♦PROCLAMATION TO THE SPANIARDS.♦ Buonaparte now addressed a proclamation to the Spaniards. What possible result, he asked them, could attend even the success of some campaigns? Nothing but an endless war upon their own soil. It had cost him only a few marches to defeat their armies, and he would soon drive the English from the peninsula. Thus, to the rights which had been ceded him by the princes of the last dynasty, he had added the right of conquest: that, however, should not make any alteration in his intentions. His wish was to be their regenerator. All that obstructed their prosperity and their greatness, he had destroyed; he had broken the chains which bore the people down; and, instead of an absolute monarchy, had given them a limited one, with a free constitution. The conclusion of this proclamation was in a spirit of blasphemy, hitherto confined to the barbarous countries of Africa or the East. “Should all my efforts,” said he, “prove fruitless, and should you not merit my confidence, nothing will remain for me but to treat you as conquered provinces, and to place my brother upon another throne. I shall then set the crown of Spain upon my own head, and cause it to be respected by the guilty; _for God has given me power and inclination to surmount all obstacles_.” But though Buonaparte had thus easily dispersed the Spanish armies, and made himself master of Madrid, his triumph was not without alloy. He now perceived with what utter ignorance ♦CHANGE IN BUONAPARTE’S VIEWS CONCERNING SPAIN.♦ of the national character he had formed the scheme of this usurpation, and he complained of having been deceived, when, in reality, he had turned a deaf ear to all who would have dissuaded him from his purpose. Till he arrived at Madrid, ♦DE PRADT, 180.♦ the people, as well as the armies, had disappeared before him; the towns and cities were abandoned ♦ROCCA, 24, 55.♦ as his troops approached. Twelve months before there was no other country wherein his exploits were regarded with such unmingled admiration; they had a character of exaggerated greatness which suited the Spanish mind, and as he had always been the ally of Spain, no feeling of hostility or humiliation existed to abate this sentiment: now, it was not to be disguised from himself that he was universally detested there as a perfidious tyrant. But policy, as well as pride, withheld him from receding; unless he went through with what he had begun, he must confess himself fallible, and let the world see that his power was not equal to his will, and then the talisman of his fortune would have been broken. He had committed the crime and incurred the odium; wherefore then should he not reap the benefit, and secure the prize, not for a brother, whom he began to regard with contempt as the mere puppet of his pleasure, but for himself? This was a feeling which he did not conceal from those who possessed his confidence; and Joseph, and the unworthy ministers who