It had been proposed to form a national guard at Lisbon at this time, composed of all who had any property to protect; but this was rejected, less as being impracticable than as dangerous. The Lisbonians had too much reason to execrate their oppressors. Their sufferings, though not of that kind which give a splendour to history, and consecrate the memory of the sufferers, had been more pitiable, for they had been long continued and obscure. The French themselves confessed, that they knew not how the people of Lisbon subsisted during the three months preceding the harvest; ♦THIEBAULT, 95.♦ for it was known that the consumption of food in that great city was only one-third of what it used to be, and the numbers who had been expelled, who had emigrated with the court, or had found means of following it, were not greater than that of the foreign troops who had been introduced. Impossible as it was to conciliate a people upon whom they had inflicted such deep and irreparable injuries, the French deemed it politic at this time to take the most conciliatory measures in their power; if the popular feeling could be repressed or allayed only for a few days, by that time they should either have obtained a victory over the English, or have placed themselves by treaty under the safeguard of British honour. With these views Junot left a decree, that the heads of the tribunals, and the chief persons among the nobility and clergy, should be invited to assist at the council of government during his absence. He left also a proclamation to the inhabitants of Lisbon, saying, that he was departing from them for three or four days, to give battle to the English, and whatever might be the event, he should return. “I leave,” said he, “to govern Lisbon, a general who, by the mildness and firmness of his character, has obtained the friendship of the Portugueze at Cascaes and Oeyras; General Travot will, by these same virtues, obtain that of the inhabitants of Lisbon. Hitherto you have been tranquil; it is your interest to continue so! do not stain yourselves with a horrible crime at the moment when, without any danger of your own, the lot of arms is about to determine by what power you are to be governed. Reflect for an instant upon the interests of the three nations who are contending for the possession of Lisbon. What the French desire is the glory and the prosperity of the city and of the kingdom, for this is the interest and the policy of France. Spain wishes to invade Portugal and reduce it to a province, that she may again make herself mistress of the Peninsula. And England would domineer over you for the purpose of destroying your port and your navy, and impeding the progress of industry among you. The English regard the magnificence of your port with envy; they will not suffer it to exist so near them, and they have no hope of preserving it. They know that a new French army has already passed your frontiers, and that if this should not be sufficient,