his Court, to request to be authorised to give the above-mentioned developement to the proposal of the withdrawal of the troops, in such a manner as to make it depend on the arrangements which refer to the future state of Portugal, in order then to make use of this authorisation, when he repairs to London.

Without adding implicit faith to the ignorance in which he pretended to be of the proposal of his Cabinet, at the moment of his departure from Madrid, I told him that since the King had spoken to him in so explicit a manner, it appeared to me indispensable to take into great consideration the words of his Most Christian Majesty, and to make of them the text of new explanations in the sense. the most adapted to give to the step of Spain the character of reason and prudence, which it did not appear at first sight to possess.

The course which the Spanish Minister is preparing to adopt, already announces that he has ceased to hasten, or that he never intended to hasten, the decision. We shall see the answers that he will receive from his Court, and the ulterior communications that he will make.

Affairs with this government invariably assume

a character of slowness, tergiversation and intrigue, which cause fastidiousness and discomfort; but one must not be discouraged, or disgusted, because great interests depend on them.

[The following Despatch shows the success of Russian diplomacy in Portugal, and the attitude in which that country was thereby placed towards England, by the triumph of the apostolical faction.]

THE EARL OF DUDLEY TO THE MARQUIS DE

PALMELLA.

Foreign Office, 22nd April, 1828.

THE undersigned, &c., has received His Majesty's commands to acknowledge the receipt of the note of his Excellency the Marquis de Palmella, &c. dated the 8th instant, in which his Excellency has enclosed the extract of a letter from the Vicomte de Santarem, and to inform his Excellency that his Majesty receives the assurances of the sincerity of the intentions of his Royal Highness the Infant Regent, which his Excellency the Vicomte de Santarem has conveyed to the Marquis de Palmella, for the information of his Majesty's Government, as a proof of the desire of his Royal Highness the Infant Don Miguel to cultivate the friendship and acquire the confidence of his Majesty.

The undersigned, however, would be wanting, both to his duty, and to that frankness and sincerity which ought to prevail in the intercourse betwixt two countries so long and so closely connected as England and Portugal, if he were to conceal from his Excellency, that many events which have marked the outset of his Royal Highness's Regency, had excited in the mind of his Majesty sentiments of uneasiness and disappointment.

By the letter of those engagements, under which his Royal Highness took upon himself the government of Portugal, he was obliged to observe the Constitutional Charter; by the whole spirit and tenour of them, he was no less bound to abstain from all such measures as might afford just cause of public apprehension and alarm. It is with the utmost regret that the undersigned feels himself compelled to remark, that in neither view do these engagements appear to have been fulfilled.

It may not be improper to recall to his Excellency the promises by which his Royal Highness bound himself, before his arrival in

Portugal, and at the same time those circumstances in his subsequent conduct which do not correspond with them.

In the year 1826, his Royal Highness took the oath of fidelity to the Constitution, enjoined by the Portuguese Charter. In the month of October, 1827, his Royal Highness, having been appointed by his brother the Emperor and King, Don Pedro, to be his Lieutenant and Regent of Portugal-“ aux termes des Lois existantes dans cet Etat, et conformément aux Institutions données par l'Empereur Son Auguste Frère à la Monarchie Portugaise," - declared by his Plenipotentiaries, the Baron de Villa-Secca and the Count de Villa-Real, upon the Protocol of a Conference at Vienna, which was held upon that occasion, that he had ordered a letter to be prepared for his signature, addressed to his sister, the then Regent, Donna Maria Isabel, "de manière à ce qu'elle (cette lettre) puisse être rendue publique, et à ce qu'elle ne puisse en même tems laisser aucun doute sur la ferme volonté de ce Prince, en acceptant la Lieutenance du Royaume, que l'Empereur son Frère vient de lui conférer, d ́en maintenir religieusement les Institutions,* de vouer le passé à un entier oubli, mais de contenir en même tems avec force et fermeté l'esprit de parti et de faction qui a trop long tems agité le Portugal.”

His Royal Highness likewise addressed his Majesty, in a letter, dated Vienna, the 19th October, in which his Royal Highness stated: "convaincu de la part qu'elle y prendra par suite de l'Ancienne Alliance entre le Portugal et la Grande Bretagne, et que je desire sincèrement cultiver, j'osé me flatter qu'elle voudra bien m'accorder sa bienveillance et son appui; le but que je me propose étant de maintenir invariablement la tranquillité et le bon ordre en Portugal, au moyen des Institutions octroyées, par l'Empereur et Roi mon Frère,-Institutions que je suis fermement résolu de faire respecter."

It was impossible for his Majesty, without harbouring suspicions most injurious to the character and dignity of a young Prince, then acting under the guidance of a wise and virtuous Sovereign, to doubt the intention of his Royal Highness to carry into execution promises

* It is evident that Don Miguel meant, at this time, the Institutions of the Cortes, and by no means the Constitution of Don Pedro.-ED.