express from Indy Mahamed Slawey,
Governor of that place, to request that, if I knew
you had been in this country, you would use
every possible endeavour to come to him at
Larache; and to accompany him to the Emperor
who wished to see you.
Let me therefore request your moving as quick
as possible to Larache direct from Tetuan, and
join him before he departs. Should you miss
him, he has left orders to his Lieutenant-governor
there, to forward you to Sidy immediately.
No. V.
Letter written to JOHN ROSS, Esq. Acting Consul General at Tangiers.
Larache, May 17th, 1806.
SIR,
His Excellency the Governor of this place having last evening received
a letter from the Emperor, inclosing a communication transmitted by
the French Consul, together with a note from Paris, His Excellency has
honoured me with both to peruse. Their contents were the most severe
philippics against England; our blessed government was represented the
most perfidious and treacherous in the world, and great art used to
excite distrust, and to produce a rupture with England. M. Talleyrand
informs His Imperial Majesty, by command, of the taking of Naples, and
the republic of Ragusa; that Bonaparte, for certain political reasons,
has thought it expedient to appoint Louis Bonaparte King of Holland;
and Joseph, his other brother, King of the Two Sicilies: that it was
Bonaparte's determination to exclude the English from every port in
Europe: that Ceuta should, as soon as an opportunity offers, be
occupied entirely by French troops; that Spain and Portugal would soon
become provinces of France, and that His Imperial Majesty could do no
better thing than to abandon the English, and make common cause with
France: that the French Consul was charged to demand five thousand
bullocks, as many horses and mules; wheat and barley for the French
forces: that an equivalent in territory should be given to the
Emperor, and a certain scheme submitted to the Court of Morocco highly
honourable and advantageous to Barbary.
I told His Excellency to be on his guard; for that, by art, Bonaparte
has enslaved, plundered, and overturned the continent of Europe: that
I could not help ridiculing the idea of exporting provisions and
cattle from Barbary: that Bonaparte might cause them to be exported by
air-balloons, but by no other means or conveyance, while England rules
the seas. I availed myself of this opportunity of delineating the
features of the Great Nati
|