t the terms of
compromise. There would, in either of these cases, be a tangible
object for mediation. But where the difference was not external; where
it arose from irritated feelings, from vague and perhaps exaggerated
apprehensions, from charges not proved, nor perhaps capable of proof,
on either side, in such cases each party felt that there was nothing
definite and precise which either could submit to the decision of a
judge, or to the discretion of an arbitrator; though each might at the
same time feel that the good offices of a third party, friendly to
both, would be well employed to soothe exasperation, to suggest
concession, and, without probing too deeply the merits of the dispute,
to exhort to mutual forbearance and oblivion. The difference
is perfectly intelligible; and, in fact, on the want of a due
appreciation of the nature of that difference, turns much of the
objection which has been raised against our having suggested
concession to Spain.

Our mediation then, as I have said, was refused by Spain as well as by
France; but before it was offered to France, our good offices had been
asked by Spain. They were asked in the dispatch of M. San Miguel,
which has been quoted with so much praise, a praise in which I have
no indisposition to concur. I agree in admiring that paper for its
candour, manliness, and simplicity. But the honourable member for
Westminster has misunderstood the early part of it. He has quoted
it, as if it complained of some want of kindness on the part of the
British Government towards Spain. The complaint was quite of another
sort. It complained of want of communication from this Government, of
what was passing at Verona. The substance of this complaint was true;
but in that want of communication there was no want of kindness. The
date of M. San Miguel's dispatch is the 15th of November; the Congress
did not close till the 29th. It is true that I declined making any
communication to Spain, of the transactions which were passing at
Verona, whilst the Congress was still sitting. I appeal to any man of
honour, whether it would not have been ungenerous to our allies to
make such a communication, so long as we entertained the smallest hope
that the result of the Congress might not be hostile to Spain; and
whether, considering the peculiar situation in which we were placed at
that time, by the negotiation which we were carrying on at Madrid
for the adjustment of our claims upon the Spanish Gove