XI. 1821. effected. Murillo was well aware of the secrets and de- CHAP. signs of these conspirators, and was in possession of a number of important papers establishing them. It was mainly to get these papers out of his hands, as well as on account of his known resolution of character, that the public indignation was so strongly directed against him 1 Martignac, on occasion of his conduct in repressing the recent dis- i. 326, 327. turbances in Madrid.1 41. sa, and his arrest. Sept. 18. Riego, who, as already mentioned, had been reinstated in his command in Arragon after having been tempor- Riego's plot arily deprived of it, was closely connected with the at Saragos clubs in Saragossa, and was suspected by the Government, not without reason, of having lent himself to their extravagant designs. His principal associate was a French refugee named Montarlot, who employed himself at Saragossa in writing proclamations which were sent across the Pyrenees, inviting the French troops to revolt and establish a republic. Government having received intelligence of the conspiracy, took the bold step of ordering Moreda, the political chief at Saragossa, to arrest Riego. He was apprehended, accordingly, as he was returning to that city from a tour in the provinces, where he had been haranguing and exciting the people, and conducted a prisoner to Lerida. Immense was the excitement which this event produced among the Liberals over all Spain. His bust was carried at the head of a triumphal procession through Madrid; the clubs resounded with declamations; the press was unanimous in denying his criminality; and to give vent to the public transports, a picture was painted, intended to be carried in procession through the streets, representing Riego in the costume which he wore on occasion of the revolt in the island of Leon, holding in one hand the Book of the i. 339, 340; Constitution, and overturning with the other the figures iv. 465,466. of Despotism and Ignorance.2 The moment was decisive. Anarchy or law must triumph; and the victory of the former was the more to 2 Martignac, Ann. Hist. XI. 1821. 42. Suppres sion of the tumults thence arising at Madrid. CHAP. be apprehended, as it was known that the military were undecided, and that some regiments had openly declared they would take part with the insurgents. But in this crisis Murillo was not wanting to himself, or the cause with which he was intrusted. Having assembled the civic guard, he harangued them on the necessity of crushing the advance of the factions; and having previously given orders to the military to stop the procession, he put himself at the head of the national guard to support them. The revolutionists, however, declared that they would proceed with the procession carrying the picture ; and when they arrived at the Puerto del Sol, the royal guard stationed there refused to stop them; and the regiment of Saguntum, stationed in another part of the city, broke out of their barracks to advance to their support. All seemed lost; but then was seen what can be done by the firmness of one man. Murillo advanced at the head of the national guard; San Martin, his intrepid associate, seized the picture with his own hands, which he threw down on the ground; and at the same time Murillo charged the head of the procession with the bayonet. Struck with consternation at a resistance which they had not anticipated, the mob fled and disi. 341, 343; persed, and Madrid was for the time delivered from the efforts of a faction, which threatened to involve the country in anarchy and devastation.1 'Martignac, Ann. Hist. v. 463. 43. Yellow fever at In the midst of these civil dissensions, a fresh scourge broke out in Spain, which threatened to involve the Barcelona. country in the evils, not merely of political troubles, but Sept. Oct. of physical destruction. The yellow fever appeared in the end of July in Barcelona, and by the middle of August it had made such progress that all the authorities quitted the town, and a military cordon was established within two leagues of the walls around it. In spite of this precaution, or perhaps in consequence of the greater intensity which it occasioned to the malady in the infected districts, the disease soon appeared in various XI. 1821. quarters in the rear of the cordon, particularly Tortosa, CHAP. Mequinenza, and Lerida. By the middle of October, when the fever was at its height, 9000 persons had been cut off by it in Barcelona alone, out of a population not at that period exceeding 80,000 persons, and 300 died every day. So terrible a mortality struck terror through every part of Spain; and the French government, under pretence of establishing a sanitary cordon, assembled an army of 30,000 men on the eastern frontier of the Pyrenees, but which was really intended chiefly to prevent communication between the revolutionary party in the Spanish towns and the secret societies in France. In the midst of these alarms, physical and moral, two classes of the people alone were insensible to the peril, and hastened, at the risk of their lives, to the scene of danger. The French physicians flocked over of their own accord to the theatre of pestilence, and brought to its alleviation the aid of their science and the devotion of their courage; and the Sisters of Charity appeared in the scenes of woe, and were to be seen, amidst the perils of the epidemic, by the bedside of the sick, and assisting at the supreme unction of the dying. Their exertions were not unavailing in alleviating individual distress; and the cool weather having set in, the epidemic gradually abated, and by December had entirely disappeared, but not before it had cut off 20,000 persons in Barcelona, out iv. 467,469; of 80,000; and in Tortosa, six out of twelve thousand i. 347, 319. inhabitants.1 1 Ann. Hist. Martignac, tion. 44. The terrors of the epidemic did not allay for any considerable time the political agitation of Spain. The club Fresh agitaof the Fontana d'Oro resounded with declamations, of which the arrest of Riego was the principal subject; and its orators declared "that the political atmosphere would never be purified but by the blood of twelve or fifteen thousand inhabitants of Madrid." The Government felt itself unable to coerce these excesses and the extreme democrats in the provinces, seeing the impotence XI. 1821. CHAP. of the executive, erected themselves, with the aid of selfconstituted juntas, into separate powers, nearly as independent of the central government at Madrid as they had been during the war with Napoleon. Saragossa continued the theatre of such violent agitations that Moreda, the intrepid officer who had arrested Riego, was obliged, on the summons of the municipality and clubs, to resign his post and retire. At Cadiz, the Government dismissed General Jauregui, and having appointed the Marquis de la Rennion, a nobleman of moderate principles, to the command, the Liberals refused to receive him. The Baron d'Andilla having upon this been substituted in his room, he too was rejected, and General Jauregui, a noted Liberal, who was entirely in their interest, forcibly retained in his post. The municipality and people of Seville, encouraged by this example of successful resistance, revolted also against the central authority; and Manuel de Velasco, the captain-general, and Escovedo, the political chief of the province, addressed the king in the same style as the Liberals at Cadiz, and caused their names to be inscribed in the national guard of the city, "in order to die at their post, if necessary, in defence of their country." Nor was Valencia in a more tranquil condition, for General Elio, a gallant veteran of the war, the former governor of the province, had been condemned to death by the revolutionary authorities in Ann. Hist. that city, as having acted in 1814 against the Constitu471; Mar- tion of 1812, and the sentence having not as yet been executed, the clubs resounded with incessant declamations, demanding his instant execution.1 iv. 455, 470, tignac, i. 353, 355. Matters had now come to such a pass that the Government at Madrid saw they had no alternative but to take a decided line, or to abdicate in favour of the provincial authorities. They accordingly transmitted orders to Baron d'Andilla to proceed to Cadiz and take the command. But they soon found that their real power was XI. 1821. 45. Cadiz and might Seville to receive the where King's go revolt at confined to the walls of Madrid. The authorities at CHAP. Cadiz continued Jauregui in the command, refused to admit the baron within their gates, put the city in a posture of defence, and sent orders to all the towns in Refusal of Andalusia to stop and arrest him wherever he appear. The same thing was done at Seville, General Moreno Davix, sent from Madrid to assume the vernors, and command, was stopped at Ecija, on his way to that city, Corunna, and sent back. Meanwhile Meria at Corunna, who had been replaced by General Latré, sent from Madrid, revolted, and having secured the garrison in his interest, expelled Latré, and declared himself independent of the central government. But Latré was not discouraged. He raised the militia of the province of Galicia, which was thoroughly loyal, and appearing with an imposing force before the gates of Corunna, compelled Meria to surrender and depart to Seguenza, the place assigned for his exile. At the same time troubles broke out in Estremadura, Navarre, and Old Castile, where guerilla bands appeared, ravaged the country, and rendered all collection of the revenue impossible. To such straits was the Memorias treasury in consequence reduced, that the Minister of de General Finance was obliged to open a fresh loan of 200,000,000 375, 389; reals (£2,000,000) in foreign states, which was only in i. 356, 357; part obtained, and that at a most exorbitant rate of iv. 470,471. interest.1 1 Mina, ii. Martignac, Ann. Hist. 46. Cortes. The distracted state of the country rendered an early and extraordinary convocation of the Cortes necessary, Opening of in the hope of obtaining that moral support from its votes ordinary which was sought in vain in the affections of the country. Nov. 25. It met accordingly on the 25th November, and the king, in his opening speech, deeply deplored the events at Cadiz, and earnestly invoked the aid of the Cortes to support him in his endeavour to cause the royal authority to be respected.* The Cortes, in reply, appointed two * “C'est dans la plus profonde amertume de mon cœur, que j'ai appris les |