Extract of a Letter from Don Antonio Rocca.
(Translated.)
“Reus, January 20, 1811.
“While we have venal men, ignorant men, and perfidious men in our government, no good can befal us. He must be mad who can expect our condition to ameliorate. The venal are those who, without being called, seemingly abandon their own affairs, and introduce themselves into the different branches of administration with no other view than to enrich themselves at the public expense. The ignorant are those who think themselves wise, and who either obtain by intrigue or accept without reluctance employments the duties of which they are not capable of discharging. The perfidious are all those who are indifferent spectators of this bloody struggle, and who care not for the issue, as they will equally submit to any master. Place no confidence, my friend, in these sort of persons, nothing can be expected from them, and yet by an inconceivable fatality which is attached to us, to the ruin of all parties, it would appear that the provinces employ none but these very people. Those who commend us are either venal or ignorant, or indifferent; at least the more we search for the remedy, the more our evil increases.”
Captain Codrington to sir Charles Cotton.
“April 24, 1811.
.... “With respect to the proposed plan of admitting supplies of grain in neutral vessels from the ports of the enemy, &c., I have no hesitation in saying I do not see sufficient reason to justify it in the present circumstances of this part of the Peninsula, as I have always found bread for sale at the different places on the coast, at the rate of about two pounds and three quarters for the quarter of a dollar, at which price I yesterday bought it at Escala. And as there has been of late more corn at Taragona than money to purchase, I presume the latter has been the greater desideratum of the two.”
.... “The difficulty of allowing a free passage of provisions from one part of the coast to the other would be lessened by being limited to vessels above the size of common fishing-boats, in which I have reason to believe considerable quantities have been carried to Barcelona; and captain Bullen, I understand, found even a mortar in a boat of this description.”
General C. Doyle to captain Bullen.
“Ripol, April, 1811.
“Can you believe that in this town, the only fabric of arms, six months have passed without a firelock being made!!! They begin to-morrow, and give me two hundred and fifty every week, &c.”