The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-05 00:00:00

SPAIN AND MOROCCO.

A private letter from Madrid of the 26th of
February gives some particulars of the state of feel-
ing there. The writer says :
" You will have known by this of the rupture of
the peace negotiations, and that the Spanish army
is preparing to move—against Tangier according to
some, against Fez according to others. Muley-
Abbas, attended by the Moorish Minister of Foreign
Affairs, Mohammed-el-Ketif, conferred with O'Don•
nell on the 23d, but failed to persuade the Spanish
General to lower his conditions of peace. These
conditions, we hear, were 200,000,000 of reals
(£2,000,000 sterling), with the guarantee of the
proceeds of the Customs of a maritime town ; the
Jaossession and perpetual dominion of the
whole of the conquered country, Tetuan included ;
liberty for the Spaniards to practise their religious
rites and ceremonies in the country, and to have
ambassadors at the Imperial Court of Morocco.
"I must say, though a Spaniard, that moderate
men %lid men of sense here deem these conditions
exorbitant. It is to be observed that those who
affirm that peace shoald not be made without the
conquest of Tangiers are the two extreme political
parties— Carlists and the wild Democrats. These
arc the men who shout the loudest for the continua-
tion of the war, for their hopes depend much on the
occurrence of some great calamity. In quiet times
they have hardly a chance of seizing power; their
best and only opportunity is in the storm. The
Progresistas, who support O'Donnell, are anxious
for peace; the Vicalvarists desire only what
O'Donnell desires ; the Conservative's wish for
peace, and all who Are engaged in commerce and. in
agriculture, the taxpayers and the functionaries,
join in the same prayer.
. _

" O'Donnell could not imagine that on such ter-
rible conditions the Moors would accept peace.
He cannot have forgotten the wends he uttered in
the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies in October
last. lie said that ' Spain did not desire conquests
son the African soil ; that she did not seek fcr poli-
tical and territorial•compensation ; and that what
she wanted was only to avenge the affront offered
to the Spanish flag by the undisciplined tribes of
Anghera.' At the same time the Spanish Govern-
ment gave the English Minister a written a4sur-
ance that we were not going to make any conquests,
and that, whatever might be the result of the war,
the O'Donnell Cabinet promised to abandon, when
peace was signed, the places occupied during the
war.

"Now, I do not mean to charge the O'Donnell
Cabinet with perfidy. I believe that in October
last year they did not think of conquests, and that
What the Spanish Parliament said, it said in good
faith, and that what was promised to Mr. Buchanan
was really meant to be carried out. But circum-
stances have changed since then ; the situation of
O'Donnell is no longer the same : it it very critical,
and it is that situation which may force him and
the Cabinet to fail in their own solemn declarations,
in the declarations of ParliaMent, and the obliga-
tions contracted with England,
" I will just say a few words on the state of
affairs. It is notorious that O'Donnell undertook
the war for personal reasons and to please the
Queen, who from religious reasons was most enthu-
siastic for it, and her Majesty was led to believe
that she was predestined to carry out successfully
the famous testament attributed.to th e first Isabella.
For his part, O'Donnell, though caring very little
for the first Isabella or her supposed testament,
calculated that a successful campaign in Africa
would consolidate his power as Minister in Spain,
which, from various reasons, was rather shaky.
In place of making himself thoroughly acquainted
with the vulnerable points of the empire in mari-
time towns, in place of assembling the army and
the squadron on the coasts of Andalusia, and fall-
ing unexpectedly with a division on one point, or
of bombarding Mogador, or some other Mari.
time town, badly prepared from the unecrf
tainty of the movements of tho Spanish
army, he suddenly called to mind that the
19th of November was the Queen's Saints
day, and ordered Echague to proceed with
ion of the
the vanguard to the coast, take p
h see old walls
undefended Serallo, and announce possession of
to
the Queen, on her holy festivhael
whole of the
, those old walls
were occupied. On Nov. 25th the Moors fell on the
rapits;wvMais heaped_ together. in
were occupied. On Nov. 25th, t
O'Donnell, on hearing of
Ptrialattihleas passed ee
Spanish unexpectedly, and 0
the fact, crossed tilhierdseter
army except the t,
Ceuta and Sierra Bul-
lones ; we have had to sustain 50 sanguinary ttliheenc confined n filnVehdysapialcet hbee between .
com-
bats without real utility, and cholera decimated Our
ranks until we routed, on Feb. 4th, the camp of
Muley Abbas, and on the 6th entered Tetuan, hav-
ing spent in these operations 500 millions of reals
(15,000,000 sterling), and lost near 15,000 men.
From fault to fault, from error to error, O'Donnell
finds himself at Tetuan in the imperious • necessity
of satisfying the opinion of official Spain, excited
by the Cabinet and its agents, not to speak of the
national desire of the country for some eon-Tense-
tion for the iranaerme sacrifices which she has been
forced to make.

"The Moors have asked on what conditions
Spain would make. peace. O'Donnell, forgetful
of his promises to England, and his own solemn
words in Parliament, has demanded the
whole of the conquered territory, 200 millions
of reals, and certain political and commercial com-
pensations which the public have as yet no exact
knowledge of. Ile is between two difficulties—his
oNN, n words and the stipulations of his Government,
and the strict account the country will call upon
him to render, if after having spent 500,000,000
reals and 15,000 men, it is to remain contented
with Ceuta and its approaches. If he made peace
without conquest O'Donnell would fall from
Power, scouted by all Spain ; and this explains
.Why he preferred continuing the war, and trust-
ing to future success for the solution of his
Present difficulties. As a Spaniard, I lament that
my country is involved in a war sanguinary, ste-
rile, and without any advantage to her, and only
for purposes which are not of public interest.

•
LORD MACAULAVS AIEMORY.—The late Lord
Macaulay's memory was perfectly astounding. At a friend's
houso not very many months ago he was quoting in rapid
succession long passages from the ballads of the northern
comities of England. On being asked by one of the party
where ke had obtained such stores of poetic lore, he replied
that ho had spent a great part of one of his long vacations
while at Cambridge in the north of England, and had taken
that opportunity of traversing Cumberland and Northum-
berland on foot, entering the cottages of the poor people,
and'aitting down in their chimney corners to chat, and that
he made it a point not to leave a cottage without extracting
from each good woman some story or legend, in prose or
in poetry, which he carefully recorded day by day. He
addod, that he did not know where this store of folk-lore
now,was, but added that it would probably turn up among
his papers some day or other. We trust that his executors
will now remember the hint, and do their best to exhume
the buried treanre,-0400 Week,