Acting Chief Secretary.
The audacity of this portaria—setting aside the stipulations of His Majesty and his late ministers in my commission, thus rendering it null and void without my consent—was only equalled by its hypocrisy. As a "further testimony of the high estimation in which I was held," &c.—His Majesty's ministers were graciously pleased to annul my commission, in order that they might get rid of me at a moment's warning!
The document transmitted to me did not bear the Rubrica of the Emperor, though falsely asserted so to do. If the reader will take the trouble to compare it with my two commissions, he will agree with me in the inference that it was written by Barbosa without the Emperor's knowledge or consent, with the object of terminating my command—the Imperial patents notwithstanding, as will be evident from the expression, "during the present war;" the war being already ended by my expulsion of the Portuguese fleet and army.
No time was lost in remonstrating against this insidious decree. After pointing out to the Minister of Marine the agreements which had been made with me by the late ministers, and ratified by the Imperial sign manual, I addressed His Excellency as follows:—
The late decree inserted in the Gazette of February 28th, instead of increasing my official rank and authority—as it professes to do—in effect circumscribes it, because there was no limitation of time in the offer which I accepted from His Imperial Majesty. But by this decree, my official rank and authority are limited to the duration of the present war. Now, if I could believe that the idea of this limitation originated with his Imperial Majesty himself, I should respectfully and silently acquiesce; but being satisfied—from the gracious manner in which he has been pleased to act towards me on all occasions—that it did not so originate, I can only consider it an intimation of an opinion prevalent in the councils of the state, that myself and services can very well be done without, as soon as the independence of Brazil shall be decided or peace restored.
As no man can be expected to dedicate his professional services to a foreign country, without having a prospect of some recompence more durable than that which such a limitation as is expressed in the document in question seems to indicate, I am naturally led to inquire whether it is the intention of His Majesty's advisers that, on the termination of the present war, my pay is to cease with my authority? or whether I am to receive any permanent reward for services, the consequences of which will be permanent to Brazil? Because—if no recompence is to be received for public services —however important and lasting in their effects those services may be—it is a duty to myself and family to consider how far I am justified in farther devoting my time to a service from which so little future benefit is to be expected; a consideration the more interesting to me, in consequence of repeated solicitations from the Chilian Government to resume my rank and command in that state.
In saying thus much, you may consider me of a mercenary disposition; but I have received from Brazil no recompence whatever, beyond the honours conferred by His Imperial Majesty. If you will peruse the accompanying papers, you will find that when I left Chili I had disbursed of my own monies, 66,000 dollars, to keep the Chilian squadron from starving, which sum, in consequence of my leaving Chili, and accepting the offers of His Imperial Majesty, has not been repaid. This amount His Majesty and his ministers agreed to repay on my acceptance of the command; but I declined to seek reimbursement at the expense of Brazil, "unless I should perform greater services to the Empire than I had rendered to Chili; but in the event of such services being rendered to Brazil, and of Chili continuing its refusal to pay me, then—and not otherwise—I should hope for indemnification." To this stipulation the late ministers gave their assent.
It is no proof of an avaricious disposition that I at once acquiesced in the proposition of His Imperial Majesty, that 40,000 dollars only for the Imperatrice, which is not one-third of her value, should be apportioned to her captors.
(Signed) COCHRANE AND MARANHAÕ.
I might have added that the squadron had received no emoluments of any kind whatever, notwithstanding the spontaneous stipulations of His Imperial Majesty to pay everything, there not being even an indication of handing over to them the 40,000 dollars awarded by His Majesty for the frigate captured at Parà. On the contrary, I had been condemned in costs and damages to a great amount for having captured Portuguese vessels in pursuance of His Majesty's orders; so that had the Court of Admiralty been in a position to enforce these, I should not only be unpaid but be mulcted of a very large sum, as the price of having accepted the command of the Brazilian navy!