wIlether of Reuss-Greiz, Reuss-Schleiz, Reuss-Knistritz, or any other Reuss. The reason of their holding thus pertinaciously to the name Henry is that they descend, or claim to descend, from Kaiser Henry I., surnamed the Fowler. The Reuss princes, having determined to be and to remain always Henrys, at first distin- guished the historical sequence by titles, such as Henry the Rich, Henry the Fat, Henry the Red, and so forth. 'This system sufficed for all practical purposes till the middle of the seven- teenth century, when, adjectives getting scarce, it was arranged by a solemn family council, in the year 1668, that the house should begin numeration, each branch counting its own Henrys ; but with this stipulation, that, after the number of a hundred had been reached, they would begin again at number one. The pre- sent sovereign of Reuss-Schleiz is Henry the Sixty-seventh ; he of Reuss-Schleiz-Kostritz—" mediatized " at the Congress of Vienna—is Henry the Sixty-ninth ; and the monarch of Reuss- Greiz is Henry the Twenty-second. The latter branch has been up already to the limited Hundred, and started on a second course. What the income of either of the reigning Henrys may be is unknown, as there is no civil list, any more than a budget, in the states of Reuss, the whole territory being more or less the private property of the illustrious descendants of Henry the Fowler. Reuss-Greiz consists of 144 square miles, with 33,000 inhabitants, and Reuss-Schleiz of 447 square miles, with about 70,000 souls. Both lines are related to Prussia, add other Ger- man houses, and the consort of the heir apparent of Reuss-Schleiz is a princess of Wiirtenaberg.
RUSSIA.
The rulers of the vast Muscovite empire were, down to the time of Peter the Great, native princes of the country, descendants, more or less, of the old chieftain Rurik. Czar Peter's union with the Livonian peasant girl, Catharine, left two children, Anne and Elizabeth, the first of whom united herself to a Duke of Holstein- Gottorp, and became in course of time the mother of a little German prince called Peter Ulrich, who, after his aunt Elizabeth had ascended the throne, was named her successor. Thanks to the efforts of the far-sighted empress, Peter Ulrich was enabled to ascend the throne without difficulty ; but was no sooner in- vested with the imperial purple, than his un-Russian doings raised a host of enemies against him, and he was hurled from his elevated position more quickly even than he had attained it. Dethroned after only a six months' reign, on the 8th of July, 1762, and assassinated soon after, the wife of Peter Ulrich, daughter of the Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst, a poor officer in the service of Prussia, was proclaimed empress, under the name of Catharine II. Henceforth, the house of Holstein- Gottorp, or, in reality the house of Anhalt-Zerbst, came to furnish rulers to the realm of Russia. Catharine II. left the crown to her only legiti- mate son, Paul, offspring of her union with the unhappy Peter Ulrich, who in turn became the father of three emperors, Alex- ander, Constantine, and Nicholas, and the grandfather of a fourth, the present Czar Alexander II. It is still the fashion of Russian poets to sing the praises of the great house of Romanoff, supposed to be even now ruling the empire ; but it requires more than ordinary imagination to discover the con- nection.
The modern dynasty of Russia, ever since the time of Catharine II., has formed matrimonial alliances only with German families. Czar Paul gave his hand, first, to a princess of Hesse-Darmstadt, and next to a princess of Wiirtemberg ; his successor, Czar Alexander I., married a princess of Baden ; his successor again, Constantine—the Czar of seven days, December 1 to 8, 1825—united himself to a princess of Saxe-Coburg ; Nicholas I. selected a daughter of the King of Prussia ; and Alexander II. a daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse- Darmstadt. There is not a royal house in Europe, not even in Germany itself, more exclusively Teutonic in blood and family alliances than the dynasty now filling the throne of Russia. One striking fact in connection with this dynasty is that, since its accession, the boundaries of the empire have remained stationary, or very nearly so. Expressed in geo- graphical square miles, the dominions of the Czar were re- presented, in 1535, at the accession of John the Terrible, by the number 37,200; in 1585, at the death of the same prince, by 144,000; in 1613, at the accession of Michael Romanoff, by 148,000; in 1645, at his death, by 258,090; in 1725, at the death,
of Peter the Great, by 280,000; in 1741, at the accession of Elizabeth, by 323,000; in 1796, at the death of Catharine II, by 343,000; and at the present moment at rather less than the foregoing number of miles. The official "Statistical Tables" recently published at St. Petersburg state the area of the empire to comprise only 392,074 geographical square miles, which is inclusive of 24,298 square miles of territory in America, not counted in the preceding enumeration.
For the first time in the history of Russia, a budget has been
published by the government in the year 1862, according to which the expenses for the imperial court amount to 4,574,146 roubles, or rather more than 700,000 pounds sterling. This, however, is exclusive of the dotation for the empress and imperial children, amounting to 495,000 roubles; the cost of maintenance of the imperial residences, set down, evidently too low, at 134,000 roubles, and the expenses connected with the administration of various subsidiary imperial establishments, such as the theatres at St. Petersburg and Moscow, and similar disbursements, calculated to be 2,754,757 roubles. So that altogether the cost of the court of Russia amounts to very nearly eight millions of roubles— exactly 7,957,903—or far above a million sterling. This is the official statement, but it is generally believed that the actual ex- penses amount to more than twice, and, perhaps, three times this sum. The imperial domains are known to produce not less than forty millions roubles per annum, and as but a small fraction of this sum is accounted for in the budget, it may be concluded that, as in other Continental states, this income is used in Russia to keep up the splendour and contribute to the magnificence of the court.
SAXONY.
The defect of concentrated family power, arising from the absence of the law of primogeniture, is nowhere more strikingly illus- trated than in the history of the princely houses of Saxony. The family was always foremost among the leading princely dynasties of central Europe, and gave a Kaiser to the Holy Roman Empire as early as the beginning of the tenth century ; yet the splitting up of the great stock into numerous small branches always and ever destroyed the work of individual greatness, and after more than a thousand years' existence left the house comparatively un- influential and powerless. Though the former division of the family possessions into more than a score of separate territories has now been reduced to five branches, these parts are among the smallest of independent states, the leading branch, the kingdom, possessing scarce two millions of inhabitants, on a territory of 6,700 square miles. From this figure the scale goes downwards, through Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, Saxe-Meiningen-Hildburglatusen, and Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, to Saxe-Altenburg, embracing only 500 square miles, with 137,000 souls, or less than the population of Bristol. It is characteristic of the history of the family that the rulers of the last-named smallest territory among the States of Saxony represent the oldest line, whereas the youngest branch exists in the sovereigns of the kingdom.
The present king, John I., prides himself on being the best
jurisconsult in Europe. He has mastered all the codes of all the states in the universe, is said to be well at home in Japanese legislation, and knows Coke upog Littleton by heart. His Majesty lives in law, as George V. of Hanover lives in music, and Louis I. of Wittelsbach in Bavarian poetry. The King of Saxony otherwise has the reputation of being, though a lawyer, a very good, kind-hearted sort of a man, much given to the laissez- aller, laissez-faire system of politics. He has a civil list of 570,000 thalers, or 84,0001; added to which are the "pin- moneys" of the queen with 30,000 thalers, and the dotations of the princes with 235,000 thalers, making, with other incidental expenses, the total cost of the royal court 863,575 thalers, or about 128,000/ sterling. Originally, by the constitution of 1831, the civil list of the king was fixed at 500,000 thalers, including all other items, but this was found to be insufficient, and the cham- bers, seeing the peaceable disposition of their learned sovereign, made no difficulties in increasing the annual allowance. The king, by his marriage with a princess of Bavaria, has four
children, two sons and two daugh'ers, and through his other re- lations is connected intimately with the houses of Portugal and of Italy.
The reigning Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, Charles Alexander, remembering the traditions of his house in the last generation, professes to be a great patron of literature and the fine arts, but is generally held to be not sincere in this endeavour, or, by others, not equal to the task. Since his accession in 1853, there have been crowds of wandering minstrels at Weimar, for greater or lesser time ; but, as yet, no Goethe or Schiller has been disco- vered among them. The grand duke is married to a daughter of the late King of Holland, with whom be received a large fortune, which, added to his own private possessions, leaves him more wealthy than the rest of Saxon princes. He has a civil list of 280,000 tinders, or about 41,0001., amounting to one-sixth of the income of the whole country. The "fine arts," besides, figure in the budget at rather a large sum, and another expensive grand ducal item is, a special corps of life guards, numbering thirty- seven men.
The Duke of Saxe-Meiningen-Hildburghausen, Bernhard, who rules a territory of 971 square miles, with a population of 172,000 souls, is one of the most popular princes of Saxony, and, perhaps, of Germany. He is a quiet unostentatious man, sincerely de- voted to the welfare of his little country, and sparing no efforts to this effect. Our late King William IV. is said to have had a particularly high regard for him, which he evidenced by making him a Knight of the Garter, in 1831. However, the subjects of Duke Bernhard have probably never seen the blue ribbon on his breast. He is now 62 years of age, and, married to a princess of Hesse, has two children, a son and a daughter, besides four grand- children. His civil list of 225,000 florMs, or 18,750/., is paid out of the income of the domains, which, under the duke's own management, produce about four times this sum.
Opinions -vary much in Germany regarding the present Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. According to most, Ernest II. is the model of a good and wise sovereign ; while others will have it that he is a superficial, vain, and ambitious prince, aiming at cheap popularity, with a glimpse at the imperial purple which is to be resuscitated at Frankfort-on-the-Main. Duke Ernest II. is. the acknowledged leader of the German national party, and has repeatedly declared his readiness to sacrifice his own posi- tion for the good of the greater country. The duke, now forty-four, and married to a daughter of the late Grand Duke of Baden, has no children, but a crowd of high relations. His uncle is King of the Belgians, his first cousin King of Portugal, one of his sisters-in-law Queen of Great Britain, and another the wife of Grand Duke Michael of Russia. Ernest IL has a civil list of 100,000 thalers, at a minimum, from the domains, and more in case these estates produce above 134,079 thalers. The proprietorship of these domains, which undoubtedly belong to the state and not to the prince, has given rise recently to endless quarrels between the government and the chambers of Saxe- Coburg-Gotha. Personally, Ernest U. appeared willing to relin- quish the domains altogether; but his late brother, the Prince Consort of England, who had a voice in the matter as heir apparent, strenuously opposed the cession, claiming the whole of the estates as private property. Finally, after long and warm debates and negotiations, a compromise was arrived at, by the terms of which the reigning duke has a civil list of 100,000 thalers out of the domains, and the next, 34,079 thalers, go to the public exchequer, while the rest is divided between the duke and the state. The legal question as to the proprietorship of the do- mains meanwhile remains unsettled.
The Duke of Saxe-Altenburg, the pettiest of Saxonic sove- reigns, has a civil list of 143,000 thalers, which is very nearly one- fourth of the annual income of his country. The little territory formerly, till 1826, belonged to Gotha; but was then parcelled off- to Saxe-Hildburghausen, and finally had the glory of becoming " independent " under its own duke. His highness's family is rather large, consisting of sixteen persons, including one mor- ganatic relation.
SCITIVARZBURG.
The sovereign family of Schwarzburg was far more famous in the Middle Ages than it is at the present moment. Count Gunther the Twenty-first was chosen opposition-emperor to Kaiser Henry IV., and his descendants were long noted for the posses- sion of immense wealth. Like all German dynasties, however, the house split into numerous branch lines, of which only two now remain—namely, Schvvarzburg-Sondershausen and Schwarz- burg-Rudolstadt, the former ruling a territory of 300 square miles, with 60,000 inhabitants, and the latter a country of 350 square miles, with 70,000 souls. Each of these sovereigns has a civil list of about 20,000/. sterling, representing very nearly three-fourths of the income of the country. The Prince of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen is possessed of a large private for- tune, acquired by his father in the distillery and brewing txade. To make this very useful occupation more profitable than it used to be, his highness hit upon the simple expedient of issuing an edict making it penal for any man but himself to brew beer and distil spirits out of potatoes. The consequence was, that in the
course of rather a long reign, be amasscd several millions of thalers, which he invested in landed property in Slavonia, Bohemia, and the classic duchies of Mecklenburg. The present sovereign of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen, Gunther the Fifty- ninth, has left off beer-brewing, but taken to paper-making.
SPAIN.
It is now exactly a century since the two monarchs of Spain and France, acting in concert with the rulers of Parma and Naples, entered into an offensive, and defensive alliance which, at the time, and long after, was a constant source of terror and alarm to all the sovereigns-of Europe. The celebrated Bourbon Family Compact, signed on the 15th of August, 1761, stipulated that. all the members of the house would "hold together con- jointly and for ever ;" would "look upon every power as their enemy which should become the enemy of either," and would make all their military as well as diplomatic undertakings "by common consent and with a perfect agreement." By the seventeenth and eighteenth articles of the Family Compact, the four monarchs engaged "each and mutually to consider the interests of the allied crowns as their own ; to compensate their several losses and advantages, and to act as if the four monarchies formed only one and the same power." When this treaty became known to the world, in the autumn of 17M, it was predicted in the British House of Commons that, in another century, the Bourbons would be masters of the whole of Europe. The hundred years have passed now, with the following net result. There are still eighty- four direct or collateral descendants of Louis XIV. living ; but of these no less than sixty-one are banished from the country over which they reigned, and are wandering as exiles over the earth. The older as well as the younger branch of the Bourbons have been chased from France ; the house has been driven from Parma, and (the Bourbon) have been expelled from Naples. In Spain only they remain ; but even three members of the Spanish family—the Infant Don Juan and his two sans—are compelled to eat the bread of exile. History has no more striking illustration of the utter futility of diplomatic con- tracts and family alliances than the result of the Bourbon Family Compact.
Queen Isabel IL, the only remaining Bourbon sovereign, is the e■ghth in lineal descent from King Henry IV. of France, on the paternal as well as on the maternal side. Her right of succession, though it was disputed by Don Carlos, and gave rise to the long and sanguinary war which recently agitated Spain, is undeniable from a legal as well as constitutional point of view. The claim of Don Carlos rested upon the Salle law, which, however, had never the force of law in Spain, The ancient rule of succession did not know of a Salic law ; and this was introduced only by Philip V., the great grandfather of Don Carlos. Previously to him, females could always succeed in Castille and Leon, as well as in Portugal ; and it was, in fact, by the right of female succes- sion that the house of Hapsburg reigned in Spain, as it was by the same right that the Bourbons themselves came to occupy the il,rcnc. King Ferdinand VII. in securing the succession to his daughter, did nothing more than repeal the decree of Philip V., and restore the ancient law of the Partidas, which allowed female succession to take its full effect. Moreover, up to the grant of the Estatuto Real of 1834, it was always held that the monarchs of Spain were absolute owners of the country, with liberty to dispose of the crown as they might think fit. It was thus that the family made over the important colony of Louisiana to Napoleon I., in return for the elevation of a Bourbon prince to the throne of Etruria. This proved a very profitable specu- lation to the French emperor, who sold Louisiana to the United States for the round sum of sixty million francs, or £2,400,000.
Queen Isabel II. has a civil list of 34,000,000 reels, or 354,1701., besides the allowances for her husband and children, which amount to 17,350,000, or half as much again; Her Majesty also possesses a very large private property, though not quite as much as her mother, Queen Maria Christina. The latter, in her flight from Spain, in 1840, is said to have carried off five hundred lsrge stone bottles full of diamonds, rubies, and other jewels, which bad to pass the frontier as "mineral waters," in consequence of the decree prohibiting the sale and export of her property. Queen Christina's marriage with the handsome life- guardsman Munoz, afterwards transformed into Duke de Rianzares, has been productive of a numerous progeny of sons and daughters, all of whom are already well established in life. Every one of the daughters married at the age of sixteen, receiv- ing a dowry of two millions of francs, in addition to one of the famous stone bottles. Her ex-Majesty is chiefly residing at
Malmaison, near Paris, living in right royal sty-le, on all ar income of about 300,000/. sterling. It is said that her unit), the handsome Munoz is a remarkably happy one ; very more so than that of her eldest daughter. There seems doubt that the husband of Isabel II., the poor cipher-kit Spain, has latterly become a perfect idiot ; and although Ge Serrano has been sent off to Cuba, the court of Madrid claims the distinction of being the most immoral circle of re; in Europe.
SWEDEN.
No dynasty of modern date has taken its place so quietly easily among the reigning families of the world as the haus Bernadotte. The son of a notary in the south of France, J. Bernadotte, from the very beginning of his career as a pri• soldier in the army of the republic, made his way as skilfully if sighting, throughout, a crown at the end of the road. B marriage with Eugenie Clary, the daughter of a mercho Marseilles, he became the brother-in-law of Joseph Bona He then fought., his way upwards to generalship, was sent 1 First Consul as governor-general to Hanover, and while her the foundation of the throne for his family. During tb. against the northern powers, Napoleon made 1,500 Swedisp soners, who were forwarded to Hanover, to be disposed chi cording to the orders of the governor. General Bernadottetti these men with the greatest kindness, had all their wants atte to, looked personally after the wounded and suffering, and fi sent them all home to their friends. The Swedes having at moment to select a king, their own monarch being childless, of the officers among the 1,500 Swedish prisoners directed a tion to General Bernadotte as the very perfection of chiv valour. Soon the story of his kindness towards the sufferi soldiers spread all over the kingdom, and carried away by pc lar enthusiasm, the Swedish Diet, on tile 21st of August, elected General Bernadotte to be heir apparent of the crown was thought at the time that the whole affair was manages Napoleon ; but succeeding events clearly proved that the Fr& emperor was not only not in favour, but strongly oppose' the sudden rise of his ambitious general, whom he never rt loved.
Bernadotte's subsequent behaviour among b is brother mom was so exceedingly prudent as almost to make them furget he was " illegitimate." Fully aware that he could not get it step into the sacred ercle of old-established royalty, lie content to marry his only son to a semi-royal princess of Le tenburg ; which had the consequence that the grandson regarded as fully legitimate, and able to get the hand of a royal daughter of the house of Nassau-Oronge. At his King Charles XIV., Bernadotte, left a foltune of more than • million sterling, which he had been able to save front his list of 120,000/., increased by lucky commercial speculat This fortune the late and the actual king have been able gt to augment ; particularly the present monarch, by his union the eldest daughter of Prince Frederick of the Notherhn His Majesty Charles XV. has a civil list of 1,278,400 rix doll or 282,600/., including all exteas, from his kingdom of Swedr which Norway adds the more modest sum of 113,000 specie or 28,5001., likewise inclusive of all further disbursementF court. The kiug's family is rather small, consisting of daughter, two brothers, a sister, mother, and three uephr attempt is made at this moment in the Diets of Sty Norway to overthrow the law of succession establish( accession of Charles XIV., and to admit, as in olds females to the throne. The immediate object of this rr intended to favour the marriage of the king's only daught ;the eldest brother of our future Princess of Wales, where crowns of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark would be uni one head at a time probably not far distant. The mov appears to shciw some possibility of success.
WALDECK.
The sovereign family of Waldeck, ruling a state of so inhabitants, claims descent from Count Wittekind, knight-errant, who took part in the Crusades, and retur. 1100, built himself a good strong castle at the end of a wood, which fortress was called, from its position, Weld-er forest-corner. As their ancestor was a fighting man, so the cc and princes of Waldeck have stuck to fighting these 700 y, and have used their sword successively in the service of potentate in Europe, not excepting the serene Elector of Count George of Waldeck, in the middle of the seventer tury, became field-marshal of the United Netherland'
ge distinguished himself in the next generation, in the rian service ; and a Count Christian of Waldeck died as Por- se field-marshal in the year 1798. The rulers of Waldeck rter times not only sold themselves, but their subjects also, ising, among others, of 1,225 men to Great Britain, during merican war of independence. Of these 1,225 faithful warriors aever returned across the Atlantic, which made the illustrious of Waldeck insist on being paid double price for the lost "on account of their sufferings." The chief income of the eat ruler, Prince George Victor, consists in the rents of the ting-tables at Pyrmont, amounting, with sundry extras, to about 100/. The annual budget of Waldeck is only 435,475 thalers, about 65,000/.
WURTEMBERG.
"he King of Wiirtemberg, William I., is the Nestor of European ereip,ns. His Majesty, born September 27, 1781, is now past 'y-one, and has filled his throne for very nearly half a century. genealogy of his family reaches up to one Bertold, Duke of annia, who acquired by marriage certain territories in
in the middle of the eighth century ; and whose grandson, ad, built a big castle on the river Neckar, called Wfirtemberg, 'omen's Hill, in honour of a beautiful and wealthy spouse. )equently, the Counts of Wiirtemberg, the same as the Counts Aollern, began to prosper by taking the part of the rising ns against the Raubriller and other unruly nobles. The task even harder in the south of Germany than in the north ; t castles, with walls seven feet thick, being plentiful as :kberries all over Suabia and Franconia. To crush the eham- t knights of the wealthy- burghers, all the nobles of Suabia led together in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, under name of the union of the Reg/eri-or...Threshers. ikgainst them,
re Dukes of Wfirtemberg, Eberhard 'I. to Eberhard V., stood valiantly, the last finally succeeding in threshing the life out the Threshers. It was thus the dukes of Wiirtemberg une powerful as well as useful ; but, unfortunately, did not Jere long to the latter quality. Succeeding sovereigns sadly messed the poor country, leaving it the prey of spendthrift itressess and usurious Jews. For some time previous to the mch Revolution, Wiirtemberg was governed very much in the o; fashion as Hesse-Cassel is at the present moment.
illiam I. is the second king of Wintemberg, the royal dignity ing been acquired by his father, who joined Napoleon's Con- ration of the Rhine, and in consideration thereof got the title ing as a new year's gift, in 1806. William I. was thrice mar- l—first, in 1808, by command of the French Emperor, to mess Caroline of Bavaria ; secondly, 1816, to a daughter of r Paul of Russia, who died in 1819; and, thirdly, the year r, to Princess Pauline of Wiirtemberg, the daughter of his le, Duke Louis. There was a spice of romance in the first m, characteristic of the times. Being powerless to resist the of Napoleon, Prince William, then heir apparent of Win-- berg, allowed the commanded nuptials to take place, but inged beforehand with Princess Caroline that they would nsver c together as man and wife, the alliance not being based on 'tufa affection.. The contract was carried out strictly, and as as the French conqueror's fate had been decided at Leipzig Vaterloo, the singular union was dissolved amiably between -o contracting parties. The second marriage of the king 'le Grand Duchess of Russia left two daughters, the whom, Maria, is united in morganatic ties to Count Veipperg, a son of the gentleman who managed to gain tions of the Empress Marie Louise, the widow of Napo- and resided as her husband for many years at Parma. er of Maria, Sophia, has risen higher in her matrimonial -, and is now Queen of the Netherlands. Of the third mar- of the king with his niece there are three children, two sons daughter, the eldest of the former, now crown prince, being ,d to a sister of Czar Alexander II. Considering these high .ly relations, the income of the King of Wfirtemberg seems His civil list amounts to only 882,400 florins, or 73,500/., is added a sum of 214,792 florins, or 23,3001., as allow- the queen and princes. However, the royal family is .sed of a very considerable private fortune, the founders of house having been careful, while fighting against Raubritter 1 other evils of the world, not to forget their own interests. iced, the fact that money is power has never been overlooked any of the princes of Germany.
have omitted in the preceding account the house of an, which, though encamped in Europe, is Asiatic ; and the baying neither family claim nor succession.
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