Since 1750, however, improvements of various kinds have been slowly, but gradually gaining ground; and, within the last few years, several important and substantial reforms have been introduced, that will, it is to be hoped, conspire to raise this fine island from the abyss into which it has been cast by bad laws and bad government.

GENOA.

A history of the various revolutions of Genoa would be a record of continual turbulence, but still interesting. Our limits, however, prevent us from attempting even a synopsis of them. In the time of the second Pu nic war, it was a considerable city under the dominion of Rome. Mago, a Carthaginian general, in the course of the war, attacked, took, and destroyed it. The senate thereupon sent the pro-consul Spurius, who in less than two years raised it to its former splendour. It remained under the Romans until it submitted to the Goths. The Lombards next possessed and almost ruined it. Charlemagne annexed it to the French empire Pepin, his son, gave the city of Genoa, and its dependencies, to a French lord of the name of Adhesnar, under the title of count. His descendants reigned until the end of the eleventh century, when the Genoese revolted against their count, set themselves at liberty, and chose magistrates from among the nobles. In the next century, the city was taken by the Saracens, who put all the men to the sword, and sent the women and children as slaves into Africa.

When again re-established, the inhabitants availed themselves of their fine situation, turned their attention to commerce, enriched themselves, became powerful in proportion to their riches, and erected their country into a republic. Their enthusiasm for liberty rendered this republic capable of great things. In it were joined the opulence of commerce with the superiority of arms. The jealousy and ambition of the citizens at length caused great troubles; the emperors, the kings of Naples, the Viscontis, the Sforzas, and France, successively called in by the different parties, divided the republic. In 1217, the principal Genoese, fearful of once more becoming the victims of civil war, chose as their first magisrate a stranger. In 1339, the state appeared in a somewhat more regular form, and had acquired tranquility. Simon Bocanegra, a man of an illustrious family, was elected duke, or doge, with a council composed of the chiefs of the principal families. In 1396, the Genoese put themselves under the protection of Charles VI., king of France, whom they acknowledged as their sovereign. In 1409, they massacred the French, and gave their government to the marquis of Montferrat. In 1458, Francis Sforza, duke of Milan, was acknowledged sovereign protector of the republic of Genoa; but his administration tending to despotism, they set themselves at liberty. It was at this time that they offered the sovereignty of their city to Louis XI. Louis, well acquainted with the disposition of the Genoese, unfiit either to command or obey, made this answer to their so licitations: "If the Genoese give themselves to me, I will give them all to the devil."

In 1528, Andrew Doria had the happiness and address to unite and conciliate this refractory people, and establish an aristocratic government. This form continued until the French republicans made their fapid conquests in Italy. Genoa was the scene of many hard-fought battles. At length, in 1797, a new republic was raised, under the name of the Ligurian republic; but which, like the rest of the modern French creations, was dissolved at the downfall of Napoleon, in 1815, and transformed to a de pe.dent province of Sardinia.

THE HISTORY OF SARDINIA

SARDINIA is an insular and continental kingdom in the south of Europe. The continental part occupies the north-west portion of Italy, and is bounded by Switzerland on the north, the duchies of Milan and Parma on the east, the Mediterranean on the south, and France on the west. It stretches about 200 miles from north to south, and 130 from east to west. It consists at present of Piedmont, with the county of Nice; the duchy of Montferrat; part of the duchy of Milan; the territory of the late republic of Genoa; Savoy (not properly included in Italy), and the island of Sardinia, with the adjacent isles.

THE ISLAND OF SARDINIA

is divided from Corsica by the Strait of Bonifacio. The Greeks called it Ichnusa Sandaliotis, and Sardo. While it was in the possession of the Romans, it was a place of banishment; and afterward the Saracens possessed it nearly four centuries. Their expulsion could not be effected by the Pisanese, on whom Pope Innocent III. had assumed the prerogative of bestowing it in 1132. The emperor Frederic paid so little regard to this grant, that he again reunited it with the empire; but the Pisanese taking advantage of the long interregnum, got possession of it in 1257. A difference afterward arising between them and the see of Rome, the pope again bestowed the island, in 1298, on James II. of Arragon, whose son, Alphonso IV. made himself master of it in 1324. From this time it continued under the crown of Spain, governed by a viceroy until 1708, when the English making a conquest of it for King Charles III., afterward emperor, by the title of Charles VI., it was confirmed to him by the treaty of Utrecht. In 1717, it was recovered by the Spaniards; and in 1718 the emperor exchanged it for Sicily with the duke of Savoy, who was put in actual possession of it in 1720, and took the title of king of Sardinia.

"The inhabitants of Sardinia," says Mr. Salt, "(I speak of the common people), are yet scarcely above the negative point of civilization; perhaps It would be more correct to say that they appear to have sunk a certain way back into barbarism. They wear, indeed, linen shirts, fasted at the collar by a pair of silver buttons, like hawks' bills; but their upper dress of shaggy goats' skins in the pure savage style. A few have gone one step nearer to perfectability, and actually do wear tanned leather coats, made somewhat in the fashion of the armour worn in Europe in the 15th century. With such durable habiliments, it is easy to conceive that they do not require much assistance from the manufactures of foreign coun tries." Another writer, whom we have frequently quoted in this work says, "Notwithstanding her extent, the richness of her soil, her position in the centre of the Mediterranean, and her convenient harbours, Sardinia has been strangely neglected, not only by her own governments, but by the European powers generally; and has remained, down to our own times, in a semi-barbarous state. A long series of wars and revolutions followed by the establishment of the feudal system in its most vexatious and oppressive form; the fact of her having been for a lengthened period a dependency of Spain, and, if that were possible, worse governed even than the dominant country; the division of the island into immense estates, most of which were acquired by Spanish grandees; the want of leases, and the restrictions on industry, have paralysed the industry of the inhabitants, and sunk them to the lowest point in the scale of civilization

BAVARIA.

BAVARIA, now one of the principal secondary states of Germany, was derived from a circle of the German empire, of the same name, bounded by Franconia and Bohemia on the north, Austria on the east, Tyrol on the south, and Suabia on the west. The earliest inhabitants of Bavaria were a tribe of Celtic origin called the Boii, from whom it received its old Latin name of Boiaria; but, about the time of Augustus, the Romans subdued it, and it afterwards formed a part of what they_termed Rhætia, Vindelicia and Noricum. After the downfall of the Roman empire, Bavaria fell under the dominion of the Ostrogoths and Franks, by whom it was governed till Charlemagne took possession of the country, and committed the government to some of his counts; and on the partition of his imperial dominions among his grandsons, Bavaria was assigned to Louis the German. Its rulers bore the title of margrave till 920, when Arnold, its reigning prince, was raised to the title of duke, which his successors con'inued to bear till 1623, when Maximilian I., having assisted Ferdinand II. gainst his Bohemian insurgents, was elevated to the electoral dignity. In 1070, Bavaria passed into the possession of the Guelphs; and in 1180 it was transferred by imperial grant to Otho, count of Wittelsbach, whose descendants branched out into two families, the Palatine and the Bavarian, the former inheriting the Palatine of the Rhine, the latter the duchy of Bavaria. Few events of any importance occurred till the war of the Spanish succession, when Bavaria suffered severely from following the fortunes of France. It, however, received a great accession in 1777, when, upon the extinction of the younger line of Wittelsbach, the palatinate, after a short contest with Austria, was added to the Bavarian territory. After the adjustment of the Austrian pretensions, the electorate enjoyed the blessings of peace till the French revolution, which involved all Germany in the flames of civil discord. The elector remained on the side of the Imperialists till 1796, when the French marched a powerful army into his dominions, and concluded a treaty for the cessation of hostilities. In the following year was signed the treaty of Campo-Formio, and in 1801 that of Luneville, by which all the German dominions left of the Rhine were annexed to France, and the elector lost the palatinate of the Rhine, his possessions in the Netherlands and Alsace, and the duchies of Juliers and Deux Ponts; receiving as indemnities four bishoprics, with ten abbeys, fifteen imperial towns, and two imperial villages.

In the conflicts between France and the continental powers, Bavaria continued to maintain a neutrality till 1805, when the elector entered into an alliance with Napoleon, who shortly afterwards raised him to the dignity of king, and enlarged his dominions at the same time, by the annexation of several imperial provinces. Of all the allies of the French emperor, no country has retained more solid advantages than Bavaria. Shortly after the campaign of 1806, when Austria, to purchase peace, sacrificed part of her possessions, Bavaria received a further enlargement, by the addition of Tyrol, Eichstadt, the eastern part of Passau, and other territories; when she began to assume a more important station among the surrounding states.

At the dissolution of the Germanic confederation, and the formation of the Rhenish confederation, another alteration took place, the duchy of Berg being resigned for the margraviate of Anspach, together with the imperial town of Augsburg and Nuremburg. In 1809, Bavaria again took part with France against Austria, and again shared in the spoils of war:

but subsequently ceded some of her territories to Wirtemburg and Wurtzburg; and by another alteration, which shortly followed, exchanged a great part of Tyrol for Bayreuth and Ratisbon.

But the friendship of the Bavarian monarch for his ally and patron was soon to be put to the test. When the thirst for military conquest induced Napoleon to march the French armies to Moscow, the Bavarian troops were among the number. Apprehending the ruin that awaited the French, but while the fortunes of Napoleon were still doubtful, the king of Bavaria seized the critical moment, and entered into a treaty with the emperor o. Austria, and joined the allies in crushing that power which had long hel so many nations in thraldom. These important services were not for gotten. Bavaria was confirmed in her extensive acquisitions by the treaties of 1814 and 1815; for though Austria recovered her ancient possessions in the Tyrol, &c., Bavaria received equivalents in Franconia and the vicinity of the Rhine. Though the inferior kingdoms and states of Germany are of too little importance to become principals in any European wars, they are frequently found very effective allies, as was the case with Bavaria. Its army during the war amounted to sixty thousand men. In the history of Greece it will be seen that Otho, a Bavarian prince, was, in 1832, elected king of that country; and that, in 1843, he consented to give his subjects a more liberal government.

HANOVER.

THE kingdom of Hanover, which, until the year 1815, was an electorate was formed out of the duchies formerly possessed by several families belonging to he junior branches of the house of Brunswick. The house of Hanover may, indeed, vie with any in Germany for antiquity and nobleness. It sprung from the ancient family of the Guelphs, dukes and electors of Bavaria, one of whom, Henry the Lion, in 1140, married Maude, eldest daughter of Henry II. king of England. Their son William, called Longsword, was created first duke thereof. The dominions descended in a direct line to Ernest, who divided them, upon his death in 1546, into two branches; that of Brunswick Wolfenbuttle, and Brunswick Luneburg. The possessor of the latter, Ernest Augustus, was, in 1692, raised to the dignity of an elector; before which he was head of the college of German princes. Ernest married Sophia, daughter of Frederic, elector palatine, and king of Bohemia, by Elizabeth, daughter of James I., king of Great Britain. Sophia being the next protestant heir to the crown of England, through the medium of the house of Stuart, the parliament fixed the succession upon her, on the demise of the reigning queen Anne. Sophia died a short time before the queen; and her eldest son, George Louis, in consequence, became king of Great Britain. This was in 1714 from which time till 1837, at the death of William IV., both England and Hanover have had the same sovereign.

The families set aside from the succession by the parliament on that occasion, independent of the family of King James II. by Mary of Este, were as follows: the royal houses of Savoy, France, and Spain, descend ́ ants of Charles I., through his daughter Henrietta; Orleans and Lorraine, descendants of James I. through Charles Louis, elector palatine, eldest

son of Elizabeth, daughter of the said king; Salm, Ursel, Condé, Conti, Maine, Modena, and Austria, descendants of James I., through Edward, elector-palatine, youngest son of the said Elizabeth. The history of Hanover for the two centuries preceding the Lutheran reformation presents little interest, except in the connection of its princes with the wars of the Guelphs and Ghibelines, in the latter end of the fourteenth century. Among the most zealous supporters of the reformation, however, were the princes of Brunswick; and their subjects, during the thirty years' war, very effectively supported their anti-papal efforts. Ernest of Zell, the reigning duke at that period, was one of the most eloquent defenders of Luther at the diet of Worms; and his endeavours to improve the people by establishing clerical and general schools, when learning was appreciated by only a few, shew him to have been a man of enlightened and liberal views. On the accesssion of her present Majesty to the throne of Great Britain, the Hanoverian crown, by virtue of the salic law, devolved on her uncle Ernest, duke of Cumberland, fifth but eldest surviving son of George III. It had previously been for many years under the viceroyship of the duke of Cambridge. Hanover suffered in the French war of 1757; but it experienced still greater sufferings during the French revolutionary war, after the enemy got possession of it. At the peace af Amiens, it was given up to the king of Great Britain; but that peace being of very short duration, it again fell into the hands of the French, without resistance, or without an effort to save it, on the part of the inhabitants or the government. In 1804 Prussia took possession of Hanover, but ceded it in the same year to the French, who constituted it a part of the kingdom of Westphalia, established in 1808. At the peace of 1813, the king of Great Britain reclaimed his rightful dominions, which were then formed into a kingdom, and much enlarged by the stipulations of the treaty of Vienna. The countries which compose what is called Hanover, consist of Luneburg, acquired by inheritance in 1292; Danneburg, by purchase, 1303, Grubenhagen, by inheritance, 1679; Hanover (Culenburg), by inheri tance, 1679; Diepholtz, by exchange, 1685; Hoya, by inheritance, in part, 1582; the remaining part by a grant from the emperor, in 1705; Lauenburg, by inheritance, 1706; Bremen and Verden, by purchase, 1715 and 1719; Wildeshausen, by purchase, 1720; and the Hadeln-land, 1731. The district of Lauenburg has since been ceded for the bishopric of Hildeshiem, the principality of East Friesland, the districts of Lingen, Harlingen, &c. Hanover so long formed an appendage to the British crown that we are induced to extend this slight history by quoting a further account of its government: "Before Prussia ceded Hanover to France, in 1804, the form of government was monarchial, and the various territories were subject to feudal lords. The peasants of the marsh lands had more freedom, and in East Friesland the constitution of the country was almost republican. In the territories of the princes of the empire, the representation of the people by estates, composed of the nobles, prelates, and deputies from the towns, served to check the power of the sovereign, as in other parts of Germany. In 1808, when Napoleon created the kingdom of Westphalia, the territories of Hanover, with the districts of Hildesheim and Osnabruck, formed a part of it, and the code Napoleon took the place of the ancient laws, and a sham representative government was established. On the return of the rightful sovereign to Hanover, in 1813, the French institutions were summarily abolished, and the old forms re-established; and in 1818 the estates, summoned upon the ancient footing, drew up the form of a new constitution, modelled on that of England and France, and substituting a uniform system of presentation for the various representative forms which prevailed under the empire. As the salic law, excluding fe males from the succession to the throne, prevails in Hanover, William IV. was succeeded by his eldest surviving brother Ernest, duke of Cumber.