seatic ports by Brazilian vessels, shall not, in the above-mentioned ports, pay the export and import duties, and any other duties, except according to the rates granted to the direct commerce of the most favoured nation.

On the other part, any merchandise whatever, without distinction as to origin, exported from the ports of Lubeck, Bremen, or Hamburgh, to Brazil, or from Brazil to these ports, in Hanseatic vessels or in vessels belonging to any nation favoured in the Brazilian ports in their direct commerce, shall not pay in Brazil the import or export duties, or any duties whatever, but such as are fixed by a rate to the direct and national commerce of the most favoured nation; a rate which by other treaties has been temporarily fixed at fifteen per cent, instead of twenty-four, for all merchandise introduced for consumption.

The Hanseatic cities not having placed any restriction on the indirect commerce of Brazil, and the Brazilian government not being in all respects able, in the present state of their commercial relations, to grant to the indirect commerce the same latitude and perfect reciprocity, it is agreed that the said indirect commerce shall for the present be restricted, and shall only take place with respect to the nations whose direct commerce is or shall be favoured in the Brazilian ports by particular treaties.

All merchandise exported in Hanseatic vessels from the ports of the said nations favoured in Brazil, shall pay the same duties of import and export, or any other duties which are paid by the Hanseatic cities in their direct commerce; these merchandises remaining nevertheless liable to the other

formalities required when they are imported into the Brazilian ports by nations favoured in their direct

commerce.

All bounties, drawbacks, or other such advantages granted in one of the countries on importation or exportation, in the vessels of any foreign nation whatever, shall in like manner be granted when the importation or exportation shall be performed by the vessels of the other country.

In the direct navigation between the Brazils and the Hanseatic cities, the manifests viséd by the Consuls, Brazilian or Hanseatic respectively, or if there should not be any consuls by the local authorities, shall be sufficient to admit the respective importations or exportations to the advantages stipu Îated in this article,

Art. VII. The indigenous ar ticles referred to in the preceding article shall experience in the respective Custom-houses, as far as regards their valuation, all the advantages and facilities which are or shall be conceded to the most favoured nation. It is understood that in cases where they shall not have a fixed value in the Brazilian tariff, the entry at the Customhouse shall be made on a declaration of their value, signed by the party who shall have imported them; but in the event of the officers of the Customs charged with the collection of the duties suspecting the valuation to be faulty, they shall be at liberty to take the goods thus valued on paying ten per cent above the said valuation; and this within the period of fifteen days from the first day of the detention, and on repaying the duties received there

on.

Art. VIII. The commerce and

navigation between Brazil and the Hanseatic ports shall enjoy in each country, without waiting for any additional convention, all the privileges and advantages which are or may be granted to any of the most favoured nations, provided always they fulfil the conditions of reciprocity. It is understood that the privileges which have been, or which may be, granted to the Portuguese nation, shall not be construed into a precedent, nor shall the effects of the present convention extend to Portugal, unless there should be particular treaties for that purpose.

Art. IX. The consuls of the respective Governments shall be treated as well in respect to their persons as to the exercise of their functions on the same footing as those of the most favoured nations. They shall especially enjoy the right of making representations as well general as particular upon the valuations made by the Customs, which shall be taken into consideration with as little delay as possible, without detaining the consignments.

Art. X.-Should either of the contracting parties be engaged in war, whilst the other is neuter, it is agreed, that whatever the belligerent party may have stipulated with other powers to the advantage of the neutral flag, shall still be in force between Brazil and the Hanseatic towns. In order to prevent all mistakes relating to what is considered contraband of war, it is agreed (without however departing from the general principle above detailed) to restrict this definition to the following articles :-Cannons, mortars, guns, pistols, grenades, fusees, gun-carriages, belts, powder, saltpetre, helmets, balls, pikes, swords, halberds, saddles,

harness, and all other instruments whatever manufactured for the uses of war.

Art. XI.-The citizens and subjectsofthe respective countries shall enjoy in the other country, in respect to their persons, their property, the exercise of their religion, and the employment of their industry, all the rights and privileges which are or shall be hereafter granted to the most favoured nations.

Some foreigners enjoying in Brazil the privilege of having accounts open at the Custom-houses for payment of duties, on the same condition and sureties as the Brazilian subjects, this favour shall extend equally to the Hanseatic residents.

Art. XII. The high contracting parties reserve to themselves the right of entering into any additional stipulations, which the reciprocal interest of trade may require, and any articles which may be hereafter agreed on shall be considered as making a part of the present convention.

Art. XIII. Although the present convention be considered as common to the three free Hanseatic cities of Lubeck, Bremen, and Hamburgh, it is agreed, nevertheless, that a league of reciprocal responsibility does not exist between their sovereign governments, and that the stipulations of the present convention shall remain in full force with regard to the rest of these republics, notwithstanding a termination on the part of one or more of them.

Art. XIV. The present convention shall be ratified, and the ratifications shall be exchanged in London within the space of four months, or sooner if possible.

It shall be in full force during

ten years, dating from the day of the exchange of the ratifications: and beyond that term, until the senates of the Hanseatic cities, whether separately or collectively, or his majesty the Emperor of the Brazils, shall have announced the intention of terminating such convention, as likewise during the negotiation for a renewal or modification of it.

In witness whereof the undersigned Plenipotentiaries of the

Senates of the Hanseatic republics, of Lubeck, Bremen, and Hamburgh, and of his majesty the emperor of Brazil, in virtue of their respective full powers, have affixed the seal of their arms.

Done at Rio de Janeiro, this 17th day of November, in the year of our Lord 1827.

(L. S.) GILDEMEISTER.
(L. S.) C. SIEVEKING.
(L. S.) Marquez de QUELUZ.
(L. S.) Conde de LAGES.

When we addressed our solemn protest to the Portuguese nation on the 24th of last May,

1st. Against all violation of the hereditary rights of his imperial majesty and those of his august daughter;

2nd. Against the abolition of institutions liberally granted by that monarch, and legally established in Portugal;

3rd. Against the illegal and insidious convocation of the ancient states of that kingdom, which had been abolished by virtue of a long prescription, and by effect of the institutions above alluded to

We then flattered ourselves that the horrible attempt, of which the acts referred to were the sad prelude, would not have been carried into effect.

We had indeed been led to believe, that the menacing attitude assumed by the ministers of foreign courts accredited at Lisbon, together with the efforts made by a part of the brave Portuguese troops, would have arrested the machinations of a perjured and rebellious

faction, and prevented the accomplishment of an usurpation pregnant with mischief, and subversive of the principle of legitimacy, held sacred by all the powers of Europe.

Every noble spirit, to which treason and perjury are obnoxious, conceived the same hopes; but neither the remonstrances of the governments most deeply interested in the prosperity of Portugal, nor the praiseworthy resistance made by the friends of legitimacy, and by all those who reverence religion and respect the sanctity of an oath, could check the fury of that faction, which had resolved, at all hazards, to seal their iniquity by a completion of the usurpation which they had premeditated.

By means of popular tumult, of violent destitutions, of innumerable imprisonments, and of revolting proscriptions ;-by the arts of seduction and undermining;-and, indeed, by the employment of every kind of means, however odious or reprehensible, they rendered access easy to the criminal object

they had in view: and their progress was so rapid, the work of usurpation was speedily effected, in despite of, and to the great injury of, all the potentates of Europe, who had, in a formal manner, fulminated a general anathema against it.

On the 23rd of June last, the assembling of the soi-disant "three estates of the kingdom" was wit nessed at Lisbon; but which, in fact, was nothing more than a meeting of the accomplices of an execrable faction: and when every thing for this scandalous proceeding was ready, having been for a long time previously arranged, it was opened, by the proposition of the following question, to ascertain "If the crown of Portugal ought, on the demise of Don John VI., to have descended to the eldest son, the emperor of Brazils and prince royal of Portugal, or to the youngest son, the Infante Don Miguel.'

On this proposition being submitted, a miserable and insidious discourse was delivered in favour of his highness's rights to the succession, and against those of the emperor our august sovereign, whom it was endeavoured to represent as a foreign prince, and deprived of his rights of primogeniture from the circumstance of his having ascended the throne of Brazils in the life-time of his father.

In this tribunal of injustice and hall of usurpation, no one dared lift up his voice in favour of legitimacy, with which the cause of the emperor of Brazils and king of Portugal is identified.

The honourable duty of defending those rights belonged, as a matter of course, to the Attorneygeneral of the crown; but he was

not called upon to fulfil it, which proves that he ought not to be included in the number of their accomplices.

Unanimity was consequently so complete amongst the conspirators, who assumed to themselves the unbecoming title of "the three estates," that they could have decided the question at once without any adjournment; but the better to impose on the Portuguese nation, and as well on the people of the two hemispheres, they deemed it expedient to defer it; and on the 28th of June, after a few days of mock deliberation, they presented to the head of the illegitimate government established at Lisbon, the result of their contemptible machinations, consisting of their unanimous and criminal votes in favour of that usurpation they had been called together for the purpose of sanctioning, and which was unfortunately consummated in that city on the 1st of July last,-a day, the memory of which will ever be execrated in the annals of Portugal, on account of the disastrous consequences which cannot fail to flow from such a deplorable event.

Disappointed in our expectations, we now find ourselves under the disagreeable, but imperious necessity, of unfolding to the eyes of the whole world, all the perfidy of the acts abovementioned, as well as the fallacies contained in the arguments brought forward against the incontestable and acknowledged rights of our august master the emperor of Brazil, and prince royal of Portugal, to the crown of that kingdom on the death of the king his father.

We very well know (and all publicists confirm it), on the direct and legitimate line of any reigning

family becoming extinct, that in case there should appear amongst the collateral branches several pretenders to the succession of the vacant throne, whose respective pretensions may be doubtful, it belongs to the superior tribunals or authorities of the state to decide so important a national question; and the history of Portugal itself affords two examples: the one on the death of the king Don Ferdinand, and the other at the period when the Portuguese nation, on throwing off the intolerable yoke of Spain, exalted the august House of Braganza to the throne.

But as that question cannot be raised where the succession to a crown is regulated by the right of primogeniture (and such is the case with respect to that of Portugal, as it regards his majesty the emperor of Brazils, the eldest son of his majesty Don John VI., who has besides been recognized, as well by his own father, as by all the powers of Europe, in his quality of prince royal of Portugal, both before and since the partition which was made of the crown of Portugal, by a solemn treaty executed between the two sovereigns), the hereditary rights of our august master could not be rendered doubtful on the demise of the king, his father, nor were they.

Before even this unfortunate event, which occasioned the important succession, was known at Rio de Janeiro, his imperial majesty had been proclaimed king in Portugal, and immediately recognized as such by all the sovereigns and governments of Europe.

Such proclamation, and such recognition, as spontaneous as precise, are of themselves proof so irrefragable and solemn of the legitimacy of the hereditary rights of his ma

jesty the emperor of Brazils to the crown of Portugal, that we should be justified in limiting thereto our opposition to the usurping faction, which has dared to impugn at the same time the unanimous opinion of all the courts of Europe, and that of the majority of the Portuguese nation itself.

But we will not confine ourselves to this allegation, we will go further, and combat the arguments with which this perfidious faction have attempted to attack rights so incontestable.

And 1st. That of an ancient law made by the Cortes of Lamego, of which we transcribe the precise words-viz., "Sit ita in sempiternum, quod prima filia Regis recipiat maritum de Portugale, ut non veniat regnum ad extraneos: et si cubaverit cum principe extraneo, non sit Regina, quia nunquam volumus nostrum Regnum ire fore Portugalibus, qui reges fecerunt sine adjutorio alieno, per suam fortitudinem."

By altering the sense of this law (the existence of which, by the by, is very doubtful, but which we will not now dispute), the usurping faction pretend, that by his accession to the throne of Brazils, his imperial majesty has foregone his quality of a prince of Portugal, and has become in consequence incapacitated from succeeding to the crown of his fore fathers on the death of John VI.

The misapplication of this law is very evident. This law prohibits, it is true, queens of Portu gal to marry foreigners by birth, but it does not prevent Portuguese princes from acquiring other crowns, nor from succeeding to that of Portugal, after having acquired any other sovereignty, and