The Spanish general who entered Alem-Tejo to take possession of Godoy’s kingdom was less fortunate; ♦Neves, i. 307.♦ for he was compelled to raise contributions from a ruined people, though in other respects considerable latitude seems to have been given him, in deference to his character and talents. This general was the Marques del Socorro, D. Francisco Maria Solano, destined to leave an unhappy name in the history of his country. During many years he had been governor of Cadiz, where he had employed an almost unlimited power in the most honourable and beneficial manner. It was his delight to ornament the city, and to promote the convenience and comfort of the inhabitants. One of the beneficial acts of his government was to abolish the practice of burying in the churches: this he accomplished, not without difficulty, during one of those contagious fevers which of late years have so frequently visited that part of Spain. ♦Jacob’s Travels.♦ He is also entitled to be remembered with respect for the manner in which he maintained the old humanities of war with the English squadron which so long blockaded Cadiz: this conduct was the more honourable, because Solano was decidedly a partizan of France, and had acquired a dangerous love of political experiments in the revolutionary school. He had now an opportunity of indulging this passion; and the measures which he attempted proved the goodness of his intentions, as well as the errors of his judgement. While Junot’s edicts were in one uniform spirit of tyranny, Solano was offering rewards to those who should raise the greatest crops, or breed the most numerous flocks and herds. ♦His schemes for the improvement of society.♦ He addressed circular instructions to the judges, enjoining each of them, when he had notice of any civil suit, to call the parties before him, hear their respective statements, and advise them to settle the dispute by arbitration. If they persisted in their appeal to the laws, he was then to require from each, before the process went forward, a written statement of the case, and the documents which were to support it. If the thing contested did not exceed eighty milreis in value, he might pronounce summary justice without farther examination: the losing party, however, retaining a right of appeal to the superior courts. If the value exceeded that sum, the parties were again to be exhorted to come to some accord, or at least to agree upon shortening the process, and avoiding all unnecessary delay and expense; and the judges were empowered to do this, even without the consent of the parties, and come as summarily as possible to the merits of the case. Another of his projects seems to have been borrowed from the policy of the Peruvian Incas, or the government of Japan. Every parish was to be divided into districts, containing not less than one hundred houses, nor more than two. Each district was to choose one among its inhabitants, with the title of Commissioner, whose duty it should be to make out a list of all the members of his district, their ages and occupations; to interfere in all family disputes, for the purpose of accommodating them; and to keep all persons to their respective employments. If they were not obedient to his admonitions he was to denounce them to the magistrates, that due punishment might be inflicted. ♦Observador Portuguez, 144–150.♦ He was also to walk his rounds for at least an hour every night, accompanied by four of the most respectable men of the district, to see that no prohibited games were played in the taverns, and that nothing was committed offensive to good morals.

Such were the projects with which Solano amused himself at Setubal! The conduct of his soldiers easily accommodated itself to the good disposition of their chief. Accustomed to the same habits of life, attached to the same forms of worship as the Portugueze, and speaking a language so little different that they mutually understood each other, the Spaniards lived among them like men of the same country; and, as long as the power remained in their hands, the people of Alem-Tejo and of the northern provinces experienced none of those insults and oppressions which the French inflicted wherever their authority extended. In Lisbon the burthen was at once heavier than in other places and more galling; and most persons who had the power of removing into the country retired from those daily and hourly vexations which aggravated their sufferings. The rapacity of the French leaders opened a surer asylum for others. Notice was given that all Brazilians who wished to return to their native land might obtain passports, and be permitted to embark in neutral ships. All who could invent any pretext for availing themselves of this permission hastened to purchase it; and the money which the French thus exacted was cheerfully paid as the price of deliverance. The ships which carried Kniphausen colours took out many emigrants in the dress of sailors, who smeared their hands with pitch, the better to disguise themselves. ♦1808. Jan. 5.♦ The Nuncio20, who during these transactions demeaned himself with great propriety, and repeatedly solicited passports for Brazil, that he might follow the court to which he was appointed, succeeded at last in getting on board a licensed vessel, unknown to Junot, and reaching England in safety, went from thence to Rio de Janeiro. Meantime the most rigorous measures were devised to prevent any person from escaping to the English squadron. All the fishing boats were arranged in divisions, which were denoted by letters, and the boats then numbered; and each had its letter and number painted on the bow and quarter in white characters a foot long. The master of every boat was bound to carry a list, specifying the letter of its division, the number of his boat, his name, his dwelling-place, and the number and names of the men on board. This paper was to be his passport at the different batteries, and his protection from the watch-boats which patrolled the river, and were charged to apprehend every person whose name was not inscribed in the list, and to seize every vessel by which any part of the edict was infringed, as a prize. The magistrate of every district was to deliver in a list of all the owners of fishing boats in the corresponding division, in order that their property might be answerable for any infraction of these rules: a counter list was to be kept on board the floating battery. All the owners of all the divisions were to appear every Saturday at this floating battery, there to have their papers verified. Every boat which had any communication with the English squadron was to be confiscated; and all were bound to be within the bar at sunset on pain of being fined one piece for the first offence, three for the second, and of confiscation and corporal punishment for the third.

The sight of the British squadron off the mouth of the Tagus continually kept alive the hopes of the Portugueze. Crowds of artizans who had been thrown out of employment used to assemble upon the heights of Santa Catharina, ♦Neves, i. 261.♦ of the Chagas, Buenos Ayres, and the other eminences, fixing their longing eyes upon the English fleet, counting its number, and oftentimes deluding themselves with a belief that it was entering the river to deliver Lisbon. It was thought necessary to forbid these assemblages. Junot affected to ridicule this popular hope, ♦Neves, i. 245.♦ and said, in scorn of the Marqueza de Angeja, who was known frequently to gaze toward the same object, that she would make an excellent wife for King Sebastian. But his own secret feelings were discovered by the falsehoods which were sedulously circulated respecting England. A pamphlet was published which pretended to describe the actual state of that country; and which, the better to deceive the people, was made by the manner of its license to appear as if it had been printed under the Prince’s government. It represented our population at less than eleven millions, our army as short of 100,000 men, our fleet in great part laid up for want of naval stores; our debt insupportable, our paper-money at a discount, our custom-houses almost shut up for want of any thing to do; more than a million of manufacturers ruined, and publicly crying out for peace, agriculture decaying for want of hands and of commerce, and the people in despair, unable longer to support the burthen and endure the misfortunes of a destructive war. To excite the hatred of the Portugueze, ♦Neves, ii. 8.♦ it was affirmed by Junot that the Prince had not been conveyed to Brazil by the English, but that they had conducted him and his fleet, with all the treasures on board, to England.

Junot, it is said, was not without some apprehensions of the displeasure of Buonaparte for having suffered this prize to escape him. When that tyrant was exasperated by the failure of his commanders, he seldom condescended to ask whether success had been possible: in the present instance he either was or affected to be satisfied; and the principles upon which he had thus far proceeded were now made known to the world in a report or M. Champagny, his minister for foreign affairs: it bore date a few days before the secret treaty of Fontainebleau. ♦Oct. 21, 1807.♦ After the peace of Tilsit, this minister said, France and Russia had combined to restore peace to the world, the sole object of all the Emperor Napoleon’s labours, of all his triumphs, of all his innumerable sacrifices. He had a right to call upon the continental powers to maintain their neutrality against England; he had a right to demand that all Europe should concur in re-establishing the peace of the seas, and those maritime rights which England had haughtily declared she would respect no longer. All governments ought to make war against the English; they owed this to their own dignity, they owed it to the honour of their people, they owed it to the mutual obligations by which the sovereigns of Europe are connected. There was not any sovereign who would not acknowledge, that, if his territory should be violated to the injury of the Emperor of the French, he would be responsible. For instance, if a French vessel were seized by the English in the ports of Trieste or Lisbon, the sovereigns to whom those ports belong are bound to make the English respect their territory by force; otherwise they would make themselves the accomplices of England, and place themselves in a state of war with the Emperor of France. When, therefore, the Portugueze government suffered its vessels to be searched by English ships, its independence was violated, with its own consent, by the outrage done to its flag, just as it would have been if England had violated its territory or its ports. ♦1808. January.♦ For the ships of a power are as portions of its territory which float upon the seas, and which, being covered by its flag, ought to enjoy the same independence, and to be defended against the same attacks. The conduct of Portugal, therefore, gave the Emperor Napoleon a right of proposing to it the alternative of making common cause with him in maintaining the rights of its flag, and declaring war against England, or of being considered as an accomplice in the evil which might result to his Imperial Majesty from that violation.... Such was the law of nations as laid down by Buonaparte’s minister, M. Champagny, and such the logic by which Portugal was proved to have placed itself in a state of war with France!—M. Champagny proceeded to affirm that Portugal had pronounced her own fate. She had broken off her last communications with the continent in imposing upon the French and Spanish legations the necessity of quitting Lisbon. Her hostile intentions, which the language of perfidy and duplicity had ill concealed, were then unveiled. Not only were the English and their property placed in safety, but her military preparations were directed against France; and she waited only for the arrival of the English fleet and army which had plundered Denmark to avow herself. This curious paper concluded in a manner worthy of its reasoning and its veracity. If, it said, this war was to make Portugal undergo the fate of so many states which had fallen victims of the friendship of England, the Emperor Napoleon, who sought not for such successes, would without doubt regret that the interest of the continent should have rendered it necessary. His views, which had constantly been raised with his power, showed him in war rather a scourge for humanity than a new prospect of glory; and all his wishes were that he might devote himself wholly to the prosperity of his people.

A second report of the same minister was published at the same time. The house of Braganza, it said, had delivered itself up to the English with all that it could carry away, and Brazil from henceforward would be only an English colony. But Portugal was at length delivered from the yoke of England. Her coasts had been left without defence; and England was at this time threatening them, blockading her ports, and wishing to ravage her shores. Spain, also, had had fears for Cadiz, and now was fearing for Ceuta. Toward that part of the world the English appeared to be directing their secret expeditions: they had landed troops at Gibraltar; they had assembled there those who had been driven from the Levant, and part of those whom they had collected in Sicily. Their cruisers upon the coast of Spain were become more vigilant; they seemed to wish to revenge themselves upon that kingdom for the disgrace which they had suffered in its colonies. The whole of the peninsula ought particularly to fix the attention of his Imperial Majesty, whose wisdom would dictate to him such measures as the state of things required. ♦Jan. 6.♦ This paper was followed by a report from General Clarke, the minister of war, who announced that the corps of observation of the Gironde under General Junot had conquered Portugal; ♦The conscription for 1809 required.♦ and advised that the conscription for the year 1809 should be called out, because of the necessity of shutting the ports of the continent against their enemy, and of having considerable forces at every point of attack, in order to profit by the fortunate circumstances which might arise for carrying the war into the heart of England, of Ireland, and of the Indies. “Although,” said the General, “the indignation of all Europe is roused against England, although France has at no time possessed such armies, this is not yet enough; English influence must be attacked wherever it exists, till the moment when the sight of so many dangers shall induce England to remove from her councils the oligarchs who direct them, and intrust the administration to wise men, capable of reconciling the love and the interest of their country with the interest and the love of the human race. A vulgar policy,” he pursued, “would have induced your Majesty to disarm, but that policy would be a scourge for France; it would render imperfect the great results which you have prepared. Yes, Sire, far from diminishing your armies, your Majesty ought to increase them, till England shall have acknowledged the independence of all powers, and restored to the seas that tranquillity which your Majesty has secured to the continent.... Doubtless your Majesty must suffer in requiring new sacrifices and imposing new burthens upon your people; but you ought to yield to the cry of all the French, ... no repose till the seas are set free, and till an equitable peace has re-established France in the most just, the most useful, and the most necessary of her rights.” ♦Jan. 21.♦ Accordingly, 80,000 conscripts, of the conscription of 1809, were, by a decree of the senate, placed at the disposal of government: they were to be taken from the youths born in the year 1789; according to the conscription laws, twenty was the age at which they were ripe for slaughter, but the practice of dispensing with a year had already been begun. ♦Threats against England.♦ The minister of state, M. Regnaud de St. Jean d’Angely, pronounced an harangue upon this occasion. “A holy and powerful league,” said he, “has been formed, to punish the English oligarchy, to defend the right of nations, to revenge humanity. From the Baltic to the Mediterranean, from the Nile to the Neva, there hardly remain for the ships of Great Britain any shores where they may land, any points where they are not forbidden to touch. But it is not enough, by a just reciprocity, to have pronounced against England this tremendous sentence of outlawry among nations; no rest must be given her in the seat of her iniquitous dominion, nor upon any of her coasts, nor in any of her colonies, nor in any of those parts of the globe where she is not yet interdicted. Repulsed from one part of the world, and menaced in all the other, England must not be suffered to know where to direct the little military force which she can command; and our armies, more formidable than ever, must be ready to carry our victorious and avenging eagles into her possessions. The pillage of the arsenal and port of Copenhagen, the emigration of the Portugueze fleet, have not left the continent without ships: our legions may yet reach the English militia; Ireland may still look for succours against oppression; India may still expect her deliverers.”

Well might the French nation have shuddered at the prospect of interminable war which was thus held out by the ministers of a tyrant, whose ambition increased with his power. He found, however, implicit and servile obedience in the nation. Their crime brought with it its curse, new successes only served as pretexts for demanding more sacrifices; and at a moment when France had not an enemy upon the whole continent of Europe, and a larger military force than had ever before existed, more conscripts were thus called for in advance! But though Buonaparte at this time despised the military force of Great Britain as heartily as he hated its naval power, neither London, nor Ireland, nor India, were as yet his objects. His projects for seizing the whole Spanish peninsula were now mature, and these projects were probably communicated to Junot by dispatches which arrived from Milan the second week in January. A few days afterward that General went with more than his usual pomp to the Foundery, destroyed the portraits of the Braganzan kings, and gave orders that the Portugueze arms should no longer be placed on the cannon. He gave orders also to deface the royal arms which were carved in stone over the entrance, but no Portugueze could be tempted to commit this act of treason; and when some French soldiers broke the crown and defaced the shield, no sooner had they left the place than the women gathered up the fragments to preserve them as relics. The final act of usurpation was not long delayed. ♦February.♦ Early on the morning of the first of February the movements of the troops indicated that some great measure was about to be announced, for which the public mind was to be prepared by intimidation. Cannon were planted in the Rocio; the streets from thence to head-quarters were lined with soldiers; and Junot, with all the parade of military pomp and power, proceeded to the palace of the Inquisition, where the Regents held their sittings. ♦Junot declares that the Portugueze government is dissolved.♦ Troops followed him, filling the lobbies of that execrable edifice, and extending even to the table where these poor puppets of authority were seated: amid this scene of noise and tumult and indecorum he read a paper, of which nothing more could be collected than that it pronounced the extinction of the Portugueze government, and the consequent dismission of the Regents from office. Rockets gave the signal when the General came out, and salutes of artillery from the castle and all the forts and batteries insulted the afflicted and groaning people. The city was soon placarded with a proclamation in French and Portugueze, saying that all uncertainty was now at an end, the fate of Portugal was decided, and her felicity secured, because Napoleon the Great had taken her under his omnipotent protection. The Prince of Brazil, in abandoning Portugal, had renounced all right to the sovereignty of that kingdom. The House of Braganza had ceased to reign, and it was the will of the Emperor Napoleon that the whole of that fine country should be administered and governed in his name, and by the General in chief of his army. ♦Junot appointed governor for the Emperor Napoleon.♦ “The duties,” said Junot, “which this mark of benignity and confidence on the part of my master imposes upon me, are difficult to fulfil, but I hope worthily to discharge them. I will open roads and canals, that agriculture and national industry may once more flourish. The Portugueze troops will soon form one family with the soldiers of Marengo, of Austerlitz, of Jena, and of Friedland; and there will be no other rivalry between them than that of valour and discipline. The good administration of the public revenues will secure to every one the reward of his labours. Public instruction, that parent of national civilization, shall be extended over the provinces, and Algarve and Beira shall each have one day its Camoens. The religion of your fathers, the same which we all profess, shall be protected and succoured by that same will which restored it in the vast empire of France, but freed from the superstitions which dishonour it. Justice shall be equally administered, and disembarrassed of the delays and arbitrary will which paralysed it; the public tranquillity shall no more be disturbed by robbers, and deformed mendicity no longer drag its filth and its rags through this superb capital. Inhabitants of Portugal, be secure and tranquil! Resist the instigations of those who would excite you to rebellion, and who care not what blood is shed so it be the blood of the continent. Betake yourselves with confidence to your labours; you shall enjoy the fruits. If it be necessary that in these first moments you should make some sacrifices, it is that the government may be enabled to ameliorate your condition. They are also indispensable for the subsistence of a great army, which is required for the vast projects of the Great Napoleon. His vigilant eyes are fixed upon you, and your future happiness is secure. He will love you as he loves his French vassals: study therefore to deserve his goodness by your obedience to his will.”

A second decree, bearing date on the same day, was promulgated the next. It explained the form in which Portugal was from that time forward to be governed, in the name of the Emperor of the French, by the General in chief of the French army in that country. There was to be a council of government, composed of the General as president, a secretary of state for the administration of the interior and of the finances, with two counsellors of government, one for each department; a secretary of state for the departments of war and the marine, with a counsellor of government for the same departments; and a counsellor of government for the superintendence of justice and public worship, with the title of Regedor. The secretary-general of the council was to be keeper of its archives. M. Herman and M. Lhuitte were the two secretaries of state: the former had D. Pedro de Mello and the Senhor d’Azevedo for his secretaries; the latter had the Conde de S. Payo. The principal Castro was named for Regedor, and M. Vianez Vaublanc secretary-general. There was to be in every province an administrator-general, with the title of Corregedor Mor, to direct all the branches of administration, to watch over the interests of the province, and to point out to the government the improvements which ought to be made in it; on which subjects he was to communicate with the home secretary and the Regedor. The province of Estremadura was to have two of these Corregedores: one residing at Lisbon, whose jurisdiction was confined to that capital and its term; the other for the rest of the province, and residing out of it, at Coimbra. There was also to be in each province a general officer, to maintain order and tranquillity: his functions were purely military, but in all public ceremonies he was to take the right hand of the Corregedor Mor. This precedence was not required to prove to the people that they were under a mere military government.

The device of Buonaparte, an eagle upon an anchor, was now placed over the arsenal; the official seals were ordered to bear the same impress as those of the French empire, with this inscription, “Government of Portugal:” and on the same day that possession was thus taken, and protection promised, an edict was made public, dated from Milan Dec. 23, imposing a war contribution-extraordinary of an hundred million of francs upon the kingdom of Portugal, as a ransom for individual property of every kind. A second article of this memorable decree directed the French general to take the necessary means for promptly collecting this contribution; and a third declared that the property of the Queen, the Prince Regent, and all the royal family, should be sequestered, and that of all the fidalgos who accompanied him also, unless they should return by the 15th of February. The decree originally fixed the first, but as it was not published till the second, Junot ventured to extend the term: even then, however, it served only to show how little the framer of such decrees considered what was possible; how impudently he set even the forms of equity at defiance. It was now explained what those sacrifices were which the people had been told on the preceding day were necessary to enable the government to ameliorate their condition. The sum to be levied amounted in Portugueze money to forty million cruzados. Junot decreed that the two millions already paid, which he raised as a loan, and now called a contribution, should be accounted as part of the sum, and allowed for in the final payment. Six millions were to be paid by the commercial part of the nation at three instalments; on the first of March, the first of May, and the first of August. All goods of English manufacture being, on account of their origin, liable to confiscation, were to be ransomed by the merchants and tradesmen who possessed them, at a third of their value. All the gold and silver of all the churches, chapels, and fraternities in Lisbon and its district was to be carried to the mint within fifteen days; no other plate being excepted than what was indispensable for the decency of public worship. In the provinces the collectors of the tenths were to receive the church plate and transmit it to the mint, and the amount was to be carried to the contribution. Archbishops, bishops, religious orders and superiors of either sex, who possessed any revenue from land, or capital of any kind, were to contribute two-thirds of their whole yearly income, if that income did not exceed sixteen thousand cruzados, and three-fourths if it did; ... in consideration of which they were to be excused from paying the regular tenths for the current year. Every person enjoying a benefice which produced from six to nine hundred milreis, should contribute two-thirds of his income; three-fourths, if it exceeded the latter sum. All Commendadors of the military orders or of Malta should also pay two-thirds of their revenue. The donatories of crown property were to pay double their usual tax; owners of houses, half the rent for which they were let, or a proportionate sum if they inhabited them themselves; land-holders, two-tenths, in addition to the former imposts. The tax upon horses, mules, and servants, was doubled. The Juiz do Povo, under orders of the Senado, was to rate all trading bodies and booth and stall-keepers, and compel them to pay their assessments by distress; and shops which were not under the jurisdiction of the Senado were to be rated in like manner by the Mesa do Bem Commun, ... the Board of General Good, ... under the inspection of the Royal Junta of Commerce.

The few persons who had thus long obstinately persisted in believing or pretending to believe that France wished and intended to improve the state of Portugal could no longer deceive themselves, and dared not attempt to deceive others. The contribution thus imposed amounted to four millions and a half sterling; the population of Portugal was less than three millions: the sum demanded, therefore, was equivalent to a poll-tax at a guinea and half per head. Yet even this statement inadequately represents its enormity: from at least three-fourths of the people nothing could be collected; and the mercantile part of the community, who had been the most opulent, were already reduced to ruin. The sum required exceeded the whole circulating medium of the country; and the reason why it was permitted to be paid by instalments, and not insisted upon at once, was, that the money received at the first instalment might in the course of circulation find its way to serve for the second! It was levied with the utmost rigour. ♦Observador Portuguez, 203.♦ The lowest hucksters, stall-keepers, and labourers, were summoned before the Juiz do Povo, to be assessed in their portion; and the merchants were ordered to appear in tallies before the Junta of Commerce, and there reciprocally discuss their affairs, and tax each other! The expulsion of the English, the emigration, and the general distress, had left a very large proportion of the best houses vacant, and rents in consequence had fallen nearly to half their former value; but every house was rated at what it had brought in before these events, and the owners of those which were untenanted were compelled to pay three-tenths of what they would have received upon that valuation; and the property of those who had neither money nor commodities to satisfy the demand was seized without mercy. Articles which were needful for the army were received in part of payment in kind. The French officers turned speculators: they purchased colonial goods, which they sent to France by land; and thus the money which they had extorted was re-issued, to answer fresh exactions, or serve as booty again. They carried on also a gainful trade in money; importing French coin, which they forced into circulation, and exchanged for Spanish dollars, or for the fine gold of Portugal, at an enormous profit; or they purchased with it paper-money, which usually fluctuated between 28 and 30 per cent. discount, ... sometimes was as low as 35, and sometimes could find no purchasers. With this paper, according to law, they made half their payments at par: and when all their French money was expended in this manner, Junot issued an edict, by which he fixed a price at which it was to be received for the contribution, lower than that at which he had suffered it to be introduced.

The decree which appointed Junot governor of Portugal, and extended his authority over the whole kingdom, at once abrogated the secret treaty of Fontainebleau. That treaty had served Buonaparte’s purpose, and the Spanish cabinet was at this time too much agitated by home disquietudes to resent this breach of faith, or take warning by it. Godoy, fallen from his dreams of royalty, and trembling for his life, was ready to make any sacrifice which might procure him the protection of France. ♦Neves, i. 313.♦ ♦Part only obey his orders.♦ He had written to Junot, requesting that Carraffa’s division might return to Spain; alleging, that the English threatened a descent upon the coasts of Andalusia: ... but the French were not duped by a pretext which they themselves had invented for a different purpose; and Junot, in conformity to his master’s projects, detained the troops. Godoy probably wanted them to protect the removal of the King and Queen to the coast, but he was in no condition to insist upon any thing; and the abortive principality of the Algarves, and the kingdom of Septentrional Lusitania, came to an end before their intended lords had taken possession, and before their denominations had been made public. The Spanish troops from Algarve and Alentejo were recalled, and obeyed the order; those at Porto, and Carraffa’s division, were more under Junot’s power; they were detained, and Carraffa, upon the death of Taranco, by the French general’s order took command of both.

Thus had Junot, in pursuance of his instructions, extended his authority over the whole of Portugal. He was, however, far from feeling secure in his usurpation. The temper of the people had shown itself; and if the English had landed a force to attack him, his men were but in ill condition to take the field; for they were sickly during the whole of the winter months. ♦Journal de Coimbra, 2. 74.♦ ♦The flower of the Portugueze army marched into France.♦ For this reason he had disbanded the militia, and broken up so large a part of the native army; ... but the flower of that army was to be selected and sent into France, that they might be made agents in inflicting the same miseries upon other countries which their own endured. A great number of the soldiers who had been picked for this service deserted; and in consequence, the French code of martial law was declared to be applicable to the Portugueze army, and death became thereby the punishment for desertion. Six thousand infantry, and four regiments of cavalry, were marched off, under the Marquez d’Alorna. Gomes Freire d’Andrada, who had the highest military reputation of any officer in the army, was second in command. The Marquez de Valença, the Marquez de Ponte de Lima, the Counts Ega and Sabugal, and many other officers of rank and family, went in this ill-fated army; some by compulsion, others by choice, the leaders being devoted to Buonaparte.

Though the French despised the Portugueze troops as heartily as they did the people, it was observed that they became more insufferable in their personal conduct after the army was disbanded. As a body they might safely despise them; but every individual was in some measure restrained by the apprehension of individual vengeance, and the certainty that if in any tumult the military, as was natural, should take part with the people, the contest, though the event was not doubtful, must be far more severe. When this restraint was removed, they gave way to that insolence which adds a sting to oppression, and rouses even those who have submitted to heavier wrongs. A peasant at Mafra, Jacinto Correia was his name, killed two of these robbers with a reaping-hook; and when he was put to death for it by military process, he gloried to his last breath in what he had done, and repeated that if all his countrymen were like him, there should not a single Frenchman remain alive among them. ♦Observador Portuguez, 156.♦ The punishment was carefully made known in a proclamation, but the nature of the crime was as carefully suppressed, lest it should find imitation. It had, however, been determined to strike terror into the people by an execution, which should furnish in its example nothing but what was intimidating. ♦Executions at Caldas.♦ Insignificant as the cause was, the circumstances of this insulated tragedy deserve to be stated, as a specimen of the spirit in which the military government of Portugal was conducted. A number of French soldiers had been sent to the hospital at the Caldas, a munificent establishment of royal charity, to be cured of the itch by the baths at that place. They complained to General Thomiers, who commanded at Peniche, that the peasantry insulted them; and Thomiers sent a few stout grenadiers to take the first opportunity of resenting any mockery which might be offered to their comrades. These men paraded the streets, and drank at the wine-houses till they began to invite a quarrel. A countryman, heated like them with liquor, said to his companion as they were passing, I have killed seven of these fellows myself. The vaunt, which was probably as false as it was foolish, might have cost him his life in a regular way; but one of the French, who heard him, immediately attempted to cut him down; ... he ran to his mother’s house, which was close at hand, and calling out to his sister to help him, she stood in the door-way, let him enter, and instantly locking the door on the outside, put the key in her bosom. The French endeavoured to force the key from her; the woman was strong and determined: her cries were heard at a billiard table near, where a cadet of the regiment of Pato, which was quartered in the town, seeing a woman struggling upon the dunghill with three or four French soldiers, jumped out of the window, and ran to her assistance; the surgeon and a few others of the same regiment followed. A French captain also came up: by this time a considerable crowd had collected; the sword was knocked out of his hand by a stone, and he would have been in some danger, if a Portugueze sergeant had not called out to the mob to forbear, for he was a French officer. The soldiers now came up, and the tumult ended with no other immediate evil than that one or two of the first aggressors were slightly wounded: ... the woman was the greatest sufferer; for one of them, with the pummel of his sword, had beaten her cruelly upon the bosom. When the circumstances were made known to Thomiers, his first intention was to pass it over lightly: as the Juiz de Fora of the town happened to be with him at the time, he desired him immediately to send him any four fellows of bad character, to whom a little punishment would do no harm, and who might represent the town on this occasion. Such an arrangement, curious as it is, would have been an improvement upon the ordinary course of Portugueze justice. Four men, accordingly, against whom complaints had been recently preferred by their wives, but who were entirely innocent of the matter in question, were arrested, and put in confinement. Nine days afterward, Loison, who commanded in the district, appeared at the head of three or four thousand men, bringing Thomiers with him. The woman was called upon to declare which of the soldiers had beaten her: she pointed out the man, and there ended this part of the inquiry: but on the other part, fifteen Portugueze were condemned to death; among them the Escrivam da Camara, and one of the most respectable inhabitants of the place, who happened to be in the room with her when the tumult took place. They had been seen from an opposite house each to take a musket and load it: ... this they acknowledged that they had done; but they had taken no part in the disturbance, nor even gone into the street. It was argued that they could not have loaded those guns with any other intention than that of discharging them against the French troops, and therefore they had incurred the penalty of death. That sentence was passed against them; and the uncle of the Escrivam, being one of the magistrates of the town, was ordered and compelled by Loison to be present at the execution! Five of the condemned persons took the alarm in time, and escaped. The surgeon leaped from a window, and broke his leg: he was carried to the place of butchery upon a hand-barrow, covered with a piece of sacking. While the execution was going on, the Prince of Salm Kirburg, a young officer in the French service, lifted up the cloth to see what was under it: the sight shocked him, and he said to the French general it was monstrous to bring a man in such a condition to suffer death, ... let them heal him first, and then do with him what they would. ♦Neves, Ch. 30.♦ This intercession availed: the surgeon was remanded to the hospital, and Loison was content with having seen nine men put to death for an affray in which not a single life had been lost.

The place where this tragedy was perpetrated is a little town, containing not more than three hundred inhabitants; for its baths and for the beauty of the surrounding country it was frequented by strangers and invalids, and more wealth and more comforts were to be found there than in any other of the provincial towns. In such a place, where every one of the victims was known to the whole neighbourhood, and all had their nearest relations and connexions upon the spot, it may well be conceived what horror and what deep and inextinguishable hatred this bloody execution would excite. The hatred Junot despised; ... Buonaparte prided himself upon setting the feelings of mankind at defiance, and systematically outraging them for the purpose of displaying his power; and in this, as in every thing else, his generals were his faithful agents. The murders at Caldas were committed upon this system, merely to strike terror through the country.... Junot had refrained from making such an exhibition at Lisbon after the riot which the first act of open usurpation provoked, because there were native troops in the city; the population of a great capital would become formidable if it were made desperate; and, moreover, there was the English squadron in sight. But an opportunity had been watched for when it might be done safely and with more effect; and an affair which the nearest general passed over at the time as unworthy of serious notice was made the pretext.

The immediate superintendence of these murders had been intrusted to Loison. This general, whose military talents were considerable, had lost an arm in action with the Portugueze in Rousillon; for which reason the people now called him the Maneta, a name which will long be held in abhorrence: not that he was more rapacious, or more merciless, than his comrades; but, from the rank he held, he had better opportunities for pillage; and it was his fortune to preside at almost all the butcheries which were committed during the first invasion. Of all the French generals in this army, it is said that there were only two who preserved a fair character. These were, Travot, who commanded at Cascaes, and Charlot at Torres Vedras. They mitigated, as far as in them lay, the evils of which they were the instruments; but they could do little toward repressing the cruelty, the excesses, and the abandoned licentiousness of their officers and men. The language which the French openly held was, that Portugal was a conquered country, and therefore they, as conquerors, had a right to take what they chose and do what they pleased there; ♦Neves, ii. 132.♦ and they acted in full conformity to this principle21.

They had entered Portugal with so little baggage, that even the generals borrowed, or rather demanded, linen from those upon whom they were quartered. Soon, however, without having received any supplies from home, they were not only splendidly furnished with ornamental apparel, but sent to France large remittances in bills, money, and effects, especially in cotton, which the chief officers bought up so greedily that the price was trebled by their competition. The emigration had been determined on so late that many rich prizes fell into their hands. Fourteen cart-loads of plate from the patriarchal church reached the quay at Belem too late to be received on board. This treasure was conveyed back to the church, but the packing-cases bore witness of its intent to emigrate; and when the French seized it they added to their booty a splendid service for the altar of the sacrament, which had been wrought by the most celebrated artist in France. ♦1808. March.♦ ♦Neves, i. 247.♦ Junot fitted himself out with the spoils of Queluz, and Loison had shirts made of the cambric sheets belonging to the royal family which were found at Mafra. These palaces afforded precious plunder, which there had been no time to secure. The plate was soon melted into ingots, the gold and jewels divided among the generals, and the rich cloths of gold burnt for the metal, which constituted the smallest part of their value. ♦Neves, i. 229.♦ The soldiers had not the same opportunities of pillage and peculation, but they suffered no opportunity to escape: ♦Neves, i. 240–1.♦ those who were quartered in the great convent of St. Domingos pulled down the doors and window-frames, and put up the wood and iron work to auction. Yet their insolence was more intolerable than their rapacity, and their licentious habits worse than both. The Revolution had found the French a vicious people, and it had completed their corruption. It had removed all restraints of religion, all sense of honour, all regard for family or individual character; the sole object of their government was to make them soldiers, and for the purposes of such a government the wickedest men were the best. Junot himself set an example of profligacy: he introduced the fashion of lascivious dances, imported perhaps from Egypt ... one of them bears his name; and the Portugueze say that no man who regards the honour of his female relatives would suffer them to practise it. The Moors have left in the peninsula relics of this kind which are sufficiently objectionable: that, therefore, which could call forth this reprehension must be bad indeed. The decency of private families was insulted: the officers scrupled not to introduce prostitutes, without any attempt at disguising them, into the houses where they were quartered; and happy were the husbands and the parents who could preserve their wives and daughters from the attempts of these polluted guests.