There is some surprise that Dom Miguel has not yet disembarked in England. Don Carlos arrived yesterday at Portsmouth in the Donegal.
Spain is annoyed, and with reason, because the Duke of Terceira and the English Commissioner who made Dom Miguel sign an undertaking not to return did not exact a similar promise from Don Carlos. They now wish England and France to take measures against Don Carlos so as to make him an outlaw in Europe. This however is not admissible, in spite of the notes of the Marquis de Miraflorès and the diatribes of Lord Holland.
The conversation at Holland House is very curious. Little Charles Barrington was there the other day and said he had been prevented from riding a donkey because it was Sunday and because religious people didn't ride donkeys on Sunday. Mr. Allen grunted in reply, "Never mind: the religion is only for the donkeys themselves."
Mr. Spring Rice has just been elected at Cambridge, but by a small majority, which is by no means pleasant for the Ministry.
Sir Henry Halford, M. Dedel and the Princesse de Lieven came back from Oxford yesterday, moved, enchanted, intoxicated by the festivities on the occasion of the installation of the Duke of Wellington as Chancellor of the University. This occasion is really in its way unique. The Duke's character and his past career—it is only four years since he would have been stoned at Oxford for having passed Catholic emancipation—the magnificence of the ceremony, the number and the quality of the company, the immemorial traditions of the scene, the excitement of everybody, the unanimous applause—everything in fact was wonderful and the like will never be seen again. Even the Duke of Cumberland, universally unpopular as he is, was well received there. The Anglican spirit was in the ascendant, all personal animosities vanished in the presence of the dangers with which the Church is threatened, and this secured a favourable reception for every one who is believed to be ready to rally to her defence. In the Duke of Wellington it was less the great Captain whom they were cheering than the Defender of the Faith.
It is annoying to record that the undergraduates used the licence granted to them on such occasions to hoot the names of Lord Grey and others, which they called out loudly in order to have the pleasure of hissing them. The Duke of Wellington, on every occasion of their occurrence, showed that these demonstrations displeased him, but in spite of these signs of his disapproval they were several times repeated.
They say that when the Duke shook hands with Lord Winchelsea, on whom he had just conferred the Doctor's degree, every one recollected the duel which had once taken place between the two, and that this gave rise to a storm of cheering. The applause, however, was not less when Lord Fitzroy Somerset approached the Duke, his faithful friend and comrade, and being unable to give him his right hand, which he lost at Waterloo, extended his left. But what excited the greatest and most prolonged enthusiasm was an ode addressed to the Duke, the two final lines of which were as follows:
Till the dark soul a world could not subdue
Bowed to thy genius, chief of Waterloo.
At this point the whole audience rose spontaneously; the cries, the tears, the acclamations were thrilling; and, as Madame de Lieven said: "The Duke of Wellington may die to-day, and I may depart in peace to-morrow, for I have been present at the most marvellous scene that there has been during the twenty-two years that I have spent in England."