All of which is humbly submitted to your Majesty by your Majesty's most dutiful and devoted Servant and Subject,
Wellington.
Queen Victoria to Viscount Palmerston.
Osborne, 28th November 1846.
The Queen has just received Lord Palmerston's draft to Mr Southern,30 and must observe that she does not quite approve the tone of it, as it will be likely only to irritate without producing any effect. If our advice is to be taken, it must be given in a spirit of impartiality and fairness. Lord Palmerston's despatch must give the impression that we entirely espouse the cause of the rebels, whose conduct is, to say the least, illegal and very reprehensible. Lord Palmerston likewise takes the nation and the Opposition to be one and the same thing. What we must insist upon is a return to Constitutional Government. And what we may advise is a compromise with the Opposition. What Ministry is to be formed ought to be left to the Portuguese themselves. It being the 28th to-day, the Queen is afraid the despatch went already yesterday. The Queen hopes in future that Lord Palmerston will not put it out of her power to state her opinion in good time.
Footnote 30: Secretary of Legation at Lisbon, and Chargé d'Affaires in the absence of Lord Howard de Walden.
Queen Victoria to the Duke of Wellington.
THE PENINSULAR MEDAL
Arundel Castle, 1st December 1846.