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CHAP.

XI.

1822.

on one side; "Viva Murillo! Viva el Rey Assoluto!" resounded on the other. Riego was the very worst person that could have been selected to moderate the Cortes in such a period of effervescence. Himself the leader of the revolution, and the acknowledged chief of the violent party, how was it possible for him to restrain their excesses? "I call you to order," said he to a deputy who was attacking that party in the assembly; "you forget I am the chief of the Exaltados."-" To refuse to hear the petitioners from Valencia," said another, "is to invite the people to take justice into their own hands in the streets." To such a length did the disorders proceed. that the Cortes appointed a committee to inquire into them, which reported that the state of the kingdom was deplorable. The King's Ministers were ordered, by the imperious majority in that assembly, to the bar of the Cortes, to give an account of their conduct; the military were as much divided as the people; and under the very eye of the legislature a combat took place between the March 24. grenadiers of the guard, who shouted, "Viva Murillo !" and the regiment of Ferdinand VII., who replied, “Viva Riego!" which was only ended by a general discharge of musketry by the national guards, who were called out, by which several persons, including the standard-bearer of the guard, were killed. Intimidated by these disorders, which he was wholly powerless to prevent, the king left 1 Martignac, Madrid, and went to Aranjuez, from whence he went on to i. 391, 393; pass Easter at Toledo; and his departure removed the only v. 424, 425. restraint that existed on the excesses in the capital. 1

Ann. Hist.

of the Cor

civil war.

The first proceedings of the Cortes related to the trial 55. of various persons on the Royal side who had taken a part Proceedings in the late tumults. It was never thought of prosecuting tes, and proany person on the Liberal. A committee of the Cortes, gress of the to whom the matter was referred, reported that the exMinister of War, Don Sanchez Salvador, and General Murillo, should be put on their trial; and the resolution was adopted by the assembly as to the former, and only

XI.

1822.

CHAP. rejected as to the latter by a narrow majority. A new law also was passed, submitting offences of the press to the decision of the juries, which, in the present state of the country, was securing for them alternately total impunity, or subjecting them to vindictive injustice. A bill was also brought in, and passed, for the reduction of the ecclesiastical establishment, which was certainly excessive, notwithstanding all the reforms which had taken place. It was calculated that, when it came into full operation, it would effect a reduction of 73,000 ecclesiastics, and 600,000 reals (£6000) a-day. The knowledge that these great changes were in progress, which went to strike so serious a blow at the influence and possessions of the Church, tended to augment the activity and energy of the royalist party in the provinces. The civil war soon became universal; the conflagration spread over the whole country. Every considerable town was wrapt in flames, every rural district bristled with armed men. In Navarre, Quesada, at the head of six hundred guerillas, was in entire possession of the country up to the gates of Pampeluna, and although often driven by the garrison of that fortress into the French territory, yet he always emerged again with additional followers, and renewed the war, and united with the Royalists in Biscay. In Catalonia, Misas led a band of peasants, which soon got the entire command of the mountain district in the north; while the Baron d'Erolles, well known in the War of Independence, secretly, in the south of the province, organised a still more formidable insurrection, which, under the personal direction of Antonio Maranon, surnamed the Trappist," soon acquired great influence. This singular i. 396, 398; man was one of the decided characters whom revolution v. 427, 428. and civil war draw forth in countries of marked native disposition.1

1 Martignac,

Ann. Hist.

66

Originally a soldier, but thrown into the convent by misfortunes, in part brought on by his impetuous and unruly disposition, the Trappist had not with the cowl

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1822.

56.

pist: his

and charac

put on the habits, or become endued with the feelings of CHAP. the Church. He carried with him into the cloister the passions, the desires, and the ambition of the world. He was now about forty-five years of age-a period of life The Trapwhen the bodily frame is, in strong constitutions, yet in its appearance vigour, and the feelings are steadily directed rather than ter, and folenfeebled by age. His eye was keen and piercing, his lowers. air confident and intrepid. He constantly wore the dress of his order, but beneath it burned all the passions of the world. Arrayed in his monkish costume, with a crucifix on his breast and a scalp on his head, he had pistols in his girdle, a sabre by his side, and a huge whip in his hand. Mounted on a tall and powerful horse, which he managed with perfect address, he galloped through the crowd, which always awaited his approach, and fell on their knees as he passed, and dispensed blessings to the right and left with the air of a sovereign prince acknowledging the homage of his subjects. He never commenced an attack without falling on his knees, to implore the protection of the Most High; and, rising up, he led his men into fire, shouting, "Viva Dio! Viva el Rey!" In April 1822 he was at the head of a numerous band of men, animated by his example, and electrified by his speeches. Monks, priests, peasants, smugglers, curates, landowners, hidalgos, were to be seen, side by side, in his bands, irregularly armed, scarcely disciplined, but zealous and hardy, and animated with the highest degree of religious enthusiasm. Their spirit was not so much that of the patriot as of the crusader; they took up arms, not to defend their homes, but to uphold the Roman Catholic faith. Individually brave, they met death, whether in the field or on the scaffold, with equal calmness; but their want of discipline exposed them to frequent reverses when brought into collision with regular troops-which, however, were soon repaired, as in the wars of Sertorius, i. 398, 401; the Moors, and Napoleon, by the unconquerable and per- v. 428. severing spirit of the peasantry.1

VOL. II.

2 P

1 Martignac,

Ann. Hist.

CHAP.

XI.

1822.

57.

assault of

Cervera.
May 18.

The insurgents, after a variety of lesser successes, had made themselves masters of Cervera, where they had established their headquarters. The Trappist, after susDesperate taining several gallant actions, was driven back into that town by General Bellido, who attacked him with three regiments drawn out of Lerida, and on the 18th May made a general assault on the town. To distract the enemy, he set it on fire in four different places, and in the midst of the conflagration, which spread with frightful rapidity, his troops rushed in. The Trappist made a gallant and protracted defence; but after a conflict of ten hours' duration, from house to house, and from street to street, his men were driven out with great slaughter, though with heavy loss to the victors. Twelve hundred of the Royalists fell or were made prisoners, among whom were one hundred and fifty monks, and nearly half the number 1 Ann. Hist. of the Constitutional troops were lost. The Trappist Martignac, himself escaped with a few followers to the mountains, Moniteur, where his powerful voice soon assembled a second band, May 25, 1823. not less gallant and devoted than that which had perished amidst the ruins and flames of Cervera.1

v. 428, 429;

i. 401, 402;

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Meanwhile Misas, who had been driven into France, re-entered Spain, drew together several desultory bands to his standard, and carried the war to the very gates of Barcelona. He was attacked, however, by the regular troops in that fortress, driven back to Puycerda, where he was utterly routed, and the remains of his band driven back a second time into France, where they again found an asylum-an ominous circumstance for the republican régime in Spain. But in other quarters the Royalists appeared with indefatigable activity: Galicia was almost entirely, in its mountain districts, in their hands; Navarre was overrun by their adherents; and in the neighbourhood of Murcia, Jaimes, a noted partisan, had again raised his standard and drawn together a considerable number of followers. The king, meanwhile, was at Aranjuez, and on the 30th May, being the day of his fête, an immense

XI.

1822.

crowd of peasants assembled in the gardens of the palace CHAP. shouting "El Rey Assoluto!" which was caught up and repeated by the soldiers of the guard. The national guard upon this was called out by the Liberal authorities, and dispersed the crowd; in the course of which one of them drew his sabre against the Infant Don Carlos, and was with difficulty saved by that prince from the fate which awaited him at the hands of the enraged soldiery. On the same day a still more serious tumult broke out at Valencia, where a great mob assembled, shouting, "Long live Elio!-Down with the Constitution!" and proceeded to the citadel where that general still lay in prison, having never been brought to trial. They got possession of the stronghold by the aid of the garrison by which it was held, but were immediately invested there by the national guard and remainder of the garrison of the place, and being without provisions, they were soon obliged to surrender. The victors now proceeded to Elio's dungeon, shouting "Death to Elio!" and his last hour seemed to have arrived; but he was reserved for a still more mournful end. A little gold which he had about him occupied the first attention of the assassins, and meanwhile v. 434, 436; the address of the commander of the place got him extri- i. 409, 411. cated from their hands and conveyed to a place of safety.1

1 Ann. Hist.

Martignac,

59.

passed by

The intelligence of these events worked the Cortes up to a perfect fury; and in the first tumult of passion they Severe laws passed several decrees indicating their extreme exasper- the Cortes. ation, and which contributed in a great degree to the June 3. sanguinary character which the civil war in the Peninsula soon afterwards assumed, and has unhappily ever since maintained. It was decreed that "all towns, villages, and rural districts, which should harbour or give shelter to the factious, should be treated as enemies with the whole rigour of military law; that those in which there were factious juntas should be subjected to military execution; that every convent in which the factious were June 4. found should be suppressed, and its inmates put at the

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