“Great Britain, although late, had at last _offered_ that mediation which he wished had been _asked_ for, and it remained to consider on what terms it ought to be accepted. It would have been better if Spain had come forward with an explicit declaration of what her intentions towards the colonies in respect to constitution and commerce were. England could then have had something intelligible to mediate upon; but now Spain only desired her to procure the submission of Buenos Ayres and the Caraccas; and if she failed in that impracticable object she was to aid Spain in forcing them to submission! and he, lord Wellington, was said to have approved of this! One would really, he exclaimed, believe that Mr. Bardaxi has never adverted to the means and resources of his own country, to the object they have acquired at home, nor to the efforts making by England in the Peninsula; and that he imagines I have considered these facts as little as he appears to have done! Great Britain cannot agree to that condition! [Sidenote: See Vol. III. p. 419.] “In respect to constitution” (alluding to the acknowledgement of the civil rights of the Americans by the cortes) “the Spaniards had gone a great way, but not so far as some of her colonies would require, they would probably ask her to have separate local representative bodies for their interior concerns, such as the English colonial assemblies, yet this important point had not been considered in the treaty of mediation, and in respect of commerce the Spanish government had said nothing; although it was quite certain her prohibitory system could not continue, and the necessary consequence of the actual state of affairs required that in the treaty of mediation the colonies should be put, with respect to trade, exactly on the same footing as the provinces of Old Spain. If that was not done it would be useless to talk to the colonists of equal rights and interests; they would feel that their interests were sacrificed to those of the mother country.