Under these circumstances the undersigned has received his Majesty's commands to announce to his Excellency the Marquis de Palmella that his Majesty waits for the result of the events now passing in Portugal with patience; but also with an anxiety proportionate to the interest which his Majesty has invariably felt for the honour, the happiness, and the tranquillity of that kingdom, and the sense which his Majesty entertains of the risk to which all those advantages, as well as the honour and ease of his Royal Highness the Regent, are exposed by the conduct which has been pursued by the Portuguese government since his Royal Highness has landed in that kingdom. WELLINGTON. Mr. John Read to Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington. MY LORD DUKE, Royal Military Repository, 15th April, 1828. I have taken the liberty of addressing the enclosed to your. Grace, thinking that if any attempt of forcing the passage of the Dardanelles should be found necessary, the observations therein contained may not be deemed unworthy of your Grace's consideration. I have the honour to be, with the greatest respect, JOHN READ. [Compliments. The Duke has received his letter, and is much obliged to him.] [ENCLOSURE.] ON FORCING THE PASSAGE OF THE DARDANELLES. If hostilities should be renewed with the Ottoman empire, the passage of the Dardanelles becomes a necessary consequence; and considering what has occurred on a former occasion from the effects produced by the colossal ordnance which the castles on the Asiatic side are armed with, any suggestions which may tend to counteract and diminish their tremendous effects will not be thought a matter of indifference. Having premised thus much, I have to state that in 1799 I was attached to the military mission proceeding to Turkey, under the command of the late Brigadier-General Koehler, and soon after our arrival at Constantinople was employed with Major Holloway, R.E., who was empowered by the Turkish government to improve the defences on both sides of the Straits; for which purpose our quarters were established at Sultanier, or the Old Castle, on the Asiatic side, which defends the narrowest, and consequently the most dangerous, part for an hostile ship to pass. But on Lord Elgin's arrival at Constantinople the mission were ordered to join him before any alterations and additions in contemplation were commenced; and as Major Holloway did not leave any documents relating to this subject behind him, it is presumed that the works are still nearly in statu quo. Notwithstanding that upwards of twenty years have elapsed, I have still a recollection of certain circumstances and localities which may not be deemed unimportant at this time, and, if attended to, may render any future attempt to force a passage less dangerous. In the front of this Castle (the old one on the Asiatic side), which faces the Strait, are ranged, under an arcade, à fleur d'eau, those pieces of ordnance of immense calibre, so as to be completely covered from a lateral view; their muzzles resting on skids with a small elevation, and the breech abutting against a body of solid masonry. In addition to the concealment afforded this formidable battery by this structure, a strong wall or traverse runs from it to the water's edge, entirely covering its left flank, so that it is protected from any fire which might be directed against it from ships approaching to pass, and it is not until these guns can make use of their fire (which is instantaneous as soon as any vessel appears beyond this screen or traverse) that a ship can return it. And from this circumstance, that no vessel can annoy them until exposed to view, they are sure to have the advantage of the first discharge, with a certainty of effect from the previous arrangement of a due elevation for the distance at which the object must pass, as was experienced by Admiral Duckworth when passing this battery. Although nothing seriously is to be apprehended after the vessels have escaped the first discharge, from the impracticability of traversing these guns to follow the object-and the time taken to reload them gives the ships that have escaped the first fire the opportunity of getting out of their range, and their loading would be further interrupted from being exposed to the fire of the vessels in succession-yet one shot striking the object between wind and water would most probably be its destruction. To render the passing this battery less dangerous a diversion might be made by gun and mortar boats in taking a position which would materially distract the attention of the enemy by directing their fire against the wall which covers their left flank. And there can be no doubt that such a force, judiciously employed, would succeed in a short time in making a breach and in rendering that part too hot for occupation, and thus enable the passing ships to proceed without much molestation. The most effectual means of ensuring success in this enterprise is to employ a co-operating land-force, to disembark in the rear of the first castle on the European side and take a position where field artillery, from its elevated situation, would keep this formidable battery in check without being exposed to its fire, and the same position would have in command the castle immediately below it; so that any efforts made from thence to co-operate with the opposite shore would be rendered ineffectual. It is to be observed that this spot was the one contemplated by Major Holloway for the erection of a new work to protect the castle beneath from insult. Notwithstanding, after all that is suggested, if the Ottoman government have science enough to improve the natural advantages which present themselves in this narrow part of the Straits by erecting batteries of the common calibre only, the success of a fleet without a co-operating land force appears very problematical; and perhaps it may be found necessary that this force should protect the fleet until it passes Gallipoli and enters the Straits of Saint George. The castles at the entrance of the Straits have not been noticed, from the little danger to be apprehended; and none at all if the attempt is made before daylight and hugging the European shore. JOHN READ, R. M. Repository. VOL. IV. 2 c The Right Hon. Sir Frederick Lamb to Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington. MY DEAR DUKE, Lisbon, 16th April, 1828. Your summary of the events here is complete. I not only remember your opinion as to the withdrawing our troops when the Spaniards removed their cordon, but I pressed it at the time strongly and repeatedly with Lords Dudley and Goderich; if it had been done then we should have stood much better now. At the time when your letter was written, I too might have regarded Don Miguel's acts and omissions as isolated facts, proving no ultimate design; but you will have seen by my later despatches that I now consider his usurpation of the Crown to have been settled for him from the beginning by those who lead him. It was intended to have taken place in the first days after his landing; but the Portuguese have had enough of being put forwards, and neither the army nor the populace would set up the cry. The provocations that were given to the former to join in it did not come before me in a sufficiently authentic shape to be stated in my despatches; but there is no doubt that the soldiers on duty were incited to it by officers, and in many instances even by those who were on actual duty attending the person of Don Miguel. Among the Infant's omissions you have not stated one of the most remarkable-the omission to publish an amnesty to the leaders of the refugees. This should naturally have been one of his first acts, but the redaction presented the difficulty of treating them as men pardoned, and who, therefore, had committed, if not a crime, at least an error. They, on the contrary, would not be content to return upon these terms; they hold themselves to deserve reward, not pardon, and so does Miguel. From this contradictory situation a total silence respecting them has ensued, and the terms upon which they are to re-enter Portugal are not yet cleared up. Now for our conduct. If engagements are anything, we have a right to enforce whatever is contained in the Protocols of Vienna. Our intention not to do so is not proved by the departure of our troops; their presence was but a mode of acting, and we possess many others perhaps equally efficacious, certainly better suited to our interests. If we do not mean to uphold these Protocols, it would perhaps have been better that they should never have been framed, and this is my belief. But, however, there they are, and they contain, as I read them, two provisions—the maintenance of Don Pedro's institutions, and amnesty for the past. Now, with respect to the first of these conditions, I would not give one straw for it. Miguel has overset these institutions in the most foolish and offensive way; but it is not for us to embroil ourselves with a vain endeavour to set them up again : being down, there let them lie. Do not, however, let it be inferred from their fall that the constitutional party is the weakest. In truth, there is no party that means to risk or sacrifice anything now but what intends to gain by its opinion. The party of the head of the government will always be the strongest, and one of the absurdities of Miguel's conduct has been that he did not make it clear from the beginning what his conduct was to be. Everybody would have been glad enough to have conformed themselves to it, if he would but have left them a little time and a decent mode of doing it. To return to our Protocols. Their first provision is disposed of. Upon the second I am more stubborn. If acts of violence or persecution should take place, I know not how to limit the extent of protection which in such a case we are called upon to give. We have no point of honour towards the Constitution. We have none for the employment of any individuals in preference to others; but for their personal safety for acts done in support of a system set up by ourselves, we have; and the more so, as the Vienna Protocols were alleged (if I am not misinformed) by Lord Heytesbury (as they would have been by me) as assurances of security upon which full confidence might be placed, and which we were pledged to make respected. The call upon us to support their observance, as far as regards the safety of individuals, goes much beyond the withdrawal of an ambassador, for which the time has, in my mind, long since come. Do not let us deceive ourselves. We do not stand well here, and the reason is plain : we have not gone fairly through with either party. This is the penalty of intermeddling. But it is singular that we stand much worse with the Court party than with the other, who have much more to reproach us with. The Court party cannot forgive us our recommendation of the Constitution, and the chief families, who have taken that side of the question, retain an actively hostile feeling against us. As these will be the possessors of power, it will be some time before any British agent can find himself acting cordially with the government. All circumstances point out that, having taken the line of not interfering, your alleged non-interference should become a real one; and the presence of an ambassador gives you the appearance of striving to regain an influence which has escaped you, while it keeps up a jealousy of your doing so which it is not for your interest to keep alive. The engagements taken to you have been broken. Your call to have them respected is left unanswered. Your recommendations are flatly refused without examination. The officers who have fought for the system you advocate are removed to make way for the men whose invasion you considered as a foreign one and resisted by sending your troops. All this is done without the slightest attempt to save appearances or conciliate your feelings. There is an end of every symptom of grace or favour between the two Courts; there is an end not only to all influence, but to all good intelligence, to such an extent that my recommendation to those to whom I wish well is to cease to have any communication or connection with me. How, under such circumstances, is an ambassador to be retained here? Is it that in cases depending upon the Portuguese government he should have to apply to the Spanish minister as the preferable channel for carrying his point? My recommendation continues the same-to profit by the conjunction, in order to remodel our relations with this country according to our interest. Should you hold that interest to require the same close connection which existed before our mistaken measures about the Constitution, still I hold that this will ultimately be best secured by standing aloof for the present, and leaving these people entirely to themselves. For the moment, whatever is wrong is laid upon us; let us stand aside, and it will be but a short time before the want of us is felt. Then, and not before, we may come forward with advantage. From our system of noninterference I except only the case of protection, upon which our credit in Europe and our power of ever resuming our influence here depends. Should [ 863.] you feel this as strongly as I do, the sooner an intimation of it is given to this government the less likely will the necessity for acting upon it be to occur. In the line you have taken, then-as far as it has yet gone-I fully concur. But I go further: I feel that you had no choice, that you could have taken no other; and this I deplore. As to all political doctrines, I hold them but as the arguments by which statesmen justify the course which interest or necessity calls upon them to take; never as the motives by which that course is decided. Take the non-interference doctrine, for instance; it was invented by Lord Londonderry, when the country would not sanction the lengths to which the Holy Alliance wished to go; at the same time that he tacked to it a clause of exception, enabling Austria to take that line towards Naples in which he refused to participate. This non-interference doctrine, which has never been fairly in operation in the whole history of Europe, has subsequently been slackened or tightened according to the temper and circumstances of the country, and, as we are just now under the high pressure of a finance committee, it is drawn to the tightest. The truth is, that our conduct, both abroad and at home, has for years depended upon the struggle we are making to escape from financial embarrassments, aggravated, if not brought on, by our return to cash payments upon a mistaken principle. From the consequent vain endeavour to pay what we never owed has resulted the contradictory attempt to keep up high prices in a currency of augmented value, with all the round of expedients ending and to end in disappointment. Hence, too, has proceeded the sinking of character which ensues to nations as well as to individuals from a state of debt--I will not call it of poverty, for it is a state of debt in the midst of wealth, proceeding from the balance between our charges and our currency having been forcibly disturbed. It is to these causes that our incapacity for action abroad and our constant state of turmoil at home are due, and it is to this side that it is not even yet quite too late to look for a remedy. If my opinion upon this is false, at least it is one I am entitled to be attached to on account of the time during which I have held it; for, with your excellent memory, you cannot have forgotten my having pressed it upon you many years ago (long, indeed, before the first bill had yet been carried upon the subject) during the whole of a long rainy day out with Lady Salisbury's hounds. You may be sure I think the subject most important, and even yet practically open to revision, or I should not mention it to you now. You were right about Miguel not having taken the oath: at least, the Duke of Cadoval, who administered it, has said confidentially that he did not take it. Adieu, my dear Duke, most truly yours, F. LAMB. To Sir Henry Parnell, Bart. MY DEAR SIR, |