I must here observe that at this period nothing whatever had occurred that could serve as a pretext for the dynasty to support the rebellion.  The Diet, it is true, would not consent that the troops that were to be levied should be draughted into the old regiments; but it was obviously impossible for the Diet to consent to any such measures at a period when the rebels were everywhere led by Imperial officers, when the Austrian troops stationed in Hungary, although they had been placed under the orders of the Hungarian Ministry, refused to fight against those rebels, and the commanders of fortresses to receive orders from the Hungarian War-office.

On the 8th of September a deputation from the Hungarian Diet earnestly entreated His Majesty to sanction two acts relating to the levying of troops and taxes.  The King refused; but in his answer to the address of the deputation said, “I trust that no one will hereby suppose that I have the intention to set aside or infringe the existing laws.  This, I repeat, is far from my intention.  On the contrary, it is my firm and determined will to maintain, in conformity with my coronation oath, the laws, the integrity, and the rights of the kingdom, under my Hungarian crown.”

The King made this solemn declaration on the 8th of September, and on the 9th of September Jellachich crossed the Drave with 48,000 men to wage war in the King’s name on the Hungarian Diet and Ministry.  The King had, moreover, on the 4th of September, affixed his sign manual to a letter or Royal mandate addressed to Jellachich, and revoking the decree by which he had been deprived of his civil and military offices and dignities.  His Majesty, in this letter, also expressed his high approbation of the Ban’s conduct.  By a Royal decree, dated October 3, the constitution was suspended, martial law proclaimed, and Jellachich, the rebel, appointed His Majesty’s Plenipotentiary Commissary for the kingdom of Hungary, and invested with unlimited authority to act, in the name of His Majesty, within the said kingdom.

Hungary, so far from commencing the revolution, was not even prepared to meet the invasion of the Croatian Ban.  He was defeated near Stuhlweissenburg by the Landsturm.  The Hungarian Government only began to organize regular troops in October.

That the Diet did not recognize a decree that suspended the constitution and invested Jellachich with the dictatorship, will be found quite natural, if not by you, at least by every Englishman who cherishes constitutional freedom, the more so as its proceedings on this occasion were founded on legal right, viz., on act 4, sect. 6, of 1847-8, which expressly ordains that “the annual session of the Diet shall not be closed, nor the Diet itself dissolved, before the budget for the ensuing year has been voted.”