Secular, and Military, in order that, agreeing in the same sentiments as those manifested by the People in this City, they may be pleased to act conformably to the stipulations therein contained.

XVIII. That on the day which the Political Chief may be pleased to appoint, a solemn Mass of Thanks shall be celebrated, in the presence of the Provisional Junta, and of all the Authorities, Corporations, and Chiefs, with salutes of artillery, and 3 days of illumination.

National Palace of Guatemala, this 15th day of September, 1821.

SPEECH of The King to the Cortes, on taking the Oath to the Political Constitution of Portugal.-1st October, 1822. GENTLEMEN, (Translation.)

I HAVE examined with attention the Political Constitution of the Monarchy, which, in the name of all the Inhabitants of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and Algarve, was offered to me by its legitimate Representatives, united in the General Extraordinary and Constitutional Cortes of the Portuguese Nation; and I have considered, with scrupulous attention, the conditions of this new social Compact.

Placed by Providence at the head of a valiant and magnanimous Nation, and convinced that the general will is the fountain and the medium of all political power; it is my duty to identify my own with that general will, as I have always been sensible that my happiness is essentially connected with the prosperity of the Portuguese People. Faithful to my principles, I flatter myself with having offered to the Nation, even under the most difficult circumstances, decisive proofs of the love I bear it, and of the uprightness which becomes my own dignity. The Portuguese acknowledge it, and this is the recompense the most worthy of my labours, as well as the sole object of my ambition.

The new social Compact being, therefore, the expression of the general will, the result of your wise meditations, conformable to this enlightened Age, and founded on a reciprocity of interests and sentiments, which make my cause inseparable from the cause of the Nation, I come this day in the midst of the National Representation, to accept the Constitution which you have just framed; and to confirm, by the most solemn Oath, the inviolable promise to fulfil it, and cause it to be fulfilled.

Yes! Representatives of the heroic Portuguese Nation! your magnificent work, the fruit of so many enlightened and patriotic labours, will be respected and maintained. I swear it by the probity and firmness which you know me to possess. This sacred promise, as

spontaneous as the resolution which brought me from the New World to the cradle of the Monarchy, to co-operate in this your glorious enterprise, cannot have a surer guarantee than in the firmness with which I have maintained the bases to which I have already sworn, and which, in all the acts which characterise my promises, is as sincere, as my intentions are pure.

I congratulate myself on meriting the confidence and love of the Nation, as well as on the arrival of this happy day, twice celebrated in the annals of Portugal. It will shew to posterity, the perhaps unparalleled example, of a Nation, regenerated without disturbing the publick tranquillity, and that the first Constitutional King of the Portuguese, knowing how to make himself worthy of the confidence of the People, knows also how happy it is to reign over their hearts. Such, Gentlemen, is the glory to which I aspire, and such are the sincere motives which induced me to accept, and to swear to, the Political Constitution of the Monarchy.

CORRESPONDENCE relative to the withdrawal of the
Prussian Chargé d'Affaires from the Court of Lisbon.-
July, 1822.
(Translation.)

WHEN the Court of Vienna, and, through its influence, the Courts of Naples and Turin, had expressly refused to receive the Ministers of Portugal, named by His Majesty subsequently to the memorable day of the 4th of July, 1821, it happened that the Prussian Government refused Passports to the Chevalier d'Oliveira, who was on his way to Berlin in the quality of Chargé d'Affaires of this Kingdom, making him acquainted that he could not be admitted until certain expected Answers, connected with this subject, had been received from the Courts of Vienna and Petersburgh, whose Ministers at Berlin had pronounced themselves very positively against his admission.

Although this hesitation, on the part of Prussia, to receive our Minister, was much less offensive than the formal refusal of the Austrian Government and its actual Suffragans, Naples and Sardinia; His Majesty's Government, extremely punctilious in all that regards the national dignity and honour, the protection of which is peculiarly entrusted to them, thought it their duty strictly to follow towards Prussia the line of conduct which that Government had thought proper to trace out to them. And, accordingly, when the Prussian Government suspended the prosecution of the journey of our Chargé d'Affaires, that fact was met by a corresponding actual suspension of our Diplomatick Relations with its Chargé d'Affaires, who was made acquainted

with the same, verbally, such having been the mode used by the Prussian Government.

The Chevalier d'Oliveira received Orders not to await the decision of the Court of Berlin, but to proceed immediately to that of Stockholm, in order to replace the Minister there, who, through motives of publick service, had been ordered to return to Portugal; His Majesty neither caring to know, what inquiries had been addressed by Prussia to Austria and Russia; what the Answers of those Powers would be; nor, consequently, whether the determination of His Prussian Majesty would be to accept or to refuse the Portuguese Minister.

The Government of His Majesty judged that it would be as much beneath His dignity to await this decision, as it judged it to be opposed to the consideration due by the Court of Prussia to His Royal Dignity, that it should hesitate to receive the Minister sent to it, in reciprocity for its own Agent accredited here since the month of September last.

During the time of this suspension of his functions, the Chevalier d'Olfers applied for an Order, in the usual form, for the free delivery of certain books sent to him from Hamburgh.

No difficulty was made in furnishing him with the same; but as it was necessary that the Director of the Customs should be made acquainted with the ground for exemption of duties, and as he could not be styled Chargé d'Affaires, since at that period he was no longer so, the true reason was given; namely, that the articles had been ordered at a time when he still exercised those functions.

This Order, which was courteously sent to him under flying seal, in order that he might make of it what use he pleased, excited the anger of the Chevalier d'Olfers, who complained that the suspension of his functions had been made publick, while his Court had only intimated, verbally, to the Chevalier d'Oliveira, that he should delay the prosecution of his journey.

In vain was it observed to him that the using, or forbearing to use, the Order which he had solicited, depending upon himself, this publicity, consequently also depended upon himself, which it was in his power to avoid, if he thought that any prejudice to him might arise from it.

Although the Chevalier d'Olfers made no use of the Order, yet he considered his suspension as published, and addressed thereupon bitter complaints to his Government.

In the mean time, the expected Answers from Vienna and Petersburgh arrived at Berlin, and in consequence of them, His Prussian Majesty's Government, being able to give free course to the liberal sentiments which have constantly distinguished it, during the last 25 Years of the war of opinions which has divided Europe, since the beginning of the French Revolution, immediately declared that it would

receive any Minister whom the Portuguese Government would send to it. And in this manner ceased the suspicions which had been entertained, that the doubts opposed to the admission of the Chevalier d'Oliveira, proceeded from the same principles as the refusal of the Court of Vienna; it becoming evident that those doubts originated from no other motive than that of delicacy towards its two powerful Allies.

Upon the receipt of this intelligence, the Note of Communication, No. 1, was addressed to M. d'Olfers; who, demanding a Conference, required therein that a formal satisfaction should be made to him, for the alleged offence of having made publick the suspension of his functions; and an express declaration that His Majesty's Government had formed an erroneous and hypothetical judgment of the motives on which the Prussian Cabinet had proceeded.

He was answered, that the Portuguese Ministry, instead of making useless conjectures, as to what might have been the motives of the Prussian Government in hindering the journey of the Chevalier d'Oliveira, motives which that Government never had chosen to declare, had limited themselves to the simple act of retaliation; they had even, in order to shew that they bestowed no more thought upon such a subject, immediately changed the destination of that Minister, ordering him to proceed to the Court of Stockholm, and that he should take no further steps with regard to that of Berlin.

The Chevalier d'Olfers retiring with this Answer, took the resolution to demand his Passports, in the manner set forth in the Note No. 2, which gave rise to the Correspondence, Notes Nos. 3, 4, and 5, in which will be proved, by a fresh example, that the Portuguese Government prefers breaking off all Diplomatick Relations, rather than to suffer that Ministers accredited to its Court shall fail in a single iota in the respect which is due to the dignity of the King and of the Nation. (Lisbon Gazette.)

(1.)—Senhor Silvestre Pinheiro Ferreira to the Chevalier d'Olfers. (Translation.) Foreign Office, 3d July, 1822.

THE Undersigned, &c. has the honour to inform the Chevalier d'Olfers, &c. that he has just received from Berlin the agreeable Official Communication, that the Prussian Government, having en tered into such explanations with the Governments of Russia and Austria, as its policy had judged necessary to precede the reception of M. le Chevalier d'Oliveira, Chargé d'Affaires of Portugal, there now no longer exists any obstacle to the reception, either of M. Oliveira, or of any other Person whom His Most Faithful Majesty shall please to accredit to the Court of His Majesty the King of Prussia.

His Most Faithful Majesty, recognizing by this declaration that no

dishonour to the dignity of his Crown had a share in the motives of the delay, which the Cabinet of Berlin thought proper to oppose to the reception of M. Oliveira, has determined that the Undersigned shall signify to M. le Chevalier d'Olfers, for the information of his Government, His Majesty's extreme satisfaction in seeing happily terminated the causes which have, for a moment, suspended the continuation of the relations of friendship, never before interrupted, between the two Courts, and in which His Majesty, equally with His Government, take an interest proportionate to its high importance.

The Undersigned felicitates himself on being the organ of this communication, and seizes this occasion to renew to M. le Chevalier d'Olfers the assurance, &c. The Chev. d'Olfers.

SILVESTRE PINHEIRO FERREIRA.

(2.)-The Chevalier d'Olfers to Senhor Silvestre Pinheiro Ferreira. (Translation.) Lisbon, 6th July, 1822.

THE Undersigned, Conseiller de Légation of His Majesty the King of Prussia, has the honour to inform his Excellency, Senhor Silvestre Pinheiro Ferreira, &c. that, in consequence of the verbal explanations into which he entered with his Excellency respecting the contents of his Note, under date 3d July, it only remains to him to demand his Passports, assuring him at the same time of the regret which he feels at being compelled by his Excellency to this extremity.

The Undersigned, &c. H.E. Senhor Silvestre Pinheiro Ferreira.

D'OLFERS.

(3.)-Senhor Silvestre Pinheiro Ferreira to the Chev. d'Olfers. (Translation.) Foreign Office, 6th July, 1822. THE Undersigned, &c. has just received from M. le Chev. d'Olfers, Chargé d'Affaires, &c. a Note of this day's date, in which, after demanding his Passports, in consequence, as he states, of verbal explanations entered into between him and the Undersigned, on the purport of the Note which he addressed to him on the 3d instant, he concludes with asserting, that he has been compelled to this extremity by the Undersigned.

It being his duty to lay this Note of M. le Chargé d'Affaires before the King, the Undersigned cannot take upon himself to leave to His Majesty the task of divining, from a narrative which it would become necessary to make to Him, of the circumstances which took place between M. d'Olfers and himself, in the Conference of the 3d instant, the reasons which may have induced him to demand his Passports. And if to this be added, that the reputation of the Undersigned will not allow him to permit so serious an imputation to be recorded in the Archives of his Department, unaccompanied by the means of rightly