MT. 31.] AND SIR JOHN MOORE. 419 



represented by people who dined with him yesterday 

 as exceedingly factious and violent. 



" Having received a sort of complimentary message 

 from Miranda, I went to see him rather to prevent 

 his coming to see me, than from any wish to make 

 his acquaintance but I found him very clever and 

 entertaining, and frank about his own plans and 

 secrets, in a degree that is only to be found among 

 finished adventurers (at least so I have generally 

 found them).* He is furious at the ministry, though 

 he seems still to be connected with them ; admits 

 that he and Wellesley were on the eve of setting out 

 for South America with an army, when the Spanish 

 deputies arrived ; curses the folly of this government 

 in changing their certain plans in New Spain for any 

 such chances as Old Spain affords ; and denies that an 

 army is the right way of aiding the Spaniards. He 

 mixes a good deal of truth with much narrow, Pe- 

 ruvian, and selfish error on the subject; but I was 

 struck with one argument on the small numbers of 

 the patriots. ' Cadiz has 100,000 inhabitants ; it is 

 said to be full of patriots ; and all Andalusia is open : 

 yet they have raised a battalion of galley-slaves from 

 the hulks and prisons of that town ! ' His details of 

 the French commissariat are curious and frightful. It 

 is on the plan of the flying artillery, and organised with 

 infinite nicety and care. Miranda was, you know, 

 second in command at Jemmappes, and says the sys- 



* Don Francisco Miranda, a Spanish soldier and politician of great 

 renown in his age, 



