CHAP. IX.

SPAIN Declaration regarding Portugal-Army of Observation formed New Invasion of Portugal permitted-The defeated Rebels dis armed, and Chaves and Canellas ordered to quit Spain-Progress of the Carlists-Attempt upon Tortosa-Insurrection in CataloniaDissensions in the Ministry-M. Recacho dismissed-Progress of the Rebels in Catalonia-They establish Provisional Governments→→ Measures adopted against them-The Army of Observation is marched into Catalonia-Ferdinand goes to Catalonia himself-Arrives at Tarragona-Defeat of the Rebels-Conduct of the Clergy-Purification of the Public Offices-Executions-The French Garrison is withdrawn from Barcelona-Trade with South America-Difference with the Pope, regarding the Appointment of South American Bishops.

tain "a contrary result." His needless precautions, and who Catholic majesty, by thus identi- knew, at all events, that their very fying himself with the rebels, presence would give countenance confirmed all that had been said to Portuguese mal-contents, supof his policy; and if, by the pos- plied liberal contributions. It was sible kindling of their “fire of de- their policy to make the army respair,” he meant that, had they not gard them as the substantial probeen countenanced by his govern- viders for their wants. The royalist ment, they would have had re- volunteers, the most numerous and course to more desperate measures formidable military body in the than they actually adopted, it is not, kingdom, might be almost said to in the first place, easy to see what be in their pay. In its movements measures could have been more des- it was at their nod, and the nod of perate than rebellion and invasion; their agents ;-an instrument to be and, secondly, however extravagant played off by them at any time their “despair" might have been, against the king their master. it would at all events have proved In addition to these corps of obinfinitely more harmless to Por- servation, an ordinance was issued tugal when not equipped with directing a new levy of twentySpanish arms, and not guided by four thousand men, which was to Spanish counsels.

be completed by the end of March. In the mean time, as a precau- The period of service, however, tionary measure against any hos- was in this instance to be limited tile movement on the part of Por- to six years, instead of eight, the tugal, which Britain had guaran- regular extent of its duration. teed to Europe should not take The nobles were exempted from place, if Spain desisted honestly service on payment of fifteen thoufrom her aggressions, two armies sand reals; the same privilege of observation were stationed; the was granted to the elder sons of one on the Tagus at Talavera, un- persons not noble, on payment of der the command of general Sers- six thousand reals, and furnish feld, the other under Rodil, the ing a substitute - an indulgence obstinate defender of Callao, along which was extended to persons in the frontiers of Estremadura, from public employments, and," with Badajoz to Alcantara. Another the view of protecting learning." division was stationed near the as the decree said, to students in Gallician frontier, at Orense. To- the universities, colleges, and segether, these troops amounted to minaries.

These costly exempabout fifteen thousand men. Al- tions, however, were believed to though the finances were in such have been granted as much for the miserable disorder that money could purpose of raising money, as from not be furnished for the ordinary any wish to alleviate the burthen civil services of the government, of personal service. Such preparafunds were procured to equip these tions seemed to shew that Spain troops, on the fidelity, or devoted was serious in apprehending an atbigotry of whom, so much depend- tack from Portugal, than which no ed. The ecclesiastics, who proba- fear could well be more groundbly expected that they would be less; but no person had any right employed as much for opportune to complain of her parade of the offence as for the execution of "pomp and circumstance of war,“

so long as it was not directed of. The rebels were actually dis. fensively against her neighbours. armed, and sent into the interior. She pretended, indeed, that the But it was now further de. augmentation of her military manded, that Chaves and Canellas means was necessary to enable her should not be allowed to remain in to fulfil her promises, to disarm the Spain. This, too, was complied Portuguese rebels who might take with; and these turbulent traitors refuge in the Spanish territory; withdrew into France. The sucbut, for a long time, this duty was cess with which the cabinet of performed in a way that proved, Madrid now made its orders be how reluctantly she submitted to executed, furnished the best an. the necessity which her own mis- swer to its former pretences, that conduct had imposed upon her. the captains-general had armed and By the end of February, only be encouraged the rebels, contrary tween three and four hundred to the express instructions of their men had been returned to the War- government. One circumstance office as disarmed, although the put them to the blush. The arrebel troops, routed in the engage, tillery taken from the rebels in ment at Coruches, had amounted to Portugal was found to be printwelve thousand. It had been cipally of Seville manufacture. loudly proclaimed that the refu. As only the government has the gees were to be removed into the right, in Spain, of casting cannon, heart of the Asturias and Castile; and manufacturing powder, this but they were allowed to remain discovery directly implicated it. at Santiago and Orense in Gallicia Such a circumstance could not be within a few miles of the frontiers. referred to the unauthorized acts

There, just as before, they were of private individuals. allowed to assemble and equip In truth, the most influential themselves; and the result was a party in the country, and a portion new invasion of Portugal by even of the cabinet, would have Chaves, Silveira, and Magessi, in preferred an open avowal of the the month of February, in the assistance given to Chaves and his course of which they had pene- confederates, and would even now trated to Braga, within a short dise have urged a declaration of war tance of Oporto, before the gene- against Portugal and her_ally. rals of the regency could march Madrid was the seat of a double from Beira oppose them. government. There was the caBeing again routed by the consti- binet, with Ferdinand at its head, tutional troops, they again retired ostensibly in possession of the adtowards Spain, where they would ministration of the kingdom ; but have been received with the same there was likewise the Camarilla friendly aid as before, if the re- of the Apostolics, with M. de Camonstrances of Britain and Portu- lomarde at its head, which exergal on this new and outrageous cised more substantial authority violation of faith had not been than the monarch himself. The backed by the neighbourhood of a latter party was supported by all British army, which by this time the influence of the church, which, had advanced its head-quarters in Spain, swallows up almost every from Lisbon to Coimbra. Spain other. It was under its immeat last appeared to be in earnest. diate orders that the measures

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against Portugal had been adopted; embarrassed by poverty, an actual it was the liberality and authority war was sure to be unsuccessful, of its members that had supplied and would most probably furnish arms and money ; it was from it opportunities for a party again to that the officers of the government raise its head, before which they, were accustomed to receive com- and the Apostolics, and their masmands of one tenor with fully as ter, would all have equally reason much respect as they took instruc- to tremble. To the re-establishtions of an opposite kind from ment of the inquisition they optheir royal master; and if they posed, likewise, the interests of the thought fit to give the preference crown, to which, on the abolition to the former, it was under the of the holy office, its immense prowing of this party that they found perty had passed. The best secuprotection. Its principles and its rity for retaining these domains objects were all directed to the was, to prevent their former owners aggrandizement of the church- from being in a situation to the restoration of its revenues, the reclaim them; but precisely for re-establishment of the Inquisition. that reason, the restoration of the Politics were to be regarded only inquisition was a sine qua non of with a view to these great objects; the Apostolic party. and the political system, therefore, The principles of that party was to be one of more unmixed were thus principles of resistance and savage despotism than even to the king; and, in truth, they Ferdinand himself had yet in- showed no very great disinclination dulged in. The cabinet, again, or to apply them practically as such. at least that part of the cabinet The royalist volunteers were much which did not belong likewise to more under their control than the Camarilla, was not a whit under that of the monarch: the more attached to civil liberty, ale acts of insurrection, in which these though it was much more suspici- troops had indulged in the preous of ecclesiastical supremacy. ceding year, did not call forth from They would go, and they had gone, them any disapprobation, but seemto the extremest lengths of severity ed to have been permitted by them, in the indiscriminate proscription if not privately encouraged, in of all who might be suspected of order that Ferdinand might feel constitutional ideas; they had there was a power in the kingdom used exile, the dungeon, and the stronger than himself. Through scaffold, with abundant liberality; the clergy, the whole mass of but they feared that the resto- which, from the archbishop to the ration of the holy office might in- curate, belonged to their ranks, terfere with their own monopoly their influence with the ignorant of the power of inflicting misery. and superstitious people was unThey were as cordial haters of bounded. Their preachings and the Portuguese constitution as were exhortations had gradually prethe Apostolics themselves; they pared, among the populace and had gone to the verge of a war peasantry, the materials of a rebelwith England to subvert it: but lion, whose object should be, to they were not so blinded by bigotry compel the king to be even more as not to discern that, abandoned intolerantly absolute than he was, as they were by their allies, and and to govern more exclusively for

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the interests of churchmen. It Descending from the mountains,

. was a war of the priesthood, not in which they were rapidly ina : merely against everything like creasing, they made incursions upon equal rights or political ameliora- villages, and even to the gates of 1 tion, but even against regular au- walled towns. The government tocratical despotism: nor does the sedulously described such events ? history of Europe furnish a more as mere depredations of banditri ; melancholy example of the utter but the badges and signals of these prostration of head and heart, banditti, the activity with which which a bigotted and intolerant they searched for arms and horses, priesthood can inflict upon a priest- and the carelessness which they hood-ridden people. For the ex- manifested for other species of ecution of their purposes the clergy plunder, showed them to be Carfound willing secular instruments lists. In 1825 and 1826 they in unemployed and discontented had attempted to make themselves officers, who thought that former masters of Tortosa ; in both cases services had not been duly reward. they had been unsuccessful, goed, or whose idleness and rapacity vernment having previously obwere gratified by lawless power, tained information of their designs. which enabled them to cloak the But, in the beginning of the pursuits of the bandit under the present year, the withdrawing of mask of a political quarrel. the regular troops from the pro

While the real instigators of vinces, to form the superfluous the discontent kept their incessant armies of observation on the fronactivity concealed, these men had tiers of Portugal, presented a mor

hore gradually been forming troops, and favourable opportunity to the active organizing an insurrection in the leaders and secret abettors of this north-eastern parts of the kingdom anomalous insurrection. Their -in Arragon, Valencia, and Cata- first object was against Tortosa, but lonia. They did not conceal that the rising was to take place at the they reckoned Ferdinand unfit to same moment at Manresa, Vieh, reign, as being a prince infected and on other points of Catalonia. with constitutional heresies, and During the months of February under the tutelage of constitu- and March, small bands of the maltional ministers, degrading the just contente became more numerous rights of the throne, and disregard- and bold: they openly traversed the

, ing the holy claims of religion. country, enlisting recruits, and did They professed it to be their in- enough to put the government on tention to place the crown on the its guard, and defeat the enterprise. head of his younger brother, don The 1st of April was fixed for the Carlos, whom they reckoned more general insurrectionary movementos bigotted, intolerant, and tyrannical At Tortosa the rebels succeeded so: -better fitted to be an instrument far as to pillage the houses of some in the hand of the church to spread suspected constitutionalists, and darkness and destruction over the compel the governor to retire into land. Hence they had assumed the fort. Most of the villages, 1 the name of Carlists; and, under too, in the districts of Vich and this appellation, they had, during Gerona rose in arms. ,

But the the last two years, occasionally design failed from want of cours given some uneasiness to the police. operation. Its leaders bad scorcely. .