Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/239

Rh Republicans already, had the city, practically, in their power; the City of Mexico was certain to fall, for it could not be defended long by the forces within it. There was no point on the continent from which succor could possibly come. It is a fact against him, that he was not imprisoned, for a time, like his brother officers; but may not that be explained on the hypothesis, that although detested (as were all those who had gone over to the Empire,) by the Republicans, they still felt that he was entitled to some consideration for having stopped the effusion of blood, when the proper time arrived, and it was just and proper that he should do so. Strict military disciplinarians might urge that his duty was to have died at his post; not to presume to judge of the exigencies of a situation when his superior officer was in command, and on the ground; but civilians will ask, to what good would such self-sacrifice conduce, and it will be hard to answer. I do not propose to offer an apology for a man whose former life had been regarded infamous by his most intimate acquaintances; but something is due to the truth of history; and it really seems to me, from all the evidence which I gathered at the time, and that which I found on the spot, that Maximilian was not betrayed by Lopez; and that he (Maximilian), on the other hand, did, on the night of the 14th of May, offer to abandon his companions to their fate, and escape, personally, to the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and from thence to Europe, is beyond a doubt.

We found the room occupied by Maximilian at Las Cruces, unroofed, and filled with rubbish, from a pile of which, small trees had grown up; from one of them, as much as twelve feet in height, I plucked a handful