THREE:At Vereiva, where Buonaparte halted on the 27th of October, Mortier arrived from Moscow, having blown up the Kremlin with gunpowder, and with it a crowd of Russians who had rushed in at the moment of his evacuation. Mortier on his march had also surprised and captured General Winzengerode. From this place Buonaparte issued a bulletin, announcing that not only Moscow but the Kremlin was destroyed; that the two hundred thousand inhabitants of Moscow were wandering in the woods existing on roots; and that the French army was advancing towards St. Petersburg with every means of success. Such was the audacity of lying by which he hoped to conceal the truth from Paris. At this moment he was exasperated almost to frenzy by his prospects, and since the defeat of Maloi-Jaroslavitz he had been gloomy and unapproachable from the violence of his temper. On the march the army passed with horror the field of Borodino. "The ground," says Segur, "was covered with fragments of helmets and cuirasses, broken drums, gun-stocks, tatters of uniforms, and standards steeped in blood. On this desolate spot lay thirty thousand half devoured corpses. A number of skeletons, left on the summit of one of the hills, overlooked the whole. It seemed as if here death had fixed his empire. The cry, 'It is the field of the great battle!' found a long and doleful murmur. Napoleon passed quickly; no one stopped; cold, hunger, and the enemy urged us on. We merely turned our faces as we proceeded to take a last melancholy look at our late companions in arms."
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TWO: Peel's Second CabinetProrogation of ParliamentGrowing Demand for Free TradeMr. VilliersHis First Motion for the Repeal of the Corn LawsThe Manchester AssociationBright and CobdenOpposition of the ChartistsGrowth of the AssociationThe Movement spreads to LondonRenewal of Mr. Villiers' MotionFormation of the Anti-Corn Law LeagueIts Pamphlets and LecturesEbenezer ElliottThe Pavilion at ManchesterMr. Villiers' Third MotionWant in IrelandThe Walsall ElectionDepression of TradePeel determines on a Sliding ScaleHis Corn LawIts Cold ReceptionProgress of the MeasureThe BudgetThe Income TaxReduction of Custom DutiesPeel's Speech on the New TariffDiscussions on the BillEmployment of Children in the Coal MinesEvidence of the CommissionLord Ashley's BillFurther Attempts on the Life of the QueenSir Robert Peel's Bill on the subjectDifferences with the United StatesThe Right of SearchThe Canadian BoundaryThe Macleod AffairLord Ashburton's MissionThe First Afghan War: Sketch of its CourseRussian Intrigue in the EastAuckland determines to restore Shah SujahTriumphant Advance of the Army of the IndusSurrender of Dost MohammedSale and the GhilzaisThe Rising in CabulMurder of BurnesTreaty of 11th of DecemberMurder of MacnaghtenTreaty of January 1stAnnihilation of the Retreating ForceIrresolution of AucklandHis RecallDisasters in the Khyber PassPollock at PeshawurPosition of Affairs at JelalabadResistance determined uponApproach of Akbar KhanThe EarthquakePollock in the KhyberSale's VictoryEllenborough's ProclamationVotes of ThanksEllenborough orders RetirementThe PrisonersThey are savedReoccupation of CabulEllenborough's ProclamationThe Gate of Somnauth.The year 1812 opened, in England, by the assembling of Parliament on the 7th of January. The speech of the Regent was again delivered by commission. The great topic was the success of the war in Spain under Lord Wellington, whose military talents were highly praised. There was a reference also to the disagreements with America, and the difficulty of coming to any amicable arrangement with the United States. Lords Grey and Grenville, in the Peers, pronounced sweeping censures on the continuance of the war with France, and on the policy of Ministers towards America, from which source they prognosticated many disasters. In the Commons, the Opposition used similar language; and Sir Francis Burdett took a very gloomy view of our relations both with France and North America, and declared that we could anticipate no better policy until we had reformed our representative system.
TWO:Whilst this extirpation of the Pindarrees had been going on, the cholera broke out at Jessore, in the low lands of the Delta of the Ganges. This fatal disease has been supposed by medical men to receive its force, if not its origin, from the want of salt in this unhealthy district. Salt being one of the monopolies of the East India Company, it was not permitted, though abundant in Madras, to be carried into Bengal except on payment of a duty of two hundred per cent. The natives, therefore, who subsisted on a rice diet, not being able to procure this necessary antiseptic, frequently fell victims to the terrible scourge of cholera. From this centre, where it may fairly be said to have raged in perpetuity, it now spread rapidly up the course of the Ganges, the Jumna, and their confluent rivers, and if the British impost on salt had anything to do with the prevalence of the epidemic, a severe retribution now fell upon those who profited by it. The Marquis of Hastings, the Governor-General, was posted in Bundelcund with his army, when it appeared there and swept away thousands. The very men attending on the Governor-General at dinner dropped down behind his chair and died. To seek a healthier region, he marched eastward, but all the way the pest pursued him, and when he reached the healthy station of Erich, on the right bank of the Betwah river, towards the end of November, one-tenth of the force had fallen under its ravages. The scourge did not stop there, but for a number of years continued to spread at an amazing speed, and eventually overspread Europe with its horrors.There was one restitution, however, which the Allies had too delicately passed over on their former visit to Paristhat of the works of art which Napoleon and his generals had carried off from every town in Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands, during their wars. As has been already stated, museums had been freely pillaged by Buonaparte or by his orders. Accordingly, there was now a great stripping of the Louvre, and other places, of the precious pictures and statues which the hands of the greatest marauder that the world had ever seen had accumulated there. The "Horses of the Sun," from St. Mark's, Venice, the "Venus di Medici," the "Apollo Belvedere," the "Horses of the Car of Victory," which Buonaparte had carried away from Berlin, and many a glorious painting by the old masters, precious books, manuscripts, and other objects of antiquity, now travelled back to their respective original localities, to the great joy of their owners, and the infinite disgust of the French, who deemed themselves robbed by this defeat of robbery.












