The Revolutionary Movement of 1848-9 in Italy, Austria-Hungary, and Germany Part 17

The quarrel between Kossuth and Gorgei will always be judged differently by military and non-military critics; for, setting aside those unfortunate peculiarities of character which marked both these leaders, the struggle was one between the ideas of a statesman and the ideas of a soldier. Kossuth had already had experience of the difficulties which arose from putting confidence in officers who are out of sympathy with the cause for which they are fighting; and he was therefore specially alive to any sign of this want of sympathy in the successor of General Moga. Gorgei, on the other hand, had that belief, so common in men of his profession, that all political questions were mainly to be judged from the military point of view; and that his admitted ignorance in matters of civil administration did not disqualify him from laying down the law on the most important affairs of Government. Although he shared Kossuth's distrust for General Moga, he sympathised with Moga's preference for Monarchical Government; and although he had fought bravely against the forces of Windischgratz at the battle of Schwechat, he had previously declared that he did not see the solidarity between the cause of Hungary and that of Vienna; and he held that the oath which the officers had taken to the March Const.i.tution implied their duty to preserve that Const.i.tution in the exact form in which it had been originally granted.

But if Gorgei went beyond his province in his interference with affairs of civil government, Kossuth no doubt, in turn, hampered Gorgei in matters in which he was bound to trust him, so long as he retained him in his command. But in periods of revolution there always arise a large number of questions which, in ordinary times, would be decided on purely military grounds, but which, in that abnormal state of affairs, become necessarily complicated with political considerations. It is this peculiarity of circ.u.mstances, for which both statesmen and soldiers find it so hard to make allowance, and which makes it so difficult to judge justly in such a controversy as that which we are considering.

The first point of difference between Kossuth and Gorgei related to exactly one of those matters in which military and political feeling seem most necessarily and reasonably to come into collision. This was the choice of Bem as a general in the Hungarian army. Bem had succeeded in escaping secretly from Vienna and coming to Hungary. He had, indeed, offered his services to the Hungarians at an earlier period, but Pulszky had persuaded him that he could best serve the cause of Hungary in Vienna; and now that that city had fallen, he hastened back to Kossuth. Kossuth and Bem seem always to have recognized in each other that common faith in the people, and power of calling out popular enthusiasm, which, in different ways, was the great strength of both of them. Bem's conduct in the defence of Vienna had given sufficient pledge of his zeal against the power of Austria, a zeal which had produced such effect on the imagination of his enemies that it was said by the Vienna wits that Francis Joseph ordered the bells of Vienna to be m.u.f.fled because they would ring out "Bem, Bem!" But Gorgei disliked Bem for the very reason for which Kossuth approved of him. He considered him a knight errant who followed revolutionary methods of warfare which were quite unknown to correct military tacticians; and he soon found that his own estimates of the different officers under him were quite opposed to those formed by Bem. Kossuth therefore wisely decided that Gorgei and Bem could not work together, and he despatched Bem to take the command in Transylvania.

On the next question at issue the balance of opinion will probably be in favour of Gorgei. The volunteers who had been raised by the national Government were naturally objects of special favour to them; but they had in some cases shown themselves disorderly; and this disorder was, no doubt, considerably increased by the return to their country of Hungarian soldiers who had been stationed in Galicia and other parts of the Empire. These soldiers had, in many cases, thrown off the authority of their officers, and a.s.serted their national rights at the expense of military discipline. Gorgei tried to make special arrangements for so redistributing these recruits as to utilize their services while preventing the growth of any such feelings of insubordination as might be likely to spring from their previous mutiny. In these methods of re-organization the Committee of Defence saw a tendency to discourage patriotic feeling; and Gorgei found himself opposed in matters where he justly felt that he should have been allowed some freedom of action.

But an even more important question of controversy was the general plan of the campaign. Kossuth and the Committee of Defence were extremely anxious to defend the Western frontier of Hungary, partly in order to weaken the fears produced by the battle of Schwechat; partly, as Gorgei believed, to make it easier to draw the line between Hungary and Austria, and so break off political connection between them.

Gorgei, on the other hand, held that, since Hungary was now threatened on north, south, and west, and, since Windischgratz's army was better disciplined than the Hungarian soldiers, a defence of the frontier was impossible, and that it would be better to retreat to Raab and defend the princ.i.p.al pa.s.ses across the White Mountains, while removing the seat of Government beyond the Theiss. In this plan he was at first over-ruled. But his ideas received apparent justification in the defeats which he suffered from Windischgratz; and, on December 19 he was actually compelled to retreat to Raab.

Then followed an episode which has brought much discredit on Kossuth.

He issued a sensational address, declaring that the Committee of Defence would be buried under the ruins of Buda rather than desert the capital. Gorgei ridiculed the idea of the defensibility of Buda-Pesth; but the Committee of Defence insisted; and Gorgei was preparing for battle, when, early in January, 1849, the news suddenly arrived in his camp that the Committee of Defence had left Pesth without waiting for the siege, and had retired to Debreczin. But, if Kossuth had been to blame in these earlier matters of controversy, Gorgei now took a step which certainly seems to justify all Kossuth's subsequent suspicions.

Gorgei was, at this time, stationed at Waitzen, a little north of Pesth; and he there issued a declaration to the army condemning the policy of the Committee of Defence, and calling upon the officers to declare that the army was fighting for the maintenance of the Const.i.tution of Hungary as sanctioned by King Ferdinand V.;[21]

that it will oppose all those who may attempt to overthrow the Const.i.tutional Monarchy by untimely Republican intrigues; and that it will only obey orders received from the responsible Minister of War, appointed by the King.

A few weeks later Gorgei was again defeated by Windischgratz, who, after the battle, offered him an amnesty, and free life out of Austria.

In answer to this offer, Gorgei sent a copy of the proclamation drawn up at Waitzen, declaring that this was the ultimatum, both of his army and of himself. By this act it is evident that he called the attention of the General against whom he was nominally fighting to the internal party divisions of Hungary. However brilliant Gorgei's military abilities might be, and however unfairly he had been interfered with by the Committee of Defence, it cannot be wondered at that, after this act of treachery, they looked upon him with distrust. In the following month Gorgei was deprived of his command and superseded by the Polish General Dembinski.

In the meantime a struggle of far greater moral importance, though possibly of less value to military science, was being carried on in Transylvania. The Roumanian movement had been undergoing the same change, which had already pa.s.sed over the national movements of the Serbs and Croats. As early as June, 1848, the Croatian a.s.sembly had expressed their sympathy with the struggle of the Roumanians; and even from the Italians some utterances of sympathy had been heard, in favour of their kinsmen in Transylvania. The rejection of their pet.i.tion by the Emperor, and the consequent persecution by the Magyars had led the Roumanians to rely upon themselves; and had induced some of their leaders to look for help rather to the new State which was trying to struggle into existence in Wallachia and Moldavia, than to the Austrian Government. In September, however, a new element was introduced into the struggle by the pa.s.sing of a Conscription law by the Hungarian Diet. While the Roumanians resented this, as an attempt to make them serve under the military leaders.h.i.+p of their persecutors, they also saw that an attempt to enforce a law, pa.s.sed without the sanction of the Emperor, was a direct defiance of his authority; and at a meeting in the town of Orlat, they protested against this conscription, and declared their preference for the Austrian army, as against the Hungarian. They now openly announced their separation from Hungary, and demanded to be formed into an independent nation.

The Hungarians met this demand by authorizing their Commissioner Berczenczei to summon the Szekler to a public meeting, nominally to plan the defence of their country, but really as a counterblast to the demands of the Roumanians.

But the Roumanians felt that it was necessary to strengthen themselves by an appeal to a recognized authority; and they saw that the desultory and barbarous warfare, which they had hitherto carried on, would never suffice to win them the rights which they had now resolved to claim; they therefore made advances to Field-Marshal Puchner, the General of the Austrian forces in Transylvania. Latour had for some time past been trying to stir up Puchner to action; but Puchner had hesitated to listen either to the Austrian Minister, or to the Roumanian leaders. He seems to have been a man of much higher type than most of the Austrian generals who were engaged in the struggles of this period; and he shrank alike from the underhand intrigues of Latour, and from the dreadful cruelties of Roumanian warfare. The latter feeling would have had special force with him at this period; because the most urgent appeals for his help came from Urban, a former officer in the Austrian army, who had been the most notorious for his brutalities of all the leaders of the Roumanians. But, while Puchner was unwilling to commit himself definitely to the Roumanian cause, he opposed himself to the reckless persecution which the Magyar Commissioner Vay had carried on against all who had helped in organizing the pet.i.tion of the Roumanians; and Puchner had even gone to Karlsburg, and successfully pet.i.tioned for the release of some of the Roumanian prisoners. He had hoped, however, to combine this merciful and moderate policy with the recognition of Vay's authority, and even with a kind of co-operation with him. But the fiercely revolutionary character, which the Hungarian Diet began to a.s.sume after the death of Latour, compelled Puchner into more decided opposition to their proceedings.

On the 8th of October, Kossuth issued an order to the towns of Hungary, in which he told them that anyone who did not hang out the Hungarian flag, and express in writing his devotion to the Hungarian cause, and his willingness to obey the committee appointed by the Government, should be shot as a traitor; and this savage proclamation was followed the next day by a command from Commissioner Vay, to the tax collectors of Transylvania, that they should no longer send the taxes to the central office at Hermannstadt, but to the office in Klausenburg, which had hitherto been considered subordinate. As Hermannstadt was at once the military head-quarters of the Austrian army and the chief town of the Saxon settlement in Transylvania, this was a direct attack both on the Imperial power, and on the influence of the Saxons. A few days later the Szekler, in the meeting which had recently been summoned, denounced Puchner for his attempt to hinder that meeting, and formally repudiated his authority.

Puchner now felt that the time had come for action; and, on the 18th of October, he issued from Hermannstadt an appeal to all the inhabitants of Transylvania, and especially to the official boards. In this he declared that, since the Count Palatine and his Ministers had resigned their offices, there had been no legal Government in Hungary.

The Government of Kossuth, which wrongfully claimed to act for the Emperor, was subst.i.tuting terror for equality, and had falsely spread the rumour that the Government desired to use the Roumanians to oppress the Magyar and Szekler. In order, then, to put an end to anarchy, and to protect the country from terrorism, he, Puchner, had resolved to take advantage of the Imperial Manifesto of October 3, which had placed Hungary under military Government; and he called upon all boards to act with him in restoring order, and upon the volunteers and national guards to place themselves under his command.

Nor were the Roumanians content with this official appeal; for their own national committee issued about the same time, on their own responsibility, an address to the Szeklers and Magyars. In this address they declared that they, like the Szeklers and Magyars, had sympathized with the March movement in Hungary; but that a faction had now usurped the Government of the country, and was aiming, at once, at depriving the King of his crown, and the Hungarian Peoples of their nationality. They hoped that the better part of the Magyars and Szeklers would unite against this faction; but, if they would not, then the Roumanians must declare war on them. They promised, however, to carry on the war in a humane manner, and to spare women, old men, and prisoners. At the same time, they issued an appeal to their countrymen, urging them to abstain from cruelties in warfare, as such practices were unworthy of a free people. The Saxons had, at first, been somewhat unwilling to act with the Roumanians; but the new movement seemed to give an opening for better co-operation. Joint committees of the two races were formed, and Puchner undertook to organize the soldiers of both races.

Of the Roumanian leaders who now came to the front, the most remarkable was Avraham Jancu.[22] He had been originally trained as a lawyer; but, after the meeting in September, he went off to organize the National Guard in his own mountains; and, when Puchner had issued his proclamation, Jancu received orders to give his a.s.sistance in disarming the Magyars. This process had been begun by the Roumanians, without waiting for orders; and it had, in consequence, been accompanied with many acts of cruelty. Jancu therefore sent down three tribunes with forces to protect the Magyar families from violence; and he also persuaded one or two of the towns to surrender to him, that he might then protect them from ill-treatment. Jancu also won several victories, and became so formidable to his opponents that he gained the name of the "Mountain King." But the humane exertions of Jancu and other tribunes, seconded with all his influence by Puchner, were not sufficient to keep in check the wildness of some of the Roumanian leaders. The cruelties which both the Magyars and Szeklers had committed in the struggle; the summary execution at Klausenburg of three leaders of the Roumanians, before the actual rising had taken place, and the reputed crucifixion of another at Maros Vasarhely, roused the fury of the Roumanians to its highest pitch.

The fiercest hatred of the Roumanians was directed against the Szeklers who had been their most determined enemies; and General Gedeon marched against Maros Vasarhely. Its specially isolated position, and the bad roads in its neighbourhood made it an easy prey for a General who had some skill in guerilla warfare. The city fell into the hands of Gedeon, who revenged the wrongs of the Roumanians by inflicting every species of brutality on the Szekler inhabitants.

Horrified as Puchner was at these cruelties, he did not wholly understand the character of the men with whom he was working; for, in one of the orders which he issued, he gave a distinct sanction to the practice of burning villages. He seems, indeed, to have intended this form of violence merely to be used as an extreme measure in case of retreat; but the Roumanians did not so understand it; and when, on one occasion, Puchner was sternly rebuking some of the Roumanian leaders for not better preventing the cruelties of their followers, one of them retorted by appealing to this order.

Besides the difficulties arising from these cruelties, Puchner had to contend against the continual rivalry between the Saxons and Roumanians. The former were contemptuous towards their allies; and, according to the Roumanian theory, were disposed to take unfair advantage of the Roumanians in the election of the members of the Committee of Management. Nevertheless, the help of the Saxons probably enabled Puchner to secure a more orderly Government than he could have achieved without it; and, amongst others from whom he received this kind of help, was the Saxon clergyman, Stephan Ludwig Roth, who had already been known for his efforts to secure German emigrants to Transylvania. He was appointed by Puchner to govern the district of Mediasch, in the valley of Kokelburg, where he distinguished himself by his humanity to the Magyar families who came under his protection, and showed his large-hearted sympathy by adopting a Magyar child who had been deserted by its parents. Moreover, Bishop Schaguna, who, it will be remembered, had discouraged the first risings of the Roumanians, now joined in with Puchner's plans, and exerted himself to restrain the violence of his countrymen.

But while Puchner, aided by men like Schaguna, Jancu and Roth, was endeavouring to check the cruelties which his new followers were too ready to inflict, there was needed on the other hand an equally strong influence to restrain the savagery of the Magyar and Szekler. This was the more necessary, because, whatever injustice these races had committed towards the weaker races of Hungary, in the state in which things then stood, the Magyar cause had become identified with the cause of European freedom. Only in the success of the armies which Kossuth was trying to organize, did there seem even the least remaining chance for the overthrow of that Government which was crus.h.i.+ng out the life of Vienna, which had trampled on the freedom of Lombardy, and which threatened to be the complete inheritor of the old system of Metternich. But if the Magyar armies in North Hungary were to achieve either the military or moral success which such a cause required, it was necessary that, in Transylvania also, the same race should deserve and obtain a similar success. For that purpose, they would need a man who would be the equal of Puchner both in generals.h.i.+p and humanity. For under Puchner's leaders.h.i.+p, the Saxons and Roumanians were gaining in military prowess, even more than in self-restraint, and Klausenburg had fallen into the hands of the Imperial forces.

Such was the state of things, when, on December 15, it was announced that Bem had been appointed by Kossuth Commander-in-Chief of the Transylvanian Army. He at once a.s.sembled the officers of the Army which he was to command, and informed them that he required from them unconditional obedience. Those who did not obey, he said, would be shot. Those who did obey he would know how to reward. With these few stern words, he dismissed them. This address was evidently one which might either be delivered by a mere overweening tyrant, or by a man of real genius and strong will, who understood the work that was before him. A few months served to show in which cla.s.s Bem was to be reckoned. Ignoring the Commissioner, who had been sent down, he armed and reclad his troops; punished disorder with a stern hand, but showed such personal sympathy with his followers, that he became known as "Father Bem;" while his enemies soon learned to distinguish him from the other leaders by his generosity and humanity to the conquered. He seems to have been one of those born leaders of men, who understand when to be stern, and when to be indulgent. On one occasion an officer doubted if he could hold a position. Bem told him that he must either hold it, or be shot; and it was held. On another occasion his troops, seized by the panic natural to undisciplined levies, fled before the enemy, leaving Bem in great danger. He announced afterwards that he might have had to shoot or flog many of them; but he would not do the first, because he thought they might still serve their country; nor the second, because he would not treat them as beasts; and, therefore, he must forgive them. With regard to his military capacity, although the conventional military critics were disposed to discredit it, yet it could not be denied that he taught an undisciplined mob to stand fire before a regular army, to obey discipline, and even to develope a courage and capacity which won special applause and honours for the Szekler nation; that he succeeded in about three months in completely turning the fortunes of the war in Transylvania; and at a later period in holding his own for another two months against the powerful armies of two nations. His personal daring was more like that of a knight errant than of a modern general. On one occasion, after a battle in which he had been worsted, he saw some Austrians carrying off one of his cannon. He darted forward alone, exclaiming, "That is my cannon"; and so cowed his enemies, that they surrendered it at once. On another occasion he sent an aide-de-camp to call up the rear-guard of his Army, and found that they had all disappeared, and that he was continuing the struggle with hardly any followers.

As if to mark the cause for which Bem was fighting as more distinctly than ever the cause of liberty, Puchner began, in January, 1849, those negotiations with the Russians which were finally to stamp the Austrian invasion of Transylvania with the anti-national character which other circ.u.mstances of the struggle might have made doubtful. In this matter, as in his original adoption of the Roumanian cause, Puchner seems not so much to have taken the lead as to have been driven into his position by unavoidable circ.u.mstances. Schaguna, whose prominence among the Roumanians had specially marked him out as an object of hostility to the Magyar Government, fled from Hermannstadt on the first news of Bem's arrival in Transylvania, and is believed to have made the first appeal for Russian help. The Roumanians, whose kinsmen of the Princ.i.p.alities (Wallachia and Moldavia) were in some alarm about the intentions of Russia, do not seem to have sympathized warmly with this action of their bishop; but the Saxons were less scrupulous; and the towns of Kronstadt and Hermannstadt sent a formal address to General Luders, the Russian Commander in Bucharest, asking him to come to their a.s.sistance. Luders answered that the Czar sympathized with the brave defenders of the Austrian throne, and wished to respond to their appeal; but that he was unable to do so without a direct request from the Austrian Commander-in-Chief. Under these circ.u.mstances, Puchner felt himself bound to yield to the wishes of the Saxons; some of the Roumanian leaders joined in the appeal; and so, on February 1, formal application was made for Russian help. The Russians do not seem to have come in great numbers, nor with that formal announcement of war which accompanied their later invasion, in June. Bem, at any rate, did not lose courage. Although he had recently been repulsed by Puchner, he rallied his forces; and, on March 11, he defeated the Russians before Hermannstadt, and followed up his victory by the capture of the town. This signal victory secured, for a time, the reconquest of Transylvania by the Magyars; and, if Bem had remained in that province, it is possible that he would not only have retained the territory under Magyar rule, but that he might have made that rule acceptable to the Saxons, and, in time, even to the Roumanians.

But behind Bem stood the dark figure of one who had already brought disgrace and injury on the Magyar cause, and who was still further to degrade it on this occasion. This was Ladislaus Csanyi, the intriguer who had introduced into the election of Zala County those elements of bribery and intimidation which had compelled Deak to refuse election. Csanyi now desired to put Hermannstadt to the sword; but Bem interfered, and the Saxons still honour his memory as that of the man who saved their countrymen from ma.s.sacre and their chief city from destruction. Determined to counteract, so far as he could, the brutal policy of Csanyi, Bem issued a general amnesty to those who had opposed the Magyar Government; but, unfortunately, that Government believed that they needed Bem's military talents more than his civil wisdom; and they despatched him into the Banat, to clear that province also of the enemies of Magyar rule. So, while Bem was succeeding in battle in the Banat, Csanyi was undoing his work in Transylvania. With the approval, apparently, of Kossuth, Csanyi repudiated Bem's amnesty altogether, and established tribunals in Transylvania for the summary execution of his enemies and the confiscation of their goods.

There was one victim of this reign of terror whose character and sufferings stand out in a manner which throws a halo over the Saxon cause. Stephan Ludwig Roth had, as above mentioned, distinguished himself by his humanity in the administration of the government of Mediasch under Puchner's rule; and the Magyar officials of the town of Elizabethstadt had sent him an address of thanks for his protection of their town from plunder. But he was hated by the strong partizans of Magyar rule, as the most ill.u.s.trious embodiment of the feeling in favour of Saxon independence; and his attempts to promote the immigration of Germans into Transylvania had been remembered against him by those who wished to crush out, in Hungary, all national feeling except that of the Magyars. Bem had been so well aware of the hatred which Roth had excited, that he had thought it necessary to give him, in addition to the general amnesty, a special guarantee for his safety. In reliance on this security, Roth had retired to his parish of Meschen, and was living without any apparent fear, when he was suddenly arrested there by the soldiers of Csanyi, and brought, after some delay, to Klausenburg. There he was kept in prison, and, though at first leniently treated, he was, after a time, prevented from holding any communications with his friends. In the meantime, the tribunal which was to decide his fate was not allowed to come to a free decision. The Magyar mob of Klausenburg gathered round the court and demanded his death; and even those of the judges who were convinced of his innocence were terrified into voting for his condemnation. His friends appealed for mercy to Csanyi, but he indignantly rejected all pet.i.tions, declaring that Roth had deserved ten deaths.

After his condemnation Roth sent the following letter to his children:--

"Dear Children,--I have just been condemned to death, and in three hours more the sentence will be put into execution. If anything gives me pain, it is the thought of you, who are without a mother, and who now are losing your father. But there are good men who will advise and help you for your father's sake. The Hungarian foundling whom I adopted, I entreat you to continue to take care of; only if its parents should wish for it, they have a nearer claim. Except for this, I have nothing more in this world. The children of my church at Meschen, and my Nimisch people I think of in love. May G.o.d make these communities become rich in the fruits of G.o.dliness, like fruit-trees whose loaded boughs hang down to the ground! In my writing-table are the prospectuses of the school and church newspaper which is to be published. The body of the nation is broken to pieces. I do not believe in any binding together of its limbs any more. So much the more do I desire the keeping alive of the spirit which once lived in these forms. For that purpose I entreat my brother clergy whom I leave behind to take care to carry on this newspaper, in order to keep alive the character, pure manners, and honesty of will of our people. But, if it is decreed in the Counsels of History that it must perish, may it perish in a manner that shall not bring shame on its ancestors! Time flies. I know not if my sick body can honourably support my willing spirit.

All whom I have insulted I heartily entreat for pardon. For my part, I leave the world without hate, and pray G.o.d to forgive my enemies. So let the end come in G.o.d's name!

"Klausenburg, 11th May, 1849.

"I must add that neither in life nor death have I been an enemy of the Hungarian nation. May they believe this, on the word of a dying man, in the moment when all hypocrisy falls away!"

He was shortly after led out to execution. When his sentence was read out to him, in which he was accused of having taken the sword instead of the Bible, and of having led on the Saxon and Wallack hordes, he cried out indignantly, "It is not true. I never carried a sword." He refused to have his hands bound; and, with his face to the soldiers, he fell, after the third shot. The captain in command of the soldiers was so much impressed by the spectacle, that he exclaimed, "Soldiers, learn from this man how to die for one's people."

But long before Csanyi's reign of terror had reached this climax, the aspect of affairs in other parts of Hungary had gone through important changes. The removal of Gorgei and the appointment of Dembinski had caused great irritation among the friends of the former. This irritation might be somewhat excused by the fact that nearly a month had elapsed between the time when Gorgei had sent his proclamation to Windischgratz and his deposition from command; and the deposition even received an appearance of injustice and hards.h.i.+p from its announcement at the moment when Gorgei had just obtained a victory. But the opposition to this change of command would have been almost as certain if the removal had taken place earlier, and under different circ.u.mstances. It was looked upon as a blow struck by the politicians of Buda-Pesth at the politicians of the army; and the appointment of a foreigner added an element of national prejudice to the outburst of professional irritation. Moreover, Dembinski seems to have been exactly the kind of officer whom Gorgei most disliked. His reputation rested on certain brilliant feats of guerilla warfare in the Polish insurrection of 1830; and of course Gorgei and his friends may have been right in thinking that such a man was ill fitted to carry on the more regular warfare which was needed for the defeat of Windischgratz. But, whatever excuse they may have had for opposition to the appointment, they clearly put themselves in the wrong by their evident determination not to allow Dembinski a fair chance. Gorgei, indeed, at first affected to discourage the protests against Dembinski's appointment; but the language in which he did so was so evidently defiant in intention as to call forth a censure from his personal friend, the War Minister Meszaros; nor was it long before Gorgei threw off even this slender mask, and openly defied Dembinski's authority.

Gorgei's faction among the officers was so strong, and the dislike to Dembinski so general, that the commanders of divisions at last agreed to demand the deposition of their chief. Kossuth came down to the camp to inquire into the circ.u.mstances; and he found the feeling against Dembinski so violent that he consented to his removal. Gorgei seems to have used this opportunity for once more discussing the political situation with Kossuth; and, strange to say, he made to him the very proposal which Batthyanyi had rejected when it was put forward by Jellacic; namely, that the War and Finance Ministries should be removed to Vienna. If this proposal had been unsatisfactory when Vienna was free, and Ferdinand on the throne, it could have sounded little short of treason to the cause of Hungary, when Vienna was under the absolute rule of Windischgratz; and it is not wonderful, therefore, that, though Kossuth was willing to remove Dembinski, he preferred appointing General Vetter as Commander-in-Chief to trusting Gorgei with the leaders.h.i.+p.

It was at this crisis that the event occurred which was mentioned in the last chapter, and which hastened on the final phase of the movement. Encouraged, as Gorgei believed, by the victories of Windischgratz, Francis Joseph and his advisers suddenly dismissed the Parliament at Kremsier, and proclaimed a Const.i.tution "octroye" for the occasion. Hungarians of all parties condemned this act as a violation of their old laws and customs, and an a.s.sertion of the arbitrary will of the sovereign. For, indeed, the discontent now aroused was far from being confined to the Magyars; and it would have been strange had it been otherwise. The dissolution of the Kremsier Parliament was, even irrespective of all that followed it, the most barefaced act of despotism that had been committed since the March risings of the previous year. Even Ferdinand of Naples could plead that barricades had been thrown up in the streets before his _coup d'etat_ of May 15. The unfortunate June insurrection at Prague had given a plausible excuse for preventing the meeting of the Bohemian Parliament; the murder of Lamberg had, no doubt, seemed to Ferdinand of Austria to supply at least a palliation for his dissolution of the Hungarian Diet; the murder of Latour and the persecution of the Bohemian deputies supplied Windischgratz with sufficient argument for depriving Vienna of its liberties; and even the violent dispersal of the deputies of Berlin could be defended by the King of Prussia by reference to the previous riots of August. But not a single excuse of this kind could, with the least show of plausibility, be urged in defence of the dissolution of the Kremsier Parliament. Indeed, Francis Joseph betrayed the weakness of his case by pleading in his defence the nature of the subjects that had been discussed in the Parliament; and he could not even pretend that it had either exceeded its powers or exercised them in a disorderly manner.

Nor was the Const.i.tution, which was offered as a sequel to this dissolution, any more acceptable than the dissolution itself; and a general protest went up from nearly every race in the Empire. However much the Viennese might, under other circ.u.mstances, have liked a Const.i.tution which was centralised at Vienna, they none of them would welcome it when it was combined with the rule of Windischgratz. The Bohemian leaders felt themselves doubly offended; first by the dissolution of a Parliament to which they had specially trusted for justice; and secondly by the refusal of any real provincial independence to Bohemia. The Croats indignantly denounced the restoration of the military rule on the frontier, and the consequent separation from Croatia of the Slavs who inhabited the frontier district. The Serbs, ever since January, had been complaining of the advance of military rule in the Serb districts, and the gradual diminution of the power of the Voyvode; and they now felt that all their local inst.i.tutions were still further endangered by the centralisation of the new Const.i.tution. Some of the bitterest protests came from the Roumanians. They had been treated from the first with the greatest contempt by most of the Imperialist officers; and directly after the capture of Hermannstadt by Bem, they found themselves suddenly deserted by the Austrian forces, which were withdrawn into Wallachia. While they were still smarting under this treachery, the news of the new Const.i.tution reached them; and they found that they were as far off as ever from obtaining that separate national organization for which they had so long been pleading; while a part of the Banat, which they considered specially Roumanian, was to be placed, by the new arrangement, under the Serbs.

In this state of general discontent, it might have seemed that Kossuth would have had a fair chance of rallying round him all the races of the Empire, in a common desire for local independence, and a common hostility to the rule of Francis Joseph. But the divisions and mutual suspicions between the various races of the Empire had gone too deep to allow of this change. As for co-operation between the Bohemians and Germans, even if such a combination had been possible after the various causes of bitterness mentioned in the preceding chapters, little good could be effected by it at this crisis, when both Prague and Vienna were at the mercy of the conqueror. The important question, therefore, was the att.i.tude to be taken up towards the new Const.i.tution, by the various races in the Kingdom of Hungary; and here it must be owned that it was not wholly the fault of Kossuth, that he did not succeed in combining them in this emergency.

Many both of the Croats and Serbs expressed plainly their discontent with the treatment which they had received from the House of Austria, but both Croats and Serbs were paralysed by the leaders whom they had accepted. The Ba.n.a.l Council[23] of Croatia protested against the publication of the new Const.i.tution; but Jellacic declared that he was bound to see that it was published, and that the Council were only to carry out his orders. In a similar manner, many of the leading Serbs remonstrated with Rajacic on his acceptance of the vague promises, which were the subst.i.tute in the new Const.i.tution, for those ancient liberties which the Serbs claimed as their due. But Rajacic maintained his authority over his countrymen, and accepted a place of completer subordination to the Austrian General than that which he had hitherto held. On the other hand, Kossuth seems to have neglected the opportunity offered by the general feeling of discontent, which prevailed at this time among the Serbs and Croats; and it was not till months later, when driven to desperation, that he proposed to make those concessions, which had by that time lost all grace. Towards the Roumanians, indeed, Kossuth seemed disposed to make concessions, by which he hoped to draw them away from the Saxons; and he chose a negotiator, whom he thought well fitted for this purpose. But Jancu distrusted Kossuth's emissary, and perhaps also Kossuth himself; and so the negotiation broke down.

And if Kossuth failed to draw round him, at this crisis, the different races who were discontented with the new Const.i.tution, it was a much stranger fact that he was unable to maintain the union between the different parties in the Magyar nation itself. This was all the stranger, because just at this time both the personal and political grounds for difference between Kossuth and Gorgei seemed to be suddenly removed. Deep as had been Gorgei's irritation at the appointment of Vetter, it had naturally been brought to a close by the sudden illness which removed Vetter from the command, and which was followed on March 31 by the appointment of Gorgei as provisional Commander-in-Chief; while, as to political opinions, Gorgei and Kossuth were both agreed in denouncing the circ.u.mstances under which Francis Joseph had been thrust on to the throne of Hungary, and the character and origin of the Const.i.tution which he had just issued.

Under these circ.u.mstances, it seemed as if there could be no further ground for division between the military party who followed Gorgei, and the larger body of Magyars, who accepted Kossuth as their leader.

But it soon appeared that this was not the case.

Kossuth and his friends naturally argued that as the only member of the House of Hapsburg who claimed the throne of Hungary was admittedly in an illegal position, the only logical course was to depose the House of Hapsburg from the throne of Hungary; and that as the only Const.i.tution by which the rulers of Austria would consent to link themselves to Hungary was admittedly an illegal Const.i.tution, the only logical course was to separate Hungary from Austria. Gorgei and his friends, on the other hand, shrank with horror from the idea of fighting without the authority of a King. They had sworn to obey Ferdinand, and to accept the Const.i.tution of March 1848; they therefore insisted on ignoring the abdication of Ferdinand, and the abolition of that Const.i.tution, and continued to fight, in the name of a King who did not wish to reign, and on behalf of a Const.i.tution which had ceased to exist. Kossuth and his friends, however, were resolved to a.s.sert their principles; and on April 14 they issued the celebrated "Declaration of Independence."

The strongly legal and historical character which had marked the whole Hungarian movement since the time of the meeting of the Diet in 1825, still shows itself even in this semi-revolutionary doc.u.ment. The Declaration goes back to the first connection of the House of Hapsburg with the throne of Hungary, and declares that no House had ever had so good a chance of governing successfully, and had so misused it. After mentioning some of the tyrannies of the earlier Kings of this House, the Declaration dwells on the fact that while Hungary had often had to fight for its freedom, it had always been so moderate in its demands that it had laid down its arms as soon as the King gave a new oath to preserve its freedom; but these oaths had never been kept, and for three hundred years this policy had never been changed. The people, after each promise, had forgotten the wounds of past years, in exaggerated magnanimity; but now the time had come to break the union.

The House of Hapsburg had united itself with the enemies of the people, and with robbers and agitators, in order to oppress the people. It had attacked those of its subjects who would not combine against the Const.i.tution which it had sworn to protect, or against the independent life of the nation. It had attacked with violence the integrity of the country, though it had sworn to preserve it. It had used a foreign Power to murder its own subjects and suppress their lawful freedom. Any one of these crimes was sufficient reason for depriving the Dynasty of its throne. The Declaration then goes on to consider the excuses which the Dynasty offered for its conduct. As for the independence secured by Hungary in March, 1848, that was only the confirmation of an old tradition; for the Pragmatic Sanction showed that neither Hungary nor any of the provinces connected with it had ever been absorbed in Austria. Joseph II. alone had ignored this fact, and his name, therefore, never appeared in the list of the kings of Hungary. As for the laws which the Diet had pa.s.sed in March, Ferdinand had sanctioned them; but he now wished to suppress them. Yet the Hungarians had taken no advantage of the disturbances in different parts of the Austrian Empire to secure greater independence for themselves, but had remained content with what had been granted in March. They had supported the monarchy; but Ferdinand had tried to break his oath as soon as it was made. The Government at Vienna had at first tried to act through the Count Palatine; but, as this combination had weakened their power, they had gradually withdrawn more and more power from him. They had tried to impose customs duties which would have cut off Hungary from the rest of the world; and when this method failed they tried to stir up the different nationalities against the Hungarian Ministry. The proclamation proceeds to say that dates and doc.u.ments prove that the Archduke Louis, the Archduke Francis Charles, and the Archd.u.c.h.ess Sophia had stirred up the movements in Croatia and Slavonia. They attribute Ferdinand's first denunciation of Jellacic as a traitor to the difficulties caused by the war in Italy; but they accuse him of having played a double part, both in Croatia and Slavonia, and of having helped the Croats and Serbs with money and ammunition at the very time when he was denouncing them as rebels. They charge the Serbs with having committed great cruelties in their rising. They denounce, as illegal, the scattering of Hungarian troops in different provinces of the Austrian Empire, and they declare that it was in consequence of this arrangement that they were unable to save Fiume from Jellacic. They complain of the order given to the soldiers and commanders of fortresses not to obey the Hungarian Ministry, and to take orders only from Vienna. They complain that the Emperor had made a general of the Slavonic priest who had headed the rising of the Slovaks in North Hungary. They complain of their desertion by the Archduke Stephen, after his promises of support, and of the intrigues of Latour with Jellacic and with other generals against the liberties of Hungary. Lastly, they complain of the abdication of Ferdinand in favour of Francis Joseph. Yet even Francis Joseph they would have accepted had he claimed his rights in a legal manner; but he had threatened to conquer Hungary by force, and had, for the conquest of Transylvania, called in those Russians who had crushed out the liberties of Roumania. They further stated that, although at first the Hungarians had been driven back, they had now recovered their ground in Transylvania, cleared North Hungary of foes, suppressed the Serb rising, and defeated the Austrians in five battles. Under these circ.u.mstances they now declared Hungary independent of the House of Hapsburg, and appointed Kossuth as their President.

Kossuth's supremacy in Hungary had been an important fact for a considerable time past, and had been due, not only to his personal qualities, but to the gradual retirement from public life of most of the leading statesmen who had played a part in the earlier phases of the struggle against the ruling powers in Vienna. Batthyanyi had abandoned all direct initiative in Hungarian politics ever since his resignation of the Premiers.h.i.+p, and had only attempted to mediate between the contending armies, a mediation which had been scornfully rejected by Windischgratz. Deak had, from the first, announced that he was unfit for revolutionary propaganda; and, after devoting himself, in the early days of the March Ministry, to the compilation of a code of laws and the administrative work of his office, he had gradually a.s.sumed the same position of mediator which Batthyanyi had desired, and with equal want of success. Wesselenyi was now old and blind; and, though he had consented to go with Eotvos on that deputation to the Vienna a.s.sembly which had been repulsed by the Bohemian Deputies, neither he nor Eotvos now took any regular part in public affairs.

Szechenyi, horrified at the results which, as he considered, had flowed from his early encouragement of Magyar feeling, lost his reason, and was at this time under restraint. Thus, of the statesmen who had been prominent in Hungary during the struggle against Metternich, Kossuth was the only one who could still be said to be before the public.

Kossuth's unrivalled eloquence, and his keen sympathy, both with the intensity and the narrowness of Magyar feeling, had given him a force which none of the other leaders of the movement had ever possessed; and his discovery of the military genius of Bem had secured him an influence in Transylvania which considerably increased the strength of his position. On the other hand, his intolerant att.i.tude towards the subject races of Hungary had marked him out in a special manner as the object of their hatred; while his contempt for ordinary military arrangements, his growing distrust of Gorgei, and last, but perhaps not least, the belief among many military men that he was deficient in physical courage, tended to strengthen against him a formidable party in the army which was eventually to prove too strong for him. But, if the divided state of Hungarian feeling threw formidable difficulties in the way of Kossuth, he could find compensations in the condition of the forces opposed to him. Windischgratz does not seem to have been reckoned, by military critics, a considerable general. Stratimirovic, whatever military qualities he may have possessed, was continually held in check by the cautious policy of Rajacic. Puchner, who had succeeded in giving such force to the Roumanian rising, was becoming an object of suspicion to the more conventional Austrian generals, and was shortly to be removed from Transylvania; while a cause of weakness, which was perhaps still more important, was to be found in the withdrawal from the country of a large body of Austrian and Croatian soldiers, who were being despatched against the new Government of the Roman States.

For in Italy, too, the champions of liberty were preparing for their final struggle, though under rather different auspices from those under which it was being fought out in Hungary. On the very day when the Declaration of Independence was published in Hungary, Mazzini, Saffi, and Armellini, who had been elected Triumvirs of the Roman Republic, after the failure of Charles Albert's final war, appeared in the a.s.sembly for the first time in their new capacity. They had no light task before them. Apart from the enemies who were threatening the Republic from outside, there were dangers arising from the feelings of the different parties within the Roman State. The deposition of the Pope had undoubtedly given a shock to the feelings of many strong Liberals, of a much keener, and if one may say so, more intelligible kind, than the deposition of the House of Hapsburg could possibly give to any Hungarian leader. Even Castellani, the Amba.s.sador of the Venetian Republic, hesitated to identify the cause of his city with that of the opponents of the Pope; while the feeling among the priests of the Roman States had been shown by a formidable conspiracy in Imola and Ascoli. General Zucchi, who had taken part in this conspiracy, had even attempted to force his way into the Neapolitan territory, in order to put himself under the authority of the Pope.

Garibaldi had defeated this attempt, and Zucchi had been sent as a prisoner to Rome; but the conspiracy was not forgotten; and, when the Triumvirs came into power, they found that these outbursts of priestly opposition were provoking savage reprisals on the part of the Republicans.

While Saffi had been only Minister of the Interior, and Mazzini only a private member of the a.s.sembly, they had both warned the Government of the probability of this danger; and they now found that a Society had been formed at Ancona which threatened death to the enemies of Liberalism. The Triumvirs first sent down two officers, who tried to organize the local leaders into a committee for preserving public order; but, though their emissaries were satisfied with their own action, the Triumvirs were less easily contented. Felice Orsini was sent down with full powers to put down the insurrection; and, if necessary, to declare Ancona in a state of siege. He at once arrested twenty men, called out the National Guard, put down opposition by force, and carried off his prisoners to Rome, where they were shut up in the Castle of St. Angelo. From Ancona Orsini went on to Ascoli, where he condemned three of the most dangerous persons to be shot, and sequestrated the goods of a cardinal, who had stirred up the clerical insurrection. But the Austrian forces were now advancing into the Roman territory; and Orsini was compelled to retire to Rome.

Even in the capital the Triumvirs had to use strong measures to check the fierce feeling against the priests. This feeling had just been roused to an unusual height by special discoveries of priestly cruelty. In sweeping away the various irregular tribunals, which had grown up under the papal tyranny, the Triumvirs had to deal with the question of the Inquisition. They appropriated the former offices of that celebrated inst.i.tution, as dwellings for the poor; but, in making the buildings available for this purpose, they threw open the secret dungeons, and discovered prisoners who were slowly dying of their imprisonment. One bishop, who had remained there since the time of Leo XII., had absolutely lost the power of walking. The horrible instruments of torture, which were found in the same place, excited still further the indignation of the people; and that feeling found yet a new cause for its expression, when a book was discovered in the library of the Inquisition, containing the secrets of the princ.i.p.al families of Italy, which had been obtained through the revelations of confessors. Several of the fiercer spirits in Rome at once made an attack on the pulpits and confessionals, and burnt some of them in the Piazza del Popolo. These tumults were sternly checked by the Triumvirs; and they succeeded in protecting from the popular vengeance the convent in which the chief Inquisitor lived. But while they protected the persons and private property of the priests, they appropriated the greater part of the ecclesiastical lands to the support of the poor, arranging that every family of three persons should have as much land as could be managed by a pair of oxen. At the same time the jurisdiction of the clergy over the universities and schools was taken away.

While the attention of the Government was thus devoted to the restoration of internal order, and the carrying out of necessary reforms, they did not neglect the vigorous measures which were needed for the resistance to foreign enemies. The forces which had been rather carelessly scattered in the outlying provinces of the Roman State, were concentrated by the Triumvirs near Bologna. That gallant little city had been in a state of alarm ever since the early part of February, when the Austrian forces had again attacked Ferrara; and the difficulties of communication between these two cities had increased the alarm of the Bolognese, though it had also strengthened their eagerness for resistance. But even before this Austrian invasion, the Roman Republicans had been alarmed at the threats issued by another Power. Three days after the flight of the Pope, General Cavaignac announced in the French a.s.sembly that he had sent three frigates to Civita Vecchia to secure the safety of His Holiness. This expedition had excited much opposition in France; and, during the subsequent contest for the Presidency, the following letter was addressed by one of the candidates to the editor of a French newspaper:--

"MR. EDITOR,

"Knowing that my agreement to the vote for the Expedition to Civita Vecchia has been remarked upon, I think myself bound to declare that, whatever may have been decided about the arrangements suitable for guaranteeing the liberty and authority of the chief Pontiff, nevertheless I cannot approve by my vote a military demonstration that appears dangerous both to the sacred interests that they pretend to protect, and that has a tendency to compromise European peace.

"Yours respectfully, "LOUIS NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE.

"December 2, 1848."