jects he had in view. Having, then, received from him a taunt as to an unprotected part of our dominions, let us take the hint, and by an act of our own render a repetition of the taunt unnecessary. It had been said, that beat a fool in a mortar with a pestle, he would never quit his folly:we have been beat in a mortar for many years, but what had we got but disgrace?"

we

Sir Francis then proceeded to speak of the affairs of Spain. "If were to assist the Spaniards," he said, "it was the duty of ministers to have seen that there was a rational hope of attaining our end: if they had proceeded upon light grounds, they had been guilty of a crime of the deepest magnitude. After having obtained accurate information as to the real state of public feeling in that country, they should have seen that there were 300,000 men in arms; that all the passes were secured; that a British army would be able to fight with every advantage; that the soldiers would not be subject to the want of food; and that they would only have to fall, if they did fall, in the field of glory. If these things could not be insured, it was their duty not to have landed a single man, but to have supplied the Spaniards with arms and other necessaries, which might have prolonged the war. And with respect to sending money to them, it would well have become the ministry, before they call ed for a supply from the exhausted pockets of the people, to have restored the millions of which Spain some years ago had been so unjustly pillaged by the government of this country, and which had gone to his Majesty, under the name of droits of admiralty. But there was no rational expectation of success in such a

contest. They had trusted the British character and honour on the rotten plank of the Spanish government and the inquisition! The absurdity of acting on the divine right of kings had been the misfortune of this reign, -in support of it we had made an unavailing waste of blood and treasure, but we had never yet embarked in any legitimate object. It suited administration now to say, that the internal government of a country should not be interfered with. How did this doctrine accord with the idea of that contest in which, for the last fifteen years, we had been engaged with the French, simply because they chose to alter their internal form of government? Instead of a monument to the memory of the minister who involved us in such a war, he deserved to have lost his head on a scaffold.-The House is called on for an address of thanks. I, for one," said Sir Francis, "have no thanks to bestow: kings are too much exposed to have adulation. poured into their ears, and this has been the cause of the overthrow of too many of the thrones of Europe. We have not heard that any of the kings who have of late years fallen under the dominion of Buonaparte were in want of courtiers. It is fit that the king of England should occasionally hear the truth from his Commons, and no better opportunity than the present can possibly present itself.-Mr Canning has objected to the thought of this being a sinking country:- he himself may be rising, but the country is sinking; and there is too much ground to be lieve that it will sink still lower, if a reform does not speedily take place."

Lord Henry Petty applauded the speech. "In the principal parts of its sentiments,-sentiments," he said,

"which were delivered with such an eloquence as could not soon be forgotten, he cordially concurred; and there was no man in whose sentiments he would be more happy to feel it consistent with his opinions to concur than Sir Francis Burdett." Mr Canning could not help expressing his astonishment and regret at hearing this. "To the talents of Sir Francis," he said," and to his sincerity also, no man was more willing to do justice than he was; but without meaning any thing disrespectful to that, honourable baronet, he must say that he was grieved to hear the noble lord, who was naturally to be ranked among the great men of the country, and who was to be looked to as one of its probable governors, declare such an entire concurrence in sentiments so dangerous in their nature and character. If the evils which Sir Francis Burdett deplored were so grievous, why did he not bring them forward in some distinct and tangible form, and not fasten a general declamation upon a question of this nature? why not propose some practical remedy, such a remedy as any minister could apply, and not continue to repeat his doctrine, that the whole frame of the government was not worth preserving?"

the House, whether such an imputation was applicable to him? whether the course which he had pursued that night, as he had uniformly done, in reprobating the abuses that prevailed in the administration of government, could be fairly deemed inconsistent with the profound veneration which he felt for the genuine constitution of the country? Upon this Mr Canning replied, that he referred to the phrase of " absurdly contending for loyalty," which the baronet had introduced in his speech. Sir Francis explained his meaning to be, that the argument respecting loyalty in Spain was pushed to an extremity inconsistent with the freedom of any nation, and particularly with the constitution of England. But though this particular phrase, might thus be fairly explained, and nothing fell from him in this speech contrary to that veneration which he expressed for the constitution, it is not the less certain that, during the whole of the Spanish revolution, Sir Francis Burdett and his partizans have shewn a callousness of feeling toward the patriots, and an indifference toward the best interests of mankind, which were not to have been expected from any true lovers of liberty.

VOL. II. PART I.

HE

THe campaigns in Portugal and Spain were concluded, but they were to be fought over again in Parliament. A vote of thanks Jan. 23. was moved to Sir Arthur Wellesley, for the battle

of Vimiera. Earl Moira protested against it, because Sir Harry Burrard was not included. "That general," he said, "had approved of the dispositions made by Sir Arthur for the battle, and thereby made himself responsible for those dispositions. He had the command; he was present, for a great part of the time, in the hottest of the engagement; and he controuled the opinion of Sir Arthur respecting the advance to Torras Vedras. Had the army been defeated, he must have participated in the shame of the defeat: surely, then, justice required that he should partake of the triumph of the victory, especially as, after what had transpired in the Court of Inquiry, to leave his name out of the vote of thanks would be, in fact, to pass the severest censure upon him." This inference was totally denied by the ministry. Lord Mulgrave said he knew Sir Harry Burrard well, knew his sentiments upon the subject, and that that gallant general

utterly disclaimed all right to thanke which he felt he had not earned. This assertion did not preclude a repetition of the same arguments in the House of Jan. 25. Commons, by Lord Folkestone and Mr Whitbread. General Stewart replied, that no man could have a higher respect for Sir Harry than he had; but he could not help observing, that if the thanks of Parliament were to be voted him, it would be impossible to make the army understand for what; for the soldiers had seen the activity of Sir Arthur Wellesley, and knew that Sir Harry Burrard did nothing more than come into the field.

On these questions no division took place, all parties being agreed that the services of Sir Arthur Welles ley and the army under his com mand deserved the thanks of the country. The question upon the convention of Cintra was a trial strength. Lord Henry Petty moved two resolutions, stating that it had disappointed Feb. 21 the hopes and expectations of the country, and that the causes and circumstances which le to it had in a great measure arisen

from the misconduct and negligence of his Majesty's ministers. These resolutions were introduced by a speech of considerable length. Lord Henry began by saying, that "no proceedings which had yet taken place upon this subject were of a nature to preclude the expediency and necessity of a parliamentary investigation; for the Board of Inquiry was a tribunal incompetent to give satisfaction to the country, and irreconcileable with all the received principles of law and equity-Opening its doors to the public, calling upon the very parties to give their testimony, and drawing from them information by which they were to be subjected to criminal prosecution, it was calculated rather to defeat than to promote the ends of justice.

"It is not my intention," he pursued, "to discuss the extent of the insurrections which broke out in Spain; but if they afforded any room for military exertion on our part, government could not have been found more fortunately situated with regard to military means than it was. There was at that time a considerable expedition prepared for distant service, there was another force in the Mediterranean, under General Spencer: it had been sent to take possession of Ceuta, but when it arrived, the attack upon Ceuta was found impracticable. Soon afterwards a new prospect of vigorous exertion opened upon Lord Castlereagh, and a third army was sent upon a voyage of discovery and observation, to look for an expedition in the Baltic. Thus, then, when government was called upon to co-operate with Spain, it had in actual readiness three distinct masses of disposable force. Lord Castlereagh was actually rich in his own failures. It was

resolved to send a force to assist the Spanish patriots: Sir Arthur Wellesley was appointed to the command; and the ultimate destination of the expedition was Portugal. There was nothing in the possession of Portugal itself,-nothing in the possession of the port of Lisbon, as a source of immediate succour to the Spaniards,

nothing connected with the real interests of our faithful ally the Queen of Portugal, or of her subjects, that could point out, much less justify that destination; for of all the calamities that can be inflicted upon a country, the conquest of it by a power not able to retain it is the greatest; because it is thereby exposed to all the calamities and horrors of two revolutions. It subjects a country to calamities, of which the immediate evil inflicted by the conqueror is the least; for it draws out all the lurking vices that are concealed in the bosom of society, and brings all those dormant bad qualities into play, which never fail to accompany and aggra vate the convulsions of a country. These evils are inflicted even by a change from good to better; but how much more must they be increased when the change is from bad to worse! Such an assistance this country could not be called upon to afford, neither was Portugal inclined to require it; and such was the only assistance we could give to Portugal, independent of Spain. But we now have been taught that it is not on the Tagus that Buonaparte was to be restrained in his pursuits. In the progress of his unlimited schemes of ambition, it is not to momentary triumphs, to the eclat of public rejoicings, or to the firing of Park guns, that his exertions are directed. Because he aims at ultimate advantage, and hopes for ultimate success

and ultimate glory, he looks with utter contempt at Portugal, whilst he presses without cessation upon the provinces of Spain. Do I say, however, that there were no objects in Portugal which claimed our attention? By no means. There was in that country a French army, and in its port a Russian fleet. The capture of that army and the possession of that fleet were of the highest importance; and we stood not only ourselves, but beheld the enemy in such a relative situation as we had never before the good fortune to witness. We saw a French army in a position in which it was cut off from all means of assistance, situated in an unfriendly country,-deprived of every succour by sea and land. Every man who looked to it might say, that, whatever should be the fate of the other armies of Buonaparte, whatever views of aggrandisement they might be the means of promoting, here at least was an army cut off from all possibility of relief-an army that must be forced to pay the tribute due to British valour, and submit, by British exertions, to confusion and defeat. This expedition, however, required several important and necessary considerations to be attended to most particularly. It required that the most positive and clear instructions should be given to the officer who was to have the conduct of it. Being intended to act in different situations, according to dif. ferent circumstances, it was, above all things, necessary that it should be properly equipped for the service; that the commander should at least have had the opportunity afforded him of choosing his own ground; that after such discretion was confided to him, he should at least be continued in his command. This

was essentially necessary to insure its success. But the shores of Portugal were not the first object of the expedition. It fluctuated between the northern and southern coasts of Spain; and the suggestion of carrying it to Portugal, far from having been founded upon any previous original determination, was taken up in forty-eight hours, upon the suggestion of the Spanish deputies.

Spain was the original destination of this army; and, on the 21st of June, Lord Castlereagh says, in his letter to Sir Arthur, that it was better to bring the whole force together than to trust to a junction on the coast of Spain: but from that moment every thing was trusted to a junction there. Sir Arthur's expedition sailed separately, the cavalry belonging to it sailed separately, General Moore's expedition sailed separately, General Auckland's expedition sailed separately, the whole of the ordnance sailed separately,— and the junction of all these forces and equipments was left to be effected on the coast of Spain. On the 28th one letter was written to Admiral Purvis, directing him to send intelligence to Sir Arthur, on the north coast of Spain; and another to General Spencer, telling him that Sir Arthur was to co-operate with him; so that the machinery by which the expedition was to be worked was, that Admiral Purvis, who was off Cadiz, was to send requisites to Sir Arthur Wellesley, who was in the north of Spain, which were to induce Sir Arthur to send orders to General Spencer, who was in the south. Two days afterwards the whole plan is altered, in consequence of an opinion given by the Spanish deputics in London; and in opposition to all the previous plans, Sir Arthur is instruct