Vienna and the King of Pruffia were renewed and confirmed; and the right of the king to fucceed to the margraviates in the remote younger branches of his own family, upon the failure of iffue in the immediate poffeffors, (a right which had been only called in question through the vexation of the late conteft) was now fully acknowledged and established. The ducal houfe of Mecklenburgh was put off without any other advantage in lieu of its claims, than the promife of fome new privilege with refpect to appeals.

Upon the whole, few treaties of peace have been conducted upon more equitable principles, than thofe which feem to have prevailed in the prefent. The territory acquired by the houfe of Auftria is not inconfiderable; being about 70 English miles in length, and fomething from about half to a third of that extent in breadth. This acquifition lies between the Danube, the river Inn, the Saltza, and the borders of Auftria; including the towns of Scharding, Ried, Altheim, Braunau, Burghaufen, Fryburg, and fome others; forming, all together, a strong barrier, and a fixed unequivocal boundary, the limits of which are decifively marked out by thofe great rivers, between that archduchy, and the prefent dominions of Bavaria. This acceffion of territory, the court of Vienna feems, however, to have purchafed at fomething about a fair price; partly to be paid in money, and partly by a renunciation of old, vexatious, and otherwife inextinguishable claims, which however, in general, unproductive, would

for ever have kept open a fource of litigation, trouble, mifchief, and war. To which may be added, that the establishment of a fixed and permanent barrier and boundary between the two ftates, feems to be a measure fraught with greater advantage to the Elector of Bavaria, as the weaker prince, than to the Arch-Duke of Auftria, who is fo abundantly his fuperior in ftrength. It may likewife be farther obferved, that feveral parts of the ceded territory, were, what may be called, debateable land; the titles being difputed, oppofite claims laid, and they having been heretofore, at different times, objects of great conteft.

Such was the early and happy termination of the Ġerman war, A war of the greatest expectation; not more from the great power, than from the great abilities of the principal parties.

Many circumstances attending the late war and peace between Ruffia and the Porte, could not fail to fow the feeds of future difcontent, jealoufy, ill-will, and litigation, between the parties. Extraordinary fuccefs and triumph on the one fide, with an equal degree of lofs and difgrace on the other, are little calculated to promote any intercourfe of friendfhip, or cordiality of fentiment, among men; nor will a recollection of the hard neceflity under which a peace was fubfcribed, ferve at all to render palateable the bitternefs of its conditions. On the other hand, the victors are fure to confider the vanquished as owing them too much. They are apt to think, that they have always a right to claim thofe advantages, which they omitted to fe

eure in the moment of their fortune; and which they look upon as rights exitting though neglected, as they could not at that time have been refused if demanded.

The navigation of the Black Sea, the opening the gates of the Dardanelles and Bofphorus, fo as to admit a free intercourse from the White Sea to the Black, the affairs of the Crimea, with thofe of the Greek dependent provinces of Moldavia and Walachia, afforded the grounds of thofe difputes between the two empires, which were now rifen to fuch a height, as feemed to render a new war inevitable.

commerce on that fea. It may then be fairly prefumed, without an abfolute poffeflion of facts, that commercial avidity was continually increafed, in proportion to the number, magnitude, novelty, and value, of the objects which were gradually opened to its view; and that thus, new, and perhaps unreafonable claims, were as frequently ftarted on the one fide, as an indifpofition to comply with the fair and literal terms of the treaty, was prevalent on the other.

With respect to the firft of thefe articles, we have formerly had occafion to obferve, that nothing lefs than the most urgent neceflity, under the preffure of immediate and imminent danger, could have induced the Porte to admit Ruffia to the navigation of the Black Sea. It might be compared in private life, but under circumitances of infinitely greater danger and lofs, to a furrender of the benefits, navigation and fisheries of a fine lake, lying in the center of an eftate, into the hands of a powerful and litigious neighbour, who was watching only for means and opportunities to grafp at every part of the whole manor. It is not then to be doubted, that the Porte ufed every poffible evafion to avoid a compliance with, and threw every obftacle in the way which could tend to render ineffective, that article of the late treaty. It feems however, that the Ruffians had notwithstanding, with wonderful fpirit and induftry, very fpeedily advanced large cas pitals, and opened a confiderable

The fecond ground of difpute, feemed ftill more difficult and delicate. The Porte had unwilling ly confented by the late treaty, to admit or acknowledge the independence of the Crimea. That independence must be confidered only as nominal. Between fuch powers powers as Turkey and Rulia, fuch a power as the Khân of the Crim Tartars, cannot be really independent. The Turks were in hopes, as that prince and his fubjects are Mahometans, to weaken the force of that article, by their natural inclination to the Porte! Otherwife they would have confi dered their conceffion in a still worfe light. To have thrown that whole country, fituated as it is, with its own and the adjoining nations of Tartars, together with the reigning family, the immediate defcendants of Tamerlane, and in direct fucceffion to the Ottoman throne, entirely into the hands of Ruffia, were circumftances exceedingly grievous to a power, which ufed to give and not to receive the law. Yet this was already the difagreeable and alarming confequence of that con ceffion. For 'Ruffia, by a judicious but unfparing diftribution of pre

[4] 4

fents

fents amongst the Tartars, and by artfully fomenting fome divifions which had originated within them. felves, with respect to the fucceffion, had been able (as we have formerly fhewn) to defeat and depose the reigning khân, and to place a creature of her own, although a prince of the royal blood, in poffeffion of the nominal fovereignty; whilft the government was now in effect more dependent upon Ruffia, than it had even formerly been upon the Porte; the dependance being doubly fecured, as well by a predominant faction among the people, as by the difpofition or attachment of the prince. Ly thefe, and by other means, the Crimea, with Little Tartary, and the Budziac, were become fcarcely any thing less than provinces to Ruffia; or at leaft, they were as dependent on that empire, as the nature of that fingular people will admit of their being, while they retain any confiderable degree of inherent ftrength.

This conduct, and thefe circumstances, which certainly militated, at leaft, with the fpirit of the late treaty, could not but give great umbrage to the Porte; and afforded, if not a clear juftification, a tolerable ground of controverfy, with refpect to any flacknefs or non-compliance on her fide, in fulfilling its conditions. But they alfo afforded caufe of the most ferious concern and alarm. For that peninfula, furrounded as it is by the Black Sea, and the Palus Maotis, and commanding the communication between both, would afford fuch a claim of right to Ruffia, with fuch an intereft in, and fuch a ftrength upon those

feas, as nothing could afterwards be capable of oppofing

The difputes relative to the Greek nominal princes, but in effect governors, of Moldavia and Walachia, though not of a nature fo immediately alarming and dangerous as the foregoing, yet were founded on claims, and on an interference, which tended ulti, mately to the fame point; to the depreciation of the Ottoman power and government, the narrowing of its European dominion, and the finally throwing every thing on that fide of the Danube into

the hands of Ruffia. The attachment which the Greek Chrif tians, who inhabit these provinces, had fhewn to Ruffia in the late war, had, along with other motives, induced her to obtain very confiderable conceffions in their favour at the conclufion of the peace. The effect of the partial advantages granted to these two provinces was foon apparent, by the emigration of Chriftian inhabitants from thofe on the other fide of the Danube which it naturally occafioned; who, as well as the natives, looked up to another power, than that to which they avowed allegiance, for fayour and protection. In order to fecure their independence on the Porte, Ruffia made a demand, that thofe princes fhould not be depofed or punished, (mi fortunes to which they were particularly liable) on any pretence or account whatever.

In fo unhappy a state of weaknefs and diforder was that vast and unweildy empire, that it might be a queftion of doubt, whether to admire the fpirit, or to con

demn

demn the rafhnefs, which induced the apparent refolution and vigour, with which the prepared for war. The ill fuccefs of the late war, had drawn out and exhibited in their utmost magnitude thofe enormous disorders, which had for fo many years been acquiring growth, under a weak and wretched fyftem of government. The diftant provinces were till torn to pieces by faction and diffention; and the officers of the ftate, as well as the great men of the refpective countries, were fill, in many inftances, too powerful to be governed. To crown the calamity, the plague had in the preceding year made fuch horrible ravages in Conftantinople, as had not been before known in that capital, (to which it is fo frequent a vifitor) fince its first acquisition by the Ottomans. It was computed that above 160,000 perfons perished by that dreadful diforder, within the metropolis and its environs.

On the other hand, though Ruffia was confcious of the advantages acquired by the late treaty, fhe was far from defirous of war. That war, amidst its great and fplendid fucceffes, had discovered fome fymptoms of internal weaknefs. The rebellion of Pugatfcheff, was a fit which laid open fome defect in the conftitution. Befides, Ruffia probably could never hope, with the confent of other powers, to obtain advantages equal to the victories fhe might hereafter purchase as dearly as the had done thofe of the preceding war. By which, along with her Jaurels, the brought the plague into a country exhaufted of men and treasure. The empress was

therefore very willing to receive any mediation, confiftent with her dignity, which in all events fhe was refolved not to facrifice. France had the addrefs to avail herself of this fituation. The French minifter was again the friendly mediator, and the fuc cefsful negociator in bringing about an accommodation. And his merits and fervices were again honoured and rewarded, with fi milar expreffions of gratitude, and with fimilar marks of favour from both fides.

It was, in the first instance more efpecially, a matter of no fmall general aftonishment, that Great Britain, which had been fo long and fo clofely united, in the ftrict eft bands of friendship, and apparent political communion of views and interefts, with Ruffia, and which had even gone fome extraordinary lengths in the late war in her favour, fhould not have undertaken the friendly office of mediator; by which means fhe would likewife have had an opportunity of wearing off that, not unfounded, jealoufy, which the Porte could not but entertain of her late conduct. On the other hand, a strong jealousy had for several years fubfifted between France and Ruffia; and their political interefts and regards so much clashed with refpect to that war, that all the world knew, it was in a good meafure the apprehenfion of England, which prevented the house of Bourbon from taking a decided part against the latter, upon her fending a fleet to the Mediterranean.

Whether it was that we were too feeble in the Mediterranean to appear with any luftre in fuch a negociation,