th under the necessity of commencing
proceedings, did they not endeavour to set aside the claims of the
captors by the monstrous pretence that they had no interest in their
captures when made within the distance of two leagues from the shore?
Will your excellency contend that this was a good and sufficient
reason? Was it founded in common sense, or on any rational precedent,
or indeed any precedent whatever? Was it either honest to the squadron
or faithful to the country? Was it not calculated to prevent the
squadron from ever again assailing an invading enemy, or again
expelling him from the shores of the empire? Then, in the next place,
did not these most extraordinary judges pretend that at least all
vessels taken in ports and harbours should be condemned as droits to
the crown, and not as prize to the captors? Was not this another most
pernicious attempt to deprive the imperial squadron not only of its
reward for the past but of any adequate motive for the risk of
future enterprise? And in effect, were not these successive pretences
calculated to operate as invitations to invasions? Did they not tend
to encourage the enemy to resume his occupation of the port of Bahia,
and generally to renew his aggressions against the independence of
the empire on her shores and in her ports without the probability
of resistance by the squadrons of his Imperial Majesty? And have not
these same judges actually condemned almost every prize as a droit
to the crown, thereby doing as much as in them lay to defraud the
squadron and to damp its zeal and destroy its energies? Nay, have
not the auditors of marine actually issued decrees pronouncing the
captures made at Maranhao to have been illegal, alleging that they
were seized under the Brazilian flag, although in truth the flag
of the enemy was flying at the time both in the forts and ships;
declaring me a violator of the law of nations and law of the land;
accusing me of having been guilty of an insult to the Emperor and
the empire, and decreeing costs and damages against me under these
infamous pretences? Can your excellency perceive either justice or
decency in these decrees? Do they in any degree breathe the spirit of
gratitude for the union of so important a province to the empire, or
are they at all in accordance with the distinguished approbation which
his Imperial Majesty himself has evinced of my services at Maranhao?

Can it be unknown to your excellency that the late minister