Page:History of the War between the United States and Mexico.djvu/54

42 on the part of Mexico. 0n the 23rd of August, 1843, Mr. de Bocanegra, the Mexican Minister of Foreign Relations, ofﬁcially informed Mr. Waddy Thompson, the American Minister in Mexico, that "the Mexican government [would] consider equivalent to a declaration of war against the Mexican Republic, the passage of an act for the incorporation of Texas with the territory of the United States; the certainty of the fact being sufficient for the immediate proclamation of war, leaving to the civilized world to determine with regard to the justice of the cause of the Mexican nation, in a struggle which it [had] been so far from provoking." The tone of a portion of the note of Mr. de Bocanegra was harsh and dictatorial, and received a sharp reproof from Mr. Thompson. A second note was written by the former, in September, which was more subdued in its character, and assured the American Envoy, that Mexico did not threaten, still less provoke or excite; but that she would "regard the annexation of Texas to the United States as a hostile act." The same Mexican ofﬁcial, however, addressed a circular letter to the European ministers resident in Mexico, on the 31st of May, 1844, in which he pronounced the treaty of annexation, absolutely, "a declaration of war between the two nations."

The Mexican Minister at Washington, General Almonte, wrote a note to Mr. Upshur, on the 3rd of November, 1843, protesting, in the name of his government, against the annexation, and declaring that, "on sanction been given by the Executive of the Union to the incorporation of Texas into the United States, he [would] consider his mission ended, seeing that, as the Secretary of State [would] have learned, the Mexican