The National Register. — London, England, 1808-08-14 00:00:00

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Av_________------------- ~---- - ---_ . sca t of kW 'loyal Bighim was fruity resolved aremove . scat of Government to Brasil. whichlormed the most import:in. and best•defeeod part of Ail dosainiontr; His Adis% Highness then ordered bisvaboleartay to move tattle coasts and sea- ports SUposieg that. as France bad "essentially obtained all she de maanded, she had aothing more •to ash ; confided In that good Nth which.ouht to be coasidered as the fundamental principle in every Government which hat ceased to be revolutionaryr, and felt conscious that baviag done everything in his power to se cure the tranquillity of bis people, a d avoid as useless effusion of blood, he had ful fi lled all tbe duties of a virtuous Priam, adored by 1114 subjects, and wbo to the Sttplrealeo Being alo ft bas to account for his actions. . - " The Court of Portugal might then justly. and With every of foundation; flitter itself that ' that of the Thuilleries would respect a neutrality which it had acknowledged by a so kindlema treaty,. and from which it derived such 'decided advantages, when it was awaked from its security in the month of August, 180 i, by a formal declaration of the Minister of State for Foreign Relatios, M. Talleyrand to Lord Yarmouth. NI which 4he former notified to the ;alter , that If England di,d norbsake a ma ritime peace, the French blovernment would declare war against Portugal, and order Oat country to he occupied by SO,OOO into. It aas not with so,ooa men that the invasion of Portugal could be effected, w hat thiamperor of the French, who knew the se curity in .which Portugal found' herself in consequence of the Treaty of neutrality, thought he could take her by surprise, and this was sufficient tojustify his proceedings. The Court of Eng land was alarmed by the above declaratiou, and proposed and offered to that of Portugal alt kind of succour ; but France, which at that period had arranged every thing to crush the Prus sian Courttwhich then shine/aid defiance to the superior power of the Empefor of the French; while a twelvemonth before it would not attack * hint, though she might even have compelled bin% to receive the law., and have saved Europe, jointly with Russia and. Austria, found means top acify the Court of Portal - which she then, chose to spare, and could not conceive, that ,miler Per fi dy could be the attribute c i f a power, whose greatness should keep pace with that integrity and those d fied sentimeits which suit so well an exalted' rank. The war vhich was afterwards continued with Rissin i aryl which might perhaps have , saved Europe, if the union of the Govern.; moots which divide it had been as close as it should have been, il.l retarded the execution of the views of the a nd of the reach with regard to the Court of POrtUgal i and it was only concluding the Peace of Tilsit, that the Court of the Thullle ;it-4 in a dictatorial tone, such as might becotne Charlemagne addressing the Princes, w hose Sovereign Lord he was. caused the strange demand to be made to the Court of Portul,through 'he medium of the Frettph Charge d'Affaiks and bye tbe Spanish ,stabassador, Ist, To shut up' the ports of Portugal against pa , land ; td, To detain all Euglishatco who resided..in portugal • and 3d, To ioutiscate all English property ; r, in case of refu sal, to expose itself to an immediate war with France and tipain, because the French Charge d'Affaires and the Ambass dor of Spain had orders to depart the Ist of, Sept. about three weeks after the said proposition was made, in case the Court of Portugal should not comply with all the pretensions a ihe two Courts. The good faith of the French Governmentr is no less remarkable, with regard to the celerity with which, aftey hav ing made that declaration, and without waiting for the ansiver of the Court of Portugal, it ordered all Portyaguese merchant ships to be detained which were in the.ports Of France, and by that measure actually began hostilities without any previous de. claratioa of war, and thus carried to a far disseter length sal the procerdinp which formed its' continued tolgeof Vit.sach again-4 England , which,' after suclva conduct will destly , valued. . • • I" The Court of Portugal might thou well have adopted the ' kno a n maxim of the Roinans.and been conviaced, that disgrace- fat conditions frequently saved those who refuse them, and brought destruction over those by whom they were proposed ; but on the ono side it could Dot believe that the Court of tile Thuilleries made, in earnest, proposals which consmitted both its honour and its digaity ; and on the fatter side, it hoped to wad off the storm, desirout-of spariug the blood of its neoPie, and placing implicit tonlinleacrs in the fricodship of his Britannic Majesty, its old add faille's% ally, it ersteavoured to iender the pretensions of the French Gov.efaaseat move mansterate, b y aceed. ing to the shuttlag up of the ports. oodlefosing the two other artickes, contrary -to thewiples of thopulalic law, and to the tnedeli which salaamms the two natioas ; anti his Royal - .. 4 • . i'..t s • .. •.w4 1‘.•140, received rioas with .• • • • HighneSs the MU, Mtge., of .. no tation O. al. bad lies • aid dare, that those two articles wad:Odell equally his religion the principles of moralityfrom which he sever deviated, abd which are perhaps the true castle of the 'what eo fidelity which he has experienced on the part Of his subjects. " The French G overnment then ofise r ved a liar of coudoct to wards his Royal Highness and his dominions, which weeld,tae unprecedented in history, were not the lovas!on of dwitserlopi by France at the tittle o f' the Executive Directory of a sisisjlar descriptio. General Juno' without any previous doehtenSioes without having obtained the consent of the Prince Redeot fir Portugal, entered that kingdom with the vanguard of toilhs anay, assuring the people of the country, he was worthies our his Royal Highness against an invasion of the Eneclish and that he entered Portugal as &General of a friendly and al lied Power. He received 611 his journey convincing proofs of tae . good (alp' of the Portuguese Government, for he witneoed the perfect un easiness which 'prevailed with regard to France, and that all the Portuguese High troops were near the coast. Ills Royal gess the Prince of Portugal, surprised in such an extraorditutry manner, might have rallied aronod him the body of troops, %bids were at a small distance from him, caused the fr o -h deet to ebter the port of Lisbon, and thus cot to pieces the small and miserable corps with which General Junot was 114VallCing% with idegree of hoseerwhich would have been iiilicolous, had not Crerteral Junot, w conduct otVenice and Lisbon was but 140 well known, relied on the feelings of a virtuous Pripee, WIWI ~. would never have exposed his people to the most dreadful cala mities by a sure ant success, Which would only have served to chasten the audacity; of a man, who like many others, abused the power with which be was entrusted, or who acted in purse since of orders which cannot beustified. " His Royal Majesty the prince Regent, then adopted the only measure which could suit his situation, according to the • principles which he had constatoly followed, to save the blood of his people, and In order to prevent the criminal plan of the. • French Government front being carried into esecutimt. which had no less in view than to secure his Royal Person, and the whole Royal Family , order to divide, at its own will and pleasure, the spells of the Crown of Portugal, nod the Portu ese domittiom. Providence seconded the efforts of a just Prince, and the magnanimous yesolution which hit Royal High gess adopted, to retire with his Aughst Royal Family to Brazil, disconcerted at once tbe efforts of the French Government, and. exposed. in the light, iu the face of Eurape, the crimi nal and - - of a G o vernor which aims at the uttisersal -hole World, if the great - stiptsr into wt to oppose Royal I learned the pit. shameful true . Royal Bray' accoati.. account mil over e land n T t h r i e:t vi t offered which sian C of the yrould bun t Russ; gal, a sin greal tied yet men Fro by rie adi ttu thi at sa I • tail' In tsseirr........_ _ e , nil treacherous vrews o f a G0vern0...... !rsal domination of all Europe and of the whole NN ono, IL ;rent European Powers, •ruitstld from the lethargic stipor • i whicir they ore sunk.do not make common cause vigorously ppose an vabition so immoderate and enceisive. Since his al HigimeOfssafe arrival in his dominions in Brazil, he has ned-with beecor, not Only the asurpatinn of Portugal, and pillage lota 'tender practised in that country• hot al-o the meful proceediag of the Emperor of the French, who, fts the ,t Dictator or F.tirope. dares.to represent it as a crime of his yal Highnss, that . he has retioved his seat of Goveriottent le azil, aad in s foil sub.jecta who follower% him, to have !oitipatiligl a*Prince Oho,* all his people revere, still more on moot of his'virtites then orthe rights of hii /I.ll4ust 11.41 al Fa,- ly which lie 'hit: inherited, and by virtue of which he _reigns er th an . his Royal Iligltness has witnessed with horror the with whicir an attempt has been made, in an official 6 ittoseribertlie iigiiti of his August Royal Family, to . . . h ofPnrtugsl, with which he will r ater part ; apd Ise id to demand -of the has of the French., from st hat 1T of the .Law of Nations he has drawn 'bailor istrinci pies anil eceived soca tut antherity, claiming to this sohject the m ost tolls consideration or all the European Powers, who raiinot iei in indifference what has here been stated. Red the introduc, [ion of at new- Government in Portugal 'without hit eon-ent, as well as the raising of an etorbitant contribution, demanded from a country which opposed no kind of resistance to the a nd of the French troops, and which on this very ground could not con.i7 der its sts being at Vitt? with France. The most remote po terity, as well a s impartial Europe, will see with grief s uch trausaetion4, the forerunners of barbarism and misery, such as those which followed the downfall of Roman Latpire, and \ which cannot be avoided, unless e%ertions he made to restore the equipoise of Europe by an on:miming* effort, and.with a oh- I : ' \ Thins of all Ideas and *cling of rivalship, which has hitherto been the true cause of tkat alliditfuell power which threaLoas lit swallow up all. ail 4- •, t. '•-•siir osaiitt.l..-ust. 4 •- • . . • '........ d• . . . 14.. .• - .i. Mt, ~' ..• b 3.... . - ' .Nt .h: . 7, i W , • '‘,—.4....0 • , • .. . a • % t rrr 11 i t N I UI • ~i I I I !'), .