Faz o ninho em Portugal.
Poe um A pernas acima,
Tira—lhe a risca do meio,
E por detraz lha arrima,
Saberas quern te nomeio.”
“The Imperial Eagle rises, with his children at his tail, and with his claws before him makes his nest in Portugal. Put an A with its legs upside down; take away its middle bar, and put this bar behind it. You will know him I name.” The coarseness of the wording belongs to the era and to the popular literature of Portugal generally. The N and the imperial eagle are made out perfectly. The coincidence does not quite convince, but in the words of the hero of the Gridiron story, “it is mighty remarkable!”
Junot proceeded to depose the Royal House of Portugal with the coolest unconcern, and from the old Palace of the Inquisition, where he established his Intendance Générale, and upon whose ruins the new National Theatre has just been raised, he issued a proclamation declaring that “the dynasty of Braganza had ceased in Portugal!” Meanwhile Solano, a creature of Godoy’s, who had accompanied Junot to Lisbon, was active on behalf of his infamous master, whose obscure birth-place I lately saw at Badajoz, and substituted in several public acts the name of the King of Spain for that of the Prince Regent of Portugal. He created a Chief Judge and a Superintendent of Finances, and both employments were conferred upon Castilian subjects. Solano was the intimate confident of the Prince of the Peace, and it is believed that it was not without superior orders that he proceeded in these hasty innovations. The future Sovereign of the Algarves, as designated in the secret treaty with Napoléon, was so impatient to reign on his own account that, if the reports which prevailed at the period are to be believed, dollars were struck at the Madrid mint, bearing upon one side the head of Godoy with the legend Emmanuel primus Algarviorum dux, and on the other the ancient arms of the kingdom of Algarve.
Shortly after his arrival Junot proceeded, as he phrased it, “inaugurer avec éclat à Lisbonne le drapeau tricolore français.” The Portuguese had previously received them as friends: this outrage opened their eyes. It was on a Sunday; 6,000 men of all arms were assembled in the great square of the Rocio, to be reviewed by the General. Mid-day sounded. A salvo of artillery resounded from the Castle of St. George, originally built by the Moors. Every eye was turned towards these ancient walls, which topple over the city somewhat like the Calton Hill at Edinburgh. In an instant was seen to fall the standard of Portugal which floated before on the loftiest tower of the Castle, while its place was taken in another instant by a foreign flag surmounted by the imperial eagle! To describe the outraged feelings of the Portuguese, to paint their indignation and horror, is impossible. Their loyalty and their national pride are almost the only virtues which they retain. Their southern hatred was excited to terrific intensity. Conceive what would be the feelings of veteran warriors, who have dragged out the remnant of an existence spared by the missiles and casualties of war, to see the flag beneath which their blood has flowed insulted by its enemies. Some idea may then be formed of the grief and rage which took possession of the people of Lisbon. A torrent of bitterness deluged their souls. The sacred standard which was thus supplanted was consecrated alike by religious feelings and by secular remembrances of glory. It had been given, according to popular belief, by Christ himself to Afonso Henriques, the founder of the Monarchy, impressed by the Redeemer with the marks of his Passion, for the five shields of the conquered Moorish kings displayed on the Quinas were likewise said to be typical of the Sacred Wounds, and with this other labarum their new Constantine had been told to “go forth and conquer.” “Death to the French!” was soon the cry, but the cannon and paraded soldiery of Junot suppressed the insurrectionary movement.
The earthquake, stated in the text to have occurred at the period of the French entry into Lisbon, is strictly historical. “Le lendemain de l’entrée des Français on éprouva dans Lisbonne une légère secousse de tremblement de terre, qui fit monter la mer sur les quais.” (Foy, Hist. Guerre. Pénins. liv. ii.) Junot wrote thus impiously concerning this event to the Minister of War, Clarke. “Les dieux sont pour nous; j’en tiens l’augure de ce, que le tremblement de terre ne nous a annoncé que leur puissance sans nous faire de mal!”
Napoléon’s treatment of Spain was not characterized by the same daring recklessness, but by what must be regarded as unprincipled profligacy. One of his own generals, Baron Foy, calls the Spanish invasion “une traîtreuse usurpation.”—Hist. Guerre. Pénins. liv. ii.