Any military advantages which the _Christinos_ may have derived from the Quadruple Treaty were more than counterbalanced by the harm, which the jealous interference of France and Great Britain in her internal affairs, inflicted upon Spain. Long after the Pretender had fled and outward peace had been restored, the political settlement of the country was retarded by the rivalry and intrigues of the ambassadors and ministers of the two Powers. The marriages of 1846, and all the evils which they brought in their train, were an outcome of the policy which Palmerston had inaugurated twelve years before. But he had not been in power during the whole of this period, and, when he returned to the Foreign Office, the marriage question was already far advanced. Aberdeen was not responsible for the Quadruple Treaty, and he was sincerely desirous of putting an end to the practice of meddling with internal politics, which both the French and British agents at Madrid had adopted. Nevertheless, his weakness and irresolution in dealing with M. Guizot were the cause of much mischief. Had he adhered to his first pronouncement that England would object to any alliance which threatened to disturb the balance of power, but that, with that exception, she looked upon the Royal marriages as an exclusively Spanish affair, none of the subsequent complications could have arisen. Unfortunately, however, after the downfall of Espartero, he undertook to observe a kind of benevolent neutrality towards the principle of the French government--that Isabella's husband must be a Bourbon. The compact of Eu and the different interpretations which were placed upon it, the pretensions set up in the _Memorandum of February 27_, 1846, were the consequences of the modifications introduced into his original declaration. CHAPTER XI PALMERSTON AND THE REVOLUTION OF '48.