Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 67, No. 411, January 1850Various
History
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 67, No. 411, January 1850
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
That the contest in Hungary was one for the domination of a race,
not the freedom of people, is evident from two circumstances
which have been studiously kept out of view by the Liberal party,
both on the Continent and in England. The first is that _after_
the emperor had conceded to Hungary the most extreme liberal
institutions, based on universal suffrage, the Magyar leaders sent
private orders to all the Hungarian regiments in Radetsky's army
to leave his banners, and return to Hungary; thus rendering to
all appearance the dismemberment of the monarchy inevitable, and
surrendering the Italian provinces, the brightest jewel in the
Imperial crown, to the tender mercies of Charles Albert. The second
is, that, in the contest which ensued, the Hungarians were in the
end overthrown. Possessing, as Hungary does, fourteen millions of
inhabitants--nearly a moiety of the whole Austrian empire, and four
times more than Upper and Lower Austria, with the Tyrol, which
alone could be relied on in that crisis--it is evident that, if the
_whole_ Hungarian people had been united, they must have proved
victorious, and have decided the contest long before the distant
Muscovite battalions could have appeared on the theatre of war. The
Hungarian insurrection broke out in April 1848, and was aided by
contemporaneous revolts in Prague, Lombardy, Venice, and Vienna. To
all appearance the Austrian monarchy was torn in pieces. Muniments
of war they had in abundance: Comorn, with its vast arsenal and
impregnable walls, opened its arms to receive them. When Georgey
capitulated, he had one hundred and thirty-eight guns, besides
those in the hands of Kossuth and Bem. Fully half the military
stores of Austria fell into the hands of the Hungarians, the moment
the insurrection broke out. Yet, with all these advantages, they
were overcome. This demonstrates that the war was not a national
one, in the proper sense of the word: that is, it did not interest
the _whole_ people. It was an effort of a gallant and ambitious
race, forming a small minority of the population, to establish a
domination over the whole remainder of the inhabitants, and sever
themselves from the Austrian empire; and a greater calamity than
such a separation, both to the Hungarians themselves and the general
balance of power in Europe, cannot be imagined.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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