by the superscription, to open in In the mean time, the news of Alexander's decease had reached Warsaw on the 7th of December, two days before the event was made known in St. Petersburgh. Constantine, however, continued to live as a private individual; and, far from assuming any of the titles or emblems of royalty, despatched, *The following is a letter from Constantine to the minister of justice, prince Lobanow Rostowsky. "The counsellor of the college of the section of the procurators-general of the directing senate has remitted to me a despatch for your highness with this addressTo his Imperial Majesty Conslantine Paulowitsch,' a very submissive report of the minister of justice.' "As I do not think myself entitled to accept it, because, according to this direction, it is not sent to me, I send it back to your highness by the same officer. By my letter of the 3rd (15th) of December to his excellency the president of the senate, the privy counsellor of the first class, prince Labouchin, your royal highness must have been exactly inform ed of the reasons which do not permit me to accept the imperial dignity. I have, in consequence, only to repeat to you in a few words, that, according to the oath taken by all the subjects on the accession of his majesty the emperor Alexander, of glorious memory, in which, among other things, it is expressly said that every subject is faithfully to serve and to obey in all things, not only his majesty the emperor Alexander Paulowitsch, but also the successor to the throne of his imperial majesty who should be designated ; and as it appears from the documents opened in the council of state, which are entirely conformable to those deposited with the directing senate, that by the supreme will of his late majesty, the grand duke Nicholas has been designated as successor to the throne, the directing senate, as conservator of the will of his late majesty the emperor Alexander Paulowitsch, of glorious memory, ought to consented to mount the throne; and by a manifesto, dated the 24th of December, announced his own accession, and communicated to the empire the instruments under which his right to the throne arose. These were, the letter from Constantine to the late emperor, expressive of his desire to abdicate the right of succession, stating that he "does not lay claim to the spirit, the abilities, or the strength, which would be required to exercise the high dignity" attaching eventually to his right of primogeniture, and declaring himself satisfied with private life-Alexander's answer, accepting the renunciation manifesto by Alexander, in conformity to the preceding arrangement, settling the crown on Nicholas and the letters dated the 26th of November, (o. s.) from Constantine to Nicholas and the empress mother, referring to his former abdication, and confirming it. At the same time, the new emperor transmitted to Constantine a rescript announcing his accession; to which that prince immediately returned an answer, displaying the affection of a brother and the duty of a subject." have carried it, and will carry it into execution. a Though the manifesto was dated on the 24th of December, it was not till the 25th of December, that Nicholas read, in the senate, the formal renunciation of the crown by his brother, and declared that he accepted the throne. He was immediatly proclaimed emperor of Russia. On the 26th, the manifesto of Nicholas the First was published: and on the morning of that day, all the regiments of the guards were to take the oath of alaccession to the ancient throne of our beloved Russia. The supreme law of Russia, the sacred law, which the stability of the existing order of things renders a blessing of heaven, is the will of the sovereign whom Providence gives us. By executing this will, your imperial majesty has executed that of the King of kings, who so evidently inspires the monarchs of the earth in affairs of such high importance. The decrees of God are accomplished. If I have in any thing co-operated in their accomplishment, I have only done my duty; the duty of a faithful subject, of a devoted brother, in short, of a Russian, who is proud of the happiness of obeying God and his sovereign. The Almighty, who protects the destinies of Russia and the majesty of the throne, who lavishes his benediction on the people whom he finds faithful to his laws-the Almighty, in his mercy, will be your guide, Sire, and will guide you by his light. If my most ardent efforts can contribute to lighten the burden which God has imposed on you, I hasten to lay at the foot of your throne the homage of my unlimited devotedness, of my fidelity, of my submission, and of my zeal in executing the will of your imperial majesty. I implore the Most High, that his holy and inscrutable providence may watch over the precious health of your majesty, that he may prolong your days, and that your glory, Sire, the glory of your crown, may be transmitted from generation to generation. CONSTANTINE. I am, Sire, your imperial majesty's most faithful subject. (Signed) Warsaw, Dec. 20, 1825, (Jan. 1, 1826.) [M] legiance to the new sovereign. At noon the general of the guards and of the staff, came to the palace to announce that the oath had been taken by the regiment of horse guards, by the guards of Preobajensky Semenoffsky, the grenadiers Pawlowsky, the chasseurs of the guard and of Finland, and by the miners and sappers. No accounts had been received from the other regiments, but this circumstance was attributed to their barracks being at a greater distance: until it was announced that four officers of artillery had shown some opposition; that they had been put under arrest; and that the remainder of the artillery had taken the oath unanimously. Immediately afterwards, news was brought that 300 or 400 men of the regiment of Moscow had quitted their barrack with colours flying, and had proclaimed Constantine the First. These men proceeded to the square of Isaac, where they were soon joined by great numbers of the people and by many soldiers of the body grenadier regiment, and of the marines of the guard. No other corps took part in the sedition, and the numbers of the factious did not exceed 2,000. Informed Informed of these disorders, general Miloradovitsch proceeded to the square to address the rebels. But at that moment a man in plain clothes fired a pistol-shot at him, and he died of the wound some hours afterwards. The emperor himself appeared without arms, and attempted to reclaim the mutineers, but without success. At last, after having exhausted all gentle means, and after having in vain explained the circumstance of the renunciation of Constantine, he was forced, at the approach of evening, to order the troops and artil lery to advance. The rebels, having formed themselves into a square, had the boldness to fire first, but they were soon dispersed, and pursued in all directions. The number killed amounted to two hundred. At six o'clock order was re-established; the troops remained faithful, and the greater portion of them bivouacked all night round the palace. The grand duke Michael, who arrived in St. Petersburgh at the moment of the tumult, succeeded in reclaiming six companies of the Moscow regiment, who took no part in the revolt, but who refused to take the oath. This disturbance, it was alleged, was not the effect of any accident or of any predilection of the soldiery for the prince who had abdicated, but the result of a revolutionary plot which had been in existence for many years, and which seized this moment as a favourable opportunity for accomplishing the designs of the conspirators, by means of the assassination of the whole of the imperial family, and a general massacre of all who should adhere to their cause. To investigate the subject, the emperor immediately instituted a special committee of inquiry, consisting of the grand duke Michael, the minister of war general Tatistcheff, the privy counsellor prince Galitzin, generals Berkendorff, Lewascheff, and Patapoff. This committee, it was stated, quickly ascertained the nature and the extent of the plot, and the names of those who were most active in its formation and management. Numerous arrests, especially of military officers, took place, both in the capital and in various provinces of the empire. "What did the conspirators intend?" said Nicholas, in a proclamation issued on the 2nd of January, "The sacred words of fidelity, oath, legitimate order, even the name of the Cesarowitsch and the grand duke Constantine, were for them only a pretext for treason. They wished to profit by the moment to accomplish their criminal design-designs long contrived, long meditated, long matured in darkness, and the mystery of which the government had penetrated only in part. They intended to cast down the throne and the laws, to overturn the empire, to produce anarchy. What were their means? As sassination. Their first victim was the military governor, count Milaradowitsch. He, whom, in the field of honour, the chance of war had spared in 50 battles, has fallen under the hand of an assassin. This murder is not the only one. Count Sturler, commander of the regiment of grenadiers of the body guard, killed; major-general Schenschin, major-general Fredericks, and others, severely wounded, have sealed with their blood their fidelity to honour and to duty. "Hurried in the tumult, the soldiers of the companies that were seduced did not participate in these crimes, either in act or intention. A rigorous inquiry has given me the proof of this, and I consider it as a first act of justice, as well as my first consolation, to declare them innocent. But the same justice forbids us to spare the guilty. All those against whom proceedingsare instituted, and who shall be convicted, will undergo a punishment proportioned to their crimes. "From the measures already taken in the proceedings, the punishment will embrace in its whole extent, in all its ramifications, an evil the germ of which is of the growth of years; and I am confident they will destroy it to the very root; they will purge of this foreign contagion the sacred soil of Russia; they will cause to disappear that odious mixture of melancholy truths and gratuitous suspicions which is repugnant to noble minds; they will draw for ever a decisive and ineffaceable line of demarcation between love of country and revolutionary passions, between the desire of improvement and the rage of convulsions; they will show to the world that the Russian nation, always faithful to its sovereign and to the laws, repels the secret efforts of anarchy, as it has repelled the open attacks of its declared enemies; they will show how people may free themselves from such a scourge; they will prove that, it is not every where indestructible.” The real nature and extent of the alleged plot was not disclosed to the world. The rumour, was, that an attempt to establish a constitution was to have commenced by murdering the whole imperial family, on the 12th of January, a day on which every member of the family attends, at the chapel in the castle, the celebration of a religious ceremony in memory of Paul. The imperial victims were to have been shut up in the chapel, and there murdered; the castle was then to have been seized, all the foreigners were to have been massacred, and the town given up to the soldiers, to be pillaged, for three days. That there did exist a conspiracy, subsequent events showed too plainly. In consequence of the discoveries made by the committee of inquiry, orders were sent to arrest licut. colonel Mouravieff' Apostol, of the infantry regiment of Tchernigoff. These orders were executed by lieut. colonel Gebel, commanding that regiment: but Mouravieff attacked that officer and wounded him in several places. He then instigated six companies of the regiment to revolt, by urging upon them the obligation to remain faithful to the oath which they had taken to Constantine. He next arrested the courier and the gens d'armes who had been sent to convey him to St. Petersburgh, pillaged the regimental chest, set the malefactors who were confined in the municipal prison of Vassilkoff, free from their chains, and gave the town up to the licentiousness of the soldiery. Three companies, however, of the regiment, under the orders of major Trouchin, remained firm to their duty, and separated themselves from the insurgents. As soon as the commander-in-chief of the first army was informed of these events, he ordered prince Scherbatoff to proceed directly, with a sufficient number of troops, to exterminate the rebels; and lest they might escape from the pursuit of that officer, the emperor confided the command of another corps of infantry to the grand duke Constantine, with a view to secure more certainly the suppression of the revolt. Mouravieff at first seems to have intended to march upon Bronssiloff by Yastoff: but the motions of his pursuers compelled him to change his plan, and he was proceeding towards Bela-Tcherkoff, in the hope of getting possession of considerable sums of money, which were in the house of the countess Branicka. He was, however, soon surrounded on all sides; and, on the morning of the 15th of January, a detachment under the command of lieutenant general Roth came up with the insurgents on the heights of Oustinovka, near the village of Pologoff, in the district of Vassilkoff. Mouravieff Apostol, seeing the imperial troops approach, formed the rebels into a square, and advanced upon the artillery: but being received by a discharge of grape shot, the square was immediately broken. The cavalry then made a charge, and all the insurgents threw down their arms. About seven hundred soldiers were taken prisoners, as well as Mouravieff Apostol himself, who was severely wounded by a grape shot, and by a sabre cut on the head; the second captain, baron Solovieff, lieutenant Bystrytchy, the sub-lieutenant Bestoujeff-Rioumine, of the infantry regiment of Poltava, and a brother of Mouravieff, a lieutenant-colonel on halfpay, were also prisoners. Lieutenants Kouzmine, Chippela, and another brother of Mouravieff Apostol, were killed, besides many soldiers; and some were wounded. Of the imperial troops not a man was either killed or wounded. Nicolas professed a firm purpose to pursue the same policy which his deceased brother had followed. The note addressed by count Nesselrode, minister for Foreign Affairs, to the foreign ministers accredited to the court of Russia, on the emperor's accession, was in these words :-"Called to the inheritance of the dominions of the emperor Alexander, the emperor Nicolas inherits also the principles which directed the policy of his august predecessor; and his Imperial Majesty has therefore given orders to his ambassadors, ministers, and agents at foreign courts, to declare to them, that, earnestly striving to follow the footsteps of the Sovereign whose loss he deplores, he will profess the same fidelity to the engagements contracted by Russia, the same respect for all rights con |