3-053-764 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Señor Castelar, the new president of the Spanish Cortes, 1873. Engraving from a photograph by M. J. Laurent. 'Emilio Castelar...is a journalist and orator of some rhetorical power, but not much of a practical statesman...For a time he was Professor of History and Philosophy in the University of Madrid; but in 1866, having taken an active part in the revolutionary movement which was put down by Marshal Serrano, he was prosecuted by the Government of Queen Isabella and was condemned to death; he had contrived, however, to escape from the country, taking refuge first in Geneva and afterwards in France. When the throne of Queen Isabella was overturned, in September, 1868, Castelar returned to Spain, and became one of the most uncompromising champions of a Republic...The fall of the monarchy as represented by an Italian Prince has given Senor Castelar a fresh opportunity of trying the experiment of a Spanish Republic. But, what with the Communists or Red Republican faction in the south, and what with the Carlists in the north of Spain, it appears as though it were no easy task to establish an orderly Commonwealth based on popular suffrage in that country'. From "Illustrated London News", 1873.