FORE:But now Catherine of Russia had concluded her entanglements with Turkey. It was the August of 1791, and her eyes turned immediately on Poland, and she pretended to take great offence and alarm at the new Constitution, as full of French and Revolutionary principles, and therefore intolerable to any neighbouring state. She began to negotiate with Sweden, and Prussia, and Austria, to co-operate with her in her design against Poland. Prussia was easily led to adopt her ideas, for the king was like herself, greedy of his neighbour's dominions, and had been repulsed by the Poles in grasping at Thorn and Dantzic. Leopold of Austria was, by his connection with the royal party of France, through his sister, naturally ready to put down any influence from the French Revolution in a neighbouring country; but he was indisposed to war, and too just and moderate for aggression. His death, on the 1st of March, 1792, removed this obstacle, and Francis, his successor, was found to be more accessible to the Czarina's selfish arguments. Russia, Prussia, and Austria were all agreed on the plunder of Poland, whilst they still preserved the most hypocritical appearance of caring only for its unity and national interests. As for Gustavus III., of Sweden, brave and honest as he was, he was of such chivalrous and, to a certain degree, insane character, that he was easily led on by the artful Empress of Russia to lend himself to her designs, without being aware of them. He had declared himself the knight of Marie Antoinette, and had sworn to rescue her. He was avaricious of military glory, and, like his predecessor, Charles XII., he was desirous only of conducting some great and brilliant enterprise. He desired to lead an army against the French, now bursting out under the Revolutionary general, Custine, on Germany, and, joining with the army of the Emigrants, eighteen thousand in number, to beat back the Democratic general, to march into France, and restore the throne of Louis and Marie Antoinette. But he had no money; the Empress of Russia, who wished him employed at a distance, and especially in keeping back the French Democrats, whilst she carved up Poland, offered him both money and arms. But the Empress was relieved of the high-minded Gustavus in a manner which she had by no means contemplated. He fell, on the 16th of March, in his own capital, by the hand of an assassin called Ankarstr?m.When peace was made in Europe, the United States became anxious for peace too. Madison had begun the war in the ungenerous hope of wresting Canada from Great Britain, because he thought her too deeply engaged in the gigantic war against Napoleon to be able to defend that colony. He believed that it would fall an easy prey; that the Canadians must so greatly admire the model republic that they would abandon monarchy at the first call, and that he should thus have the glory of absorbing that great world of the north into the American Republic. In all this, he and those who thought with him found themselves egregiously deceived. The Canadians showed they were staunchly attached to Great Britain, and the attempts at invasion were beaten back by the native militia and by our handful of troops with the greatest ease. Meanwhile, the blockade of the east, and the seizure of the merchant shipping, drove the New England and other eastern States to desperation. Throughout this war Great Britain made a uniform declaration of a preference for peace, but her offers were regularly rejected so long as Napoleon was triumphant. The United States, professing the utmost love of freedom, were the blind and enthusiastic worshippers of the man who was trampling the liberties of all Europe under his feet. It was not till the last momentnot till he had been defeated in Russia, driven by Britain out of Spain, routed and pursued out of Germany, and compelled to renounce the Imperial Crown of Francethat the American Government began to understand the formidable character of the Power which it had so long and so insolently provoked, and to fear the whole weight of its resentment directed against its shores. It is certain that, had Britain been animated by a spirit of vengeance, it had now the opportunity, by sending strong fleets and a powerful army to the coast of America, to ravage her seaboard towns, and so utterly annihilate her trade as to reduce her to the utmost misery, and to precipitate a most disastrous system of internal disintegration. The New England States, in 1814, not only threatened to secede, but stoutly declared that they would not furnish another shilling towards paying the expenses of the war. They even intimated an idea of making a separate peace with Britain. In Massachusetts especially these[114] menaces were vehement. Governor Strong spoke out plainly in the Legislative Chamber of that State. Madison endeavoured to mollify this spirit by abandoning his Embargo and Emancipation Acts, but this was now too late, for the strict blockade of the British, in 1814, rendered these Acts perfectly dead.
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