Star. — London, England, 1809-08-24 00:00:00

THE EVENING STAR.. LONDON. THURSDAY, AUGUST 24, et. IlssrruoLosszw.—No business done at the Stock Exchange. PRICE OF STOCKS YESTERDAY. Bank Stock 2810 Omniunt, 1 01 pr. 8 per Cent. Red. 6$ 69 68f India Stock 1864 187 1864 s per Cent. Cons. 68iff India ponds, 225. 2.15. pr. 4 per Cent. 84.19 Excbeq. Bills, Bs. 14s. pre. 4 per Cent. Navy 98.1 99 State Lottery Tickets 424. 17s. Long Ann. 18 13-161 Consols for ace. 118 it SPAIN, By the Spanish Patriot, DURELL master, which left Cadiz the ScLinstant, we have recei►ed the following communication : " A Aritish Officer of rank, who was in the province et Catalonia, sounded the disposition of the inhabi, tants on the subject of the public defence. He had scarcely imparted his sentiments before he raised 700 men, and in a few days 7000 were collected round the standard of FERDINAND. Thus circumstanced, he wrote to Seville, requesting that 12 or 14 Field Offi cers should be sent to organize this new levy, but his IF:tters were not attended to, and fur want of leaders, the recruits disbanded." • This account is confirmed by a Gentleman who left Cadiz also on the 2d inst. lie says, that Officers only are wanted, and that the zeal of the lower ranks is so ardent, that a few Proclamations in populous districts would soon raise an army adequate to the entire expulsion of the enemy. He observes, tha great complaints were made by the English of the deficient supply of necessaries, but he added, that the exertions of the Junta were now in some degree pro portioned to the urgency of the occasion. All the cars and mules in the neighbourhood of Cadiz and Seyille bad been put in requisition, to transmit the supplies, and the quarantine of -ships from America bad been dispensed with. Nine vessels of the United States laden with tobacco, corn, and other important I rticles, were to discharge their cargoes, without any regard to quarantine, in order that the expectations of the British army might not be disappointed. We have more than once noticed the lamentable want of energy that has been so glaringly conspicu. ous in the Spanish Junta ever since it took the direc tion of the affairs of that Kingdom. Vire have also , expressed our surprise that after more than twelve months they should not yet have 100,000 men effec tively in arms out of a population of twelve millions of men ; and we have frankly declared our opinion that something should be done for the people as well as for FERDINArD, if it be really desirable that the moral and physical energies of the kingdom should be tolled into action. To enable onr readers to form an opinion of the degraded and imbecile state of the great mast of the Spanish population, we shalt Lty before them a document from the pen of the celebrated Jevat.Lallos, a distinguished Member of the Supreme Central Junta, a man of liberal potions, and possessed of the most perfect knowledge of the manners, local habits, and national prejudices and wants of his countrymen. This document appears hi the Appen dix to 1.4111 HOLLAND'S Account of the Life and Writings Of LOPS =VEGAS, " The labouring class of society require diversions, but not exhibitions ; the government is not tailed up on to divert them, but to permit them to divert them selves. For the few days, the short moments which they caw devote to recreation and entertainment, they will naturally seek, and easily find, amusement for themselves. Let them merely be unmolested, and protected in the enjoyment of them. A bright sky and fine weather on a holiday, which will leave them at liberty to walk, run, throw the bar, to play at ball, quoits, or skittles, or to junket, drink, dance, and caper upon the grass, will fill all their desires, and yield them complete satisfaction and contentment. At so cheap a rate may a whole people, however numerous, be de lighted and amused. How happens it then that the majority of the people of Spain have no diversion at all ? for every one who has travelled through our pro winces must have made this melancholy remark ; even ( n the greatest festivals, instead of that boisterous merriment and noise which should bespeak the joy cf the inhabitants, there reigns throughout the market places and streets a slothful inactivity, a gloomy still ness, which cannot be remarked without the mingled emotions of surprize and pity. The few persons who leave their houses seem to be driven from them by listlessness, and dragged as far as the threshold, the market, or the church-door. There, muffled in their cloaks, leaning against some corner, seated on some bench, or lounging backwards and forward;, without object, aim, or purpose, they pass their hours; aye, j may say, their whole evenings, without mirth, recrea tion, or amusement. When you add to this picture, the dreariness and filth of the villages,the poor and sloven ly dress of the inhabitants, the gloominess and silence of their air, the laziness, the want of concert and union so striking every where, who butweuld be astonished ; who but would be afflicted by so mournful a phenome non This is not indeed the place to expose the errors which conspire to produce it; but whatever those errors may he t one point is clear --they are all to be found in the laws. Without is andel ing from ,oy subject, I may ; be permitted to observe, that the cilio mistake lies in 1 the faulty police of our villages. Many Magistrate; are misled, byan ill-judged zeal, to suppcse that the g perfeetlign of municipal government *consists in the' subjection of the people ; they imagine that the great object of subordination is accomplished, if the inhabi tants tremble as the voice of Justice ; and no one ven tures to move, or even to breathe, at the very sound of her name. Hence :Any mob, any noise or disturb ance, is termed a riot or tumult ; and every little dis pute or scuffle becomes the subject of a criminal pro ceeding, involving in its consequences examinations and arrests, imprisonments and fines, with all the train of legal persecutions and vexations, Under such an op pressive police, the people grow dispirited and dishear tened ; and sacrificing their inclinations to their secu rity, they abjure diversions, which, though public and innocent, are replete with embarrassments, and have recourse to solitude and inaction, dull and painful in deed to their feelings, but at least unmolested bylaw, and unattended with danger. The same system has occasioned numberless regulations of police, npt only injurious to the liberties, but prejudicial to the welfare and prosperity of the villages ; yet not less harshly or less rigorously enforced on that account. There re some places where music and ringing of bells, others where balls and marriage-suppers are prohibited. In one village the inhabitants must retire to their houses at the curfew, in another they must not appear in the streets without a light ; they must notloiterabout the corners, or stop in the porches; and in all they are subject to similar restraints and privations. The rage for go. venting, in some eases, perhaps, the avarice of the Magistrates, has extended, to the most miserable ham lets, regulations, which would hardly be necessary in all the confusion of a metropolis ; and the wretched husbandman, who has watered the earth with the sweat of his brow. and slept on the ground throagh out the week, cannot on Saturday night bawl at his will in the streets of his village, or chaunt his ballad at the door of his sweet-heart. " Even the province in which I live (Asturias), remarkable for the natural cheerfulness and innocent manners of its inhabitant:, is not exempt from the hardship of similar regulations. Indeed, the discon tent which they produce, and which I have frequently witnessed, has suggested many of these reflections on the subject. The dispersion of • its population fortu nately prevents that municipal police, which has been contrived for regular villages and towns ; but the tot tagers assemble for their diversions at a sort of wake, called Romerias, or Pilgrimages. And there it is that the regulations of the police pursue and molest them. Sticks, which are used more on account of the inequa lit f of the country, than as a precaution for self-de fence, are prohibited in these wake's. Men-dances are forbidden ; those of women must dose early in the evening ; and the wakes themselves, the sole diver sion of these innocent and laborious villagers, must break up at the hour of evening prayer. How can they e t reconcile: shearit all. ih , emyseelsv,e it s i s t with rue : t n h v e :::::c i : al : such werarielm inn—r.iciice ? It may, indeed, be said, L but they bear it with an ill will ; and who is blind to the consequences of long and reluctant submission? 1 The state of freedom is a state of peace and cheerful . ness ; a state of subjection is a state of uneasiness and discontent. The former then is permanent and dura ' ble, the latter unstable and changeable. All, therefore, is not accon !fished : quicn the are quiet, they siiculd also le contented; and it is only a heart devoid of feeling, or a head unacquainted with the principles of government, that can harbour a no tion of scenting the first of these objects, without ob i taining th e secon d. Th ey who disregard it, either do l not see the necessary connection between liberty and prosperity ; or, if they see it, they neglect it. The error in either case is equally mischievous; for surely this connection deserve: the attention of every just and mild government. A free and cheerful people are al ways active and laborious ; and an active and laborious people are always attentive to morals and observant of the laws. The greater their enjoyments, the more they love the government under which they live ; the bet ter they obey it, and the more cheerfully and willingly do they contribute to its maintenance and support. The greater their enjoyments the more they have to lose ; and the more, therefore, they fear any distur bance, and the more they respect the authorities in tended to repress it Such a people feel more anxiety to enrich themselves, because they must be conscious that the increase of their pleasures, will keep pace with the improvement of their fortunes. In a word, they strive more ardently to better their conditions, because they are certain of enjoying the fruits of their ' ciertion, If such then, be one of the chief objects of a good government, why is it so disregarded among ' us? Even public prosperity, as it is called, if it be any thing but the aggregate of individual happiness, depends upon the attainment of the object in ques tion—for the power and strength of a state do not consist entirely in multitudes or riches, but in 'the moral character of iti inhabitants. In point of fact, can any nation be strong, whose subjects are weak, corrupt, harsh, unfeeling, and strangers to all senti ment of public spirit and patriotism ? On the other hand, a people who meet often, and in security, n public, for the purposes of diversion, must necessarily become an united and affectionate people ; they can feel :slat a common interest is, and are consequently less like)/ to sacrifice it to their own personal views and individual advantage. They have a higher spit it, because they 4,7 e freer—a consciousness of which im • proves their notions of rectitude, and exalts their seri •inienns of honour and courage. Every indisriduo i . • • respects his own class in such' a" society, because he respects himself; and he respects that of others, as the best mode of ensuring respect for his own. If once the people respect ths government, and the su bordination establishe4 by law, they regulate their conduct by it ; they grow attached to the institutions of their country, and defend them with spirit ; be, cause, in so doing, they are convinced that they are defending themselves, *So clear is it, that freedom and cheerfulness are greater enemies of disorder ; than subjection and melancholy, " Let me not, however, be suspected of considering a magistracy or police, appointed to preserve the public peace, as in itself either useless or oppressive. —On the contrary, it is my firm .persnasion, that without such an institution, without its unremittng vigilance, neither tranquillity nor subordination can he preserved. I am well 'aware that licence ho vers on the very confines of liberty ; and that some restraint must be devised to keep in those who would pass the limits. This is, indeed, the most delicate a saint in civil jurisprudence ; and it is this that so many injudicious magistrates mistake, by con founding vigilance with oppression. Hence, at every festival, at every public diversion, or harmless amuse ment, they obtrude upon the people the insignia of magistracy and power. To judge by appearances, one should suppose that their aim was to build their authority on the fears of the subject, and to purchase their own convenience at the expeuce of the freedom and pleasure of the public. In every other view, such precautions are idle, for the people never divert them selves, without complete exemption from restraint in their diversions. Freedom is scared away by watch men and patroles, constables and soldiers ; and at the sight of staves and bayonets, harmless and timorous mirth takes the alarm, and disappears. This is surely not the method of accomplishing the purposes for which magistracy was established ; whose vigilance, if 1 may be permitted so awful a comparison, should resemble that of the SUPREME Br►lxo ; should be per petual and certain, but invisible ; should be acknow-• ledged by every, body, but seen by nobody; should watch licence, in order to repress it ; and liberty, in order to protect it. In one word, it should operate as a restraint on the bad, as a shield and protection to the good. The awful insignia of justice, are other wise the mere symbols of oppression and tyranny : and tb,e police, in direct opposition to the views of its institution, only vexes and molests the persons whom it is bound to shelter, comfort, and protect." SPANISH AND PORTaGVESE PAPERS. By the Duke of Marlbor o packet, arrived at Falmouth from Lisbon in six days, we have this morning received Spanish papers to tho 11th, and Portuguese to the 15th hct. The bead-quarters of tx.r.A.Lagar...Ev and his ga".iant army Were, on the 7th inst. at Delectosa; and. i we may believe the Spa_ nish accounts, no interruption to the advance of the allied armies will, in future, be experienced from the want of provisions. The Supreme Junta have made arrangements for a regular and liberal supply in future, and waggon loads of stores of all descriptions seem to be proceeding towards the armies, in all di rections. VXNEGAS is said to have defeated the French near. Aranjuez ; and it was also reported at Lisbon that Sir A. WELLESLEa had attacked and completely rout ed SOULT, who was on his way to join the defeated army of King JosEnt. Subjoined are the most im portant articles contained in the Spanish and Portu guese Papers: SEVILLE. GAZETTE EXTRAORDINARY or THE GOVERNMENT, AUGUST 8, 1809. General Venagas writes from his head-quarters at Ocanha, under the date of the sth instant, that pn that day the Ist, 2d, and 3d divisions of his army had crowned thenkselves with glory, on the banks of the Tagus, at Aranjuez ; where being three times attacked by the enemy, with the greatest obstinacy, they repulsed them as often, the calmness and cou rage of our troops being above all praise. The force of the enemy consisted of from It to 15,000 men, and the action lasted from five to eight in the evening. By another dispatch from Genet.al Cuesta we learn that the Anglo-Spanish Army is at Ponte de Arci- 1 bispo, on the right and left banks of the Tagus, watching the movements of Marshal Soult. Extract from a Letter from the Army, Delectosa, August At the moment when the Courier is mounting his horse to set er, we learn that the Su preme Junta of Spain and the Indies, has appointed Sir A. Wellesley Generalissimo of Spain." BADAJOZ, AUGUST iz. It was at first estimated, according to letters from the army; that the loss of the French at the battle of Talavera de Reyr,a, .ryas not less in killed, wounded, and prisoners, than 22,000 men. It now appears that the dispatches of General Cuesta do not snake their loss more than half that number. Yet it is the general opinion that it cannot have been less than 16,000, including the dispersed, and the wounded which the French'carried away with them ; and, according to some accounts, were so numerous that they tilled 100 carts, The route would have been complete had our armies been able to follow immediately to Ma drid : but the troops were extremely fatigued, and wanted provisions, which we wgre not able to supply :hem with the promptness which circumstances quireq. While our troops were burying this dead on the field of battle, i n f ormat i on was received that 5,u1: had entered the province with an army, and was marching upon Ponte de Arcibispo and Almaraz, as well to intercept the provisions and to cut of tl. t retreat of our army, as to place it between two Generals Wellesley and Cuesta, penetrating t!..?‘!:. signs of Suult, prepared to frustrate them, tak r.g retrograde movements new positions, the forme:- ~; the bridge of Almaraz, and the latter at Pon't t . , Arcibispo, on the left of the Tagus. They fail to take the precaution of burning the 14 i.; . • boats which bad been constructed at Alin : Victor immediately turned suddenly upon T de la Reyna—Unfortunate town Last night an e;pross arrived, dispata:.d ' , at Merida to the Junta here, who asserts that (7. ; .; who passed through that town brought .:c • that Soult had been repulsed. We the arrival of the courier, to learn ‘%! . :!., count be confirmed. So long as our armies maintain th;:tr.., :,-; :?, 4 present positions, we have no fear that f. 2 -: be in want of provisions, as ins.umci“i;le with supplies of every End are colitinaa':. along the high road of Seville and 13a eaj. ;1. Sitme wounded English have place on their way to Lisbon. The cursed Soult has been the caw is not now at Somosierra, and of ti;:! ti is A . grid and Talairera are suffering. Our head-quarters are at Mesa . Arcibispo the French lost 4000 nicT:, and t!: • that Soult lost six pieces of artillery at PlAeent that he offered to capitulate. Tl.e English arc: isi ..Almaraa, apd their heal-qua.: ters arc at Dele:tes, l I.!SJON, AUGUST - It It appears by the latest accounts from Iltda;c.,, that the corps of Soult, Ney, and Mortier having .Id. vanced to Placentia, in the rear of the combined the latter passed to the left bank of the Taglis, a strong corps on the right in front cf route de Ar. cibispo, to command the passage of the River it should think proper. The Lritish army has head-quarters at Delectosa. The Pottrguese, untie: the command of Marshal Beresford, were at Fiume de Grinalda, beyond Ciudad Rod:ie. s), on the '!! t • inst. We know nothing of the Spanish armies ; certainly the whole of the French haviyg united a;:i. left Arragon, and bath the Castiles, without a L - ;.:)!. son, it is the most favourable moment fix those provinces, destroy:,ng the weak garrison v.l - :, may be found there, and retaking many points, e , tial to the subsistence arid 1,41 enemy, whose privations and want of kirc: excessive. Yesterday a report .pas in circulation that !lc French cliVisim commanded by Marshal Souk, had made its appearance in the environs of Plamtia, had been defeated by the main body cf the Englis army and some Spanish troops ; it was even asserted that Soult himself had been killed, and that his lc.; consisted of 9000 men, in killed, wounded, and prisoners. We do not vouch for the truth cf intelligence, but it is likely to be confirmed, a; Marshal Wellesley was closely watching the said division of the enczny; and we leaser, sine ago, that he had ordered a sufficient nufnl.tr c,f trouj to march against it. BADAJOZ, AUGUST S. The following order of the day was published to our army on the 2d instant : _ " Head-quarterB Talavera de la Reyna, August C. 68 Soldiers of the Army of Estremadura !—On the 27th and 28th days of July you fought bravely ! You repeatedly repulsed the enemy, who was com pelled to fly, leaving the Meld of battle covered with his dead. This gler7ous victory is due to your firm ness and union ; to your incessant and well-supported fire, and to confidence in your Officers and Chiefs ; if you always observe the same, you will always be invincible. The French are not men, except wlica they find no resistance ; that which tkey met with in the valiant English troops, our allies, routed and put them to flight : we know that the French soldier: now refuse to enter Pan action after seeing their beNt troops destroyed. " Soldiers ! I am [satisfied with your valour and firmness ; I congratulate you on your triumph, and I rely on your union and discipline.—l do not ,;111 g Soldiers' nor consider as a part of the army, thaw base cowards who abandoned their regiments on the days of battle, fleeing in tlae moment of danger, and with the design of producing disorder. Such wretaes, besides their infamy, which covers them, shall be decimated as soon as they are apprehended. (Signed) 46 CUESTA." Yesterday his Royal Highness the Dnke of KEN:: entertained their Royal Highnesses the Prince ct WALEs, the Dukes pf You 4, CLAn:Ncr,.litrsr, ;tant.ANp, Sussex, and CA:a/MIDGE, and a select party of Noblemen and Gentlemen, with an elegant •iinre: at his house, a; Castlebear-hill. Yesterday the Earl of Livi nroor, left town f.. CoombWoOd. Yesterday the Ea 4 of BATIMRST left town for seat at Roehannaton. Yesterday Lord CASTUREACIt kft town for hi seat at Stanmore. Lord FLUtitOWBV 1011 town on SaLirday for Wim bledon, on a visit to Earl BATltx;ns . c. Yesterday the CHANcELLoR of tic ENcirrOUr-n town, for his teat at Ealing.