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-Well, then, now he is come; not recalled, but come. He is come home to tell his own story. We, before, called upon his defenders to produce us his Protest; but we now call upon himself. Now, then, Mr. " conqueror of Vimeira;" now, then, gallant Sir Arthur;" now, then, you whose friends have hazarded political infamy for your sake; now, then, produce this Protest to us; and, if you cannot, tell us, whose labour, whose sweat and pain and misery have supported the vast expence of the expedition; tell us why you signed the armistice of the 22d of August, after having beaten with " half" your force," the "whole of the French force, commanded

by the Duc D'Abrantes in person." Come, Sir, none of your haughty Eastern airs. None of your disdainful silence. That will hot serve your turn. Your friends have asserted, that you made a Protest. Where is it? Shew it us. Tell us of what it consisted; or acknowledge that those friends, in wittingly asserting what was false, with a view of saving your reputation at the expence of your associates, have proved themselves to be the very greatest scoundrels that ever infested the earth, and that they merit the gallows and the gibbet more than any malefactor, whose name and deeds stand recorded in the annals of Newgate. "Letters "from persons of high honour in the army!" Vile miscreants! To go thus coolly and deliberately to work in the hatching, the completing, and the publishing of a set of corresponding lies! It is impossible to proceed. No words can do justice to conduct like this. The reader will perceive, that the same set of worse than felonious villains are now at work upon "further letters from the

army and navy." The protest is not now spoken of. The tone is softened. No great blame upon any body, except the poor Portuguese. Take a specimen." Ex"tract of a letter from an officer of distinction "on board one of his majesty's ships, just "arrived from Lisbon.-Yesterday I got

some papers, in which I perceive Sir A. "Wellesley's conduct in the suspension of "arms, is most unjustly confounded with "thenal treaty. The first, he signed at "the immediate desire of Sir Hew Dal

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rymple; but with the latter he had nothing ❝ to do at all. The whole was contrary to "his opinion. The motives by which he "has been influenced, are highly honour"able to his feelings. In short, your news

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papers are all ill-informed of the state of "affairs at the time; and I believe most

persons will be astonished when they "know that the French embarkation, after

"all their losses, amounted to 25,000 men. "And you may depend upon it, the Por

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tuguese army availed ours nothing; and "there never was a symptom of revo!!

in favour of us. I mean not to defend

"the treaty-it is a disgraceful and an in"famous one; but as the principal object "was obtained, there need not have been "the outcry which appears to have been "made in the country. As to the Russian "fleet, that is in our possession. I think, "if Sir C. Cotton had not orders from "home, he has done wrong; but if our

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generous conduct is the means of forwarding our negociations for a peace with Russia, it will be hereafter considered as a good act."I beg the reader to look upon this as a sham letter; but, what a pretty fellow this officer of "distinction" must be, if the letter be real. You see, the fellow, who has been base enough to palm this letter upon the public, dares not name either the writer, or the ship that he is on board of. All that is here said about fine feelings, an ill-informed press, and the policy of not fighting is, to be sure, but too cha racteristic of but too many "officers of "distinction" yet not of the navy. slander upon the Portuguese, however, is worthy of marked reprobation. It was exactly thus, that the Pittite crew uniformly treated the French royalists. They first inveigled them into a state of dependance; and then they belied and betrayed them. Does the man, who has published this pretended letter" from an officer of distinction" in the navy, think that such statements will not be resented by the Portuguese? But, what cares he? He has his pay for the use of his dirty columns, and that is all he wants.

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Well, but what are we doing? What part are we acting? We, the people of this fine" free country," who live under a constitution that is, as Pitt used to say, at the end of his speeches," the greatest "blessing that a benign Providence ever "bestowed upon man.' Upon himself, I suppose, he meant. But, what are we, free fellows as we are; what are we doing? We have been talking for a long while; we have been fretting and fuming and scolding and crying like women, or rather like Italiau men, like Jews and Genoese, who, when they are kicked and cuffed, scold and run and run and scold. Here it will end, and that our masters well know. There has been a little stir, owing to Mr. WAITHMAN, in the city of London; but, we shall not now see the example followed, as it was, the other day, when the object was to praise the conduct of those in power. Then we had

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Old Rose galloping down into Hampshire, calling meetings, and assembling his sycophauts from far and near. Now they are as still as mice. Over a bottle, the servants being gone and the doors shut, they look wise, shake their heads, assume a bluff countenance, and begin to talk big; but, the reptiles dare not stir an inch. One wants a sinecure, another a pension, another a place for his son, another a contract, another a living, another a ribbon or a star. They dare not stir. They are the basest slaves that ever disgraced the earth. Let them be told, that the ministry wish them to address, or petition, against the Conventions in Porugal, and you will see them pouring forth in hundreds, as bold as heroes, looking as big and talking as bold as if every individual of them felt himself strong enough to overset a church steeple. Oh, the base wretches! Well, they suffer for it. They are pretty decently peculated upon, and their continual anxiety, their constant fear of displeasing, their perpetual dependance, is a sort of hell upon earth. Yet, now, you shall hear these miserable slaves talk about freedom, about the birthright of Britons, and about our glorious constitution, in as good terms as you could wish to hear. This is a part of their punishment. They are compelled to belie their hearts. They are slaves, and compelled to assume occasionally the appearance of being free.- This does not apply to Hampshire alone. It is, with very few exceptions, applicable to the whole kingdom. There is, it appears, to be a meeting in Essex, and, if it produce a good, plain, manly complaint, unaccompanied with nauseous common-place flattery of the king and his family, which would be not less dishonourable in him to receive than in the county of Essex to offer, it will be a fit subject for commendation; but, it will not, I am afraid, meet with much imitation. Te same influence that sent Wellesley and his comrade Convention-makers to Portugal; that influence which has done so much upon other occasions, will not fail to be exerted now. Indeed, it exerts itself. It is sown all over the country, as regularly as corn is sown in a field. Seventy millions a year are, in one way and another, spent by the government. The government employs and pays all, and it receives all. There is a chain of dependance running through the whole nation, which, though not every where seen, is everywhere felt. There is not one man in one thousand who does not feel the weight of this chain. Army, navy, church, the law, sinecures, pensions, tax offices, war and navy offices, Whitehall,

India-house, 'Bank, contract, job, &c. &c. Who is there; who is not himself, or who has not a son, a brother, or some relation or other, employed and paid by, dependent for bread upon, the minister of the day? Those means by which men formerly maintained their sons and relations, and by which a country gentry were supported in a state of independence, are now drawn away in taxes; and, in order to find a maintenance, those sons and relations must now go and serve the ministry, in some capacity or other; must go and crouch to them, and receive from them, in the shape of pension or of hire, a share of that income, which has been drawn, in taxes, from their parents, or other natural supporters. This is the state in which we are. There needs no trouble, on the part of the ministry, upon an occasion like the present. They know well, that the country cannot stir; because they know that, generally speaking, he who stirs must, if they please, starve. Hence it is, that our anger seems always to evaporate in noise; that, like a mob, we hollow and bawl and threaten when no one can distinguish one of us from the other, and that, the moment we are put individually to the test, we, by conduct, if not by words, deny having had any share in the clamour. And, does it become us to scoff at the slavery of other nations? We are exceedingly bold in reproaching the French with their abject submission; but, let me put this question to you, reader: What do you think the French government would have done, had its generals made such a convention as ours have made ?. Pause a little, and then answer that question. Well, now for another. Suppose, that the French govern ment had not discovered any anger at such conduct in its generals, but seemed, as far as the people could judge, to be resolved to screen them; what do you think the French people would have done in that case ? "Held their tongues," say you. So they would, and so shall we. That is to say, they would have gabbled about the disgrace in their coffee-houses and at their tables, but would have said not a word to their government; and what have we done more? And, if our conduct be, in effect, the same as theirs, under similar circumstances, would have been, of what consequence is it, what difference is it as a question of freedom, whether men be kept in awe by the terrors of the naked sword, or by the terrors of starvation? Of all the proofs of a state of slavery, none is so complete as that of not daring to complain when one is aggrieved. The French, we say, dare not complain,

and therefo 2 we call them slaves. Well, then, if we do not now make our complaints, we are in this dilemma either we dare not complain, or we dare; if the former we are slaves it the later, we are the basest of hypocrites. Who will believe in the re. Ity of our sorrow and indignation at the Con_entions in Portugal? What Portuguese or Spaniard or Swede will be fool auough to give credit to any of our noisy professions of regard for the interests of our allies? No one. Not a man of the three nations. We must do something; or, whatever we may think of ourselves, they will look upon us as a people pretty fairly represented by the convention-making generals. To this we may make up our minds. The world will hear none of our excuses. They will not be able to hear the piteous stories of those who have places and pensions and contracts and jobs, who have sons to push forward, who have manifold dependents for whom to provide. Of all these the world will hear nothing. The world knows that we have made a great, a loud, a furious clamour against the Conventions în Portugal; that world has been told that we are a people perfectly free; and, if we do not act as well as make a mob-like noise, the world will have the good sense and the justice to regard us as slaves, or as hypocrites. It is said, that Sir Hew is arrived. It was time; for, in my opinion, his Proclamation is even worse than the Conventions. What! takeupon us to rule the country and punish the people, unless they submit to n en set over them by us! But, Thave not time to go into this sub'ect at present.

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SPAIN. We have, then, at last, sent an envoy to Spain. In the first place. we have sent the veryman, Mr. John Hookham Frere, who was there when the last quarrel with Spain took place, and when we attack ed and siezed their richly-laden ships, before a declaration of war had been made.. the next place, to whom do we send him? Why, the Gazette tells us, that "the king has "been pleased to nominate and appoint the 5. right hon. John Hookham Frere to be his majesty's envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to his catholic majesty Fer"dinand the VIIth, and has been pleased to "direct him to reside in that character at the

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seat of the central and supreme Junta in "Spain." So. We do acknowledge, then,-that a man may be legally unkinged, and that another may be put up in his stead? Thus is the doctrine of cashiering kings, which gave so much offence, some years ago; and the promulgation of which caused so many persons to be punished in England,

openly recognised by a solemn act of the government of England. Ferdinand and Charles are both alive; they are both out of Spain; they are both in France; both have abdicated the throne in favour of the Buonaparte dynasty. Now, why do we prefer Ferdinand to Charles? Why simply for this reason, because the people, or some of them, say that they wish to have the former, while none of them say that they wish to have the latter. It is pretended, that Ferdinand's right to the throne is founded upon the abdication which Charles made in his favour; but, Charles, the moment he was out of the hands of Ferdinand and his partizans, protested against that abdication, and declared that it was extorted from him with the knife at his throat. Upon that abdication, therefore, we can buila no right for Ferdinand, without, by the same act, destroying the superstructure; for, if Ferdinand, by the abdication of Charles in his favour, became rightful sovereign of Spain, Joseph Buonaparte became the rightful sovereign of Spain in virtue of the abdication of Ferdinand. Both abdications I believe to have been extorted; but, while we have a protest of the abdicating party against the former, we have none against the latter. Were be at liberty, we should, I dare say, have it; but, we are not quite sure of that, while we are in actual possession of the protest of poor old Charles. It is clear, therefore, that, in point of hereditary right, Charles is king of Spain; and that, in acknowledging the latter to be king, we have acknowledged a right in the people of Spain to cashier their kings.But, the most interesting point is this: why do we choose to send an envoy to any king of Spain? From the first I have feared, I have expres sed my fears, that the contest, as far as we were concerned, would be another contest for a king; and, who can say how far the leading men in Spain may, by our interference, have been induced to make it a war for a choice of kings, instead of a war of freedom against despotism? It was not, observe, until after our agents went to Spain, that there was much talk about Ferdinand. Until then a reform of abuses was the main object which the people appeared to have in view; and the public will recollect, that they spoke of their "late infamous govern ment,' uncoupled with any exceptions whatever.It must be acknowledged, that an English minister is to consider, how, in this war, the exertions of England are to be be made most effectually to contribute to wards the permanent safety and greatness of England, provided no wrong be done to any

To me it has

ally. If, therefore, it appeared, that to make war for Ferdinand was the most likely way of succeeding in this object, it was right to make war for him. But, I do not think, that this did appear always appeared, that, for Spain to frustrate the views of Napoleon, to baffle and to mortify and to humble him, and to give an encouraging example to the rest of Europe, the war should have been a war of freedom against despotism. Between Joseph and Between Joseph and Ferdinand many people will see but little difference; and many more will ask, what government could have been worse than that which the Spaniards themselves have declared to have been infamous ?It seems to me, therefore, that the English ministry ought to have wished that the names of Ferdinand and Charles should be totally left out of the contest.It is not to be believed, that the people will fight and endure for the sake of either of their kings. They must perceive, that the result of the contest is of comparatively little importance to them; and, the moment they do so view the thing, there is an end to their exertions.

-But, so think not Lloyds' and Whitehall. They are for a war for a king. Good luck to them; but, they will be kind enough to excuse me, if I feel a little less anxious for the fate of the man, who surrendered the sword of Francis I. to "His Serene Highness, the Grand Duke "of Berg," than I felt for the fate of so many millions of men, who appeared to me to be fighting for that freedom, which a set of degenerate despots had so long withheld from them. There has appeared, and will be inserted below if I have room, a paper, entitled an EXPOSITION OF FACTS, (relating to the usurpation of the crown of Spain by Napoleon) from the pen of Don PEDRO CEVALLOS, who, it must be confessed, has been most advantageously situated for the purpose, having been Secretary of State for foreign affairs, to the three kings, Charles, Ferdinand, and Joseph, and who is now in high favour, it would seem, with the Junta and with our people. Mr. Pedro tells a tough story. Much too tough to be examined in the time that I have, at present, to spare for the purpose; but, I must say, even now, that there wants a good deal to convince me, that it is that "true and artless tale," that the London newspaper editors appear to think it. "A man cannot serve two masters, says the Gospel; but, Don Pedro has served three. Bother me not, ye whining calumniators, with your insinuations that I dislike this man

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because he has exposed Buonaparte; insinu ate or say or swear what you will, you shall never make me affect to believe what ap pears to me to be incredible, merely because it comes from a man who attacks Buonaparte. Falsehood is falsehood, if spoken of the devil himself.- -Don Pedro not only served three masters, but was confided in by all the three. He gives us an account of some conversations between him and Napoleon, and the Courier (I believe it is) ob. serves, that we cannot have a better proof of his integrity, than the fact, that Napoleon reproached him for having too much of that quality. May be so; but, we really are, as yet, destitute of any proof of that fact; unless we take Mr. Cevallos's assertions for proofs, as the country folks in the House used to do with those of Pitt. Of one fact, however, we are quite certain, and that is, that Mr. Cevallos was chosen by this same Napoleon to be a confidential servant of king Joseph; and, I ask the reader, whether he believes, that this choice would have been made, if Napoleon had found the person chosen to be so firmly attached to his honour and to the welfare of Spain? -Mr. Cevallos will have very much to answer me; but, for the present I shall content myself with a question or two. 1st. Was he carried by force to Bayonne? 2d. If he was not, how came he to repair thi ther at the request of Napoleon, after having been so intimately acquainted with all the previous machinations and detestable perfidies of Napoleon 3d. How came he, who was the confidential minister of Ferdinand, to suffer that king to go to Bayonne without using bis utmost endea vours to prevent it? 4th. How came Ferdinand to give up the sword of Francis I. to the "Grand Duke of Berg?" And, 5th, how came Mr. Cevallos himself to write and publish paper upon paper, addressed to the people of Spain, assuring them that all their jealousies of the French were groundless, for that the views of the Emperor were of the most friendly and affectionate sort and this, too, at a time, when the

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machinations" were going on, and when he was intimately acquainted with those machinations?When Mr. Cevallos, or any one for him, has answered these questions, I have some more ready to put to him. But, whatever may have been the conduct of Buonaparte; however wicked and perfidious that may have been. I think, that it is evident enough, that Mr. Cevallos has all along had a desire to be upon the strongest side; that he deserted Joseph, because he

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was persuaded that he was become the weakest; and that the whole story, some falsehood some truth, was written for the purpose of making his peace with the Spaniards and of again getting possession of power and emolument.-Now, reader, divest yourself, for a moment, of the desire to hear Buonaparte accused of infamous acts, and say, whether this be not, to all appearance, the real truth; and, if that should be your opinion, you will not, I am persuaded, think that there is virtue enough in this EXPOSITION to make it "a lever "wherewith to raise the world against the "Corsican Usurper;" but will, perhaps, think with me, that the principles of political freedom, laid down as the basis of the cause in Spain, is the only lever, by which that nation, and, by their example, the rest of Europe, can be raised effectually to oppose a military despot-Aye, the truth is; the truth that speaks with "voice "trumpet-tongue," though those in power will not hear it, is, that to raise the world against the despotism of Napoleon, you must show the world, you must give the world to see and feel, something better than the despotism of Napoleon. Botley, 12th Oct. 1808.

CONVENTION OF PORTUGAL. SIR;-It is impossible not to be satisfied, for the most part, with the clear, candid, and able manner in which you have examined the Articles of the Convention of Lisbon, and stated your opinion on the several circumstances connected with it, as far as they are hitherto authenticated; and, although you are very successful in applying the light to the flaws and hollow parts of several of the excuses urged in palliation of the act, you, nevertheless, do not appear to advance reasons sufficient to support your assertion,

that the people had a right to expect an ⚫ unconditional surrender." After detailing the difficulties surmounted, and advantages obtained at the battle of Vimiera, you say: "When we are told all this, and were in"formed that immediately after this bril

liant success, our army was augmented to "nearly double what it had before been, "we naturally expected, that, by the next "arrival seeing that the enemy could re

ceive no supplies by land or sea, we should "be informed of his surrender at discretion." Now, I cannot see how this could naturally be expected by the next arrival. It was clear from the London Gazette, announcing the rape of the French at Vimiera, that the year Jonot was led to retire unmolested to his strong position, and there to

concentrate his forces. Nay, the newspapers for several succceding days contained invectives against Burrard for not permitting Wellesley to pursue and destroy the French army. And it is not necessary here to inquire whether any, or what advantage, was to be obtained by the pursuit, or, if any favourable moment was neglected, to whom the crime of such neglect attaches. It is sufficient to the consideration of the present question, that the passibility of Junot's safe arrival in his strong hold was placed beyond all doubt on the 3d September, and re-echoed throughout the kingdom in the interval between the 3d and 17th September. You state, that Junot's army, after the battle, might be 10.000, and the English 30,000, or thereabouts, which is, perhaps, nearly correct The same scraps also, from which we ascertain that the cheek-scratched Duc D'Abrantes retreated with 10,000 men, inform us that nearly 3,000 men were left in these strong places, and that 7,000 Portuguese soldiers were in the French service, men who never attempted to prevent Junot's returning to his entrenchments. There were besides 5,600 Russian soldiers, unoffending) neutrals certainly, men who would not engage in active hostility, as some of the papers have asserted; poor harmless creatures, who only confined 5000 Spanish soldiers on board their ships! These, collectively, compose a very formidable force; and allowing for every exaggeration, there appears no reason to doubt, but there were 20,000 men on whose active services Junot could rely. And I am even now entitled to ask, knowing the resolute and Tartar-like character of the Duke, and considering that his immense plunder was a most powerful motive to- obstinate resistance, whether his situation was so deplorable and despair-creating, as to justify the public in expecting his surrender at discretion by the next arrival; an arrival, recollect, which was looked for a week before the 17th September: I shall, however, examine the reasons adduced by you in support of this general opinion. You ask,

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since when did these places become so

very strong? Junot found no difficulty in "getting into them when he entered Por "tugal with the same army, which Wel"lesley told us he had beaten hollow, only

a few days before you made the Conven"tion; nay, he marched into them, or r. "ther over them They have been quick "then, it seems, in growing into places of "such adamantine materials." It is almost unnecessary to observe, that this is no proof that the position was not strong when the English army appeared before it; nay, it is

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