but rather to put down the lawless bands by which the country

was infested.

Towards October, in the same year, 1818, a safe conduct was offered to me for my father and family; and it was also pledged that his estates, as well as my own, should be exempted from plunder and destruction, and likewise that the servants and others employed on them should be free from assassination, (and what was the spirit of those times may be judged from this single fact !) on the sole condition of my withdrawing from the King's banners, and remaining neutral. This proposal met with the same reception as the preceding one. I always considered the indolent and cowardly man as guilty of a crime, who remains a quiet spectator of the misfortunes with which society is afflicted, without taking part in them, or endeavoring to alleviate the sufferings of his countrymen. I, therefore, went forth to the campaign, under a hope that I was about to serve the Mexicans, the King of Spain, and the Spaniards.

I was uniformly successful in war. Victory was the inseparable companion of the troops I commanded-nay, I never lost an action. I defeated all the enemies who appeared before me, or

The congress of Mexico deliberated on erecting statues to the memory of the leaders of the insurrection, and performing funeral obsequies to their ashes. Against these very same leaders did I myself serve, and would do so again, if we were to return to those times. In order that it may be ascertained who was in the right, the congress or myself, it must not be forgotten, that the term insurrection does not signify independence, or just freedom; nor was it the object of those revolutionists to vindicate the rights of the nation; but rather to exterminate every European, destroy property, rush into excesses, contemn the laws of war, of humanity, and even of religion. The belligerent parties then carried on a war of extermination, and disorders preceded the operations of both Americans and Europeans; but, it must be confessed, that the former were culpable, not only on account of the evils which they occasioned, but because they gave room to the second to practice the same atrocities which they saw in their enemies. If such men as these deserved statues, what is there held in reserve for men who do not deviate from the path of virtue?

This proposal, made to me by the leaders of the first insurrection, is well known to the Mexicans. I was at the time, at the San Felipe manufactories, commanding a detachment of thirty-six soldiers, and at four leagues' distance from me, was Hidalgo's main force, amounting to 90,000 men. I expected no aid; and I should have died on the spot, if I had not received orders from the government to which I belonged to proceed to Toluca, rather than contribute to the ruin of my country.

3 I was only repulsed, and compelled to fall back in the year 1815, when I attacked Copero, an almost inaccessible and well-fortified military posi tion. I was then serving under the orders of the Spanish general, Llanos, who commanded me to attack, when my duty did not allow me to point out the difficulties of such an enterprise. I was well aware that the issue must necessarily be unsuccessful, and, whilst on my march, I mentioned

those I was able to find, often with inferior forces, in the proportion of one to eighteen and even twenty. I commanded in chief the sieges of fortified points; and from all I dislodged the enemy, and destroyed the asylums in which discord had taken refuge. I had no other adversaries than those who were opposed to the cause which I myself defended; nor did I know any rivals beyond those who, at a more remote period, were envious of my good luck, or not equally successful when running the same race: yet, when were either wanting to the fortunate?

In the year 1816, I commanded the provinces of Guanajuato and Valladolid, as well as the army of the North. All I renounced, through motives of delicacy; thus retiring from the public service, in order to live in a manner more suited to my natural inclinations, by attending to the cultivation of my estates. The ingratitude of man had wounded me to the very quick; and the bad faith which I had already experienced, led me to avoid all further opportunities of again becoming the victim of malevolence. On the other hand, the greatest number of the factious bands being then dispersed, and nearly all the provinces restored to a state of tranquillity, I saw myself freed from those engagements by which, six years before, I was bound. The country no longer required my services, and I was consequently enabled to seek repose, after the fatigues of the past campaigns, without being wanting to my duty.

In 1820, the Constitution of Spain was re-established. This new order of things; the state of fermentation in which the Peninsula was placed; the machinations of the disaffected; the want of moderation in the promoters of the new system; the indecision of the local authorities; the inconsiderate conduct of the Madrid government, and the madness of the Cortes, who appeared determined to lose the Mexican dominions, if one can judge from the decrees which they issued, in accordance with the ranting speeches pronounced by some of the deputies, were all causes which materially tended to excite in a people, again possessed of a country, an eagerness for independence; whilst the Spaniards, established among us, were terrified at the idea of a repetition of those horrid scenes of insubordination which they had already witnessed. Our governors soon assumed the attitude of men actuated by dread, yet still wielding power; at the same time that those who had hitherto lived on disorders, were preparing to continue their old pursuits. In such a state of things, the

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the same to the general, through the medium of a dispatch. Things turned out as I expected; nevertheless, I saved four-fifths of my force, in an action in which the chances of losing the whole were against me.

on the

fairest and richest portion of Northern America, was again eve of being rent asunder by factions. In every direction clandestine meetings were held, in which the system of government, most expedient to be adopted, became the subject of anxious deliberation. Of the Europeans, and those devoted to them, some labored to consolidate the constitution of Spain, which, badly obeyed and egregiously mutilated, already evinced symptoms of a rapid decline; whilst others were disposed that it should undergo a reform, as in the shape in which it had been enacted by the Spanish Cortes, it was evidently unadapted to the situation of the Mexican provinces. Many again sighed for the return of an absolute government, as being the best support of the offices which they despotically held, as well as of fortunes amassed by means of monopolies. The privileged and wealthy classes encouraged these parties, inclining to one or the other, according to their mental acquirements, and the projects of greater or lesser utility which their imaginations represented to them. The Americans, as a body, certainly wished independence; but they were not agreed as to the manner in which it was to be attained, or the form of government that was afterwards to be adopted. As regarded the first point, the Americans were of opinion that, before any thing else was done, the Europeans ought to be exterminated, and their property confiscated. The least sanguinary were satisfied with driving them out of the country, thus leaving numberless families in an orphan state. Some, more moderate than the rest, were willing to exclude them from all the public offices; by this means reducing them to the same state as that in which, for three centu ries, they themselves had kept the native inhabitants. Other subdivisions of the same parties still existed. Many wished an absolute monarchy-others, a moderate one, with the Spanish constitution as its basis: some, with a new code; whilst, at the same time, there were strenuous partisans for a federate, and others for a central republic, &c. &c. Each system had its zealous adherents, and all equally labored to realise their favorite and.. respective schemes.

I had friends in the principal towns, persons either attached of old to my family, or with whom I had become acquainted in my.. various journeys, and during the time I held command. I relied also on the love of the troops. All hastened to send me informasi tion of what was passing. Through the best provinces I had myself travelled, and formed correct ideas of their capabilities, as well as of the character of the inhabitants. I knew the points susceptible of fortification, and the resources on which I could rely. Numerous revolutions were then on the eve of breaking out, and my country was again about to be inundated with blood. I thought

myself capable of saving it, and a second time I hastened to comply with a duty so sacred..

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I formed my project, known by the name of the Iguala-plan, clearly my own, because I alone conceived it. I penned, publishe ed, and executed it.' I proposed to render my country independent, because this was the general wish of the Americans; a wish founded on a natural feeling, as well as on the principles of justice, and at the time considered as the only means to promote the prosperity of both nations. The Spaniards, however, would never be convinced that their own decline commenced, from the period in which they became possessed of their colonies in the New World; although the colonists were so far in advance as to besensible that the time for their emancipation had arrived. If, on these two points, there should be any doubt, let politicians decide I have not undertaken to write dissertations on them.

The Iguala-plan guaranteed the religion which we inherited from our ancestors. To the reigning family of Spain, it also: proposed the only means of still retaining the extensive and valuable provinces of Mexico. To the Mexicans, it secured thes power of making laws for themselves, and of having, within their own territory, a government of their own; whilst, on the other! hand, to the Spaniards it held out an asylum which they would not have disregarded, if they had been provident and understood their real interests. It provided for the rights of equality, and became a safeguard to property and freedom-requisites in the public estimation so essential, that every one who had once felt the contrast would not fail to do his utmost to preserve the benefits acquired. In a word, the Iguala-plan destroyed the horrid dif ference between the castes, and besides offered to foreigners the. most secure and convenient hospitality. It left the road open for merit to advance and possess; it reconciled opinions, as long as

A pamphleteer has asserted that it was the work of an assembly of serviles, who held their meetings in the Profesa, an edifice belonging to the congregation of St. Philip in Mexico. Any one who has read the plan, from its purport alone, will readily be convinced that it could not have been dictated by servilism. It matters not what were the private opinions of › those to whom the plan in question is attributed. These are subjects in which the public are often mistaken. In my estimation, the persons named by the pamphleteer are men respectable for their virtues and learning. This Memoir will reach them; and I almost feel afraid of calling it

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own, because I have too much delicacy to expose myself to them chance of being again belied. After forming the plan, which was called... the Iguala-plan, I consulted it with those persons best versed in the several points to which it referred, and there was not one who did not express his approbation. It afterwards received no modifications, diminutions, ori additions. Locid duiw antabat h

they were founded on reason, and above all, it opposed an impenetrable barrier to the machinations of the turbulent. 11

The execution of this plan was attended with all the happy consequences which I had fondly anticipated. Six months sufficed to loosen the knot which had hitherto bound the New and Old World together. Without bloodshed, conflagrations, robberies, or depredations-nay, without even a misfortune, a single sigh or a tear, my country was rendered happy, and, from a colony, transformed into a great and independent empire. One circumstance alone was wanting to crown the whole work, and render it conformable to the usages admitted among nations; and this was, a treaty which diplomatists might add to the long list with which they have already filled their protocols, records which usually serve as a proof of the bad faith of men, since they are too often broken, when there is no interest or inducement to insure their observance on the part of him who has the power in his own hands: nevertheless, it is well not to deviate from established practice. On the 24th of August, I had an interview, in the town of Cordova, with the worthy Spanish general, Don Juan O'Donoju; when, on the same day was concluded, the treaty bearing the name of the place in which it was signed, and all the necessary formalities being ended, it was immediately forwarded to Ferdinand VIL by one of the officers belonging to General O'Donoju's suite.

The treaty of Cordova opened to me the gates of the capital.

All the Europeans, desirous of following the fate of the country, retained the situations they held, and were successively promoted to those to which they were entitled by their services. Subsequently, they were called to occupy the highest places, and to discharge the most important commissions. In the congress, in the council of state, in the departments of government, in the army, and at the head of the provinces, were to be found Spaniards, in no small number, and there were some also by my side when I occupied the throne. Those who did not wish to become citizens of Mexico, were at full liberty to depart, with their families and property, to whatever place they might deem most expedient. The public functionaries, who wished to withdraw, received a fourth of their pay, to meet the expenses of their voyage; the military had their conveyance defrayed as far as Havannah; and this was the case even with those of them, who, after the government was established, and their word pledged not to oppose it, attempted to overturn it, and were defeated and disconcerted. This generosity, on my part, possibly gave rise to the belief that I was acting in concert with the troops sent over from Spain; but, if there had been any truth in this, their officers themselves would have declared it, even if it had been for no other reason than to throw the blame on me of a crime which dishonored them, and exposed them to the mortification of being beaten, disarmed, arrested and tried. The result of the trials could not fail to be fatal to them; nevertheless, they were pardoned, and there was not a single Spaniard ill-treated, as long as the war of independence was directed by myself. Colonel Coucha's death was the result of a private duel.