In common with the Three Continental Powers, the Plenipotentiary of His majesty considered the question of peace or war with Spain, as a question peculiarly French. In his answer (given in simultaneously with those of the Three Continental Powers) to the queries of the French Plenipotentiary, and in all the discussions which followed thereupon, the Duke of Wellington uniformly alleged, as one of his reasons for not assenting to the propositions of M. de Montmorency, the ignorance of the British Government as to the antecedent transactions and communications (during the last two years) between the Governments of France and Spain.

No objection was stated by the Duke of Wellington, on the part of the King his master, to the precautionary measures of France, within her own frontier; measures which the right of self-defence plainly authorized, not only against the danger of contagious disease (in which they professedly originated, and to which, till the month of September, they were exclusively ascribed,) but against those inconveniences which might possibly arise to France from civil contest in a country separated from France only by a conventional line of demarcation; against the moral infection of political intrigue, and against the violation of French territory by occasional military incursions. But it appeared to His *Majesty's Plenipotentiary at Verona to be necessary and just, [*760] that, before he was called upon to promise eventually the support of his Government to measures on the part of France which were likely to lead to war with Spain, opportunity should have been allowed to his Government to examine the grounds of those measures; that the cause of offence given by Spain to France should have been specifically defined.

It was therefore impossible for His Majesty's Plenipotentiary to "concur" in the decisions of Verona.

It remains for the undersigned to advert to that part of the French Official Note, which appears to insinuate a reproach against this country, as if she had abandoned at Verona opinions which she had formerly declared with respect to the affairs of Spain.

"England," it is said, "partook, in 1820, of the inquietude which the revolution in Spain occasioned to many great Powers; she foresaw cases in which it might be impossible to preserve with Spain the relations of good intelligence and peace."

The undersigned must be permitted to say, that though questions were indeed propounded to England in the year 1820, as to possible future contingencies in the affairs of Spain, so far from "foreseeing cases," and deciding upon the conduct which would be applicable to them, in the manner here described, the British Government positively declined to bind itself, by a contingent opinion, to any conditional course of action.

But there was no indisposition or hesitation to avow the principles upon which the opinion of England would be formed, and her course of action regulated. It was not only declared that the British Government disclaimed any general right of interference in the internal concerns of independent nations; but it was specifically stated that there was, perhaps, no country of equal magnitude with Spain, whose internal disturbances would be so little likely to menace other States with that direct

and imminent danger, which could alone, in exception to the general rule, justify foreign interference.

The application of these principles to the cases brought forward by France at Verona, was as direct as it was consistent with the former professions of the British Cabinet. That application was further enforced by other considerations, which, though they had not, perhaps, been distinctly anticipated in a prospective and hypothetical argument, bore nevertheless with undeniable force upon the question to be decided at Verona.

Dangers, not necessarily arising from the existence of the internal agitations of Spain, might nevertheless be created by an uncalled for and injudicious interposition in them. The spirit of revolution, which, shut up within the Pyrenees, might exhaust itself in struggles, trying, indeed, to Spain, but harmless to her *neighbours, if called forth from [*761] within those precincts by the provocation of foreign attack— might find, perhaps, in other countries fresh aliment for its fury; and might renew, throughout Europe, the miseries of the five-and-twenty years which preceded the Peace of 1815.

For these and abundant other reasons, the voice of His Majesty's Plenipotentiary at Verona was for peace. The preservation of general peace is the earnest wish and object of His Majesty: and the undersigned is commanded to repeat, that no means will be left unexhausted by His Majesty's Government, which the impartial employment of good offices can afford, to soothe the irritation at present unhappily subsisting between the Governments of France and Spain, and to prevent, if possible, the commencement of hostilities, the consequences of which no human foresight can calculate.

The undersigned, &c.,

GEORGE CANNING.

The Vicomte de Marcellus.

APPENDIX IV.

Another Despatch from Mr. Canning on the same Subject, dated March 31st, 1823.-From State Papers (Spain,) Vol. 10, pp. 64-70.)

[Foreign Office, March 31st, 1823.

SIR,-The hopes of an accommodation between France and Spain, which His Majesty has so long been encouraged to cherish, in despite of all unfavourable appearances, being now unhappily extinguished, I am commanded by His Majesty to address to your Excellency, for the purpose of being communicated to the French Minister, the following explanation of the sentiments of your Government upon the present posture of affairs between those two kingdoms.

The King has exhausted his endeavours to preserve the peace of Europe.

The question of an interference in the internal concerns of Spain, on account of the troubles and distractions which have for some time prevailed in that kingdom, was not one on which His Majesty could, for himself, entertain a moment's hesitation. If His Majesty's Plenipotentiary at Verona did not decline taking *part in the deliberations [*762] of the Allied Cabinets upon that question, it was because His Majesty owed to his Allies, upon that, as upon every other subject, a sincere declaration of his opinions, and because he hoped that a friendly and unreserved communication might tend to the preservation of general peace.

The nature of the apprehensions which had induced the King of France to assemble an army, within his own frontier, upon the borders of Spain, had been indicated, in the first instance, by the designation of the "Cordon Sanitaire." The change of that designation to that of an "Army of Observation" (which took place in the month of September last,) did not appear to His Majesty to imply more than that the defensive system originally opposed to the contagion of physical disease, would be continued against the possible inconveniences, moral or political, which might arise to France, from a civil contest raging in a country separated from the French territory only by a conventional line of demarcation. The dangers naturally incident to an unrestrained intercourse between two countries so situated towards each other, the dangers of political intrigue, or of occasional violation of territory, might sufficiently justify preparations of military defence.

Such was the state of things between France and Spain at the opening of the Congress of Verona. The proposition brought forward by the French Plenipotentiary in the Conferences of the Allied Cabinets were founded on this state of things. Those propositions did not relate to any project of carrying attack into the heart of the Spanish Monarchy, but were in the nature of inquiries:-1st. What countenance France might expect to receive from the Allies, if she should find herself under the necessity of breaking off diplomatic intercourse with the Court of Madrid? and, 2ndly, What assistance, in supposed cases of outrage to be committed, or of violence to be menaced by Spain? These cases were all contingent and precautionary. The answers of the three Continental Powers were of a correspondent character.

The result of the discussions at Verona was a determination of His Majesty's Allies, the Emperors of Austria and Russia and the King of Prussia:-1st. To make known to the Cabinet of Madrid, through their respective Ministers at that Court, their sentiments upon the necessity of a change in the present system of the Spanish Government; and, in the event of an unsatisfactory answer to that communication, to recall their respective Ministers, and to break off all diplomatic intercourse with Spain. 2ndly. To make common cause with France against Spain, in certain specified cases; cases, as has been already observed, altogether contingent and precautionary.

His Majesty's Plenipotentiary declined concurring in these measures; not only because he was unauthorized to pledge the faith of his

Government to any hypothetical engagement, but because *his [*763]

Government had, from the month of April, 1820, uniformly recommended to the Powers of the alliance to abstain from all interference in the internal affairs of Spain; and because, having been from the same period entirely unacquainted with whatever transactions might have taken place between France and Spain, his Government could not judge on what grounds the Cabinet of the Tuileries meditated a possible discontinuance of diplomatic relations with the court of Madrid, or on what grounds they apprehended an occurrence, apparently so improbable, as a commencement of hostilities against France by Spain.

No proof was produced to His Majesty's Plenipotentiary of the existence of any design on the part of the Spanish Government to invade the territory of France; of any attempt to introduce disaffection among her soldiery, or of any project to undermine her political institutions; and so long as the struggles and disturbances of Spain should be confined within the circle of her own territory, they could not be admitted by the British Government to afford any plea of foreign interference. If the end of the last and the beginning of the present century saw all Europe combined against France, it was not on account of the internal changes which France thought necessary for her own political and civil reformation, but because she attempted to propagate, first her principles, and afterwards her dominion by the sword.

Impossible as it was for his Majesty to be party to the measures concerted at Verona with respect to Spain, his Majesty's Plenipotentiary declared, that the British Government could only endeavour, through his Majesty's Minister at the Court of the Catholic King, "to allay the ferment which those measures might occasion at Madrid, and to do all the good in his power."

Up to this period no communication had taken place between his Majesty and the Court of Madrid, as to the discussions at Verona. But about the time of the arrival of his Majesty's Plenipotentiary, on his return from Verona, at Paris, Spain expressed a desire for the "friendly interposition" of his Majesty to avert the calamities of war; Spain distinctly limited this desire to the employment of such "good offices," on the part of Great Britain, as would not be inconsistent with "the most strictly conceived system of neutrality." Nor has any period occurred throughout the whole of the intercourse of the British Government with Spain, at which the Spanish Government has been for one moment led, by that of Great Britain, to believe that the policy of his Majesty in a contest between France and Spain, would be other than neutral.

In pursuance of this request, and of his previous declaration at Verona, his Majesty's Plenipotentiary received instructions at Paris, to make to the French Government the offer of his Majesty's mediation. In making this offer the British Government deprecated, from motives of expediency as well as from considerations *of justice, the employment towards [*764] Spain of a language of reproach or intimidation. They represented, as matter of no light moment, the first breach, by whatever Power, of that general pacific settlement which had been so recently established, and at the cost of so many sufferings and sacrifices to all nations. Nor did they disguise from the French Government the anxiety with which

they looked forward to all the possible issues of a new war in Europe, if once begun.

In addition to suggestions such as these, the British Government endeavoured to learn from the Cabinet of the Tuileries the nature and amount of the specific grievances of which his Most Christian Majesty complained against Spain; and of such specifie measures of redress or conciliation, on the part of Spain, as would arrest the progress of His Most Christian Majesty's warlike preparations.

The French Government declined the formal mediation of His Majesty's alleging, in substance, that the necessity of its warlike preparations was founded, not so much upon any direct cause of complaint against Spain, which might be susceptible of accurate specification and of practical adjustment, as upon the general position in which the two kingdoms found themselves placed towards each other;-upon the effect which all that was passing, and had been for some time passing, in Spain, produced upon the peace and tranquillity of His Most Christian Majesty's dominions; upon the burdensomeness of that defensive armament which France had thought herself obliged to establish on her frontier towards Spain, and which it was alike inconvenient to her to maintain; or, without some change of circumstances which would justify such change of counsel, to withdraw ;-upon a state of things, in short, which it was easier to understand than to define; but which, taken altogether, was so intolerable to France, that open hostility would be far preferable to it. War would at least have a tendency to some conclusion; whereas the existing state of the relations between France and Spain might continue for an indefinite time: increasing every day the difficulties of Spain, and propagating disquietude and alarm throughout the French army and nation.

But although His Most Christian Majesty's Government declined, on these grounds, a formal mediation, they professed an earnest desire for peace, and accepted his Majesty's "good offices" with Spain for that object.

Contemplating all the mischiefs which war might inflict upon France, and, through France, ultimately, perhaps, upon all Europe; and which it must inflict more immediately and inevitably, upon Spain,-whose internal animosities and agitations a foreign war could not but exasperate and prolong-the British Government was deeply impressed with the necessity of peace for both kingdoms; and resolved, therefore, whether invested or not with *the formal character of mediator, to make every

effort, and to avail itself of every chance for the prevention of [*765] hostilities. The question was now become a question simply and entirely between Spain and France; and the practical point of the inquiry was, not so much how the relations of those two Governments had been brought into their present awkward complication, as how that complication could be solved without recourse to arms, and an amicable adjustment produced, through mutual explanation and concession.

Nothing could have induced his Majesty to suggest to the Spanish nation, a revision of its political institutions as the price of his Majesty's friendship. But Spaniards of all parties and descriptions admitted some