HISTORY OF EUROPE. 



167 



should not be re-established, who 

 could foresee the consequences of 

 such blind obstinacy i It was the 

 interest of France to preserve the 

 integrity and the independence of 

 Spain: but if Spain remained an 

 enemy, France must seek to 

 weaken, dismenaber, and destroy 

 her. God, he said, who read 

 the hearts of all men, knew his 

 motives for speaking to them in 

 that manner. Their immutable 

 destiny was not yet pronounced. 

 He exhorted them not to sutt'er 

 themselves to be any longer the 

 dupes of passions excited by the 

 common enemy ; but to listen to 

 their reason, which would tell 

 them, that the French soldiers 

 were friends ready to defend them. 

 "Rally (said Joseph) around me, 

 and let this day be to Spain a new 

 era of glory and happiness." 



There is one passage in king 

 Joseph's proclamation to the Spa- 

 niards, at which most of the sove- 

 reign princes of Europe may well 

 prick up their cars : " The kings 

 of Spain ought either to have sup- 

 ported the elder branch of the 

 house of Bourbon, or expected, 

 and reconciled themselves to the 

 idea of falling with it." On the 

 same ground, and in the same 

 spirit, Buonaparte may tell his 

 ■vassal kings, and some others not 

 jret falling quite into that class of 

 princes, that they ought to attri- 

 bute the French revolution, and 

 aII the evils flowing from thence, 

 Dot to him, but to themselves, 

 who had not the sense to unite for 

 Insisting it. He may by and by 

 tell them, that they had betrayed 

 their people, and neither deserved, 

 nor were fit to exercise sovereign 

 Authority. In thf satae strain^ 



a letter was addressed by general 

 O'Farrel, who had gone over to 

 king Joseph from the Spanish 

 army, to liis old companions in 

 arms. " The former dynas:;y,'' 

 he said, " from decrepitude, and 

 that decay which is incident to 

 every thing of human origin, had 

 ruined and lost all the nerves of 

 force and power." He added a 

 consideration, omitted, though not 

 forgotten, by the author of the 

 manifesto, that " there was an in- 

 separableandinsurmountable con- 

 nection between the very blood of 

 the second branch of the Bourbon 

 family, and hatred towards a 

 neighbour, whose power was 

 above all control or resistance." 

 This attempt of general O'Farrel's 

 to justify the perpetration of one 

 crime by that of another, was not 

 likely to meet with much success 

 with the Spaniards ; but, on the 

 contrary, to excite abhorrenceand 

 indignation." 



On the 31st of January, the ad*" 

 vanced guard of the French army 

 under general Victor, appeared 

 before Seville. The fortifications 

 that had been thrown up around 

 it were of immense extent. They 

 would have required 60,000 men 

 to man them. The garrison was 

 only 7,000. It was utterly inca- 

 pable of resistance. Heralds were 

 sent at three different times to the 

 French camp, offering to surrend- 

 er on terms. Seville, they said, 

 being the capital of Andalusia, 

 was not to be considered as a city 

 of an inferior order. They wished 

 to stipulate for its independence, 

 andthe particular distinction which 

 they thought due to it. Among 

 other conditions, they demanded, 

 as if Seville had represented the 



