e negotiations;--they must necessarily be wrong from the
beginning to the end; it is only in reference to their fitness for
the end proposed, that the papers themselves can be matter worthy of
discussion.

In reviewing, then, the course of these negotiations, as directed to
maintain, first, the peace of Europe; secondly, the peace between
France and Spain; and lastly, peace for this country, they divide
themselves naturally into three heads:--first, the negotiations at
Verona; secondly, those with France; and thirdly, those with Spain. Of
each of these in their order.

I say, emphatically, in their order; because there can be no greater
fallacy than that which has pervaded the arguments of many honourable
gentlemen, who have taken up expressions used in one stage of these
negotiations, and applied them to another. An honourable baronet
(Sir F. Burdett), for instance, who addressed the House last night,
employed--or, I should rather say, adopted--a fallacy of this sort,
with respect to an expression of mine in the extract of a dispatch to
the Duke of Wellington, which stands second in the first series of
papers. It is but just to the honourable baronet to admit that his
observation was adopted, not original; because, in a speech eminent
for its ability and for its fairness of reasoning (however I may
disagree both with its principles and its conclusions), this, which
he condescended to borrow, was in truth the only very weak and
ill-reasoned part. By my dispatch of the 27th of September the Duke
of Wellington was instructed to declare, that 'to any interference by
force or menace on the part of the allies against Spain, _come what
may_, His Majesty will not be party'. Upon this the honourable
baronet, borrowing, as I have said, the remark itself, and borrowing
also the air of astonishment, which, as I am informed, was assumed by
the noble proprietor of the remark, in another place, exclaimed '"Come
what may"! What is the meaning of this ambiguous menace, this mighty
phrase, "that thunders in the index"?--"Come what may!" Surely a
denunciation of war is to follow. But no--no such thing. Only--come
what may--"His Majesty will be no party to such proceedings." Was ever
such a _bathos_! Such a specimen of sinking in policy? "_Quid dignum
tanto feret hic promissor hiatu?_"'

Undoubtedly, Sir, if the honourable baronet could show that this
declaration was applicable to the whole course of the negotiations,
or to a more adv