The Sun.
London, England, 1836-09-19 00:00:00

BAVARIA.

MUNICH, SEPT. B.—The report that was spread a few
days ago that the cholera had broken out at Mithenwald,
on the frontiers of Bavaria and Tyrol, and that 25 persons
had already fallen victims to it, created at the first a great
sensation, which, however, was soon allayed when it ap-
peared that it was the ordinary dysentery, which, it is true,
often assumes the form of the cholera.

THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT AND

THE SPANISH CONSTITUTION.

[From an Article in the Revue des Deux Monde:,
written by M. Viardot, well known for his Writings on
Spanish Politics, History, and Literature.]
The revolution of July was saluted by oppressed nations
as an aurora of freedom. The Spanish refugees especially
could not but hope that Prance, guilty of having crushed
their cause in 1823, would make amends now, and con-
sult both interest and justice in restoring to Spain the
freedom of which the French had deprived her. On the
first tidings of the events of the Three Days they hastened
to Paris from all parts of Europe, and soon a kind of re-
union or junta was formed, consisting of all the eminent
men of the Liberal emigration, Ministers, Deputies, Ge-
nerals, State Councillors, &c.; amongst them were To-
reno, Mendizabal, Isturiz, Calatrava, Galiano, Duc de
Rivas, De la Cuadra, Seoane, San Miguel, &c. The aim
of the Junta was double—to communicate with the pa-
triots in the interior of Spain, and also with the French
Government. Being intimate with the greater part of
those who composed this meeting, I was charged with
this ,latter mission. And for this my first business was at
the Palais Royal, become the scat of GovernmentZ in
lieu of the deserted Tuileries. The Spanish emigrants
demanded aid in raising their country to insurrecrion,
and in expelling Ferdinand. It offered to the French
Government in return, under the promise of ratification by
the Cortes, the crown of Spain, for the Due de Nemours.
This new Philip the Fifth, in marrying Donna Maria, the
heiress of Don Pedro, then at Paris, would have joined
Portugal to Spain, as the marriage of Ferdinand and Isa-
bella had joined Castile and Aragon, and the entire Penin-
sula would have become annexed to France, or at least
sufficiently allied to realize the wish of there being no
longer any Pyrenees. The proposal was received as it
ought—.that is to say, with eagerness, and I may say with
enthusiasm. The Spanish refugees were encouraged, and
full liberty was given to them to act. Efficient succours
were promised them, and 100,000 francs were taken from
the King's private purse to supply the first wants. It was
M. Mole, now Prime Minister, and then Minister for Fo-
reign Affairs, who gave this sum with his own hand to
General Lafayette, who settled with M. Mole tile use that
should be made of it—and this was, that 70,000 francs
should be sent to Bayonne to the refugees there, and the
rest (30,000) to General Torrijos, who was preparing an
expedition at Gibraltar.
The second part of my mission was to the Ministers
themselves. I waited on M. Guizot at the moment that
he took possession of the Home Department. I stated to
him the object of my visit, the intentions of the Spanish
emigrants, and I demanded of him the categorical answer
which they awaited, and which bade them go on or desist.
M. Guizot replied without hesitation :—" Tell those who
have sent you hither that France committed a great political
crime. in 1823 ; that she owes to Spain a complete an. d, pub-
activity. .S 0
lie reparation, and that this reparation shall be
explicit an answer filled the Spanish emigrants with J? 3:,
and they entered upon their part of. the contrac,t. with.
formed a Spanish committee, composed of some of
i
members, to aid in revolutionizing Spain. The committee
her The society called Aide-toz, le etc/ t aide?
.at;
consisted of Gamier Pages, E. A rago, SehTla. ;
Mar-
chais, Gauja. I was also one of it. Our principal occu-
pation was to form at the foot of the Pyreneystoa little
Spain
under of volunteers, which might penetrate
which would have been the signal for the of the
for subscrip-
patriots. We sent all through the provinces.
under a Spanish liberal commander, and the.. inii,,trancpecof
tions, and received considerable sums in Paris. Most
of the Ministers were subscribers, and I possess a long and
curious list of names whose owners might to-day be asto-
nished to see themselves on so revolutionary a document.
M. Bertin de Vaux, editor and proprietor of the Journal
des Debats, figures there, with Rambuteau, Lefebvre,
Gautier, Berenger, &e. Casimir Perier himself, then a
Minister, authorised his eldest son to make one of our Spa-

nish Committee. M. Guizot, more than any other, aided
our plan for collecting a little army on the frontier, com-
posed of recruits enrolled at Paris. Every day the dili-
gences reserved places for these recruits, who were wheeled
off rapidly to Bayonne and Perpignan. Pursuant to the
order of M. Guizot, passports were made out at the Pre-
fecture of Police, and delivered to French, German, and
Italian volunteers, who, in bands of fifty, one hundred,
and two hundred, marched off, drums beating and colours
flying, and treated on the route as a regular military corps
to revolutionize the Peninsula. These corps were com-
manded by Borso di Camimati, Charrier, Barraco, Rouy,
Cesarini, &c.
But the revolutionary fever did not last long at the Palais
Royal. Foreign diplomacy soon intervened, bringing pro-
posals of alliance and peace.
It was remarked that the famous treaties of the 20th of
November, 1815, were still the political law of Europe ;
that the contracting Sovereigns had therein engaged to
maintain the Bourbons on the throne of France, and had
mutually guaranteed each other against any revolution in
that country ; that Louis Philippe being himself a Bourbon,
they might, if so inclined, not choose to see a violation of
treaties or casus belli in his accession, upon condition that
he would repress the democratic spirit, and give to Europe
the same securities against revolution which had been given
by the Bourbons of the elder branch. The sending of M.
de Talleyrand as Plenipotentiary to the Conference of Lon-
don was the answer given to the insinuations of diplomacy.
From that time the splendid vision of a Peninsular crown
was forgotten. Spain, Italy, and Poland, which had been
stirred, or at least covertly encouraged to revolt, were left
to shift for themselves. Still it was necessary for some time
longer to conceal this new game. Some manoeuvres were,

however, employed before the mask was entirely thrown off,
and I will cite one fact which will alone suffice to charac-
terize the policy of the Government.
Among the Spanish refugees there was one man who, by
the just popularity of his name, was pointed out as the
fittest person to direct the revolutionary movement of
Spain : that man was General Mina. Like the rest of his
countrymen, he had come from London to Paris, where

immediately on his arrival he had waited upon General
Gerard, a Minister, the similarity of whose profession to
his own led him to select as the first he should visit. He
was received in the most cordial manner by the Marshal,
and the most positive assurances of sympathy and protec-
tion were given him. But Marshal Gerard (and certainly
it is not his loyalty which I accuse in this manner) made
him swear upon his honour that he would immediately
betake himself to Bayonne without seeing any person at
Paris, not even General Lafayette ; that he would care-
fully conceal his plans, his journey, and even his name ;
and that he would postpone all his enterprises for
six or seven weeks, in order to give France
time to take up a position with regard to Europe.
Mina promised, and lie kept his word. But how fatal the
promise became ! The most precious time was lost in
inaction—the time in which the Cabinet of Madrid,
plunged in stupor, was incapable of taking any mqasures of
salvation. A still greater evil was also the consequence.
On the one hand, the reserve of Mina, and the inexplicable
secrecy in which he shrouded himself; caused his friends in
France to look upon him, first with surprise, afterwards
with coolness, and finally with distrust. On the other
hand, his compelled inaction, and his efforts to adjourn the
movement, compromised him still more seriously among his
countrymen, and weakness, and even treason, was hinted at.
He was accused of having sold himself to the interests of
England, and of endeavouring to prevent the movement
which was to give France a decided supremacy in the Pe-
ninsula. An afflicting disunion thus sprung up in the too
scanty ranks which should have been united together by
the bands of their common misfortune, and of their equal
devotedness to their country, and their friends in France
grew cool towards men who were apparently disposed to
commence a civil war upon a foreign soil. The men, the
arms, and the money intended for Mina were sent to others,
and the undertaking had no longer either bond, or unity,
or chief.

The French Government was in the mean time bending
itself more and more to its new line of policy. Desirous of
adding the gratitude of the Cabinet of Madrid to that of
the other Courts of Europe, it sacrificed the Spanish cause
to its convenience. The succours granted to Spaniards on
their road to the frontiers were discontinued, their departure
was forbidden, and rigorous measures were adopted against
them. By an iniquitous contradiction the Government ap-
peared indignant at an inaction which itself had recom-
mended, an the refugees were accused of having conceived
projects of revolution which they had not fulfilled. Severe
orders were transmitted to the local authorities, and many
unfortunate Spaniards were despoiled of the arms and am-
munition which they had sold their garments to purchase.
Without entering into the detail of these afflicting persecu-
...

tions, I will cite one more fact to show the mortal blow which
they gave to the Spanish cause. When, after the desperate
resolution of Colonel Valdes, who crossed the Bidassoa, ra-
ther than give up his arms, Mina saw himself obliged to
hold out his hand and join him, the plan of a campaign was
drawn up by him, a plan which was wise, able, and perhaps
decisive. Having, on the 20th of October, entered
Spain with a small troop, it was necessary. during
some days, to confine his operations to some insigni-
ficant manoeuvres near the frontier of Navarre, certain
of drawing to that point, by the mere power of his name,
all the royal forces dispersed in the Basque provinces, in
Arragon, and Navarre. Eight days afterwards General
Plasencia, who had been re-assembling in the interval the
platoons of refugees scattered on the banks of the Adour,
was to penetrate into Arragon, at that time without troops,
and to march, without striking a blow, to Saragossa, where
the Liberals of the province, with whom this movement
had been concerted, would be in waiting to receive him.
In effect, General Llauder united the troops in Arragon
with those of Pampeluna, in order to attack the refugees
at Vera. But while Mina, resigned beforehand to the re-
verse which was awaiting him, after having passed thirty
hours in the crevice of a rock to escape the men and the
dogs which had been sent to capture him, had re-entered
France as if by a miracle, where he hoped to hear of the
success of his lieutenant, a sous-prefet seized the arms des-
tined for the troop of Plasencia, and rendered totally vain
the devotedness and the death of so many brave men,
caused the failure of a most able manoeuvre, and perhaps
retarded the liberation of a whole people. All these facts
are stated in a menzoire which General Lafayette placed
before the King and the Ministers at the beginning of No-
vember. This memoire, signed by M. Mendizabal, who
had generously sacrificed his whole fortune in the cause,
had for its object to propose to the Government a sort of
mezzo ternzine.

Notwithstanding all this, and in spite of the remon-
strances of Lafayette, the order was given that the refu-
gees assembled on the frontier should return into France,
and we witnessed the odious spectacle of the elite of a na-
tion brought back into the interior of France by gendar-
merie, as if they had been sent by Ferdinand VII. into the
penal settlements of Africa.
Here commences a second era, and the Spanish Revolu-
tion, fettered in France and by France, broke out, deve-
loped itself, and increased in Spain itself. We all remember
the death of Ferdinand, who said of himself so truly, " Je
suis le bouchon de la boutelle de biere ; quand je sauterai,
tout sauterai' We remember the defence of Saint Ilde-
fonso,. the accession of Christina to the Regency, the en-
lightened despotism attempted by M. Zea, his fall, and the
succession to the Ministry of the first man from the ranks
of the Spanish emigration. M. Martinez de la Rosa,
called upon to direct the new Administration, and passing
thus, without an intermediate step, from proseri?tion to
power, said to his friends, " My mission will be short. I am
to lead Spain from the so-called enlightened despotism of my
predecessor to the meeting of the representatives of the
people. The Ciirtes once assembled, I will give up to
them the cares of Government, and my part will be
finished." M. Martinez de la Rosa then understood the
situation of Spain and did himself justice. He was, in
fact, the man of the transition. His Statut Royal, far from
being a constitution, as might be helieve4l, is only a decree
for the convocation of the general Cortes of the kingdom.
are,
and
But M. Martinez de la Rosa and his successor, M. de To_
reno, allowed themselves to be abused by the councils
les
and the promises of Frenchltemaindipwlhomernecy..ou
The
notes invariably said,
nothing more. If the rebels in Navarre make any progress
should in the name of Don Carlos, or if the revolution be-
come irritated and cast you out, call us our intervention
will ;
will be ready." M. Martinez de la Rosa
remembered
this promise before his fall, and
upon
this promise M.
de Toreno established his whole policy.
against the insurgent juntas, it was because
If he held up
a French army was in readiness he thought
Bidassoa. Driven to an e on the banks of the
rounded the armed interventionxtremity, the Queen de-
experienced a...refusal,. and • promised by France. She
be seen that she was a • in her consequent anger let it
blind confidence had thrown are of the abyss into which her
councils; supported by her. The policy of false
without anything lying promises, was born at Paris,
ambassador who from. Spain having aided its birth. The
since the repre§ented France in that country ever
Revolution of July was not an accomplice. M.
de Rayneval
was
certainly not a man who had any pas-
sionateleanings towards democratic opinions ; but he pos-
sessed good sense, wit, and saaac't He saw things
clearly, and lie would see them before he gave his opinion.
While the English Cabinet relied upon the lofty intellect,
the superior knowledge, and the upright and noble charac-
ter of its young representative at Madrid, the Doctri-
naires, in their fatuity, instead of consulting facts ofi
which to found an opinion, established their opinion in
spite of filets. In 1834 I heard M. de Rayneval complain
bitterly that he was neither believed nor consulted, that
he acted a part which was conrrary to his opinions, and
to blame in his heart what he was charged officially
to maintain. It was on this point that he engaged me to