like you as a patient." "And I," said the Prince, "love you as a man of learning and intelligence, but you know I hate physic." The Princes of the Imperial family are obliged to receive the viaticum in the presence of the Court. It was feared to inform the Duke of Reichstadt that the time had come for him to fulfil this last duty. The Court prelate Michel Wagner, who had instructed him while a child, did not feel able to propose it to him. The Archduchess Sophia, who had given the young Prince so many proofs of tender and affectionate interest, took upon herself to conceal this terrible truth from him by persuading him to unite their prayers, he for his cure, she for her approaching accouchement. The ceremony was performed in the midst of a sad and numerous assembly, who were present at the sacrifice, though the Prince was not aware of it. What a sight! the union of these two members of the Imperial family at the foot of the altar; one pale, exhausted, almost expiring, receiving the sacrament of death when hardly on the threshold of life; the Archduchess, in all the brilliancy of beauty, youth, and maternity, preparing herself by this religious act to consecrate the birth of her second child. It was of a deeply touching character, the reflection which thus united in one prayer life and death, the cradle and the tomb. The Prince grew perceptibly weaker and worse every day; he was sometimes carried to an enclosure in the gardens of Schoenbrunn, and there placed on a balcony that projected from his apartment, that he might enjoy the air which his lacerated breast now breathed with great difficulty. Soon he could not leave his bed. He was in that state fluctuating between hope and despair, which is the characteristic symptom of his complaint; but when he spoke to us of his approaching death, it was with the immoveable firmness of a brave man. On the evening of the twenty-first of July, Doctor Malfettis informed us that he feared the worst the following night. Baron Moll never left his chamber, but unknown to him, for he could not bear any one should stay with him at night. For some time he seemed to be dying. Towards half past three he raised himself on his couch, and exclaimed, "I am sinking! I am sinking!" (Ich gehe unter) Baron Moll and his valet de chambre took him in their arms, and tried to calm him. "Mother! mother!" were his last words. Hoping that it was only a passing weakness, Baron Moll hesitated to send for the Archduchess; but when he saw the Prince's feature becoming fixed and deathlike, he trusted him to the valet, and ran to call the grandmaitresse of Maria Louise and the Archduke Francis, whom the Prince had asked to be with him in his last moments. Maria Louise thought herself able to stand by her expiring son, but she fell kneeling at his bedside. The Duke of Reichstadt could not speak; his dimmed eye fixed on his mother tried to express to her the feelings his lips had not life to utter. The prelate then pointing towards Heaven, he raised his eyes in answer to the thought. At eight minutes past five he expired without a struggle, in the same chamber which the triumphant Napoleon had occupied, in the same place where, for the last time dictating peace as a conqueror, he slept amid all the illusions of victory, promising himself a glorious marriage and the eternity of his dynasty. It was the twenty-second July the anniversary of the act which had given to the Duke of Reichstadt his last name and title, the anniversary of the day on which the Prince learnt at Schoenbrunn the death of Napoleon. On the coffin was the following inscription: "To the memory of Joseph François Charles, Duke of Reichstadt, son of Napoleon, Emperor of the French, and of the Archduchess Maria Louisa of Austria, born at Paris, twentieth March, 1812, saluted in his cradle by the title of King of Rome. In the flower of his youth, and endowed with every fine quality of mind and body, of an imposing stature, noble and agreeable features, elegant in his language, remarkable for his military information and aptitude, he was attacked with a phthisis and died in the Emperor's castle at Schoenbrunn near Vienna, the twenty-second July, 1832." Unfortunate Prince, when in agony you slowly approached the tomb, you exclaimed, "so young alas! must I end a useless and obscure life? My birth and my death-they are my history." Ah! your life did not close without fame, though deprived of the perilous honors of power, the terrible brilliancy of battles, without great events, but not great qualities. Your existence furnishes, by its contrast with the prodigious life of your father, one of the most eloquent pages of history, perhaps the most worthy of our meditations. That being is not extinguished without glory which learns how to conquer the love and regrets of the Imperial family, and of a people whom the author of your being crushed under the power of his victories. The lamentations of the people of Vienna escorting to the tomb of the Czars the coffin of the son of Napoleon, is a noble funeral oration. The tears shed at your funeral are preferable to those drawn by victory: for victory draws more than tears. If, to give the world one of its sublimest lessons, heaven chose that your premature end should be the termination of a great sacrifice, at least it took care to adorn the victim with such high qualities and precious gifts, as rendered him worthy of the oblation, and consecrated him forever in the memory of mankind. The credit system of France, Great Britain, and the United States. By H. C. Carey, author of the Principles of Political THE SECOND SESSION OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH CONGRESS. THE SENATE. (Continued from Vol. IV. page 120.) THIS NUMBER CONTAINS SEVEN SHEETS, OR ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE PAGES. AMONG the phrases which within a year or two past have been resounded through the community by partizan zeal, for the purpose of disturbing the reflection and judgment of our fellow-citizens, none perhaps has been the subject of so much senseless declamation as that at the head of the present article. If reliance is to be placed upon the evidence furnished by newspaper paragraphs, dinner orations, and Congress speeches, "the Credit System," is the veritable horn of plenty from which all the bounties bestowed upon our favored land have been poured forth. The extent and fertility of our territory-the variety and value of its staple productions-the indomitable energy of our citizens and the habits of industry and thrift so widely diffused among them-the security furnished by our system of self-government against improper restraints upon individual enterprise-and the protection for the acquisitions of diligence and economy, guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States in its golden provision that nothing but a sound and equal currency shall ever be made a legal tender for the payment of debts-these are all nothing compared with the CREDIT SYSTEM in promoting the prosperity of the country. The phrase in question denotes something wholly distinct from that mutual confidence and good faith among men, which are the most essential elements of the prosperity and happiness of all communities. These fundamentals of well ordered society require to be preserved equally from violent outrage and fraudulent cupidity. The principal object for surrendering a portion of our natural lib. erty, and submitting to the restraints of any form of Government, is to afford this protection by placing every individual, however different with regard to strength, cunning, talent, and wealth, equally under the broad aegis of the law. But is the artificial policy, dignified with the name of the "Credit *The credit system of France, Great Britain, and the United States. By H. C. Carey, author of the Principles of Political Economy. Philadelphia. 1838. |