History of the Peninsular War, Volume 5 (of 6)Southey, Robert
History
History of the Peninsular War, Volume 5 (of 6)
Southey, Robert
Peninsular War, 1807-1814
They proceeded to speak with becoming feeling and becoming pride of
the manner in which the emigrants from the ravaged provinces had been
received wherever they had fled. The great expense of subsisting the
fugitives at Lisbon had been supported, they said, by the resources
which were at the disposal of Government, but still more by the
voluntary donations of individuals, among whom they mentioned with
particular distinction, the British subjects in Portugal. It remained
for completing the work, to restore the fugitives to their homes;
to render habitable the towns which the barbarians had left covered
with filth and unburied carcases; to relieve with medicine and food
the sick, who were perishing for want of such assistance; to revive
agriculture, by supplying the husbandman with seed corn, and bread for
his consumption for some time, and facilitating his means of purchasing
cattle and acquiring the instruments of agriculture. These, they said,
were the constant cares of the Government, these were their duties; but
their funds were not even sufficient to provide for their defence, and
therefore they called upon individuals for further aid.
♦LORD WELLINGTON ASKS RELIEF FOR THE SUFFERING PORTUGUEZE.♦
Lord Wellington in the preceding autumn, as soon as he fell back to
the lines of Torres Vedras, had represented to his own Government the
distress to which those districts must be reduced through which the
enemy passed, ... a distress which Portugal had no means of relieving.
“Upon former occasions,” he said, “the wealthy inhabitants of Great
Britain, and of London in particular, had stepped forward to relieve
foreign nations, whether suffering under the calamities inflicted
by Providence, or by a cruel and powerful enemy. Portugal had once
before experienced such a proof of friendship from her oldest and most
faithful ally: but never was there case in which this assistance was
required in a greater degree than at present, whether the sufferings
of the people, or their loyalty and patriotism, and their attachment
to England, were considered. I declare,” said Lord Wellington, “that
I have scarcely known an instance in which any person in Portugal, of
any order, has had communication with the enemy, inconsistent with
his duty to his own sovereign, or with the orders he had received.
There is no instance of the inhabitants of any town or village having
remained, or of their having failed to remove what might be useful to
the enemy, when they had sufficiently early intimation of the wishes of
Government, or of myself, that they should abandon their houses, and
carry away their property.” He therefore recommended this brave and
suffering people to the British Government, and the British people,
whenever the country should be cleared of its barbarous invaders, as he
hoped and trusted that it would.
♦APRIL 8.
PARLIAMENTARY GRANT FOR THE RELIEF OF THE PORTUGUEZE.♦
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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