On the last day of April, Murat presented to the Infante Don Antonio a letter from his brother King Charles, requiring him to send off to Bayonne the Queen of Etruria[31] with her children, and the Infante Don Francisco de Paula, Ferdinand’s youngest brother, ... the other was already in the snare. The Junta were assembled at the time, and proposed to make the demand known to Ferdinand, and await his pleasure; but Murat replied, that this was unnecessary; the Queen of Etruria was her own mistress, and Don Francisco being a minor, was bound to obey his father. The Junta then said they would consult the Queen, who might certainly go if she were so pleased, but to the departure of the young Infante they could not consent. The Queen of Etruria will be remembered hereafter among those high-born sufferers whose strange and undeserved afflictions are recorded as examples of the instability of fortune. Her only desire was to return to Tuscany; but she loved her parents, and declared herself ready to obey their summons without hesitation, not expecting farther perfidy from Buonaparte, even after the perfidious manner in which she had been despoiled. With regard to the Infante, the Junta were informed by Murat that he must go also, or force would be used to make him. ♦THE JUNTA DELIBERATE CONCERNING THE INFANTE.♦ These poor pageants of authority summoned to their assistance in this new perplexity the chief persons of all the different councils, and held a meeting that night, less with the hope of coming to any salutary and dignified determination, than for the sake of finding in the exposure of their own helplessness an excuse to themselves and others for passive submission. One person proposed, that if force were employed to remove the Infante, it should be resisted, and O’Farrill was then called upon to relate what means of resistance could be calculated upon. He entered into a mournful statement. There were 25,000 French in, and immediately about Madrid, and they occupied the Buen Retiro and the heights of the Casa del Campo, which were the strongest positions; besides this force they had 10,000 men in Aranjuez, Toledo, and at the Escurial. The Spanish troops in Madrid were only 3000, and the people were unarmed and had never been disciplined in any militia service; therefore to attempt resistance would be to deliver up the city to be sacked. The effect of this representation, which might have dismayed firmer hearts than those to which it was addressed, was strengthened by the opportune arrival that night of D. Justo Maria de Ibar Navarro, whom Ferdinand had dispatched to apprize the Junta of his situation, and his resolution not to accede to any thing incompatible with the dignity of the throne, and with his own just rights; but while the event was undecided, he charged them carefully to preserve a good understanding with the French, and to avoid any thing which might increase his difficulties and even his personal danger. They agreed