This letter seemed to leave the Regency no power of deliberation, but simply to require that they should ratify the treaty. But in fact, Ferdinand, if he had any such wish, had no such expectation; and he had penetration enough to see that the course of events which had compelled Buonaparte to treat with him upon such terms, must in their consequences restore him to his kingdom; even though the Regency should, as he supposed, refuse to ratify it, because of their engagement with the allied powers. He gave the Duque, therefore, ♦SECRET INSTRUCTIONS FROM FERDINAND.♦ secret verbal instructions to inquire into the spirit of the Regency and the Cortes; and if he should find them loyal and well affected to his royal person, ... not, as he suspected, tainted with infidelity and Jacobinism, ... he was then to let the Regency know, but in the greatest confidence, his royal intention that the treaty should be ratified, if it could be done without injury to the good faith which Spain owed to the allied powers, or to the public weal; but that he was far from requiring this if it were otherwise. Should the Regency be of opinion, that without compromising these points, the treaty might be ratified, upon an understanding with England temporarily, and until his return to Spain should in consequence be effected, upon the supposition that he, without whose free approbation it could not be complete, would not ratify it when at liberty, but would declare it to have been constrained and null, and moreover as being injurious to the nation; in that case he wished them so to ratify it, because the French could not reasonably reproach him, if, having acquired information concerning the state of Spain, which had been withheld from him in his captivity, he should refuse to confirm it. But if the Duque should discover that the spirit of Jacobinism prevailed in the Regency and the Cortes, he was then simply to require that the treaty should be ratified; for this would ♦ESCOIQUIZ, 108–10.♦ not prevent the King from continuing the war after his return, if the interest and good faith of the nation should so require. This intention, however, was to be kept profoundly secret, lest, through any treachery, it should be made known to the French government. ♦MACANAZ SENT TO VALENÇAY.♦