damental laws, and bring about the ruin of our holy catholic
religion.--The only remedy therefore to such grievous ills, which are so
manifest to all Europe, is in war, which we declare against him.' The
injuries, done to the Portugueze Nation and Government, previous to its
declaration of war against the Emperor of the French, are stated at
length in the manifesto of the Court of Portugal, dated Rio Janeiro, May
1st, 1808; and to that the reader may he referred: but upon this subject
I will beg leave to lay before him, the following extract from the
Address of the supreme Junta of Seville to the Portugueze nation, dated
May 30th, 1808. 'PORTUGUESE,--Your lot is, perhaps, the hardest ever
endured by any people on the earth. Your princes were compelled to fly
from you, and the events in Spain have furnished an irrefragable proof
of the absolute necessity of that measure.--You were ordered not to
defend yourselves, and you did not defend yourselves. Junot offered to
make you happy, and your happiness has consisted in being treated with
greater cruelty than the most ferocious conquerors inflict on the people
whom they have subdued by force of arms and after the most obstinate
resistance. You have been despoiled of your princes, your laws, your
usages, your customs, your property, your liberty, even your lives, and
your holy religion, which your enemies never have respected, however
they may, according to their custom, have promised to protect it, and
however they may affect and pretend to have any sense of it themselves.
Your nobility has been annihilated,--its property confiscated in
punishment of its fidelity and loyalty. You have been basely dragged to
foreign countries, and compelled to prostrate yourselves at the feet of
the man who is the author of all your calamities, and who, by the most
horrible perfidy, has usurped your government, and rules you with a
sceptre of iron. Even now your troops have left your borders, and are
travelling in chains to die in the defence of him who has oppressed you;
by which means his deep malignity may accomplish his purpose,--by
destroying those who should constitute your strength, and by rendering
their lives subservient to his triumphs, and to the savage glory to
which he aspires.--Spain beheld your slavery, and the horrible evils
which followed it, with mingled sensations of grief and despair. You are
her brother, and she panted to fly to your assistance. But certain
Chiefs, and a Go