THE THREE KINGDOMS.

THE transition to activity and interest from leisure and indifference has seldom been more marked than at
the close of the long vacation of '51. Wearied out of patience with the Pope and his Cardinals, tired to
death of the Great Exhibition, there suddenly sprung up in the very nicety of time a variety of subjects to
satisfy the public craving. We have had the great leader of the Magyars preaching his crusade throughout
our cities. We have had the new law of Evidence put upon its trial in our Courts. We have had Mr.
Edwards, Mr. Blagg, Mr. Coppock, and Mr. Blanks set up in a pillory at St. Albans. The new Lord Mayor has
gone to Westminster attended by no less than five-and-twenty men in armour; and the old Lord Mayor has been
pitilessly "sat upon" by a whole court of belligerent aldermen. Rumours of outbreaks and revolutions
have been floating over the Continent with every breeze: while the wires of the electric telegraph, at last
safely submerged in the waters of the Channel, have been flashing messages of peace between the shores of
Calais and Dover.

Far above those messages of peace, however, have risen for the moment the war-notes of the Hungarian
exile. The eloquence of M. Kossuth has been acting as a charm. All within whose reach it came have been
listening without thought of what its glowing periods aimed at, until the apostles of universal peace have found
themselves unexpectedly assisting at what would probably, if successful, inaugurate a general war. Even
now that the eloquent hero has departed, and Mr. Gilpin no longer rides in his chariot, and Mr. Cobden's
unadorned periods mingle no more with his thrilling invocations, and Mr. Bright's denunciations of bribery
thunder no longer in the ears of his opponents, public opinion is left strangely divided as to the moral results
of his oratorical crusade. Desiring rather with a strict impartiality to describe, than for the future to take any
active share in promoting, this eager conflict of opinion, let us make the attempt, in this place, to discriminate
its leading phases.

His welcome from particular sections of the extreme liberal party has been hearty and unmisgiving
throughout. They have accepted his visit as the practical announcement of the advent of a new era in the
history of Europe. They say that its result has exhibited an eagerness in the people, which must react with
great force upon the government, to be no longer content with offering a silent sympathy to the struggles
for freedom which have convulsed Europe, and affected even the empire of Asia. As a direct consequence
of this feeling they anticipate the most formidable alliance which the continental despots have yet seen
banded against them. In the vote of the American Congress in favour of M. Kossuth, in the vessel sent to
convey him from the shore of his captivity, in the preparations throughout the Union for a reception such as
no man since Lafayette has found awaiting him, they discover certain signs of a power about to enter the
European field of politics sufficient to balance even the colossal weight of Russia. In short, the somewhat
feeble help which England has heretofore been able to give to continental liberty, is now to be strengthened
and made thoroughly efficacious by sturdy alliance with her transatlantic cousin. There is thus to be a
combination of all the members of the Anglo-Saxon race, on behalf of the old Saxon principles of self-
government; and as a proof that this sympathy of the American people for European liberty actually
prevails, and is ready to show itself in act as well as word, an old and most distinguished member of the
American Congress has appeared at M. Kossuth's banquets to denounce the tyranny of Russia, to warn
England that she is not safe in the neighbourhood of a coalition of European despots, to foreshadow the
nobler alliance of two great and kindred nations, and to offer the right hand of American fellowship to
that large party of English Liberals who are willing to undergo every risk for the maintenance and extension
of constitutional freedom. The party of whose opinions we speak have accepted all the later speeches of
M. Kossuth as but a glowing commentary on this great text. They regard it as his primary distinction to
have perceived the approach of a fact so enormous, to have acted upon it, and to have shaped his studies
and exertions to its realisation. That such a drawing up of all the peoples of Europe, for the first time in
history, in array against all the kings, is an awful spectacle to anticipate, they do not deny; nor do they
affect to conceal their profound regret at such a crisis being imminent; but they believe it to have be
solely occasioned by the crimes and blunders of the old governments themselves, and they hold that it never
can be safely dealt with by supporting the pretensions of those governments to re-establish the now old and effete
regimes of courtierdom, soldierdom, and policedom, over millions who have become alive to their sufferings,
their rights, their numbers, and their power. When M. Kossuth has told them, therefore, that in Hungary,
in Germany, in Italy, and in France, the peoples want but a favourable opportunity to rise simultaneously
against oppression, they who hold these opinions do not shrink from the conclusion that the time is near at
hand for that practical alliance of America and England which can alone operate as the stop to Russia and
her barbarians; and they revel in the hope, as Mr. Bright expressed it in Manchester, of "a glorious
resurrection of the trampled nations." But at the same time, being many of them members of the Peace
Society, they are not without expectation that the mere fact of the alliance may suffice for the resurrection,
and that all which needs to be done may be done by the exertion of diplomacy.

Up to this point, the party of which we have been speaking carry the more intelligent of the Chartist
leaders with them. These men have enjoyed heartily M. Kossuth's dry rejection of Mr. Feargus O'Connor's
overflowing "love; " and, in consideration of his having decisively pronounced, not only for a republic with