In their choice of the regents the Junta seem to have looked for the fittest persons, without regard to any other considerations. Three of them were well known. The Bishop of Orense was venerable for his public conduct, as well as for his age and exemplary virtues; no man had contributed more signally to rouse and maintain the spirit of the country. Castaños had received from the Junta a species of ill treatment which was in the spirit of the old government, but for which they made amends by this appointment. When he was ordered as a sort of banishment to his own house at Algeziras, the people of that place, greatly to their honour, mounted a volunteer guard before the house, as a mark of respect; and the Junta, in the last days of their administration, when they turned their eyes about in distress, called upon him to take the command, and resume the rank of captain-general of the four kingdoms of Andalusia. The call was too late, but he came to the Isle of Leon in time to rescue some members of that body from the populace of Xerez; and in nominating him to the regency, they seem to have consulted the wishes of the people. Saavedra was in full popularity, and had given good proof of disinterested zeal during the tumult at Seville. Instead of securing his private property, he occupied himself in calming the people, and in preserving the public treasure and the more valuable public records; and as there was a want of vessels, he embarked the public property on board the one which had been hired for his own effects. Escaño had been minister of marine at Madrid, and was known as a man of business and fidelity. Leon’s appointment was not agreeable to the Junta of Cadiz, who felt their power, and were determined to derive from it as much advantage as possible; he therefore declined accepting the office on the plea of ill health, and D. Miguel de Lardizabal y Ariba, a native of the province of Tlaxcalla, in New Spain, and member of the council of the Indies, was appointed in his stead.

A government was thus formed, which, receiving its authority from the Supreme Junta, derived it ultimately from the same lawful source, ... the choice of the people and the necessity of the state. In such times, and in a nation which attaches a sort of religious reverence to forms, it was of prime importance that the legitimacy of the new government should be apparent, and its right of succession clear and indisputable. For this Spain was principally indebted to Jovellanos, the last and not the least service which that irreproachable and excellent man rendered to his country. But it was the fate of Jovellanos, notwithstanding the finest talents, the most diligent discharge of duty, the purest patriotism, and the most unsullied honour, to be throughout his life the victim of the unhappy circumstances of Spain. Seven years’ imprisonment, by the will and pleasure of the despicable Godoy, was a light evil compared with the injustice which he now endured from that government which he, more than any other individual, had contributed to appoint and to legitimate. The council of Castille, which first acknowledged the Intruder, and then acknowledged the Junta, in the same time-serving spirit attacked the Junta now that it was fallen, affirmed that its power had been a violent usurpation, which the nation had rather tolerated than consented to, and that the members had exercised this usurped power contrary to law, and with the most open and notorious selfishness and ambition. The people, not contented with their compulsory resignation, accused them of having peculated the public money; and the regency, yielding to the temper of the times, and perhaps courting popularity, acted as if it believed this charge, registered their effects, and seized their papers. Even Jovellanos was ordered to retire to his own province, which happened at that time to be free from the enemy, and there place himself under the inspection of the magistrates. This act is inexpiably disgraceful to those from whom it proceeded; upon Jovellanos it could entail no disgrace. He had long learnt to bear oppression, and patiently to suffer wrong; but this injury came with the sting of ingratitude, it struck him to the heart, and embittered his few remaining days.

This rigorous treatment of the Central Junta was the work of their implacable enemy, the council of Castille, a body which they ought to have dissolved and branded for its submission to the Intruder; and of the Junta of Cadiz, a corporation equally daring and selfish, who thought that in proportion as they could blacken the character of the former government, they should increase their own credit with the people. The members of that government had given the best proof of innocence; not one of them had gone over to the enemy, nor even attempted to conceal himself at a time when the popular hatred against them had been violently excited. Several of them had embarked on board a Spanish frigate for the Canaries; when their baggage was seized, it was, at their own request, examined before the crew, and the examination proved that they had scarcely the means of performing the voyage with tolerable comfort. Tilly died in prison without a trial. This was a thoroughly worthless man, and it might probably have appeared that he had found means of enriching himself when he was sent, in the manner of the republican commissioners in France, to superintend the army which defeated Dupont. But Calvo, who was arrested also and thrown into a dungeon, without a bed to lie on or a change of linen, and whose wife also was put in confinement, was irreproachable in his public character. He had been one of the prime movers of that spirit which has sanctified the name of Zaragoza, and during the first siege repeatedly led the inhabitants against the French. All his papers had been seized; he repeatedly called upon the regency to print every one of them, to publish his accounts, and bring him to a public trial; but he was no more attended to than if he had been in the Seven Towers of Constantinople. After the Cortes assembled he obtained a trial, and was pronounced innocent.

The Intruder, following his armies, and thinking to obtain possession of Cadiz, and destroy the legitimate government of Spain, issued a proclamation at Cordoba, characterized by the impiety and falsehood which marked the whole proceedings of the French in this atrocious usurpation. “The moment was arrived,” he said, “when the Spaniards could listen with advantage to the truths which he was about to utter. During more than a century the force of circumstances, which masters all events, had determined that Spain should be the friend and ally of France. When an extraordinary revolution hurled from the throne the house which reigned in France, it was the duty of the Spanish branch to support it, and not lay down its arms until it was re-established. But it required a spirit of heroism to adopt such a resolution, and the cabinet of Madrid thought it better to wait for that from the progress of time, which it wanted courage to obtain by arms.” This truth, for such the Intruder might well call this part of the proclamation, marks, as much as the falsehoods which accompanied it, the devilish spirit by which the French councils had long been possessed; having allured the Spanish Bourbons by oaths and treaties to their own destruction, France now reproached them with the very conduct which she had tempted them to pursue. The paper proceeded to affirm, that, during its whole alliance with France, Spain had been watching an opportunity of falling upon her. “The conqueror of Europe,” it continued, “would not allow himself to be duped. The princes of the house of Spain, not having the courage to fight, renounced the crown, and were content to make stipulations for their private interests. The Spanish grandees, the generals, the chiefs of the nation, recognized those treaties. I,” said the Intruder, “received their oaths at Madrid, but the occurrence at Baylen threw every thing into confusion. The timid became alarmed, but the enlightened and conscientious remained true to me. A new continental war, and the assistance of England, prolonged an unequal contest, of which the nation feels all the horrors. The issue was never doubtful, and the fate of arms has now declared so. If tranquillity is not immediately restored, who can foresee the consequence? It is the interest of France to preserve Spain entire and independent, if she become again her friend and ally; but if she continue her enemy, it is the duty of France to weaken, to dismember, and to destroy her. God, who reads the hearts of men, knows with what view I thus address you. Spaniards! the irrevocable destiny is not yet pronounced. Cease to suffer yourselves to be duped by the common enemy. Employ your understanding: it will point out to you in the French troops, friends who are ready to defend you. It is yet time: rally around me! and may this open to Spain a new era of glory and happiness.”

If the Spaniards had had as little wisdom, or as little sense of national honour, as the party who opposed the measures of government in England, they would have believed the Intruder, and submitted to him. This party, who, at the time of Sir John Moore’s retreat, told us that the Spaniards had then yielded, and that their fate was decided, now declared, with a little more prudence in their predictions, that the show of resistance must soon be at an end. The king’s message, declaring that Great Britain would continue its assistance to the great cause of Spain, as the most important considerations of policy and of good faith required, excited in them the gloomiest forebodings. “We were then still,” they said, “to cling to the forlorn hope of maintaining a footing in Portugal! Our resources were still farther to be drained in supporting our ally, or rather in supporting a system which did not arouse its own people to its defence; and for our efforts, however strenuous, in the support of which we did not receive either their gratitude or their co-operation. It was reported,” they said, “that the English army had made a retrograde movement to Lisbon, and actually embarked in the transports at the mouth of the Tagus. Having uniformly declared their opinion, that this expedition, under Lord Wellington, was injurious to the most important interests of the country, as they affected both its resources and its character, they should most sincerely and warmly congratulate the public if such were its termination.” That is, they would have congratulated us if we had broken our faith, deserted our allies, fled before our enemies, left Buonaparte to obtain possession of Cadiz and Lisbon, and then waited tremblingly for him upon our own shores, with our resources carefully husbanded till it pleased him to come and take them!

“It has been conjectured,” said these hopeful politicians, “that Cadiz might be abundantly supplied from the opposite coast of Barbary. But those who hazarded this opinion were not precisely informed of the state of things on the African coast. The Emperor of Morocco was extremely unfriendly to his Christian neighbours. Cadiz, to be sure, was an interesting point, which it was our interest to maintain as long as possible; but they had no expectation that Cadiz, when really attacked, could long hold out. It could not be supplied with fuel with which to bake bread for the inhabitants for one week.” While this party thus displayed their presumptuous ignorance, and vented their bitter mortification in insults against the ministry and against our allies, they endeavoured to direct attention toward the Spanish colonies, saying that the great, and indeed only object, of this country, should be to establish a mercantile connexion with the empire which was to be erected there, and recommending that we should take immediate measures for assisting the emigration of the Spanish patriots! Happily the councils of Great Britain were directed by wiser heads, and the people of Spain actuated by better principles and by a braver spirit. “We are supported,” said Romana to his countrymen, “by the illustrious English nation, who are united with the brave Portugueze, our brethren, possessing a common interest with ourselves, and who never will abandon us.” The people and the government had the same confidence in British honour. English and Portugueze troops were dispatched from Lisbon to assist in the defence of Cadiz, and Ceuta was delivered in trust to an English garrison.

The Isle of Leon forms an irregular triangle, of which the longest side is separated from the main land by a channel, called the river of Santi Petri, ten miles in length, and navigable for the largest ships. This side is strongly fortified, and the situation also is peculiarly strong. The bridge of Zuazo, built originally by the Romans, over the channel, is flanked with batteries, and communicates with the continent by a causeway over impassable marshes. There are two towns upon the island; that which bears the same name, and which contains about 40,000 inhabitants, is nearly in the middle of the isle; the other, called St. Carlos, which stands a little to the north, was newly erected, and consisted chiefly of barracks and other public buildings. Cadiz stands on the end of a tongue of land seven miles in length, extending from the isle into the bay; this isthmus is from a quarter to half a mile broad, flanked on one side by the sea, and on the other by the bay of Cadiz. Along this isthmus, an enemy who had made himself master of the island must pass; new batteries had been formed, new works thrown up, and mines dug; and if these obstacles were overcome, his progress would then be opposed by regular fortifications, upon which the utmost care and expense had been bestowed for rendering the city impregnable. Before this unexpected and unexampled aggression on the part of France, the great object of the Spanish government had been to render Cadiz secure from the sea: as soon, therefore, as the approach of the enemy was certain, one of the first operations was to demolish all those works on the main land from whence the shipping could be annoyed. This was a precaution which Admiral Purvis had strongly advised after the battle of Medellin, and again as soon as the more ruinous defeat of Areizaga was known. Upon the first report that the enemy were hastening toward Cadiz, in the hope of surprising it, he requested Admiral Alava to remove the ships, and place them in the lower part of the harbour, where they might be secure; but it was not till Mr. Frere had strongly urged the necessity of this precaution that the Spanish Admiral, after much reasoning on his part, reluctantly complied. The ill spirit which at this time prevailed among the naval officers arose rather from the pitiable situation in which they found themselves, than from any predilection for the French, or the more natural feeling of hostility toward the English in which they had grown up. Men being wanted for the land service, and not for the fleet, the navy had been neglected during this contest: the ships were ill manned and miserably stored, the pay far in arrears; and the officers had latterly disregarded their duty as much as they thought themselves disregarded by the government, ... hopelessness producing discontent, and discontent growing into disaffection. This temper could produce no ill effect when the regency and the people were so well disposed. The fleet was removed in time; and the hulks also in which the miserable prisoners were confined were moved lower down into the bay, and moored under the guns of the English and Spanish ships.

The British Admiral had represented in time how important it was that the batteries on the north side of the harbour should be kept in an efficient state. The danger now was from the land side, not from the sea, and by good fortune the land quarter had been strengthened some fifty years before, at a cost and with a care which had then been deemed superfluous. But the Spanish government had not forgotten that it was on that side Essex had made his attack, and England was the enemy against whom those precautions were taken. At that time every villa and garden upon the isthmus had been destroyed. During after-years of security the ground had again been covered, and was now to be cleared again. The Spaniards, roused by the exertions and example of Alburquerque, as much as by the immediate danger, laboured at the works, and carefully removed every building on the isthmus. Night and day these labours were carried on, and the sound of explosions was almost perpetual. The wood from the demolished buildings was taken into the city for fuel.

Marshal Victor, before he understood how well the isle was secured, sent a summons to the Junta of Cadiz, telling them he was ready to receive their submission to King Joseph. Jaen, Cordova, Seville, and Granada, he said, had received the French with joy; he expected the same reception from the people of Cadiz; and as the fleets and arsenals were the property of the nation, he demanded that they should be preserved for their rightful sovereign. They returned an answer, signed by every individual of their body, declaring that they acknowledged no one for King of Spain but Ferdinand VII. Soult, also, representing the English as the enemies of Spain, insinuated, in a summons to Alburquerque, that it was their intention to seize Cadiz for themselves. Alburquerque replied, no such design was entertained by the British nation, who were not less generous than they were great and brave; their only object was to assist in the defence of Cadiz with all the means in which they abounded, an assistance which the Spaniards solicited and gratefully received. Cadiz, he added, had nothing to fear from a force of 100,000 men; the Spaniards knew that the French commanded no more than the ground which they covered, and they would never lay down their arms till they had effected the deliverance of their country.

The service which Alburquerque had rendered was so signal, and its importance so perfectly understood by all the people of Cadiz, that he was deservedly looked upon as the saviour of the place. Having been appointed governor in obedience to the general wish, he became in consequence president of the Junta, as Venegas had been before him, whose obedient policy was now rewarded by the highest station to which a subject could be appointed, that of viceroy of Mexico. Alburquerque had not solicited these appointments; on the contrary, he remonstrated against them, pointing out how impossible it was, that, having the command of the army, he could attend to other duties at the same time; and in consequence of his representations, D. Andres Lopez de Sagastizabel was nominated to act as his deputy in both capacities. The Junta of Cadiz had obtained their power unexceptionably, but no men ever made a more unworthy use of it; they had reluctantly assented to the formation of the regency, and when it was formed, endeavoured to restrain and overrule it, and engross as much authority as possible to themselves, in which, unhappily for Spain, and more unhappily for Spanish America, they were but too successful. Alburquerque became the marked object of their dislike, because he had recognised the regency at a moment when, if he had hesitated, they would have struggled to get the whole power of government into their own hands. That spirit, which had never condescended to conceal its indignant contempt for Godoy, could not stoop to court the favour of a Junta of mercantile monopolists. Not that he despised them as such; his mind was too full of noble enterprises to bestow a thought upon them, otherwise than as men who were called upon to do their duty while he did his.

His first business had been to complete the unfinished works of defence, especially the cortadura, or cut across the isthmus, where the battery of St. Fernando was erected; and lest any attempt should be made to pass beside it at low water, the iron gratings from the windows of the public buildings were removed, and placed on the beach as a chevaux-de-frise. While these things were going on, the people of Cadiz manifested a disgraceful indolence; they assembled in crowds on the ramparts, wrapt in their long cloaks, and there stood gazing silently for hours, while the English were employed in blowing up the forts round the bay; appearing, says an eye-witness, indifferent spectators of the events around them, rather than the persons for whose security these exertions were made. Meantime the troops, whose rapid march had placed these idlers out of fear, were neglected in a manner not less cruel to the individuals than it was detrimental to the public service. The points to be protected were so many, that the numbers of this little army did not suffice to guard them, without exhausting the men by double duty. Alburquerque requested that the regiments might be filled from the numberless idle inhabitants of the isle and of Cadiz, who, while they were idle, were at such a time worse than useless. Unless this were done, he said, it was not only impossible for his men to undertake any offensive operations, or even to improve themselves in discipline, but they must be wasted away with fatigue and consequent infirmities. These representations were in vain; neither was he more successful in requiring their pay, a supply of clothing, of which they stood evidently in need, and those common comforts in their quarters, which were as requisite for health as for decency. The Junta of Cadiz had seven hundred pieces of cloth in their possession, yet more than a month elapsed, and nothing was done toward clothing the almost naked troops. Alburquerque asserts, as a fact within his own positive knowledge, that the reason was, because the Junta were at that time contending with the Regency, to get the management of the public money into their own hands, and meant, if they had failed, to sell this cloth to the government, and make a profit upon it, as merchants, of eight reales per vara!

It is not to be supposed that the Junta were idle at this time; they had many and urgent duties to attend to; but no duty could be more urgent than that of supplying the wants and increasing the force of the army. The Duke applied to them in vain for six weeks, during which time he discovered that the Junta looked as much to their private interest as to the public weal; for from the beginning, he says, their aim was to get the management of the public expenditure, not merely for the sake of the influence which accompanies it, but that they might repay themselves the sums which they had lent, and make their own advantage by trading with the public money. At length he applied to the Regency. The regents, feeling how little influence they possessed over the Junta, advised the Duke to publish the memorial which he had presented to them, thinking that it would excite the feelings of the people. In this they were not deceived; ... the people, now for the first time called upon to relieve the wants of the soldiers, exerted themselves liberally, and there was not a family in which some contribution was not made for the defenders of the country. But the Junta were exasperated to the last degree by this measure, which their own culpable neglect had rendered necessary. Alburquerque’s memorial contained no complaint against them; it only stated the wants of the soldiers, and requested that, unless those wants were supplied, he might be relieved from a command, the duties of which, under such circumstances, it was not possible for him to perform. Though he was persuaded of their selfish views, he had no design of exposing an evil which there was no means of remedying; and when he understood how violently they were offended, he addressed a letter to them, disclaiming any intention of inculpating them, in terms which nothing but his earnest desire of avoiding all dissensions that might prove injurious to the country could ♦The Junta attack Alburquerque.♦ either dictate or justify. This did not prevent the Junta from publishing an attack upon him, in reply, of the most virulent nature. They reproached him with having exposed the wants and weakness of the army; entered into details as frivolous in themselves as they were false in their application, to show that they had done every thing for the soldiers; declared, with an impudence of ingratitude which it is not possible to reprobate in severer terms than it deserves, that his cavalry had retreated too precipitately, and ought to have brought in grain with them; and concluded by a menacing intimation, that the people of Cadiz were ready to support them against any persons who should attempt to impeach their proceedings. If the Junta of Cadiz had no other sins to answer for, this paper alone would be sufficient to render their name odious in history; so unprovoked was it in its temper, so false in its details, so detestable for its ingratitude. Had Alburquerque been capable of consulting his own safety by a precipitate retreat, Portugal, as he said, and the English army were at hand, ... and he needed not to have undertaken an arduous march of 260 miles in the face of a superior enemy, and in direct disobedience of the orders of his government. If the cavalry which saved Cadiz, and which they thus wantonly accused of retreating too precipitately, had been even a quarter of an hour later, it could not have entered the Isle of Leon. “This,” said the indignant Duke, “is the patriotism of the Junta of Cadiz; the enemy is at the gates, and they throw out a defiance to the general and the army who protect them!”

But Alburquerque was too sincere a lover of his country to expose it to the slightest danger, even for the sake of his own honour. He could not resent this infamous attack without exciting a perilous struggle; and without resenting it he felt it impossible to remain at the head of the army. Having thus been publicly insulted, a reparation as public was necessary to his honour, and that reparation, for the sake of Spain, he delayed to demand. The Regency would have had him continue in the command; he however persisted in resigning. No injustice which could be done him, he said, would ever have made him cease to present himself in the front of danger, had he not been compelled to withdraw for fear of the fatal consequences of internal discord. Accordingly, he who should have been leading, and who would have led, the men who loved him to victory, came over to England as ambassador, with a wounded spirit and a broken heart.