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To crown the whole, an insurrection was daily expected at Madrid, to prevent which the nationals were disarmed, which measure tended greatly to increase their hatred against the moderado government, and especially against Quesada, with whom it was supposed to have originated.
It was a charge, however, universally believed in Spain, and was even preferred in print by a certain journal, the official organ of the silly Duke of Frias, one of the many prime ministers of the moderado party who followed each other in rapid succession towards the latter period of the Carlist and Christino struggle.
"What has become of the moderado government?" said I to Baltasar, whom I suddenly observed amongst the crowd, dressed as when I had first seen him, in his old regimental great coat and foraging cap; "have the ministers been deposed and others put in their place?"
In reward for this exploit he was persecuted by the government, which, at that time, was the moderado or juste milieu, with the most relentless animosity; the prime minister, Ofalia, supporting with all his influence numerous and ridiculous accusations of plunder and robbery brought against the too- successful general by the Carlist canons of Toledo.
It is probable, indeed, that had the chiefs of the moderado party but continued true to themselves for forty- eight hours longer, their cause would have triumphed, and the revolutionary soldiers at the Granja would have been glad to restore the Queen Regent to liberty, and to have come to terms, as it was well known that several regiments, who still continued loyal, were marching upon Madrid.
These were the heads of the moderado government, but as they were by no means popular at Madrid, and feared the nationals, they associated with themselves one who hated the latter body and feared nothing, a man of the name of Quesada, a very stupid individual, but a great fighter, who, at one period of his life, had commanded a legion or body of men called the Army of the Faith, whose exploits both on the French and Spanish side of the Pyrenees are too well known to require recapitulation.
Liberalism had been routed and a Moderado Cabinet, under the leadership of Count Ofalia, ruled the city and such part of the country as was sufficiently complaisant as to permit itself to be ruled. As the Moderados represented the Court faction, Borrow saw that he had little to expect from them.
He was, moreover, a fluent, elegant, and forcible speaker, and was to the moderado party within the cortes what Quesada was without, namely, their horses and chariots.
I forthwith paid a visit to Sir George Villiers, informing him of what had occurred. He promised to do all he could to cause the prohibition to be withdrawn. Unfortunately at this time he had not much influence, having opposed with all his might the entrance of the moderado ministry to power, and the nomination of Ofalia to the presidency of the cabinet.
In this unfortunate state of affairs, the most influential of the Moderado party, with the hope of preventing anarchy, then greatly threatened, if it had not already raised its head, and conclude terms of peace, prevailed upon Peña y Peña, an able and enlightened jurist, statesman, and patriot, and senior judge of the Supreme Court, to assume the provisional presidency.
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