Page:Mexico as it was and as it is.djvu/19

xiv Nearly four years ago, I took occasion, in a private interview with a distinguished statesman then in power, to indicate the probable disruption of the soi-disant Republic, of which this seems to be the premonitory symptom. The people of the Mexican Provinces will no longer consent to be the prey of the central chiefs, who make a Paris of the city of Mexico, and control the nation when they hold the key of the capital. Distracted, dissatisfied, divided, fragmentary, each one will, perhaps, set up for itself—Zacetecas, Durango, Coahuila, California, and the rest, going off in separate discontent and establishing themselves as petty principalities. Each of these, in the course of a few years, will grow into little Mexicos. The concentrated venom of the whole Republic will be diffused in weakened virus among the lopped members. Every clipped head of the original hydra will sprout into mimic serpenthood, and, although the hiss of the rattlesnake may not be as dangerous as the fang of the monster, yet the ultimate task of the Eagle, in controlling the dangerous brood, will be infinitely multiplied.

I beg leave in writing thus of Mexican matters to be distinctly understood as not encouraging the conquest of that country or endeavouring to cherish the war and plunder spirit that would eagerly prey on the fair domain of the invaded Republic. No such idea is seriously mine for a moment; but it is time that Mexico should be aroused to a sense of her own position, and it is still more important to have her future policy distinctly defined in relation to the affairs of this Continent and Europe.

It has recently been asserted by an American writer that the Province of Rio de la Plata has been decimated during the administration of the celebrated Rosas, and the allegation is enforced by an extract from the "Tables of Blood," of which the following resumé is given by Don José Rivera Indarte

"During the frightful massacres of October, 1840, and April, 1842, the heads of well known citizens were paraded through the streets in carts, accompanied by indecent music and followed by the cries of who'll buy peaches? Who'll buy oranges? The bodies of other victims were exposed, naked, in the public market place, the severed heads adorned with blue ribbons—labeled, Beef with the hide on—Carne con cuero! One of the ornaments of the drawing-room of Rosas, which has been seen again and again by foreigners visiting at his house, is a glass case