The Sun. — 1827-05-30 (London, England)

ROMERO ALPUENTE.  We insert a letter from a correspondent, who calls himself an Italian refugee ; but the chief interest, we confess, • which ho has excited in us, is for- a fellow-passenger of his late compulsory flight from Lisbon, the illustrious, magnanimous, ill-requited, long-suffering, and now dying sage and hero, Romero Alpuente, cruelly driven within these few weeks from Portugal, whither he had just attended an only niece, who from her youth had nursed hia infirmities—but now, in the last stage of an incurable disorder, sought with him at the threshold of their miserable country, the refuge of a common grave. Romero Alpuente is ox the verge of 90 ; and through. this preternatural term of existence has borne a name the most unimpeachable for public and private honour. When he sat many years ago as Chief Judge or Fiscal of the Criminal Court at Madrid, a woman of high rank, an adultress and a murderess, was brought before this venerable Judge. She had instigated her paramour to the murder of her husband. The evidence was conclusive, and the sentence rested with the Court. The numerous and affluent connexions of the culprit beset the magistrate with persuasions, threats, and unceasing importunities for mercy. The infamous and allpowerful Godoy, too, was a cousin of the guilty woman. This personage offered Alpuente, besides 40,0001. sterling in money, the highest and most lucrative patronage under the monarchy, if he would but spare her life ;—with a denunciation of the fiercest enmity if he refused it. But the intrepid and virtuous Judge had a prerogative which, by usage, was held too sacred for the minion of despotism to contend with. He signed the warrant, and the murderess was led to execution. From that hour open war existed between B omero Alpuente and the Court of Madrid. He was throughout the whole series ofrevolutions, from 1808 to 1823, a stern patriot, never flinching, esteemed, honoured, and revered for spotless integrity, by all enlightened Spaniards. Were the patriarch now but to show himself on his native soil, the wasted and fleshless form would rally round it the whole constitutional spirit of the nation. But the persecuted old man will never again rouse an assembly of Patriots by his eloquence, or guide them by his genius. He went to Portugal in a state of weal7iess, aggravated by every want that could pinch and oppress old age in its extremity. He was expelled from it without remorse or mercy. Ferdinand's Minister was in earnest,—those of Portugal were not : no English authority, or humanity, or feeling for Spanish interests, individual or national, interposed to save this poor old man. By his departure to Portugal, in hopes of mitigating under a milder climate bodily sufferings far more painful to him than his own, he had forfeited the pittance hitherto allowed him, in common with other Spaniards, by the British Government. Since his return, the Spanish Committee, out of scanty and much-burdened funds, have granted to him—conjointly with a female—a born and virtuous lady—sick beyond the reach of medicine, but not of charity, the last of his race—ll. per month ! We must end this heart-wounding relation. Romero Alpuente is in London, on that bed which grief makes a death-bed, but famine a bed of agony. There are in England bold and honest judges, who would have felt with Alpuente, when riches or worldly ruin were the alternatives offered to him, and who now can feel for a brother Magistrate, not unworthy their generous admiration, but at his last hour capable of benefit only from their tenderness and compassion. While a certain • Spanish officer, who suflers his wife to sing iu public and for hire, gained by a single concert ! within this fortnight at least 1,0001. sterling, to which some very generous persons contributed from a belief that they were assisting the great body of the exiled patriots, one of the bravest and noblest among them starves, at 90 years of age !