Gazette Of The United States, & Philadelphia Daily Advertiser

Anecdote of the present Queen of Portugal.

The present queen of Portugal, in common with her countrymen, entertained a strong predilection for the English nation. The protection they received from England in the last war with Spain, and the generous assistance of the British parliament at the time of the great earthquake, were held in grateful remembrance by every Portuguese.

Previous to the queen's accession to the throne, she had evinced a tendency to that religious frenzy and despondency with which she is now so heavily afflicted; and as soon as she had possessed herself of the reins of government, to shew her affection for the English nation, she issued an ordinance, that every Englishman who would embrace the doctrines of the church of Rome should receive a reward, amounting in currency to about four pounds, and a new suit of clothes; her success more than equalled her expectations, not a British vessel entered the Tagus but the men were one and all converted to as good catholics as money and clothes could make them, and as for the crews of the packets, they received the queen's bounty money (as they termed it) five or six times over, as they constantly complained on every return from Falmouth, of the strong assaults their relatives and friends had made upon their newly adopted tenets: the queen at length discovered that the pious work she had begun could not be accomplished, even if the whole riches of the Brazils had been put in requisition, and the ordinance was revoked, to the great dissatisfaction and chagrin of the British tars.

Morn. Chron.