LORD HAWKESBURY said, that Ministers certainly had no information of the ratification, except through the medium of the French papers; but he could assure the Noble Lord that the ratification did not extend to any points of cession.

From the True Briton.

LORD TEMPLE said, he only wished to put a question to the Noble Secretary of State. It would be in the recollection of the House that the Noble Lord had stated, and he conceived himself perfectly in order in mentioning it, that the treaty made between France and Portugal on the 29th of September last, was to be cancelled and abandoned, and that the Treaty of Badajos alone was to be adhered to with relation to the article of the Preliminary Treaty which guaranteed the integrity of Portugal. It had been stated also in another place, which it would be irregular in him to coinment upon, that by an arrêt of the First Consul, published officially, it appeared that the ratification of the Treaty of the 29th September had been received, and that by the arrêt, the First Consul seemed to act upon that treaty thus ratified, by ordering the restitution of prizes, &c. He therefore wished to ask the Noble Lord, whether the ratification of that treaty did or did not make any alteration in that view of the subject which had been warranted by the statement of the Noble Secretary of State.

LORD HAWKESBURY said, in answer to the question of the Noble Lord, he had to observe, that his Majesty's Ministers were not in possession of any official information relative to the ratification of the treaty alluded

f 2

alluded to, and that they knew nothing further of the subject than what the Noble Lord, or any other individual, might be informed of through the medium of the French papers. The ratification of the treaty, however, of the 29th September, could make no difference in the execution of the Article of the Preliminary Treaty relative to Portugal. The Noble Lord had stated, that the Treaty of the 29th September was to be cancelled and abandoned; but it should be remembered, that his (Lord Hawkesbury's) statement had gone no farther than the integrity of the ter ritory of Portugal. He did not know what other points that Treaty might embrace, he only wished that his statement might be confined to the point of territory.

I.

EXPOSITION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF THE TREATY OF MADRID,

As laid down by DEFERMONT, Counsellor of State, in his Speech to the Legislative Body, on the 30th of November, 1801.

Citizens Legislators,

The treaty which I have the honour to lay before you, is another of those acts for which we are indebted to the wisdom of the measures adopted by Government, and to the courageous enthusiasm of the armies of the Republic.

You

You will readily perceive the advantages which it affords for the honour and prosperity of both nations.

It contains three principal articles.

By the first, Peace and amity are re-established between the French Republic and the Kingdom of Portugal; and the political relations between the two Powers are re-established on the same footing as before the war.

By the second, the limits are fixed for the future, between the two French and Portuguese Guianas. In an almost desert country, one could not make choice of better boundaries than the rivers and mountains, and it was natural that France, whose possessions in this part are much less than those of Portugal, should extend those limits to the ancient point at which they were fixed,

Lastly, the third part states that a Treaty of Commerce and Navigation shall be entered into between the two powers, which will fix definitively the commercial relations between France and Portugal; but, in the nean time, the communications shall be restored, the citizens and subjects of the two Powers shall enjoy equally and respectively in the States of either, every right and privilege which the most favoured nations enjoy; that the goods and merchandizes produced by the soil or the manufactures of each of the two States, shall be admitted reciprocally without restrictions, and without being subject to any tax which is not levied upon similar articles imported by other nations: it likewise stipulates that French cloths shall be introduced in Portugal upon the same footing as the most favoured merchandizes.

These stipulations prove that the government has confined itself within the bounds of moderation. It has wished for nothing contrary to the interests of a nation which demanded our friendship; the most strict justice

prescribed

prescribed an entire reciprocity; it was demanded by moderation; it opens new sources for French industry, but it is not by assuring to it certain privileges or a monopoly, that such industry is wished to be increased; it is by exciting a noble emulation, that we ought to arrive at the height of prosperity. If the French Government had not consulted any other law than force, it might have been able to obtain greater advantages from Portugal. It thought, on the contrary, that the less powerful that nation was, the less it ought to attempt to weaken it.

Portugal, for a long time, was an independent power; in 1581, it fell into the hands of the Spaniards. The Portuguese then possessed the Cape of Good Hope, by which they opened a new road to the commerce of the Indies, and filled it with their name; that vast and rich country, in which they signalized themselves by innumerable exploits, and formed there the first European establishments.

They had discovered the Brazils, and in that part of America had begun to establish a rich colony.

The other Powers of Europe could not see without uneasiness the re-union with the kingdom of Spain of a monarchy so advantageously situated for acquiring in a great degree the commerce of the world, and which had the greatest riches, and the most extensive establishments in both the hemispheres.

When, therefore, in 1640, the Portuguese undertook to re-establish the House of Braganza on the throne, they received powerful assistance, but no power came forward in their behalf with so much alacrity as France..

Relations of amity were then formed between the two nations, which were not weakened 'till the beginning of the 18th century.

. When

When the grandson of Lewis XIV. proceeded into Spain, the Portuguese Government, affrighted at seeing on that throne a Prince of the House of Bourbon, gave itself up, as it were to England, and consented to stipulations which have ruined its industry, and almost destroyed the ancient connections which existed between it and France,

The Treaty of December 27, 1703, which was confirmed in 1713, caused a monopoly of the trade of Portugal by the merchants and manufacturers of England to the exclusion of other nations.

All the woollens of England were admitted into Portugal, upon condition that Portuguese wines should pay in England only two-thirds of the duty upon French wines.

The English, by means of this treaty, caused the Portuguese manufacturers firft to languish, and then entirely to cease. They became the agents and directors of the whole trade of Portugal. Almost all the wealth which came from the Portuguese colonies, came on account of the English. Portugal was thus, in some degree, an English colony, a market for English commodities alone.

It was in vain that an enlightened Minifter, with uncommon energy and perseverance, strove to deliver his country from the degradation into which she had fallen. All that his genius and industry could accomplish, was undone by the English soon after his retreat. They were not more masters of the trade of their own colonies, than of that of the colonies of Portugal.

Manufactures then did not only find a ready sale in that country, but the English acted the part of factors between the Portuguese and all the rest of the manufacturing nations of Europe. They could not perform this

agency