he partition of Poland was the partition of a
nation. It was such a partition as is effected by hacking a living man
limb from limb. The partition planned at Loo was the partition of an ill
governed empire which was not a nation. It was such a partition as
is effected by setting loose a drove of slaves who have been fastened
together with collars and handcuffs, and whose union has produced only
pain, inconvenience and mutual disgust. There is not the slightest
reason to believe that the Neapolitans would have preferred the Catholic
King to the Dauphin, or that the Lombards would have preferred the
Catholic King to the Archduke. How little the Guipuscoans would have
disliked separation from Spain and annexation to France we may judge
from the fact that, a few years later, the States of Guipuscoa actually
offered to transfer their allegiance to France on condition that their
peculiar franchises should be held sacred.

One wound the partition would undoubtedly have inflicted, a wound on the
Castilian pride. But surely the pride which a nation takes in exercising
over other nations a blighting and withering dominion, a dominion
without prudence or energy, without justice or mercy, is not a feeling
entitled to much respect. And even a Castilian who was not greatly
deficient in sagacity must have seen that an inheritance claimed by two
of the greatest potentates in Europe could hardly pass entire to one
claimant; that a partition was therefore all but inevitable; and
that the question was in truth merely between a partition effected by
friendly compromise and a partition effected by means of a long and
devastating war.

There seems, therefore, to be no ground at all for pronouncing the terms
of the Treaty of Loo unjust to the Emperor, to the Spanish monarchy
considered as a whole, or to any part of that monarchy. Whether those
terms were or were not too favourable to France is quite another
question. It has often been maintained that she would have gained more
by permanently annexing to herself Guipuscoa, Naples and Sicily than by
sending the Duke of Anjou or the Duke of Berry to reign at the Escurial.
On this point, however, if on any point, respect is due to the opinion
of William. That he thoroughly understood the politics of Europe is
as certain as that jealousy of the greatness of France was with him a
passion, a ruling passion, almost an infirmity. Before we blame him,
therefore, for making large concessions to the pow