to him in the usual form, and which, in conformity with my late Regulations to that effect, shall be bound up in Volumes, for the purpose of being preserved in the Archives of the Municipalities.

Given at the Palace of Bemposta, 4th June, 1824.

(Countersigned)

THE KING. (With the extraordinary Sign Manual.)
ARCHBISHOP OF EVORA.

DECREE of The King of Portugal, declaring the Acts of the late Constitutional Cortes null and void, and confirming certain Laws passed by His Majesty.*

(Translation.)

I, The King, do make known to all who shall see this My Decree, that I, having already declared to be null by fact and by right, the falsely so called Cortes, the offspring of Rebellion, and of the usurpation of My Sovereign Authority, to which alone appertained the right of convoking them :-it became a necessary consequence that whatever has been decreed aud determined by them should also be made null by fact and by right. Having, however, understood, that it would be prudent to delay, for some time, this just and indispensable Declaration until the termination of the Inquiry, instituted by My Command, into all the Innovations and Laws produced by that tumultuous and illegal Congress, in order to provide, with mature consideration with respect to some few of the same, that which should appear to Me most conducive to the well-being of My People,-the only object of My paternal solicitude,—and this Inquiry being now completed, it is My Will to Decree as follows:

1. All the Innovations, Decrees, and Laws, which have emanated from the above-described Cortes, are hereby rendered null and of no effect, the same being destitute of all Authority and of Sovereign and Legislative Power. And it is My will that none of them shall be at any time cited or alleged, in judgment or out of judgment, nor mixed up or incorporated in any Collection of Laws derived from the legitimate Authority of the Sovereigns, Kings of these Realms; under the Penalties which it shall please Me to impose upon the Transgressors of this My Royal determination.

2. The Decrees and Laws published by My Command, subsequently to My Restoration to the fulness of the Rights of My Sovereignty, in virtue of the aforesaid Inquiry concerning certain of the objects treated of in the above-mentioned Cortes, remain in all their vigour. And it is My will that the same be carried into effect in accordance with their tenour; and that they never be quoted or alleged, except with reference to the said Laws and Decrees exclusively.

3. In consequence of the preceding Article, the actual value of Gold, as a Commodity, and as a Money, continues as determined in My Decree of the 24th November, 1823, of which it has seemed good to Me to make especial mention, on account of its importance, without invalidating, notwithstanding, in any wise, the other Laws and Decress, to which the above-cited Article may have a reference.

* Gazeta de Lisboa, 5th June, 1824.

4. It is My pleasure to confirm that most useful and interesting Establishment, the Bank of Lisbon :—and I shall approve whatever Regulations and Measures shall appear to me calculated to promote its prosperity, its progressive increase, and the stability of its credit; to which end I have commanded the necessary investigations to be entered upon.

5. Until I shall command such Measures to be adopted, as it is My Intention shortly to do, for the Reform of Feudal Rights and Tenures, as I promised in My Decree of the 7th of March, 1810, and which the disastrous times have hitherto prevented from being realized,—the said Reform depending upon a well-digested combination of Private Interests with the Public Interest, and with the Sacred Rights of Property which it is My duty to maintain and defend;-the said Feudal Rights are hereby restored and continued, provisionally, in the same state in which they were previously to the despotic and subversive innovations introduced in this respect by the beforementioned Cortes. With regard, however, to those Rights which have been termed Seignorial, they are to be considered as provisionally suppressed, until I shall be pleased to give such orders as shall appear to Me to be the most just upon this subject.

6. Royal and Feudal Preserves or Chases, shall be looked upon as continued on the same footing and in the same state in which they were before the above-mentioned Innovations, until I shall provide that which shall seem to Me the most useful and the most conducive to the well-being of My People in this respect. But under this Article are not to be comprehended certain portions of Land, at present brought into cultivation and sown with grain in virtue of the said Innovations.

7. And whereas strict justice requires that the Debts contracted by the State, should be paid, and that such others should be recognized as are actually consolidated under various denominations, and charged upon the Royal Exchequer, as best suits the Interests of My Royal Crown, as well as of My faithful Subjects, and as Public Faith demands, which it is My desire most scrupulously to maintain :-All such Revenues of the Crown Lands and Crown Fiefs, and all such others as are actually applied to these purposes, shall continue to have the same destination.

[Here follow the usual formalities of promulgation.]

Given at the Palace of Bemposta, 5th of June, 1824. (Countersigned.)

THE KING. ARCHBISHOP OF EVORA.

DECREE of The King of Spain, annulling all the Acts of the Constitutional Government, from the 7th of March, 1820, to the 1st of October, 1823.*

(Translation.)

THE Scandalous Excesses which preceded, accompanied, and followed, the establishment of the Democratical Constitution of Cadiz, in the Month of March 1820, have been made public, and known to all my Subjects.

The most criminal Treason, the most shameful cowardice, the most horrible Offences against my Royal Person;-these, coupled with violence, * Madrid Gazette, 7th October, 1823.

were the means employed to change essentially the paternal Government of my Kingdom into a Democratical Code, the fertile source of disasters and misfortunes.

My Subjects, accustomed to live under wise and moderate Laws, and such as were conformable to their manners and customs, and which, during so many Ages, constituted the welfare of their Ancestors, soon gave public and universal proofs of their disapprobation and contempt of the new Constitutional System. All Classes of the State experienced the mischiefs caused by the new Institutions.

Tyrannically governed, in virtue and in the name of the Constitution, secretly watched in all their private concerns, it was not possible to restore order or justice; and they could not obey Laws established by perfidy and treason, sustained by violence, and the source of the most dreadful disorders, of the most desolating anarchy, and of universal Calamity.

The general voice was heard from all sides against the tyrannical Constitution; it called for the cessation of a Code, null in its origin, illegal in its formation, and unjust in its principle; it called for the maintenance of the Sacred Religion of their Ancestors, for the re-establishment of our Fundamental Laws, and for the preservation of my Legitimate Rights,-Rights which I have received from my Ancestors, and which my Subjects have solemnly sworn to defend.

This general cry of the Nation was not raised in vain.

In all the Provinces Armed Corps were formed, which leagued themselves against the Soldiers of the Constitution: sometimes they were conquerors sometimes they were conquered; but they always remained firm to the Cause of Religion and the Monarchy.

Their enthusiasm in the defence of objects so sacred never deserted them under the reverses of War: and preferring death to the sacrifice of those great benefits, my Subjects convinced Europe, by their fidelity and their constancy, that although Spain nourished in her bosom some unnaturul Children, the Sons of Rebellion, the Nation in general was Religious, Monarchical, and devoted to its Legitimate Sovereign.

The whole of Europe-well aware of my captivity, and of that of all the Royal Family, of the deplorable situation of my Loyal and Faithful Subjects, and of the pernicious doctrines which Spanish Agents were disseminating on all sides-resolved to put an end to a state of things which created universal reproach, and which menaced with destruction all Thrones and all Ancient Institutions, in order to substitute impiety and immorality in their stead.

France, intrusted with so sacred an enterprize, has triumphed in a few Months over the efforts of all the Rebels of the World, collected for the misery of Spain upon her classic soil of Fidelity and Loyalty.

My august and well beloved Cousin, The Duke d'Angoulême, at the head of a valiant Army, a Conqueror throughout all my Territories, has rescued me from the slavery in which I pined, and restored me to my beloved, and constant and faithful Subjects.

Replaced upon the Throne of St. Ferdinand, by the just and wise hand of Providence, as well as by the generous efforts of my noble Allies, and the valiant enterprise of my Cousin The Duke d'Angoulême and his brave [1823-24.]

3 K

Army, desirous of affording relief to the most pressing necessities of my People, and of manifesting to the World, my real will in this the first moment of my recovered Liberty, I have authorized the following Decree :—

All the Acts of the Government called Constitutional (of whatever kind and description they may be,) a System which oppressed my People from the 7th of March, 1820, until the 1st of October, 1823, are declared null and void; declaring, as I now declare, that during the whole of that Period I have been deprived of my Liberty, obliged to sanction Laws and authorize Orders, Decrees, and Regulations, which the said Government framed and executed, against my will.

2. I approve of every thing which has been Decreed and Ordered by the Provisional Junta of Government, and by the Regency of the Kingdom, the first formed at Oyarzun, April 9, the other at Madrid, May 26, in the present Year, until, sufficiently informed as to the wants of my People, 1 may be able to bestow those Laws, and adopt those Measures, which shall be best calculated to secure their real prosperity and welfare, the constant object of all my wishes.

Let this be made known, and communicated to all the Ministers. (SIGNED BY THE ROYAL HAND.)

Port St. Mary, Oct. 1, 1823.

DON VICTOR SAEZ,

DECREE of The King of Spain, abolishing the Political Constitution of 1820, in the Spanish-American Colonies.*

THE violence with which several Corps of My Army, turning against My Royal Person the arms which I had placed in their hands, compelled me on the 7th of March, 1820, to recognise and swear to, the Political Constitution of the Spanish Monarchy, could not fail to attract the attention of all the Sovereigns of Europe. Their Thrones were endangered by the horrible attempt which had been made against Mine.

Masters of the Government, the Conspirators and their Accomplices did not fail to throw aside the mask under which they had, till then, disguised the true object of their mysterious designs. Blinded by their triumph, they did not dissemble that the Constitution of Cadiz was not the final object of their wishes, nor Spain the only theatre where the Spirit of Rebellion was to display its dreadful fury.

The maxims of Sedition and Anarchy disseminated among the People, the spoliation and humiliation of the higher classes; the gross insults, both in words and deeds, directed against the Majesty of My Person and all the Royal Family; the usurpations, sometimes surreptitious, sometimes violent, of My legitimate Authority; and lastly, the scandalous contempt of the Holy Religion of JESUS CHRIST, barbarously insulted and persecuted in the Persons of His Ministers, left no doubt, even to the least reflecting, that, in the dark machinations of Secret Societies, Spain was irrevocably condemned to cease to be a Monarchy.

The Revolutions of Naples, Turin, and Lisbon, contrived one after another, by the same means and on the same principles, completed the conviction of the Sovereigns, that no Throne could be secure, without cutting

* Madrid Gazette, January 1, 1824. .

off at once all the heads of the Hydra which threatened to devour the Universe. Such was the object, equally noble and important, of their frequent Meetings. But for the resolutions which for the salvation of the human race prevailed in the Congresses of Laybach and Verona, a great part of civilized Europe, deluged in its own blood, would certainly now have been the prey of its ignorant and presumptuous Reformers.

A single effort of the powerful Emperor of Austria sufficed to put an end, in a few days, to the Insurrections of Naples and Piedmont. A similar effort of the Most Christian King sufficed in like manner to cause the edifice of the Constitution throughout the Peninsula to fall to ruins upon its authors. Emboldened by the presence of My well-beloved Cousin The Duke of Angoulême and His valiant Army, the immense majority of My subjects hastened to remove the Trophies to revolt, which folly had raised, and to reestablish the Ancient Institutions which had formed the happiness of their forefathers. Conducted by Victory, the Son of France flew to the banks of the Gaudelete; attacked and carried the Trocadero; filled My oppressors with terror, and at length, I and My Family are free. Glory be to God. In the midst of the grief with which My heart is afflicted, at the sight of the Condition to which three years of suffering have reduced My Kingdom, I have seen with satisfaction that My Supreme Council of the Indies, moved by its constant zeal for the good of My service, was eager to propose to Me by its deliberations of the 30th Oct, the Measures which appeared to it the most proper to alleviate the evils caused by the Revolution of the Peninsula in that part of My Possessions: Adopting the advice of the said Council, I ordain as follows:

1. In all My Dominions in America, a solemn Te Deum shall be cele brated, in gratitude to the Almighty for the blessing which, in His infinite. Mercy, He has granted to the whole Nation, in preserving Me and all My Royal Family, safe and unharmed amidst such great and continual dangers.

2. The Political Constitution of the Spanish Monarchy is for ever abolished in My Dominions in America. Their Governments are re-established conformably to the Laws and Ordinances existing before the 7th of March, 1820.

3. The Political Chiefs, the Provincial Deputations, the Constitutional Municipalities, their Secretaries, Officers, and Dependants, shall immediately cease their functions.

4. The newly established Courts of Justice shall also cease their functions.

5. The Militia created by the Cortes, under the name of National, shall be immediately disbanded. The Individuals composing it shall give up their arms and equipments before they return to their homes.

6. The suppressed Communities shall return to their Convents, and be reinstated in all their property, comprehending all that has been alienated in any manner whatever.

7. I confirm the Favours and Employments which may have been granted during the Constitutional Government, in My Possessions in America, provided, however, that they are not derived from the Constitution, that they are not of new creation, and that those who have obtained them have not rendered themselves unworthy of them by their conduct.