Page:Notes of the Mexican war 1846-47-48.djvu/510

504 form of an appeal, against his commander, insult and outrage him to the greatest extent, though he be the General-in-Chief and charged with the conduct of the most critical operations, and that commander may not arrest the incipient mutineer until he shall have first laid down his own authority and submitted himself to a trial, or wait at least until a distant period of leisure for a judicial examination of the appeal. And this is precisely the case under consideration. The department, in its eagerness to condemn me, could not take time to learn of the experienced that the General-in-Chief, who once submits to an outrage from a junior, must lay his account to suffer the like from all the vicious under him at least, down to a rank that may be supposed without influence in high quarters beyond the army. But this would not be the whole mischief to the public service. Even the great mass of the spirited, intelligent and well affected among his brothers in arms would soon reduce such a commander to utter imbecility, by holding him in just scorn and contempt for his recreancy to himself and country. And are discipline and efficiency of no value in the field?

But it was not my request of June 4th, nor report No. 30, (of July 25th,) so largely quoted from above, nor yet the appeal of one pronunciado, that has at length brought down upon me this visitation, so clearly predicted. That appeal, no doubt, had its merits. Considering it came from an erratic brother—a deserter from the other extreme—who, having just made his peace with the true faith, was bound to signalize apostacy by acceptable denunciations of one for whom up to Vera Cruz he had professed (and not without cause) the highest obligations. It was there he learned from me that I was doomed at Washington, and straightway the apostate began to seek through a quarrel the means of turning that knowledge to his own benefit. No, there was (recently) still another element associated in the work, kept as far as practicable out of the letter of recall. Influence proceeding from the other arrested general, who is quite willing that it should generally