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which had so long been suffered to fall into neglect, the King, on October 5th, issued an ordinance, which permitted the archbishops and bishops of the kingdom to establish in each department an ecclesiastical school, the masters and tutors of which they may name, and in which they shall educate young people intended for the great seminaries. When schools are situated in towns where there is a lyceum or commercial college, the scholars, after two years study, are to take the ecclesiastical habit, and thenceforth are to be excused from attending the lectures of the lyceum or college. When they have finished their course of study, they may present themselves to the examination of the university for the degree of bachelor of letters, which shall be gratuitously conferred upon them. These ecclesiastical schools are allowed to receive legacies and donations; and it can not be doubted that their institution is an important step towards retrieving the credit and influence of the clerical body in France.

Count Blacas, minister of the Royal Household, presented to the Chamber of Deputies, on October 26th, the plan of a law relative to the civil list and endowment of the crown, for which the two Chambers had addressed the King. By the first article, the annual sum of 25 millions of francs was appropriated to the civil list, to be paid in twelve equal monthly payments. Then followed a number of articles relative to the public domains or endowments of the Crown, the conservation and administration of its property, the King's private domains, and the endowment of the Princes and Princesses of the Royal VOL. LVI.

family. For the latter purpose the annual sum of eight millions of francs is assigned to serve instead of apanage. This law was adopted in the Chamber of Deputies by a ma jority of 185 votes to 4.

The same minister appeared before the Chamber on November 29th, to lay before it a statement of the King's debts. Those of his Majesty, and of the Princes of his family, with those left by Louis XVI. amounted to about 30 millions of francs, which he justly said was no great sum, considering the number of years during which the principal and interest had been accumulating. The interest of these debts the King offered to pay provisionally out of the civil list, so that no alteration would be required in the budget. The Count then alluding to the law which restored to the companions of the King's exile such of their property as was not alienated, said, that his Majesty only felt the more strongly the obligations which it laid upon him to fulfil towards those who had nothing to expect from the measures to which the legislative body had been obliged to confine itself. It belonged therefore to him alone to succour the honourable indigence of these persons; and confiding in the co-operation which the generosity of this body promised him, he would endeavour to discharge this debt contracted by misfortune. The Count then read the plan of a law presented to the Chamber in the name of the King, After stating the amount of the debt, it proposed a commission to be appointed by his Majesty to examine the titles of the creditors, according to whose decisions they should be inscribed in the book of

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the public debt, the interest up to Jan. 1, 1816, to be paid out of the civil list, and after that date to be provided for in the budget. This law being discussed in the Chamber on December 15, an amendment, proposed by the Central Committee, was taken into consideration, namely, that it would not be proper to accept his Majesty's generous offer of paying the interest of the debt for 1815 out of the civil list; and the law thus amended passed with only a single negative. The law for the restoration of the ungold estates of emigrants passed the Chamber of Peers on December 3, by the majority of

100 votes out of 103. At the same time the Duke of Tarentum (Marshal Macdonald) in a much applauded speech, announced his intention of proposing a law for granting life-annuities to those emigrants, the sale of whose estates had left them without provision. The Duke made his proposal relative to this measure on December 10, in a speech full of calculation, which it is not necessary here to specify, and to verify which, would obviously require much investigation. Nothing more appears to have been done on this subject during the remainder of the year.

CHAP

CHAPTER VÍ.

Spain.-Political parties.-Ferdinand at Valencia, joined by the grandees and prelates.-Issues a declaration of his refusal to accede to the new Constitution, and pronounces the Decrees of the Cortes null, and their supporters guilty of high treason-Cortes sinks without a struggle.-Arrests.-Ferdinand enters Madrid.-Convents restored.-Circular, respecting the adherents of Joseph; and to the Authorities in the Indies.-Address from the University of Salamanca.-Discontents in various parts.-Re-establishment of the Inquisition.-Ordinance aboishing torture.-Reform in the proceedings of the Court of Inquisition.-Severe measures at Cadiz.-Rota of the Nuncio restored.-Measures to repress Insurgents and Banditti.-Arrests multiplied.-Insurrection of Espoz de Mina.-Restoration of feudal privileges. Popular manners of the King.-Honourable treatment of Mina in France.-Council of Mesta re established.—Despotism and weakness of the Government.-Expedition for South America prepared.-Sentence on State prisoners.-Rewards for loyalty.

T

HE radical difference between a people accustomed to free inquiry relative to topics of the most important interest to mankind, and another to whom such inquiries are yet novel, and are encountered by long-established prejudices of various kinds, was never more forcibly exemplified than by the opposite terminations of the political storms and contentions by which the kingdoms of France and of Spain had for so many years been agitated. We have seen the former, immediately upon the breaking up of a severe military despotism, quietly settling in a constitution possessing the essentials of freedom; and though displaying those contentions of party, which never fail to burst out when not repressed by the strong hand of power, yet, on the whole, appa

rently concurring in the principles of that balance of authority, which keeps within due limits every exertion of the public force. We are now to be mortified with the view presented by the latter, of a government of which political liberty appeared to be the vital spirit, subsiding at once into an arbitrary sway, directed by all the violence, ignorance, and bigotry, of the most unenlightened times.

Although the return of Ferdinand to his kingdom was hailed by the general voice of Spain, yet it was early remarked that the unanimity was only external, and that factions were brooding which would shortly involve the country in all the evils of civil discord. "We cannot conceal it; (said the Paper, entitled The Conciso,) two parties exist in Spain. The one [Fa]

consists

consists of those who love and support the political reforms which have taken place; the other, of those who either oppose, or hypocritically pretend to cherish them." The writer goes on to say, that for more than twenty months, the enemies of reform endeavoured, under the pretext of religion, to stigmatize its promoters with the appellation of heretics, atheists, and deists; and finding that this did not answer their purpose, they added the titles of jacobins and republicans, and propagated the belief, that those who had planned a constitutional monarchy, wished to leave a king out of the scheme. He further observes, that the persons disaffected to the new institution had formed a junction with the Frenchified party; and that they would doubtless attempt to instil into the mind of Ferdinand notions which had brought ruin upon Charles IV. and Maria Louisa. If the Conciso, as being under the influence of the Cortes, bore somewhat of the stamp of a party paper, it is certain that events too well verified the statement and prediction here made.

The long continuance of Ferdinand at Valencia in the month of April, manifestly gave uneasiness to the inhabitants of Madrid, where it was a general question, When will his Majesty swear to the Constitution? and rumours of the most opposite kinds were propagated on this point. At this time the French papers were continually publishing paragraphs in favour of the royal party against the popular. Thus, under the head of Barcelona, it is said, "The Cortes preserve a menacing attitude, and wish to impose upon the Sovereign conditions

which the dignity of the crown cannot admit. The new Constitution is really republican: the executive power is so limited and checked, that it is impossible the machine can support itself." The Duke del Infantado had now joined the King at Valencia, and was followed by most of the grandees, and many prelates also repaired to his court. The Cortes, becoming more and more suspicious and anxious, dispatched two letters to the King, expressing their earnest desire that he would assume the reins of Government, according to the Constitution, and representing the mischievous consequences that would result from a longer delay, to which it does not appear that they received any answer.

At length all suspence and doubt was terminated by a declaration, of considerable length, which Ferdinand issued at Valencia on the 4th of May. This paper began with a summary recital of all that had happened from the time of his first receiving the oath of allegiance of the Spanish people, to his being detained captive in France, with the subsequent events down to the installation of the General and Extraordinary Cortes in the Isle of Leon, on Sept. 24th, 1810. To this body, assembled in a manner never used in Spain, even in the most arduous cases, and the most turbulent times," was ascrib ed an usurpation of all the public authority, by means of which it imposed upon the nation the yoke of a new Constitution, in which were copied the revolutionary and democratic principles of the French Constitution of 1791, and which sanctioned, not the fundamental laws of a moderate monarchy, but

those

those of a popular Government with a delegated Chief at the head. After charging this body with the purpose of rendering all regal power odious, by making King and Despot synonymous terms, and with the cruel persecution of every one who had the firmness to contradict them; his Majesty proceeded to declare his abhorrence and detestation of despotism; his intention to treat with the procurators of Spain and the Indies, and after the re-establishment of order, to assemble a legitimate Cortes, in which laws might be enacted, serving as a rule of action to his subjects; and a declaration of his royal views in the government with which he was about to be vested. He spoke of the liberty and security of persons and property, and even touched upon the freedom of the press, within due limits; and he concluded much indefinite matter of this kind with saying, "I declare that my royal intention is, not only not to swear or accede to the said Constitution, nor to any decree of the General and Extraordinary Cortes, and of the Ordinary at present sitting, those, to wit, which derogate from the rights and prerogatives of my sovereignty, established by the constitution and the laws under which the nation has lived in times past, but to pronounce that Constitution and such Decrees null and of no effect, now, or at any other time, and that they are entirely abrogated, and without any obligation on my people and subjects to observe them. And as he who should attempt to support them will attack the prerogatives of my sovereignty and the happiness of the nation, and cause dis

content and disturbance in my kingdom, I declare, that whoever shall dare to attempt the same will be guilty of high treason, and as such, subject to capital punishment, whether he perform the same by deed, by writing, or by words."

The paper further commanded, that until the restoration of public order, and the former system of things, the present magistracies of towns, courts of law, tribunals of justice, &c. should be continued; and that from the day of commu. nicating this decree to the Presi dent of the Cortes, that body should cease its sittings; that all the acts and documents in its possession should be delivered up and deposited under lock and seal in the town-hall of Madrid; and declared, any one endeavouring in any manner to obstruct the execution of this part of the decree, guilty of high treason, and liable to the punishment of death. It also pronounced the cassation of any pending proceedings in every tribunal of the kingdom, on account of infraction of the Constitution ; and the liberation of all who might have been arrested or imprisoned on that ground.

It was manifest, that when a Court, so little distinguished for vigorous resolutions as that of Spain, ventured to issue a declaration of open hostility against the existing government, it must have been well assured of the feeble bold possessed by that government on the mind of the nation. In fact, notwithstanding the high encomiums upon the noble and elevated spirit of the Spanish people which have been so frequent since they began to contend against French tyranny, it must be ac

knowledged

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