They  did  not  refuse  it  | — ^they  did  not  make
any  reservations  or  limitations  respecting  it:
on  the  contrary,  they  took  the  most  decisive
measures  on  the  principle  of  his  proposition.
So  implicitly  did  Dom  Pedro  rely  on  them
that,  m  spite  of  all  threatening  symptoms
of  danger,  he  has  sent  his  daughter  to  Eu-
rope ; — a  step  from  which  he  cannot  recede,
without  betraying  his  own  dignity,  and  seem-
ing to  weaken  her  claims :  and  which  has
proved  a  fruitful  source  ol  embarrassment,
vexation,  and  humiliation^  to  himself  and  his
most  faithful  councillors.  By  this  decisive
measure,  he  has  placed  his  loyal  subjects  in
a  more  lasting  and  irreconcilable  state  of
hostility  with  those  who  have  mastered  their
country,  and  has  rendered  compromise  under
better  rulers  more  difficult.
Under  all  these  circnmstaoces,  Sir,  I  can-
not doubt  that  the  Mediating  Powers  have
acquired  a  right  imperatively,  to  require  that
Miguel  shall  renounce  that  authority  which
by  fraud  and  falsehood  he  has  obtained  from
them  the  means  of  usurping.  They  are
bound  to  exercise  that  right  by  a  sacred
duty  towards  Dom  Pedro,  who  has  intrusted
them  with  the  conditional  establishment  of
the  Rmoey,  and  the  people  of  Portugal,
with  whom  their  obli^eition  of  honour  is  the


more  inviolable,  because  it  must  be  informal.
I  shall  be  sorry  to  hear  that  such  duties  are
to  be  distinguished,  by  the  first  Powers  of
Christendom,  from  the  most  strictly  literal
obligations  of  a  treaty.
