Our attention has been drawn to some remarkable passages from conversations reported to have been held by Napoleon with Mr. O’Meara, in his “Voice from St. Helena.”

We do not need to make any comment upon them. What we have been writing on this question from week to week, for the last six months, amounts to little more than an enlarged commentary on these extraordinary expressions of the ex-Emperor of France, which (bating some exaggerations natural to the speaker and the time) contain the exact rationale of the Eastern question as it stands at this moment.

The conversations took place in May 1817. On the 22^nd of May, says O’Meara, after leaving the bath, Napoleon spoke about Russia, and said that the European nations would yet find that he (Napoleon) had adopted the best possible policy, at the time when he intended to re-establish the kingdom of Poland. This, he observed, would have been the only effectual means of stopping the increasing power of Russia. It was putting a barrier, a dyke, to that formidable empire, which it was likely would yet overwhelm Europe. “I do not think,” he added, “that I shall live to see it, but you may. You are in the flower of your age, and may expect to live thirty-five years longer. I think that you will see that the Russians will either invade and take India, or enter Europe with four hundred thousand Cossacks and other inhabitants of the desert, and two hundred thousand Russians. When Paul was so violent against you, he sent to me for a plan to invade India. I sent him one with instructions in detail.”

The conversation was resumed on the same day. “If,” pursued Napoleon, “Alexander succeeds in incorporating Poland with Russia—that is to say, in perfectly reconciling the Poles to the Russian Government, and not merely subduing the country—he has gained the greatest step towards subduing India. My opinion is that he will attempt either the one or the other of the projects I have mentioned, and I think the last to be the most probable.” Hereupon, Mr. O’Meara observed that the distance was great, and that the Russians had not the money necessary for such a grand undertaking. “The distance is nothing,” returned Napoleon. “Supplies can be easily carried upon camels, and the Cossacks will always insure a sufficiency of them. Money they will find when they arrive there. The hope of conquest would immediately unite armies of Cossacks and Calmucks without expense.”

On a subsequent day, the 27th of the same month, Napoleon again started the subject, and made use of the singular and most impressive statements which follow. They appear to us to approach as near to the truth and warnings of prophecy, as any political speculation we have ever known.

“In the course of a few years,” said Napoleon on this latter occasion, “Russia will have Constantinople, the greatest part of Turkey, and all Greece. This I hold to be as certain as if it had already taken place. Almost all the cajoling and flattery which Alexander practised towards me, was to gain my consent to effect this object. I would not consent, foreseeing that the equilibrium of Europe would be destroyed. In the natural course of things, in a few years Turkey must fall to Russia. The greatest part of her population are Greeks, who, you may say, are Russians. The powers it would injure, and who could oppose it, are England, France, Prussia, and Austria. Now, as to Austria, it will be very easy for Russia to engage her assistance, by giving her Servia and other provinces bordering upon the Austrian dominions, reaching near to Constantinople. THE ONLY HYPOTHESIS ON WHICH FRANCE AND ENGLAND MAY EVER BE ALLIED WITH SINCERITY, WILL BE IN ORDER TO PREVENT THIS. But even this alliance would not avail. France, England and Prussia united cannot prevent this. Russia and Austria can at any time effect it. Once mistress of Constantinople, Russia gets all the commerce of the Mediterranean, becomes a great naval power, and God knows what may happen,” &c.

The thirty-five years which Napoleon put as the limit to test his prophecy, expired in 1852; in 1853 the question is that which agitates Europe from end to end; and the nephew of Napoleon is on the throne of France. It is possible that if the exiled Emperor could have foreseen the resuscitation of his dynasty, he might have taken a more sanguine view of the possible results of that alliance with England which he thus so remarkably predicted. At any rate, here he speaks unmistakeably to us on the question so vital to the interests of Europe, and from his grave he dictates the policy which his nephew and successor can alone pursue with respect for his authority and name. —Examiner.

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