Maxims and Opinions of Field-Marshal His Grace the Duke of Wellington, Selected From His Writings and Speeches During a Public Life of More Than Half a Century

by Duke of Arthur Wellesley Wellington

The numbers of a meeting—that is to say, such an assembly of persons as would create terror in the minds of people living in the neighbourhood,—would justify the magistrate in taking measures to disperse it.

June 15, 1838.

Real cause of our interference in Spain.

The system of interference adopted by his late majesty's government, by means of the quadruple treaty, was with a view to the contest between extreme opinions—it was more with a view of aiding these extreme opinions, than to the arrangement of the mere differences between Don Carlos, upon the one side, and the queen, or her daughter, upon the other; to support certain opinions, and not to determine the succession, was the cause of interference. I regret interference upon that ground; I object to interference upon that ground; and I say, moreover, that we were not right in interfering upon that ground. I maintain that, more particularly on account of the extreme opinions that prevailed, we ought not to have interfered at all; but most especially we ought not, according to the common practice of this government, and in accordance with the declared political principles of the noble lords themselves, to have interfered in a question involving extreme political opinions. Now it has unfortunately happened that extreme political principles have been forced upon a great part of Europe by means of large armies and of great military forces, and it was consequently expected that the same thing would succeed in Spain. This, I believe, was the object of our interference with Spain, and not to determine the Spanish succession.

June 19, 1838.

We had no right to interfere against Don Carlos.

I say we had no business to interfere in the question of succession. There might have been some pretext for interference in the question of succession, if any of the powers of Europe had taken part with Don Carlos, but that was not the case. The noble baron (Lord Holland) cheers. I say, confidently, that not one of the powers in Europe had stirred a finger in support of the pretensions of Don Carlos. I say, then, that, according to all principles—the principles supported and acted upon by this country, in the case of the house of Braganza, and many other cases that I could mention—we ought to have avoided interference; and we ought to have avoided interference by armies more particularly, in the contests in Spain. I say, my lords, that not a sword had been moved in Europe in favour of Don Carlos. When Don Carlos went to Spain, in the summer of 1834, there were not three battalions in arms in that country in his favour. This I positively state as a fact. But, on the contrary, in the space of forty leagues there were forty fortified posts in possession of the queen's troops. Now, my lords, this is a positive fact; and I say that, in the year 1835, when the armistice was negotiated, when the exchange of prisoners was negotiated by Lord Eliot, Don Carlos had then acquired a superiority over the queen's forces, who were obliged to take up a position on the right of the Ebro. That is to say, between the interval of time I have mentioned,—and this is a positive fact upon which your lordships may rely, and to which I pledge my word,—between the summer of 1834 and the period at which the exchange of prisoners was agreed upon in 1835,—that is, in the course of a very few months,—the superiority had been gained by Don Carlos in that part of the country, so far that he had forced the enemy to take up a position on the other side of the Ebro, abandoning all their fortified posts, except Pampeluna and one other; and, I must add, they had very wisely abandoned them, because they found they could not march to their relief through the country. Now, my lords, this is literally and truly a fact; and it is a fact not to be forgotten, with respect to the present contest in Spain. I say, then, that it was the business of this government not to have interfered by force. We ought not to have done so, according to the noble marquis's principle—that there ought to be no interference between two hostile parties in a nation like Spain.

June 19, 1838.

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The Legion a failure.