Not only were they threatened, but many of them dethroned. The imbecile Emperor of Austria had to flee from his capital, as also the bureaucratic King of France. Weak William of Prussia was called to account by his long-suffering subjects, and compelled, upon bended knees, to grant them a Constitution.
A score of little kinglets had to follow the example; while the Pope, secret supporter of them all, was forced to forsake the Vatican—that focus and hotbed of political and religious infamy—driven out by the eloquent tongue of Mazzini and the conquering blade of Garibaldi.
Even England, secure in a profound indifference to freedom and reform, trembled at the cheers of the Chartists.
Every crowned head in Europe had its “scare” or discomfiture; and, for a time, it was thought that liberty was at length achieved.
Alas! it was but a dream of the people—short-lived and evanescent—to be succeeded by another long sleeps under an incubus, heavier and more horrid than that they had cast off.
While congratulating one another on their slight spasmodic success, their broken fetters were being repaired, and new chains fabricated, to bind them faster than ever. The royal blacksmiths were at work, and in secret, like Vulcan at his subterranean forge.
And they were working with a will, their object and interests being the same. Their common danger had driven them to a united action, and it was determined that their private quarrels should henceforth be set aside—to be resuscitated only as shams, when any of them required such fillip to stimulate the loyalty of his subjects.
This was the new programme agreed upon. But, before it could be carried out, it was necessary that certain of them should be assisted to recover that ascendency over their people, lost in the late revolution.
Sweeping like a tornado over Europe, it had taken one and all of them by surprise. Steeped in luxurious indulgence—in the exercise of petty spites and Sardanapalian excesses—confident in the vigilance of their trusted sentinel, Wellington—they had not perceived the storm till it came tearing over them. For the jailor of Europe’s liberty was also asleep! Old age, with its weakened intellect, had stolen upon him, and he still dotingly believed in “Brown Bess,” while Colt’s revolver and the needle-gun were reverberating in his ears.
Yes, the victor of Waterloo was too old to aid the sons of those tyrant sires he had re-established on their thrones.