The change of government which had place in the beginning of the year, gave hope that the democratic violence of the Cortez would decline under the control of the cardinal Bourbon; but that prince, who was not of true royal blood in the estimation of the Spaniards, because his father had married without the consent of the king, was from age, and infirmity, and ignorance, a nullity. The new regency became therefore more the slaves of the Cortez than their predecessors, and the Cadiz editors of newspapers, pre-eminent in falsehood and wickedness even amongst their unprincipled European brotherhood, being the champions of the Jacobins directed the populace of that city as they pleased. And always the serviles yielded under the dread of personal violence. Their own crimes had become their punishment. They had taught the people at the commencement of the contest that murder was patriotism, and now their spirit sunk and quailed, because at every step to use the terribly significant expression of Wellington, “_The ghost of Solano was staring them in the face_.” The principal points of the Jacobins’ policy in support of their crude constitution, which they considered as perfect as an emanation from the Deity, were, 1º. The abolition of the Inquisition, the arrest and punishment of the Gallician bishops, and the consequent warfare with the clergy. 2º. The putting aside the claim of Carlotta to the regency. 3º. The appointment of captain-generals and other officers to suit their factious purposes. 4º. The obtaining of money for their necessities, without including therein the nourishment of the armies. 5º. The control of the elections for a new Cortez so as to procure an assembly of their own way of thinking, or to prevent its assembling at the legal period in October. The matter of the bishops as we have seen nearly involved them in a national war with Portugal, and a civil war with Gallicia. The affair of the princess was less serious, but she had never ceased intriguing, and her pretensions, wisely opposed by the British ministers and general while the army was cooped up in Portugal, were, although she was a declared enemy to the English alliance, now rather favoured by sir Henry Wellesley as a mode of checking the spread of democracy. Lord Wellington however still held aloof, observing that if appointed according to the constitution, she would not be less a slave to the Cortez than her predecessors, and England would have the discredit of giving power to the “worst woman in existence.” [Sidenote: Appendix, No. 2.]