again be discussed between yourself and Prince Metternich. His disavowal has fulfilled our object, and it is not the Emperor's intention to prolong a discussion which henceforward can have no utility. His Majesty desires only to indulge those hopes which are authorized by the friendly and satisfactory assurances which the Emperor of Austria has again very recently reiterated to him through the channel of Count Strogonoff.

Receive the assurances, &c. &c. &c.

le P. de Metternich. Son désaveu a rempli notre but, et il n'est pas de l'intention de l'Empereur de prolonger une discussion, qui dès lors ne sauroit plus avoir aucune utilité. S. M. ne veut se livrer qu'aux espérances auxquelles l'autorisent les assurances si amicales et si satisfaisantes que l'Empereur d'Autriche lui a fait réitérer encore tout récemment par l'organe du Comte Strogonoff. Recevez, &c.

LETTER FROM COLONEL KAVANAGH,

FIRST REFERENDARY TO THE AULIC COUNCIL OF WAR,

TO PRINCE METTERNICH.

Vienna, 8th June, 1829.

In returning to your Highness herewith the list of questions which were communicated to me, I have the honour to make the following answers to them.

I. On the extent of the recruiting in the years 1828 and 1829.

In the year 1808 was created in Austria the system called the system of reserve, according to which a certain number of men were raised for each regiment, from the population;* they were exercised for three weeks every year; then they were disbanded, and successively called to complete the regiments, according to their wants. On the proposal of the late Marshal Prince Schwarzenberg, this system received in 1816 an extension which raised the reserve for each regiment to two thousand three hundred men; but, on the other hand, the infantry was reduced to a hundred men for each company of one hundred and sixty men, on the peace establishment, fixed in the reign of the Emperess Maria Theresa, and which had been preserved ever since. In consequence of this measure there was no recruiting for several years.

This system of reserve was attended with numerous inconveniences, which had not been foreseen; and the principal of which was the too advanced age which the men of the reserve attained in time of peace, before being drafted

From the canton of enrolment.

off according to their turn in the regiments. Thence the always increasing number of invalids in the midst of peace. By a hand-billet of the 10th of December, 1824, his Majesty demanded proposals to remedy this evil; they were stated to him in the annexed Protocol of 22nd January, 1825, after having heard the advice of the Council of State. Conformably to the opinions given by the Aulic Council and the Council of State, his Majesty judged fit to dissolve entirely the institution of the reserve; and in consequence it was openly abolished in the entire monarchy.

The annexed copy of a resolution of 4th August, 1827, confirming the proposals of the Protocol of 22nd January, 1825, and occasioned by the abolition of the system of reserve, re-established the former complement of the infantry at one hundred and sixty men each company. The recruitings of 1827 and 1828 have placed it on this footing, and have necessarily been the more considerable, because the soldiers enrolled in 1813 and 1814 were to be dismissed, their term of capitulation having expired.

The obligation of the military service being for fourteen years, all the soldiers enrolled in 1815, when a considerable recruiting took place, after the landing of Napoleon at Antibes, will be sent home in the course of 1829; in order to replace them, another equally considerable enrolment must take place.

The whole tendency of these measures is entirely pacific:* the epoch of their adoption, from 1824 to 1827, long before the battle of Navarin, proves this sufficiently.

II. Re-establishment of the Landwehr, and exemption from this service.

The first enrolment to increase the infantry to one hundred and sixty men each company was ordered the 4th of August, 1827, and the Embassy notified it at the time.

At the time of the discussions which took place on the above-mentioned measures, new principles for recruiting, and the abolishing of several exemptions from service, which dated even from the time when the obligation of military service extended to the whole of life, were resolved upon. These changes then date as far back as the year 1825. In the Protocol here cited, the organisation of the Landwehr, which, since 1821, had been entirely abandoned, is treated of. Of all the proposals of the Aulic Council, submitted to the Emperor for the regeneration of the Landwehr, his Majesty, by his resolution of the 2nd March, 1829, approved only of the following: that to compensate for the diminution which had taken place in the Landwehr by deaths or other causes, it shall be completed, on paper, to the necessary number, by the inscription of those who were under the obligation of placing themselves on the lists. The proposal of exercising, in 1829, the Landwehr during a fortnight, in conformity with its primitive institution, was rejected from motives of economy, as well as that of adding a pensioned officer to each company of the Landwehr, which have each but one officer. In the second battalions of the Landwehr the officers' places are vacant, which may be perceived by the military almanack; and even among the chiefs of battalions, there are some who are seventy-four years old and upwards. In this respect, then, there is no indication of military activity.

*

III. Concerning the re-mounting.

From economy, the cavalry had been left during ten years on a much lower footing than that which was fixed upon for a time of peace; and very old horses had been kept in

The Emperor Francis himself had assured his Excellency the Ambassador, who notified the same to his Court, that the Landwehr should be as sembled and exercised, and it is still publicly believed to be so.

the regiments. Thence arose the necessity for re-mounting in the course of last year, but in every hundred re-mounts forty horses of four years old were allowed to be taken, which again indicates nothing but pacific dispositions. The remounting of the dragoons and cuirassiers is now entirely stopped.

Towards the autumn it will re-commence, in a small degree, after the reviews of the regiments. The transport of horses from Russia for the light cavalry, will take place in July and August. What has been supposed with respect to the re-mounting of the train of artillery is pure invention, and devoid of all foundation.* In the whole monarchy not one hundred horses even have been purchased for the artillery and its train. The deficiencies in the teams are successively supplied by horses of cuirassiers and dragoons, which are no longer fit for active service.

IV. Manufacture of harness.

This is explained by the necessity of keeping complete in reserve in the depôts of the train the necessary articles, in the same way as it is necessary to have in the arsenals a sufficient quantity of arms. This necessity is common to every well-governed monarchy.

Major Achbauer, charged with the inspection of these depôts, was for several years, in consequence of illness, unable to make his rounds. After his death, his successor found that time had so much injured the articles belonging to the harness, that it was necessary in all the provinces to sell great quantities of it by auction. The consequence is, that, in order to replace them successively, a greater degree

• A considerable purchase of horses had been ordered in Bohemia; this number was said to be 40,000; whence the supposition that some were destined for the artillery and the train. On the 4th of May this purchase was suspended.