The Lisbon Gazette of the...
The Lisbon Gazette of the 5th inst. contains a tirade against the Constitution of Brazil. Articles like that wvhich we now refer to, are not of course written with the absurd expectation of either injuring or serving the people of whom they profess to speak. A country which has once flung down the gauntlet to Portugal, and treated her su- premacy with ridicule and scorn-which has felt the tram - mels of its ancient mistress as something no less preposter- ous and disgusting than a giant would consider the leading- strings tied round him by a dwvarf-such a country is not to be preached back, by any effort of ultra-Royal orthodoxy, into the prison-house of colonial dependence, aggravated, in the case of Portugal, by the two-fold plague of priestly and of kingly despotism. A Lisbon Gazette-writer might as rea- sonably supplicate the Moon to change her course, as Brazil to sacrifice her independence. But the Brazilian Constitution is abused, not for the edification of the people amongst whom it has been established, so much as for a comfort to the Portuguese themselves, and a salve to their wounded nationality. To this end, the subjects of Portu- gal are told, that the Constitution has not been granted by the " legitimate authority :" if the writer means by the Cc people" of Brazil, they have almost unianimously approv- ed it. If, on the other hand, it be not valid because the Court of Portugal" has not framed it, unquestionably the period is ratlher a remote one, at which the Brazilians are likely to agree in the Gazette-writer's notion of a " le. "g-itimate constitution." The letters received yesterday from Lisbon are dated the ltli inst., and renew the report so frequently circulated of an intention on the part of the Portuguese Government to send an expeditioii against some part of Brazil. A ru- mour so often spread, and followed by no active demonstra- tions of a corresponding nature, is entitled to little credit. The number of troops now talked of as meant to com- pose tne expedition is 10,000 ; and an order has been giveii, it is said, for calling out the whole of the Portuguese troops, for the purpose of selecting vol-nteers to join the en- terprise. Much activity is also said to prevail in the Portu- guese dock-yards, where the recent dispensation of the Pa- triarch of Lisbon, allowing the artificers to continue their labour on the Sabbath, is declared to be in full force. We believe, howvever, that these rumours are in no degree bet- ter founded than those which have preceded them.