Chapter XXV (2)

The Intruder meantime, now that immediate danger was averted, had leisure to feel the wretched state to which his subserviency to a wicked brother had reduced him. He was, indeed, in possession of Madrid, and half the kingdom was overrun by his troops; but how were those troops to be paid, or how was he to support the expenses of his court and government? Whatever might be the issue of the war in the Peninsula, the vast colonial empire of Spain could never be his, and the resources which still continued to arrive from thence were enjoyed by the legitimate government. Whereever his authority extended, trade was at an end, the people were impoverished, and the sources of revenue destroyed. The first-fruits of plunder also had now been consumed. Andalusia, indeed, offered a harvest as yet untouched, and which would ere long be at his disposal; but till the opportunity arrived, it was necessary to glean whatever had been spared in the former pillage. An edict was issued, denouncing severe punishment against those who should secrete papers or effects belonging to the suppressed monasteries, and offering a reward for the discovery of such property, proportionate to its value. He had previously confiscated the property of all Spaniards in foreign countries, who should not forthwith return in obedience to his command; he now called upon those in whose hands property, papers, or effects had been left by others when forsaking their place of residence, to deliver them up for the use of the treasury. Any persons buying or selling gold, silver, or jewels, which had belonged to a suppressed convent, or to an insurgent, were to be severely punished; and those who assisted the insurgents in any manner were to be put to death. Another decree sequestered the revenues of all archbishops and bishops, and appointed pensions from the state instead. Another commanded all persons possessing plate to the amount of more than ten dollars, except in plates, knives, and spoons, to give in an account thereof within three days; the mint was immediately to pay a fourth of its value, and the remainder was promised within four months. All plate which should be concealed after this edict was to be forfeited, and a fourth of its value given to the informer; and silversmiths were forbidden to purchase any articles in silver, except such as were permitted to be in use by the present decree.

♦MEASURES OF SEVERITY.♦

These measures proved the neediness of the intrusive government. Its atrocious character had already been amply demonstrated; if farther proof were needed, it was to be found in a decree by which all persons whose sons were serving in what it called the insurgent armies were required to furnish a man to the Intruder’s service for every son, or a proportionate sum of money; the elder brothers, or other nearest relations or guardians of those who had no father, were subjected to the same law; and those who had no money either for procuring the substitute or paying the fine were to be imprisoned, or sent into France. But it was reserved for this government to introduce a new species of barbarity, which had never before been heard of in war. Kellermann, whom the English had rescued with such difficulty from the vengeance of the Portugueze at Lisbon, was at this time governor-general of what the French called Upper Spain, ♦OCT. 28.♦ that is, of the provinces of Salamanca, Zamora, Toro, Leon, Valladolid, Palencia, Burgos, Soria, Santander, Biscay, Guipuzcoa, and Alava. ♦KELLERMANN’S EDICT.♦ Throughout this whole tract of country he placed all horses and mares above a certain height in requisition for the French armies, ordering them to be taken to the respective country towns, and there delivered for that purpose; and every horse or mare below the size named, or under thirty months old, with every mare that should be three months gone with foal, was to have the left eye put out by the owner, and to be in other ways rendered unfit for military service. A fine of four times the value of the beast was to be exacted from any one who disobeyed this edict, and all French officers were charged to see it carried into execution. Nothing can more strikingly evince their moral degradation, than that their general should have ordered them to enforce the execution ♦MEASURES OF JOSEPH’S MINISTERS.♦ of an edict like this. These were the measures pursued in the name of a King who was represented as being equally philosophic and humane, who was to remedy all the evils of long misrule, to relieve the people from all grievances, restore Spain to its ancient prosperity, and confer upon it a happiness which it had never before enjoyed! In an unhappy hour had Joseph’s ministers entered his service, persuading, or seeking to persuade, themselves that they might benefit their country by giving their countenance to a perfidious and odious usurpation. The ablest men who have ever endeavoured to do good by evil means, have felt their best intentions frustrated in the attempt. These ministers, worthy, as under other circumstances they might have been of their station, found themselves now the mere instrument of that very military power which they had flattered themselves that they should be allowed to direct. Still, however, seeking some excuse to their own hearts, and to posterity, they took advantage of the time for attempting alterations, which would have been most salutary if the nation had been prepared for them, ... but for which it was so little prepared, that the premature attempt only attached the Spaniards the more to the very evils from which it was intended to deliver them. One sweeping decree abolished all the regular orders in Spain, whether monastic, mendicant, or clerical; the individuals belonging to them were ordered to quit their convents within fifteen days, resume their secular habits, and repair to their native places, where pensions were promised them. It was certain that the intrusive government had neither the means nor the intention of paying these pensions; but the whole property of the suppressed orders was seized for the use of the state. The reason assigned for this measure in the preamble to the decree was, that these communities had taken a hostile part against the government, which, while it thus abolished them, wished to recompense those individuals who had conducted themselves well. Better reasons, Urquijo and his colleagues well knew, would only have exasperated a people whose souls were thoroughly enslaved to the superstitions which debased them; but the cause which was thus assigned exasperated them as much, and this feeling was kept up and disseminated every where by the ejected members, who, wherever they went, excited the compassion of their countrymen and inflamed their hatred of the intrusive government. Some prudence as well as humanity was shown, by exempting the nuns from this decree; they were subjected to the ordinary, and forbidden to receive pupils. The military orders were abolished also, except that of the Golden Fleece, and the one which the intrusive government had itself instituted. This was needlessly offending the national pride, which was in like manner wounded by the removal of the tax raised under the name of the _Voto de Santiago_; the relief, even had circumstances allowed it to be felt, would not have compensated for the outrage upon Spanish feeling. In taking away the privilege of sanctuary, and suppressing all ecclesiastical jurisdiction in civil and criminal cases, the ministers acted as they would have wished to do, had they held their offices by a better tenure; and in making strangulation the mode of death for all criminals of whatever rank, and decreeing that degradation was implied in the sentence. But when an edict affected to abolish all dignities and titles which had not been conferred by the Intruder, and required the traitorous nobles in his service to receive from him a confirmation of the peerage which they had disgraced, the futility of the decree only provoked contempt.

♦THE CENTRAL JUNTA ANNOUNCE THAT THE CORTES WILL BE ASSEMBLED.♦

Joseph’s ministers had leisure for legislative speculations and for dreams of reformation. The real business of government was not in their hands; in all essential points they were mere ciphers, and seemed to feel that they were so. The Central Junta was in a situation as much more trying as it was more honourable. The difficulties and embarrassments of every kind with which they were beset might have confused heads more experienced in affairs of state; and their exertions under the pressure of immediate danger left them little time for those measures of effectual reform, which Spain so greatly needed, but which were looked for more eagerly by the British nation than by the Spaniards, for as a people the Spaniards were contented with their old system, and attached to it even with all its evils and abominations. The general wish in England was that the Cortes should be convened, and this was desired as sincerely by the British government as by Jovellanos and those other noble minded Spaniards who hoped through regular and constitutional means to restore the liberty and the prosperity of their country. It was long after the installation of the Junta before the disasters of the day allowed them leisure for thinking of the morrow. To this their delay in taking measures for assembling the Cortes must be ascribed, more than to their love of power, which they were ill able to wield, or of the patronage which they unworthily bestowed. But to these motives the delay was imputed; and by not following the advice of Jovellanos when the act would have appeared spontaneous and graceful, they lost the opportunity of obtaining that popularity which even the semblance of disinterestedness is sure to acquire. It was not till eight months after their installation that a decree came forth for re-establishing the legal representation of the monarchy in its ancient Cortes. The time was left indefinite, but the edict said it would be convoked in the course of the ensuing year, or earlier, if circumstances should permit.

The language of the Supreme Junta on this, as on every other occasion, was worthy of the position in which the national government was placed, and of the principles on which it professed to act. “The Spanish people,” they said, “must leave to their posterity an inheritance worthy of the sacrifices which were made for obtaining it. The Supreme Junta had never lost sight of this object; and the progress of the enemy, which had hitherto occupied their whole attention, rendered more bitter the reflection, that all their disasters were solely owing to the disuse of those institutions which, in happier times, secured the welfare and the strength of the state. The ambition of some, and the indolence of others, had reduced those institutions to nothing; and the Junta, from the moment of its installation, solemnly bound itself to restore them. The time was now arrived for this great work. Desirous, therefore, that the nation should appear with the dignity due to its heroic efforts; that the rights of the people should be placed beyond the reach of encroachments; and that the sources of public felicity should run freely as soon as the war ceased, and repair whatever inveterate arbitrary power had scorched, or the present devastation had destroyed, the Junta decreed, that the Cortes should be re-established, and would immediately proceed to consider the method of convening it; for which end it would nominate a committee of five of its members. It would also investigate, in order to propose them to the nation assembled in Cortes, the means of supporting the holy war in which they were engaged; of insuring the observance of their fundamental laws; of meliorating the legislation and abolishing the abuses which had crept into it; of collecting and administering the revenue, and of reforming the system of public education. And to combine the information necessary for such discussions, it would consult the councils, provincial Juntas, tribunals, magistracies, corporations, bishops, and universities, and the opinion of intelligent and enlightened persons.”

♦DECLARATION WHICH WAS FIRST PROPOSED.♦

A declaration in stronger terms had been submitted to the Junta, and rejected by them at the instigation of Mr. Frere. “Spaniards,” it was there said, “it is three ages since the laws on which the nation founded its defence against tyranny have been destroyed. Our fathers did not know how to preserve the liberty which had been bequeathed to them; and although all the provinces of Spain successively struggled to defend it, evil stars rendered their efforts useless. The laws, from that time forward, have been only an expression more or less tyrannical, or beneficent, of a particular will. Providence, as if to punish the loss of that prerogative of free men, has paralysed our valour, arrested the progress of our intellect, and impeded our civilization, till we have come to that condition, that an insolent tyrant formed the project of subduing the greatest nation of the globe, without reckoning upon its will, and even despising its existence. In vain has the prince sometimes attempted to remedy some of the evils of the state: buildings cannot be erected on sand, and without fundamental and constituted laws, it is useless for the philosopher in his study, or the statesman in the theatre of business, to exert himself for the good of the people. The best projects are not put in execution, or not carried through. Good suggestions are followed by evil ones; economy and order, by prodigality and rapine; a prudent and mild minister, by an avaricious and foolish favourite; and thus the ship of the state floats without sails and helm, till, as has happened to the Spanish monarchy, it is dashed to pieces on a rock. How, but by the re-establishment of freedom, could that blood be recompensed which flows in every part of the Peninsula; those sacrifices which Spanish loyalty is offering every instant; that moral resistance, as universal as it is sublime, which disconcerts our enemies, and renders them hopeless even in the midst of their victories? When this dreadful contest is concluded, the Spaniard shall say proudly to himself, ‘My fathers left me slavery and wretchedness for my inheritance; I leave to my descendants liberty and glory.’ Spaniards, this is the feeling which, by reflection in some, and by instinct in all, animates you now; and it shall not be defrauded of its expectations. Our detractors say that we are fighting to defend old abuses, and the inveterate vices of our corrupted government; let them know that your struggle is for the happiness, as well as the independence of your country; that you will not depend henceforward on the uncertain will or the variable temper of a single man; nor continue to be the plaything of a court without justice, under the control of an insolent favourite, or a capricious woman; but that on the edifice of your ancient laws you will rear a barrier between despotism and your sacred rights. This barrier consists in a constitution to aid and support the monarch when he is just, and to restrain him when he follows evil councils. Without a constitution all reform is precarious, all prosperity uncertain; without it the people are no more than flocks of slaves, put in motion at the order of a will, frequently unjust, and always unrestrained; without it the forces of the whole society, which should procure the greatest advantages for all its members, are employed exclusively to satisfy the ambition, or satiate the frenzy of a few, or perhaps of one.”

♦OBJECTIONS BY MR. FRERE.♦

When this paper was communicated to Mr. Frere, he saw serious objections, which he stated to Garay, and which the Junta, though they would otherwise have published the proclamation, readily admitted. That ambassador perceived, more clearly perhaps than any other person at that time, the danger to be apprehended from convoking a legislative assembly in a nation altogether unprepared for it by habits, feelings, education, or general knowledge. He considered it a delicate and dangerous point in every respect, and said, “that if the decision of the question were left in his hand, notwithstanding the necessity for widening the basis of the government, the failure of all the political experiments which had been made in these latter times, and the impossibility which had been found (by a fatality peculiar to the present age) of forming a permanent establishment, even in affairs less essential than the formation of a free constitution for a great nation, would make him waver. But taking the decision for granted, he thought the manner in which it was proposed to announce it likely to produce bad effects in Spain; and he could venture,” he said, “to assure D. Martin de Garay, that it would undoubtedly create them in England. If the Spaniards had indeed passed three centuries under arbitrary government, they ought not to forget that it was the price which they paid for having conquered and peopled the fairest portion of the world, and that the integrity of that immense power rested solely upon these two words, Religion and the King. If the old constitution had been lost by the conquest of America, the first object should be to recover it; but in such a manner as not to lose what had cost so much in the acquisition: and for this reason, they ought to avoid, as a political poison, every enunciation of general principles, the application of which it would be impossible to limit or qualify, even when the Negroes and Indians should quote it in favour of themselves. And allowing that a bad exchange had been made in bartering the ancient national liberty for the glory and extension of the Spanish name; allowing that the error should at all hazards be done away; even though it were so,” Mr. Frere said, “it did not appear becoming the character of a well-educated person to pass censures upon the conduct of his forefathers, or to complain of what he may have lost by their negligence or prodigality, still less so if it were done in the face of the world; and what should be said of a nation who should do this publicly, and after mature deliberation?”

This was true foresight,--and yet the English ambassador approached Charybdis in his fear of Scylla. He spoke to the Spaniards of Religion and the King; in England the truest and most enlightened lovers of liberty can have no better rallying words; in Spain those words had for three hundred years meant the inquisition and an absolute monarch, whose ministers, so long as they could retain his favour, governed according to their own will and pleasure, unchecked by any constitutional control. The government did not obtain by their decree for ♦UNPOPULARITY OF THE JUNTA.♦ convoking the Cortes the popularity which they had perhaps expected. The measure had been long delayed, and therefore was supposed to have been unwillingly resolved on. So much, indeed, had been expected from the Central Junta, that no possible wisdom on their part, no possible success, could have answered the unreasonable demand. The disappointment of the nation was in proportion to its hopes, and the government became equally the object of suspicion and contempt. Some of the members had large estates in those provinces which were occupied by the French, and it was suspected that where their property was, there their hearts were also. Their subsequent conduct proved how greatly they were injured by this distrust. They were not censured for their first disasters, which the ablest men under like circumstances could not have averted. Had they obtained accurate intelligence of the strength and movements of the enemy when Buonaparte entered Spain; had they exerted themselves as much in disciplining troops as in raising and embodying them, and had they supplied them with regularity and promptitude; it would not have been possible to have stopped the progress of such a force. Something was allowed for the confidence which the battle of Baylen had inspired, and for the enthusiasm of the people, which the government had partaken. Neither would the nation have been disposed to condemn, even if it had perceived, errors which arose from the national character. But when, after the bitter experience of twelve whole months, no measures had been adopted for improving the discipline of the armies, or supplying them in the field, the incapacity of the Junta became glaring, and outcries against them were heard on all sides.

♦THEIR DIFFICULTIES AND ERRORS.♦

One of the weightiest errors for which they were censured was for not exerting themselves more effectually to bring the whole strength of the country against the invaders. They had promised to raise 500,000 men and 50,000 cavalry. Granada was the only province which supplied its full proportion, and Granada even exceeded it; its contingent was about 28,000, whereas it furnished nearly forty. But this depended more upon the provincial Juntas than upon the central government, whose decrees were of no avail in those parts which the enemy possessed, and were ill observed in others, where the local administrations, from disgust, or jealousy, or indolence, or incapacity, seemed to look on as spectators of the dreadful drama, rather than to perform their parts in it, as men and as Spaniards. Neither is it to the want of numbers that their defeats were to be attributed; there were at all times men enough in the field; arms, equipments, and discipline were wanting. It is unjust to judge of the exertions of the Spanish Junta by those of the National Convention in France, who had the whole wealth and strength of a populous and rich country at their absolute disposal, and who began the revolutionary war with officers, and tacticians, and statesmen capable of wielding the mighty means which were put into their hands. The fault of the Junta was in relying too much upon numbers and bravery, and too little upon their fortresses. The general under whom the great captain Gonzalo de Cordova learnt the art of war had left them a lesson which they might profitably have remembered. He used to say, that fortresses ought to be opposed to the impatience and fury of the French, and that the place for stationing raw troops was behind walls and ramparts.

The most important errors which the Junta had hitherto committed were, the delay in convoking the Cortes, and their conduct towards Sir Arthur Wellesley’s army; but the national character contributed in no slight degree to both. For it was not the known aversion of Florida Blanca to the name of a representative assembly, nor the fears of some of the Junta, nor the love of power in others, which protracted the convocation of the Cortes, so much as their reverential adherence to established forms. This was evident in Jovellanos himself, who regarded it as equally profane and dangerous to approach this political ark of the covenant, without scrupulously observing all the ceremonies and solemnities which the law prescribed. Precedents on points of this kind are not to be found in Spain as they are in England. Antiquaries were to be consulted, archives examined, old regulations adapted to new circumstances,--and this when the enemy was at the gates. The defect may well be pardoned, because of the virtues with which it was connected. Had the Spaniards regarded with less veneration the deeds and the institutions of their ancestors, they would never have supported that struggle which will be the wonder of succeeding ages. Their conduct toward the English army sprang from a worse fault; from that pride which made them prone to impose upon others and upon themselves a false opinion of their strength. It is the national failing, for which they have ever been satirized, by their own writers as well as by other nations. They will rather promise and disappoint, than acknowledge their inability; of this, their history for the last two centuries affords abundant examples; they had yet to learn, that perfect sincerity is as much due to an ally as to a confessor. In many cases the government was itself deceived; the same false point of honour prevailing in every department, from the lowest to the highest, it received and acted upon exaggerated statements and calculations; but in others, it cannot be denied, that pride led to the last degree of meanness, and that promises were held out to the English general, which those who made them must have known it was impossible to perform.

Yet it must be admitted that the errors of the Junta were more attributable to the character of the nation than of the individuals; and those individuals were placed in circumstances of unexampled difficulty. Four-and-thirty men, most of them strangers to each other, and unaccustomed to public business, were brought together to govern a nation in the most perilous crisis of its history, without any thing to direct them except their own judgement, and almost without any other means than what the patriotism of the people could supply. They had troops indeed, but undisciplined, unofficered, unprovided, half armed, and half clothed. The old system of government was broken up, the new one was yet to be formed. They had neither commissariat nor treasury; the first donations and imposts were exhausted; so also were the supplies which England had liberally given, and those from America had not yet arrived. Added to these difficulties, and worse than all, was that dreadful state of moral and social anarchy into which the nation had been thrown, and which was such that no man knew in whom he could confide. To poison food or water in time of war is a practice which all people, who are not absolute savages, have pronounced infamous by common consent; but it is a light crime compared to the means which Buonaparte employed for the subjugation of Spain,--means which poisoned the well-springs of social order, and loosened the very joints and fibres of society. Morla, when he betrayed his country, committed an act of treason against human nature. The evil had been great before, but when a Judas Iscariot had been found in Morla during the agony of Spain, in whom could the people confide? “Suspicion,” says Jovellanos, “and hatred were conceived and spread with frightful facility. How many generals, nobles, prelates, magistrates, and lawyers, were regarded with distrust, either because of their old relations with Godoy, or because they were connected with some of the new partizans of the tyranny; or for the weakness, or indecision, or ambiguity of their conduct; or for the calumnies and insinuations which rivalship and envy excited against them! It was considered as a crime to have gone to Bayonne, to have remained at Madrid, or resided in other places which were occupied by the intrusive government; to have submitted to swear allegiance to it, to have obeyed its orders, or to have suffered even compulsively its yoke and its contempt. What reputation was secure? Who was not exposed to the attacks of envy, to the imputations of calumny, and to the violence of an agitated populace?”

From this state of things it necessarily arose, that the Junta acted in constant fear and suspicion of those whom they employed. Their sense of weakness and their love of power increased the evil. Fearing the high spirit of Alburquerque, and the influence which rank and talents conjoined would give to his deserved popularity among the soldiers, they cramped him in a subordinate command, while they trusted those armies which were the hope of Spain to Cuesta, because they were afraid of offending him, and to Venegas, for the opposite reason, that they were sure of his obsequious submission. Some odium they incurred by permitting a trade with towns which the enemy occupied. For the sake, as was alleged, of those Spaniards who were compelled to live under the yoke, and also for the advantage of the colonies, they had granted licences for conveying sugar, cacao, and bark, to those parts of the kingdom. ♦JULY 14.♦ These licences were only to be trusted to persons of known and approved patriotism, who were likewise to be strictly watched, and liable to be searched upon any suspicion. The weakness of such a concession in such a war, as well as the obvious facility which it afforded to the French and their traitorous partizans, excited just reprehension; and at the close of the year ♦DEC. 28.♦ the Junta found it necessary to revoke their edict, acknowledging that, in spite of all precautions, it was found prejudicial to the public safety. Some of the members were suspected of enhancing the price of necessaries for the army, by their own secret monopolies; others were said to be surrounded by venal instruments, through whom alone they were accessible. These imputations were probably ill-founded or exaggerated; certain, however, it is, that never had any government fewer friends. Men of the most opposite principles were equally disaffected toward it. Its very defenders had no confidence in its stability, and were ready to forsake it. They who dreaded any diminution of the regal authority, could not forgive its popular origin; they who aspired to lay the foundation of a new and happier order of things, were discontented, because the measures which were taken towards the reformation of the state were slowly, and, as they deemed, reluctantly adopted. Those wretches who were sold to France were the enemies of any government which resisted the usurpation; and those whose timid natures, or short-sighted selfishness, disposed them to submission, naturally regarded it with dislike, because it delayed the subjection of the country. Among the people, who were actuated by none of these feelings, it was sufficient to render the Junta unpopular that it was unfortunate. The times rendered them suspicious; their own conduct and their power made them obnoxious to many; and their ill-fortune, more than their errors, made them disliked by all.

♦SCHEME FOR OVERTHROWING THEM.♦

Influenced by some of these motives, and perhaps in no little degree by jealousy, the Junta of Seville were particularly hostile to the government, and a plan was formed in that city for overthrowing it: the members were to be seized, and some of the most obnoxious transported to Manilla in a ship which was prepared for the purpose. Some regiments had been gained over, and it is said even the guards of the Junta; but as the persons who designed this revolution had for their direct object the good of Spain, they considered it a mark of confidence due to Great Britain to make the English ambassador acquainted with their purpose; for in fact, so far were the Spanish people from regarding the interference of Great Britain with jealousy, that they were disappointed because their ally did not interfere more frequently, and with more effect. Marquis Wellesley, of whom it had been said by Mr. Whitbread that he would, if opportunity should offer, take Spain and Portugal as Buonaparte had done, had now an opportunity of showing in what manner he thought himself bound to act by a government which he knew to be weak, and suspected to be treacherous. At the very time when this foul imputation was brought against him in parliament, he gave to that government just so much information of its danger, as, without compromising the safety of any persons concerned, enabled the Junta to prevent the intended insurrection.

The general wish was less for the convocation of the Cortes, than for the establishment of a regency, from which more unanimity and more vigour was expected, than from the present divided council. The people of Cadiz said the fate of Spain was in Marquis Wellesley’s hands, that he ought to remove the Junta, and establish an energetic government. Those persons who respected hereditary claims would have had the Archbishop of Toledo appointed regent, as being the only Bourbon in the country; but he was young; and what weighed against him more than the want of either talents or character, was, that he was believed to be governed by his sister, the wife of Godoy. Others looked to Romana, knowing his dislike to the Junta, and hoping that he would assume the government himself, or intrust it to able hands. Another project was to appoint both these personages regents, with the Duke del Infantado, and two other colleagues. It was thought that the army would gladly have seen the supreme authority vested in one of their own body, either Romana or Infantado. But both these noblemen were free from any such ambition; and Montijo, who was always intriguing for power, was so well known, that he was the last person whom any party would have trusted.

♦COMMISSION APPOINTED BY THE JUNTA.♦

The warning which had thus been given was not lost upon the Junta, and they attended to the representations which accompanied it; they knew their weakness, and perceived their danger; admitted that the existing government was not suited to the state of affairs, and nominated a commission for the purpose of inquiring in what manner it might best be replaced. Romana was included in the commission, and upon this occasion he delivered in a paper, which, if they had required additional proof of his hostility, and their own unstable tenure, would amply have ♦ROMANA’S ADDRESS. OCT. 4.♦ afforded it. “There were three cases,” he said, “either of which ought to produce a change in the system of a government: When a nation, which ought only to obey, doubts the legitimacy of the authority to which it is to submit; when such authority begins to lose its influence; when it is not only prejudicial to the public weal, but contrary to the principles of the constitution. The existing government was objectionable upon all these grounds: it was founded upon a democratic principle of representation, inconsistent with the pure monarchical system of Spain, and with the heroic loyalty of the Spaniards, and which, if it continued, would subvert the monarchy. As often as he meditated upon this subject, he doubted the lawfulness of the existing government; and this opinion was general in the provinces through which he had passed. Among the services which he had endeavoured to perform for his king and country, it was not the least that he had yielded obedience to the orders of this government, and made the constituted authorities in Leon, Asturias, and Gallicia do the same; considering this absolutely necessary to preserve the nation from anarchy. A government, though illegal, might secure the happiness of the people, if it deserved their confidence, and they respected its authority; but the existing government had lost its authority. The people, who judge of measures by the effects which they see produced, complain that our armies are weak for want of energy in the government; that no care has been taken for supplying them; that they have not seen the promised accounts of the public expenditure, and how the sums which have arrived from America, those which our generous allies have given, the rents of the crown, and the voluntary contributions, have been expended: they look in vain for necessary reforms; they see that employments are not given to men of true merit, and true lovers of their country; that some members, instead of manifesting their desire of the public good, by disinterestedness, seek to preserve their authority for their own advantage; that others confer lucrative and honourable employments on their own dependents and countrymen; that for this sole reason ecclesiastical offices have been filled up, the rents of which ought to have been applied to the necessities of the state; that that unity which is necessary in the government, is not to be found, many of the Junta caring only for the interests of their particular provinces, as if they were members of some body different from that of the Spanish monarchy; that they had not only confirmed the military appointments made by the provincial Juntas, without examining the merits of the persons appointed, but had even assigned recompences to many who were destitute of all military knowledge, having never seen service, nor performed any of those duties which were confided to them; that the Junta, divided into sections, dispatched business in matters altogether foreign to their profession, and in which they were utterly unversed, instead of referring them to the competent and appropriate ministers; that horses taken from their owners, instead of being sent to the armies, were dying for hunger on the dry sea-marshes; finally, that many of the most important branches of administration were in the hands of men, suspicious, because of their conduct from the commencement of the public misfortunes, and because they were the creatures of that infamous favourite, who had been the author of all the general misery. Such,” said Romana, “are the complaints of the people: there is but one step to disobedience; the enemy will profit by the first convulsion, and anarchy or servitude will then be the alternative.”

The Marquis then stated, that the time for which some provinces had appointed their representatives to the Junta was expired; that others had empowered them not to exercise the sovereign authority, but to constitute a government which might represent the monarch: in neither case could these provinces be expected to acknowledge an authority which they had never conferred. The commission, he proceeded to say, had proposed that the Junta should reduce itself to five persons, in whom the executive power should be vested; and that in rotation each member of the existing body should enter into this supreme executive council, which should also preside over the Cortes when it was assembled. This project discovered the love of power in the Junta more unequivocally than any other part of their conduct. What Romana proposed in its stead was as prudent in itself as it was inconsistent with his previous positions. After maintaining that the powers of the existing government were from the first illegal, and that even such as they were, they had, for part of the members, expired, he recommended nevertheless that this government should, as representing legitimately or illegitimately the Cortes, appoint a regent, or a council of regency, consisting of three or of five persons, especially advising, as a proof of generosity and patriotism, that they should nominate none of their own body. A Junta should be formed, under the title of the Permanent Deputation of the Realm, to represent the Cortes till the Cortes should be assembled; it should consist of five members and a procurador-general, and one of these members should always be chosen from their American brethren, as forming an integral part of the nation. But the Cortes should be assembled with as little delay as circumstances would permit, and then no laws should be passed, or contributions imposed, without its consent. “If,” said he, “I have in some cases connected the supreme power with the nation, I have done no more than revive the constitutional principles of the Spanish monarchy, which have been stifled by the despotism of its kings and their ministers.” However hostile to the principles of civil liberty the first positions of Romana appeared, the most zealous friends of freedom might have been contented with his conclusions.

“Ought we,” said he, “to fear that an adventurer, who usurps the throne of Ferdinand, should appear among us, if we had a government like this, emanating from the consent of the people, from submission to the true God, and from the necessity of our mournful and perilous situation? Would our armies then be defective in numbers, and in subordination and discipline? would they be so filled with ignorant and cowardly officers, so unprovided with food, so irregularly paid, and so destitute of all equipments? would men be appointed generals, because they would support the persons who appointed them, or because they knew how to command an army and how to save the country? With such a government, the nation would have invincible armies, the armies would have generals, the troops would be officered, and the soldiers would learn subordination and discipline. When Spain shall see that auspicious day, I shall think it the first day of her hope, and the most happy of her glorious revolution. Such,” he continued, “is my opinion; but I ought not to forget that I have publicly controverted it by my actions. For who sustained your sovereign authority in the army and province which I governed? Gallicia, whom didst thou obey? Didst thou respect in me any power but that of the Central Junta, or did I consent that thou shouldst separate thyself from a government which I was sanctioning by my own obedience? Asturias, didst not thou see the powerful arm upraised which thou hadst implored so earnestly, and the blow of its power fall upon a Junta, which, after having acknowledged the sovereignty of the Central, and received from it succours, of which my soldiers, naked and exhausted, were in want, domineered like a despot, and had even disobeyed the express will of our King, D. Ferdinand? Nevertheless,” said he, addressing the Central Junta, “you rewarded this scandalous disobedience; and removed me covertly from the command, in order that guilty Spaniards might be honoured with the greater distinction. My opinions were the same then that they are now; but circumstances imperiously required a government, and any government is better than none. Then it was my duty to obey; now I should not perform what is due to my character, if I did not declare what I believe to be required for the salvation of my country. How indeed should I be silent; how should I suffer the fire of patriotism to be extinguished, seeing the sacrifice of so many victims in our glorious cause; faithful wives murdered with their daughters, after the most foul and unutterable outrages; nuns driven from their cloisters, some wandering about, many more the prey of lustful impiety; ministers of the altar forced from the sanctuary; temples turned into stables and dens of uncleanness; towns reduced to servitude; opulence to squalid beggary; armies composed of the bravest spirits of the nation, which have disappeared in the hottest struggles of their native land, consumed by hunger, naked, and destitute; seeing, in fine, that such revenues and the liberal donations of Spain and America have not even supplied the first necessities of the soldier? How could I remain a tranquil spectator of such great and mournful objects, and not think them superior to the nearest personal interest, to our self-love, and to our very existence? As a Spaniard,” he concluded, “I am ready to suffer a thousand deaths in defence of our liberty; and in my rank I have rendered homage to the descendant of the Pelayos, the Jaymes, and the Garcias. As a general, I will join myself to the last soldier who shall have resolution to revenge his country in the last period of her independence; but as a representative of the nation, I must be excused from occupying that distinguished place, unless a legitimate government be immediately established, which foreign powers will not hesitate to acknowledge, which will represent our sovereign, and which will save a people who are resolved to die for their God, for their king, and for the happiness of their posterity.”

♦REPLY OF THE JUNTA.♦

It is proof of full political freedom in the Spanish press at this juncture, that this paper should have appeared, being little short of a declaration of hostility against the existing government. But though the high monarchical principles with which Romana began his manifesto displeased the democratic party, and the glaring inconsistency of his proposal weakened the effect which his authority might otherwise have produced, the government felt the necessity of doing something to conciliate the nation; they determined to convoke the Cortes, and announced the resolution in a paper which may be considered as their official apology. In this paper, without directly referring to Romana’s ♦OCT. 28.♦ charges, they replied to them. “Spaniards,” said they, “it has seemed good to Providence that in this terrible crisis you should not be able to advance one step towards independence, without advancing one likewise toward liberty. An imbecile and decrepit despotism prepared the way for French tyranny. Political impostors then thought to deceive you by promising reforms, and announcing, in a constitution framed at their pleasure, the empire of the laws, ... a barbarous contradiction, worthy of their insolence. But the Spanish people, that people which before any other enjoyed the prerogatives and advantages of civil liberty, and opposed to arbitrary power the barrier which justice has appointed, need borrow from no other nation the maxims of political prudence, and told these impudent legislators, that the artifices of intriguers and the mandates of tyrants are not laws for them. You ran to arms; and fortune rendered homage to you, and bestowed victory in reward for your ardour. The immediate effect was the reunion of the state, which was at that time divided into as many factions as provinces. Our enemies thought they had sown among us the deadly seed of anarchy, and did not remember that Spanish judgement and circumspection are always superior to French intrigue. A supreme authority was established without contradiction and without violence; and the people, after having astonished the world with the spectacle of their sublime exaltation and their victories, filled it with admiration and respect by their moderation and discretion.

“The Central Junta was installed, and its first care was to announce, that if the expulsion of the enemy was the first object of its attention in point of time, the permanent welfare of the state was the principal in importance; for to leave it sunk in the sea of old abuses, would be a crime as enormous as to deliver you into the hands of Buonaparte; therefore, as soon as the whirlwind of war permitted, it resounded in your ears the name of the Cortes, which has ever been the bulwark of civil freedom; a name heretofore pronounced with mystery by the learned, with distrust by politicians, and with horror by tyrants; but which henceforth in Spain will be the indestructible basis of the monarchy, the most secure support of the rights of Ferdinand and his family, a right for the people, and an obligation for the government. That moral resistance, which has reduced our enemies to confusion and despair in the midst of their victories, must not receive a less reward. Those battles which are lost, those armies which are destroyed; those soldiers who, dispersed in one action, return to offer themselves for another; that populace which, despoiled of almost all they possessed, returned to their homes to share the wretched remains of their property with the defenders of their country; that struggle of barbarity on the one hand, and of invincible constancy on the other, present a whole as terrible as magnificent, which Europe contemplates with astonishment, and which history will one day record, for the admiration and example of posterity. A people so generous ought only to be governed by laws which bear the great character of public consent and common utility, ... a character which they can only receive by emanating from the august assembly which has been announced to you.”

The Junta now betrayed that undue desire of retaining their power, which, though not their only error, was the only one which proceeded from selfish considerations. “It had been recommended,” they said, “that the existing government should be converted into a regency of three or of five persons, and this opinion was supported by the application of an ancient law to our present situation; but a political position which is entirely new, occasions political forms and principles absolutely new also. To expel the French, to restore to his liberty and his throne our adored King, and to establish a solid and permanent foundation of good government, are the maxims which gave the impulse to our revolution, are those which support and direct it; and that government will be the best which shall best promote these wishes of the Spanish nation. Does a regency promise this security? What inconveniences, what dangers, how many divisions, how many parties, how many ambitious pretensions within and without the kingdom; how much, and how just, discontent in our Americas, now called to have a share in the present government! What would become of our Cortes, our liberty, the cheering prospects of future welfare and glory which present themselves? What would become of the object most valuable and dear to the Spanish nation ... the rights of Ferdinand? The advocates for this institution ought to shudder at the danger to which they expose them, and to bear in mind that they afford to the tyrant a new opportunity of buying and selling them. Let us bow with reverence to the venerable antiquity of the law; but let us profit by the experience of ages. Let us open our annals and trace the history of our regencies. What shall we find? ... a picture of desolation, of civil war, of rapine, and of human degradation, in unfortunate Castille.”

The weakness of this reasoning proved how the love of power had blinded those from whom it proceeded. The Junta wished to evade the law of the Partidas, because it did not specify a case which it could not possibly have contemplated, though the law itself was perfectly and directly relevant. They assumed it as a certain consequence of a regency, that the colonies would be disgusted; that the Cortes would not be convoked; that the rights of Ferdinand would be disregarded; and that new opportunities of corruption would be afforded to France; and they forgot to ask themselves what reason there could be for apprehending all or any of these dangers, more from a council of regency than from their own body. Romana’s manifesto contained nothing more flagrantly illogical than this. Having thus endeavoured to set aside this project by alarming the nation, they admitted that the executive power ought to be lodged in fewer hands, and said, that with that circumspection, which neither exposed the state to the oscillations consequent upon every change of government, nor sensibly altered the unity of the body which it was intrusted with, they had concentrated their own authority; and that from this time those measures which required dispatch, secrecy, and energy, would be directed by a section formed of six members, holding their office for a time.

The remainder of the manifesto was in a worthier strain. “Another opinion,” they said, “which objected to a regency, objected also to the Cortes as an insufficient representation, if convoked according to the ancient forms; as ill-timed, and perhaps perilous in the existing circumstances; and in fine as useless, because the provincial Juntas, which had been immediately erected by the people, were their true representatives; but as the government had already publicly declared that it would adapt the Cortes, in its numbers, forms, and classes, to the present state of things, any objection drawn from the inadequacy of the ancient forms was malicious, as well as inapplicable. Yes, Spaniards,” said they, “you are about to have your Cortes, and the national representation will be as perfect and full as it can and ought to be, in an assembly of such importance and eminent dignity. You are about to have your Cortes; and at what time, gracious God! can the nation adopt this measure better than at present? When war has exhausted all the ordinary means, when the selfishness of some, and the ambition of others, debilitate and paralyse the efforts of government; when they seek to destroy from its foundations the essential principle of the monarchy, which is union; when the hydra of federalism, so happily silenced the preceding year by the creation of the central power, dares again to raise its heads, and endeavour to precipitate us into anarchy; when the subtlety of our enemies is watching the moment of our divisions to destroy the state; this is the time, then, to collect in one point the national dignity and power, where the Spanish people may vote and call forth the extraordinary resources which a powerful nation ever has within it for its salvation. That alone can put them in motion; that alone can encourage the timidity of some, and restrain the ambition of others; that alone can suppress importunate vanity, puerile pretensions, and infuriated passions. Spain will, in fine, give to Europe a fresh example of its religion, its circumspection, and its discretion, in the just and moderate use which it is about to make of the liberty in which it is constituted. Thus it is that the supreme Junta, which immediately recognized this national representation as a right, and proclaimed it as a reward, now invokes and implores it as the most necessary and efficacious remedy; and has therefore resolved that the general Cortes shall be convoked on the first day of January in the next year, in order to enter on their august functions the first of March following. When that happy day has arrived, the Junta will say to the representatives of the nation,