♦ADDRESS OF THE PORTUGUEZE GOVERNMENT TO THE PEOPLE.♦
But while the factious part of the British press was thus displaying how far it was possible for men to deaden their hearts against all generous emotions, the Portugueze governors were expressing their gratitude to England for the effectual support which she had given to her old ally. They told the people that their day of glory was at length arrived; they had passed through the fiery ordeal, by which the merits of men were tried and purified; they were become a great nation. “Humbling themselves,” they said, “before the first and sovereign Author of all good, they rendered thanks to their Prince, for establishing, in his wisdom, the basis of their defence; ... to his British majesty, to his enlightened ministry, and to the whole British nation, in whom they had found faithful and liberal allies, constant co-operation, and that honour, probity, and steadiness of principle, which peculiarly distinguished the British character; ... to the illustrious Wellington, whose sagacity and consummate military skill had been so eminently displayed; ... to the zealous and indefatigable Beresford, who had restored discipline and organization to the Portugueze troops; ... to the generals and officers, and their comrades in arms, who had never fought that they did not triumph; ... finally, to the whole Portugueze people, whose loyalty, patriotism, constancy, and humanity, had been so gloriously displayed, during the season of danger and of suffering.” “Portugueze,” said they, “the effects of the invasion of these barbarians; the yet smoking remains of the cottage of the poor, of the mansion of the wealthy, of the cell of the religious, of the hospital which afforded shelter and relief to the indigent and infirm, of the temples dedicated to the worship of the Most High; the innocent blood of so many peaceful citizens of both sexes, and of all ages, with which those heaps of ruins are still tinged; the insults of every kind heaped upon those whom the Vandals did not deprive of life ... insults many times more cruel than death itself; the universal devastation, the robbery and destruction of everything that the unhappy inhabitants of the invaded districts possessed: ... this atrocious scene, which makes humanity shudder, affords a terrible lesson, which you ought deeply to engrave in memory, in order fully to know that degenerate nation, who retain only the figure of men, and who in every respect are worse than beasts, and more blood-thirsty than tigers or lions; who are without faith and without law; who acknowledge neither the rights of humanity, nor respect the sacred tie of an oath.”