The Express.
London, England, 1867-01-31 00:00:00

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LONDON, PIUI:sDAY, JANUARY 31.

Tim Spanish Government, which resents criti-
cism
with so much asperity, even to the extent of
visiting the mildest and best entitled of critics
with imprisonment and exile, nevertheless feels
that there are still defects in the State—weak points
needing to be forth :LA, and gaps requiring to be
filled up. The deficiency which it has justannounced
is, however, one which only itself was likely to
discover. What Spain wants more th.m anything
else—so it is authorititively declared—is more
soldiers. Looking at the history of the country for
the last ten or twenty years, we should have been
led to the opposite conclusion, and been disposed to
think that Spain had not too few soldiers, but too
many. The army has not once been required in that
period to defend the independence the country,
but has in two ways proved a source of extreme
inconvenience and danger. It has been a hot-bed
of intrigues, the series of usurpations following
one another in rapid interminable succession. It
has made Govermnents, and then dogged them
with menaces, and kept them in continual danger.
Spanish revolutions have been thu work of plot-
ting generals, encouraged to compass the over-
throw of the Government of the day by observing
that it rarely had a higher origin than a barrack
conspiracy. Owing to the character thus im-
pressed on the public affairs of Spain, the develop-
ment of a sound political life in the civil
population has been rendered impossible.
Public opinion has been powerless, and at length
the army has been made the support of
a selfish and degraded despotism, before which
every statesman of mark has been reduced to
insignificance, while the creatures of the Court
riot in the unrestrained exercise of arbitrary
power. Abroad, Spain has fared no better. The
vain pursuit of military glory has loaded the sub-
levt with taxes, destroyed the financial credit of
State, aid! towereili its political considandon
in the eyes of the world. A delusive success in
Morocco seemed to presage a series of victorious
and profitable adventures in other parts of the
world, and the expeditions to Mexico, Cochin
China, and Sun Domingo were resolved on. Not
one of these has turned out well. They were
undertaken, in opposition to the spirit and feeling
of the age, by political soldiers, who only wanted
to use the army in order to secure their position
at Conn, without regard to the public interesta ;
but the burden of their consequences has to be
borne by the country.
The proposal to increase the army has no
ground in the present or anticipated situation
of Spain. No country in Europe is better gua-
ranteed by its political and geographical position
against attack. No Power would be so foolish as
to assail the independence of Spain, or attempt its
dismemberment. The only reason which it is
thought worth while to give for the measure is,
that Prussia and France are increasing their arma-
ments. " Spain (it is said) can neither separate
" herself front the preventive movement, nor
" abandon to chance the maintenance of her
" policy, by which alone she can advance
" legitimate interests." This is a fair specimen
of the miserable and fraudulent jargon to which
despotic Governments are accustomed to resort
when the taxpayer is to be plundered. If the
intolerable burden of excessive and ill-adjusted
taxation which now presses on the people of Spain
were lightened and better distributed, if industry
were encouraged by liberty, and public spirit
nourished under free institutions, there is
nu enterprise that could be commended to
Spanish patriotism which the country would not
be in a position to undertake with the best pros-
pects of success. The sufficiency of a national
army is not to be estimated by crude arithmetical
comparisons, but to be ascertained by direct re-
ference to the duties which it is called to perform.
The annual subtraction of 43,000 young men
from industry in a country which already suffers
from the diversion of so many of its suns from
productive occupation, will still further prejudice
the material prosperity of Spain without offering
any kind of compensation in return. This, how-
ever, is a consideration which is not likely to give
either the Queen of Seam or Marshal NARVAEZ a
moment's uneasiness.

The manner of introducing this change is as
noteworthy as the measure itself. It is effected
by a royal decree limed on a ministerial report.
This is the approved way of effecting radical con-
versions in Spain just now, and of course the oftener
it is resorted to the greater is the horror which
the court entertains for "revolution." Every
constitutional power is now in abeyance in Spain.
Even that is too favourable an account to give of
the present state of things. No one can be sure
that the suspended constitution will ever be re-
newed ; the probabilities are all the other way.
The Government assumes to itself a inure than
legislative—a constituent—power, and the very
bases of the national institutions are as liable
to subversion as particular and subordinate laws.
We are told that the Government will subse-
quently render an account of its conduct to the
Cortex; but it has too plainly shown its determi-
L.o.' n not to have its powers limited by a really
national rtpruseatation to permit the world to be-