He made vigorous onslaughts upon the privileges of the noblesse, and pleaded the cause of the middle and lower classes unanswerably. … In 1844, owing to a change of ministry which threw the liberals out of office, he lost the editorship of the Gazette; but he had kindled a flame which now blazed fiercely enough of itself." _E. L. Godkin, History of Hungary, chapter 21._ HUNGARY: A. D. 1847-1849. The struggle for National Independence and its failure. "A strong spirit of nationality had been growing up for many years, greatly fostered by Louis Kossuth, a newspaper editor. The old Magyar language, which had been treated as barbarous, was cultivated. Books and papers were printed in the tongue, all with the spirit of independence as a country and a race apart from that of the Austrians. In November, 1847, Ferdinand V. had opened the Diet in person, and proposed reforms in the Constitution were put before him. Count Batthyani, Prince Esterhazy, Kossuth, and others, drew up a scheme which was laid before the Emperor in the April of 1848, amid the crash of revolutions, and was assented to by him. But the other tribes within the kingdom of Hungary, the Rascians and Croats, began to make separate demands, and to show themselves stronger than the Magyars and Germans scattered among them. It was strongly suspected that they were encouraged by the Austrian powers in order to break down the new Hungarian constitution. The Hungarian council applied to have their national troops recalled from Lombardy, where, under Radetzky, they were preserving the Emperor's power; but this could not be granted, and only a few foreign regiments, whom they distrusted, were sent them. Disturbances broke out, and at the same time the Wallachians in Transylvania rose, and committed ravages on the property of Hungarians. The confusion was great, for these insurgents called the constitutional government of Hungary rebels, and professed to be upholding the rights of the Emperor, and, on the other hand, the Hungarian government viewed them as rebels. … Meantime a high-spirited Croatian officer, Baron Jellachich, had been appointed Ban of Croatia, and collected forces from among his wild countrymen to put down the Hungarian rule. … Jellachich advanced upon Pesth, and thus showed the Government there that in Ferdinand's eyes they were the rebels. Batthyani resigned, and Kossuth set himself to raise the people. Jellachich was defeated, and entered the Austrian states, appearing to menace Vienna. The effect of this was a tremendous insurrection of the Viennese, who seized Latour, the minister at war, savagely murdered him, and hung his body, stripped naked, to a lamp-post. The Viennese, under the command of the Polish General Bern, now prepared for a siege, while Windischgrätz