to him by the only person whose office it is to carry to him. what is passing.

To ascertain how far this accusation can be maintained, it is necessary to examine what was the state of the finances before I joined the ministry; and, without going farther back, we need only cast a glance on the accounts of the year 1821-an epoch at which the whole financial machine moved under the impelling power of the Imperial Commissioner himself. It will at once be apparent that the salaries of the civilians and the pay of the troops were a month and a half in arrear,—that the deposits and securities placed by individuals in the public chest were exhausted,-in short, that the receipts were insufficient to cover the expenditure. Such was the order maintained then. As to the disorganization of the present time, not only do the stated accounts prove that since 1822 the receipts have constantly increased by bringing into the treasury of the state sources of revenue which were previously appropriated to individual purposes; but the elements of prosperity are such, and show themselves so distinctly in every department, that an increase of comfort in the whole country may be confidently predicted, while the government, by a series of operations, will succeed in discharging its debt without augmenting the burden of taxation. In matters of this sort, phrases and words are not the things to be dealt with. Arguments, insinuations, criminations, have nothing to do with figures. Let the books be examined-let the chests be opened-and facts will speak for themselves. Well! it is just the facility of such a verification which must have induced his Imperial Highness to give credence to that which the Imperial Commissioner told him. How could it be believed that a man clothed with the confidence of the Monarch, and who, step by step, traces every movement of the Government, should not see things as they really are? How could it be suspected that he would dare

to give to the august brother of his master fictions for realities? Honesty does not suspect falsehood when it presents itself with the boldness of truth. In addition to this, the acts of my administration sufficiently prove that I have ever preferred the well-being of the public service to an ephemeral popularity; and, if I am charged with any responsibility whatever, I by no means seek to avoid it, and I take upon myself all the consequences. As to my opinion in the affair of the High Court, I should have considered that I betrayed the Monarch, if I did not obey the dictates of my conscience; and my documents are at hand, to explain the opinion I gave.

Secondly. His Imperial Highness sees, in the Polish nation, a mass of disaffected men, who only wait a favourable opportunity to declare themselves enemies of their sovereign. When no act of the subjects of the kingdom of Poland which bears this criminal character has come to the knowledge of the government, how can I avoid recognizing the type of the opinion thus expressed by his Imperial Highness, in the words pronounced in full council by the Imperial Commissioner, when he declared that revolt was an innate vice in the Poles, and that sons inherited it naturally from their fathers? If I now examine what the sovereign has done to excite his subjects to so black a defection, I see that his first engagement to the Poles was a pledge for the preservation of the institutions which the Emperor Alexander of glorious memory had magnanimously granted to unsuccessful heroism. The better to preserve the remembrance of a generosity so touching, your Majesty has willed that the current money of Poland shall record it from reign to reign, with the likeness of the regeneration of the kingdom.*

This coin has since been called in, and a new one has been issued, on which the arms of Poland adorn the black eagle of Russia jointly with those of the Asiatic provinces of the empire: viz., Georgia, Grusia, Siberia, &c.

The aberrations of a few individuals cannot have changed these paternal feelings, and the delinquents have been delivered to the tribunal which the Constitution has exclusively provided for them. The judgment of this tribunal (it would appear) is of a nature to displease* your Majesty; but, previously to superseding its sentence, your Majesty asks of your council to what motive can be attributed this defective decree, in a matter which had threatened the institutions of which your Majesty has declared yourself the inviolable guardian. Finally, amid the toils of a destructive war, a benevolent feeling escapes your Majesty on behalf of your Polish subjects. Your Majesty has desired that a monument, erected in Warsaw, should prove that an affront received under the walls of Varna by a king of Poland has been recently washed out in Ottoman blood by one of his successors.† These, Sire, are the auspices under which the Poles have learnt to know their monarch. From whom could they possibly expect greater benefits? To rebel against such a master would be the height of ingratitude, or an undoubted symptom of insanity, whether we consider the subject with reference to their personal interests or political rights.

In this matter, as in that of the finances, the Imperial

* The eight persons accused were acquitted; but the "displeasure" of the Emperor still followed them; two were carried off to Siberia, and the remainder were placed under the surveillance of the police. Their judgesthe Polish senate-were placed under arrest in Warsaw.

† Prince Lubecki here alludes to some cannon taken by the Turks from the Poles, in the year 1444, under the King Ladislas Jagello, who was killed in the battle in which they were lost before Varna They were retaken by the Russians in the campaign of 1828. Nicholas, in a fit of magnanimity or vanity, caused a column composed of these cannon to be erected in the arsenal. This act deserves to be recorded, for it is the only one in which he ever condescended to seek popularity, by appealing to the national feelings of the Poles.

Commissioner endeavours to give an authentic character to that which is erroneous; but events which are past afford a correct index to those which are present, inasmuch as I have always observed the Imperial Commissioner pursuing the same dissatisfied and suspicious course. Permit me to cite a few instances.

In 1821, at a moment when the cutting remarks of the decision of the 25th of May still rang in our ears, and when an empty treasury, squandered deposits, and arrears of pay, indicated sufficiently the wounds which had been inflicted on the public welfare, those who pointed them out were called alarmists, and the prudence which retrieved the finances was represented as a means adopted to compromise the government. Who conveyed these false impressions to the sovereign? THE IMPERIAL COMMISSIONER.

In 1822, I submitted for the sanction of the supreme government a Budget, in which the receipts exceeded the expenditure, accompanied by a plan to augment the resources of the treasury. The monarch was pre-admonished that this Budget had not attained a degree of maturity which would secure any practicable results, and that the plan proposed was only calculated to excite enemies against the government. Who, against all evidence, advanced these assertions, the erroneousness of which was established by the decisions of the supreme authority? THE IMPERIAL COMMISSIONER.

In 1823, the Administrative Council* had already sketched a petition supplicating the sovereign to annul the Constitution, as no means could be found to carry the 146th

*The Administrative Council was the executive government, composed of officers of state, appointed by the Emperor during pleasure, and paid by the Treasury!

article into execution.

Who discovered this unheard

of plan to remove an imaginary obstacle? THE IMPErial COMMISSIONER.

In the following years, the system of public credit to individuals, and the introduction of licenses, were warmly opposed. By whom? By whom? BY THE IMPERIAL COMMISSIONER.

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Finally, in the matter of the High Court, I will not again recall all that the Imperial Commissioner has asserted, because I believe the written documents which I deposited in the council for transmission to your Majesty sufficient to counterbalance the suggestions and criminations, which spring continually from his opinions. Doubtless it would be a very interesting inquiry to endeavour to discover the motives which prompt the Imperial Commissioner to sow the seeds of disunion between the monarch and his children. It may be assumed that interests the most powerful, or a blindness the most complete, must have contributed to render it a pleasure to falsify the paternal language of the first, and to criminate even the very thoughts of the second. As for myself, I do not undertake to expose these motives; I content myself with stating facts.

And now, Sire, I ought to tell your Majesty that I should perhaps have maintained silence, as I had done up to the present day, if the errors of the Imperial Commissioner were alone in question; because a deliberate inquiry would have protected the throne in this instance, as it has done in so many others. But, when I perceive that these errors have

The following is the 146th Article: "There shall be civil tribunals and tribunals of the police in every commune, and in every town, to take cognizance of transactions not exceeding 500 florins." Well may Prince Lubecki exclaim against the abolishing of the constitution, because some formal difficulties were experienced in carrying such an article into operation!