Inquiries having been mad...
The Times, 1824-04-30T00:00:00

Inquiries having been made in the natural quarter, con- cerniiu tne Spanish dividend v hich becomes due to-mor- rov, the answer has been-" No instructions have beeu " received from the Spanish Governmi,ent." That is to say, the Spanish Governmenit refuses to pay its debts. This is a perfectly novel occurrence, taken with all its accompani- ments. Other Governments have in former times, as well as lately, shuffled andl prtvaricated, and endeavoured to put uGMthe day of payment. PnnILsr II. was not the only Spanish King who did so. Wre are, moreover, well aware that the French Royal Governrment of 1788 could not long have continucd to discharge the interEst on its debt; and that the Revolutiouary Governiment which succeeded it, vielding to the pressure of circumstances, aetually cut off fromn the public credlitor two-thirds of his claim upon t'e nation. This was robbery, we are willing to adimit; but it was the plunder of extreme necessity. The obligation was acknowledg d-the right of the creditor was fully rrcognized-poverty was pleaded-and the country d'clared itself an irretrievable but an urnwilling bankrupt. Now is presented to us an example of another species. A King comes forward to tell the world-" I borrowed money from you two years ago. I publicly and solemnly sane tioned the (leeds by which the dlebt was contracted, anid the faith of my monarchy pledged ; but I thought fit, ;n " conjunction with a certain foreign Governient, to make "a total change in the existing constitutton of toy coun- " try, and in virtue of that revolution, undertaken and ac- coninplished since You lent me your money, I conieeive " myseif no loniger in debt to you." This, we confess, is a strain of audacity unparalleled in the history of fraud. It is not-" I am poor and unable to pay ;" but " I will not "pay a single farthlinlg, althuugh I feel myself so rich in "credit and resources, that I am now borrowing "in open market twice the amoulit which you lernt "me." Does FEILDINANP of Spain know one particle of public law? Has his Contessor at any tine per- mitted him to tead one book besides his Missal, or to converse with a single individual who had ideas in common with the rest of the civilized world ? If so, lie must have learned, that unless aState be-conquered and partitibmied, sbe never loses heridentity.. Spain was an inddependent king- dom in. 1822, more than she is now. She had then only Spaniards for ilhabitants; she was all over Spanish; foreigners had no right to intermnedtlle 'vith the fluctuating relatioins-of the several parts of the Government amongst each other: they saw Spain unaltered towards surround- ing nations; her sentiments were conveyed to them through the same medium of a crowned Sovereign, and that Sove- reign FERDINAND VII. He signed his, name-he sent his Ambassadors. When tliose Ambassadors or other agents catne to negotiate loans, did foreign ca- pitalists receive warning in the name of FERDINAAND by any document, or assurance, or intimation whatever, that his oaths were all perjuries-that he was not the real head of theGovernrmentwhich pretended to act for him-that he was even then conspiring its overthrov-that he had deter- minied to disown its measures, anl to obliterate even the memory of its existence? Had FERDINAND VII. takell these precautions, he would have demeaned himself like an honest man. Nobody wvould have lent him a million sterling under such discouragements; and wlat would have been the natural reward of his integrity ? '[lie Constitu- tional Goveri,ment must have fallen to pieces in a monthl! But the King's disguise was perfect. He borrowed the money in his feigned character, and now disowns the obligations in his real one: was ever swiindliing more com- plete than this? There is, indeed, as we set out with ob- serving, no instance of more daring dishonesty on record. Henceforth we know not with what face it is that any Government can venture to pledge itself for the security of a public creditor. If any nation can shake off a debt in vir- tue of certain political changes having occurred within its own territories after the debt was contracte(l, and that such becomes the admitted ]aw of Europe, the business of bor- lowing will soon be at an end. A King comes one day, and excuses himself by saying, " I am sorny you (lid not know it-but when I executel my bond to you, I was utnder "duress:" then comes some other lunctionary of some other nation with an apology of a differcnt kind-" It is true, my Sovereign was compos enough, anid as much "a despot as lhe ever had been, when you lent us the last "five millions; but then I was Finance MNiinister; I acted " under duress, for he threatened to cut my head off, if I " did not get him the cash. My acts of that period, there- "fore, must go for nothing." What alchaosmust all-national contracts become, if proceedings like this be entured! WVe pity the Contractors for the Spanish Loan now re- ferred to : what must the feelings of those Gentlemen be, whlen they contemplate the far spread ruin of which thleir high credit in this country, and their direct agency in these Spanish transactions, have proved the undesigned but most melanchloly source!