The Sun.
London, England, 1867-01-29 00:00:00

Dom Miguel and the Revolution.

(From the TVestminster Gazette.)

After the sketch, which appeared in our
second number, a few words will suffice to repel
the charge of cruelty with which the enemies of
Dom Miguel sought to brand his Government. I
have examined many of these charges, and but
one accusation of any importance—the following
one—has come to my knowledge, in which even
the bare facts of the story are founded on truth.
Eleven students of the University of Coimbra,
Revolutionists and Freemasons, were executed
under his Government ; a twelfth escaped. Dorn
Miguel signed their death warrant ; but the
competent tribunal had passed sentence of death
upon them ; and their crime was as follows :
They had agreed, in obedience to a decree of the
secret societies, to assassinate the members of a
deputation from the senate of the University of
Coimbra, on account of their attachment to their
rightful prince. They surprised the deputation
on their journey, murdered two of the senators,
and had seriously wounded five others, when a
detachment of cavalry, happening by chance to
come up, prevented the full accomplishment of the
horrible deed. The murder of teachers by their
scholars approximates to the horror of parricide ;
but in this case a father and son actually con-
fronted each other !

When Dom Miguel, a few short weeks ago, sud-
denly stricken with apoplexy and speechless,
stretched out one hand to his brother-in-law,
Prince Lowenstein, while with the other he
pressed to his lips the ftnage of the Crucified,
which was hanging on his breast, at that moment
the recollection of the flagitious students of
Coimbra most assuredly did not trouble the peace
of his noble soul.

Although Dom Miguel reigned in Portugal as
legitimate prince, and at the same time as the
prince of their choice in the hearts of his people,
nevertheless the task of his Government was
revolution diffused th • • nous principles in
anything but an
their poisonous easy one. The partisans of the
every circle into which they could creep ; at
home their numbers, compared to the mass of
the nation, shrunk into insignificance, but they
found supporters abroad. The political criminals,
who had fled from Portugal, mostly took refuge
in England, where they sought successfully,
through the medium of newspapers and pamphlets,
to diffuse a mass of falsehoods and distorted ver-
sions of facts throughout the country, and from
thence throughout the Continent. A rank and
noxious seed it was ; it throve, and sprung up lux-
uriantly, especially in Germany, where political
intelligence was then even rarer than it is at
present. I remember well how small the number
was from the very first who really understood the
state of affairs. Spain, who herself fell ulti-
mately a victim to the revolution, joined reluc-
tantly in the struggle against Dom Miguel. In
the year 1832 she raised her voice for him. In a
note of the Spanish, addressed to the English
Minister, it is said : " Can England remain deaf
to the united voice of the Portuguese people ;
to the sufferings, to the wretchedness, of so
noble a nation, who have only made use of
their rights in recognising their undoubtedly legi-
timate Sovereign ?" In the following year, 1833,
Spain was willing to send an auxiliary force
for the defence of Dom Miguel, had not the latter
been too just, too noble to win an ally on the terms
offered. Don Carlos, with his family, had fled
from Spain into Portugal; now Spain required
that Portugal should refuse him an asylum. Dom
Miy sister, and i
g
u
e
l
replied—"
my I will never betray my uncle,
nnephews. I will rather lose my
crown." Thus was Spain, unworthy of such an
ally, led to pass over into the ranks of his enemies.
With the assistance of Spain, he could have ven-
tured a struggle with the more distant Powers.
But to prevent the conquest of Portugal by Spain
(whose territory enclosed him on the landside),
backed by England and France, was absolutely
impossible. To spare his people, therefore,
further and useless bloodshed, he surrendered on
the approach of a Spanish army ; but, on the 20th
of June, 1834, on his arrival at Genoa, he protested
in the face of Europe against this violation of his
own and his people's rights. By his surrender lie
saved his country from some immediate suffering,
but it was not in his power to save her from the
progressive decay which has been preying upon her
vitals to the present hour.
The Portuguese question is the same to-day as
it was then ; but it is clearer to-day than at that
period that the Portuguese question is the Euro-
pean question. The struggle of right against
wrong has existed at all times, as long as the world
has endured, and will exist to the end of time,
wherever men associate with each other. But
this universal characteristic is something very
different from the peculiar phenomenon which