174

LIFE OF OOBDEN. [omAP:

1847. “. «+. There is one way in which this system of interfering
&r.43, in the politics of Spain is especially mischievous. It prevents
Spanish parties from being formed upon a purely domest1C
basis, and thus puts off the day when the politicians shall
devote themselves to their own reforms, At present, all the
intrigues of Madrid revolve round the diplomatic mancenvre®
of France and England. There is another evil arising out
of it. It gives the bulk of the Spaniards a false notion of
their own position. They are a proud people, they think all
Hlurope is busy with their affairs, they hear of France and
England being on the point of going to war about the
marriage of one of their princesses, they imagine that Spei®
is the most important country in the world, and thus they
forget their own ignorance, poverty, and political degradstion,
 and of course do not occupy themselves in domestic
reforms. If left to themselves, they would soon find oub
their inferiority, for they are not without a certain kind of
common sense.
“I have always had an instinctive monomania against this
system of foreign interference, protocolling, diplomatising
etc., and I should be glad if you and our other Free Trade
friends, who have beaten the daily broad-sheets into commo?
sense upon another question, would oppose yourselves to the
Palmerston system, and try to prevent the Foreign Office from
undoing the good which the Board of Trade has done to the
people. But you must not disguise from yourself that the
svil has its roots in the pugnacious, energetic, self-sufficient;
foreigner-despising and pitying character of that noble insular
creature, John Bull. Read Washington Irving’s descriptio?
of him fumbling for his cudgel always the moment he hears
of any row taking place anywhere on the face of the
earth, and bristling up with anger at the very ides of any
other people daring to have a quarrel without first asking his
consent or inviting him to take a part in it.