“It was true that the latter would lose immediately, though probably not eventually, very largely in revenue and commercial profit by such a concession. This was the unavoidable result of the circumstances of the times, she had therefore a fair claim to participate in the advantages the colonies would enjoy from it. To this object the treaty of mediation should have adverted. Spain should have confidentially declared to Great Britain her intended course, what system she would follow, what duties impose, and what proportion she would demand for general imperial purposes. Upon such materials England might have worked with a prospect of permanently maintaining the integrity of the Spanish empire on just and fair principles; or at all events have allayed the present disputes and so removed the difficulties they occasioned in the Peninsula, and in either case have insured her own real interests. Spain had however taken a narrow view both of her own and the relative situation of others, and _if she did not enlarge it, matters would grow worse and worse. It would be useless for England to interfere, and after a long contest which would only tend to weaken the mother country and deprive her of the resources which she would otherwise find in the colonies for her war with France, the business would end in the separation of the colonies from Spain._” The mediation was, however, after many discussions, finally accepted by the cortes, Mexico only being excepted, and an English commission of mediation, of which Mr. Stuart was the head, was even appointed in September 1811, but from various causes it never proceeded beyond Cadiz. The Spaniards continued to send out expeditions, Mr. Wellesley’s remonstrances were unheeded, and although the regency afterwards offered to open the trade under certain duties, in return for a subsidy, nothing was concluded. CHAPTER IV. POLITICAL STATE OF PORTUGAL. [Sidenote: 1811.] [Sidenote: Vol. III.] The power and crafty projects of the Souzas, their influence over their weak-minded prince, their cabal to place the duke of Brunswick at the head of the Portuguese army, the personal violence of the patriarch, the resignation of Das Minas, and the disputes with lord Wellington, have been already touched upon; but the extent of the difficulties engendered by those things, cannot be understood without a more detailed exposition. [Sidenote: Feb. 1810.]