Page:The History of San Martin (1893).djvu/120

90 were without experience, without plans, and had no fixed ideas; most of them desired only peace and security for their properties. The minority had clearer views; they aimed at raising their leader to the head of the State, and at independence.

On the 27th July an English ship of war reached Valparaiso, whose captain was commissioned by the Viceroy of Peru, with credentials from the Regency of Spain, to receive the subsidy which Chile was expected to contribute for the maintenance of the war in the Peninsula. One million six hundred thousand dollars had been deposited in the treasury for this purpose. The Moderates and the Royalists were for paying the amount at once, but O'Higgins, speaking for the Liberals, said:—

"Although we are in a minority we shall know how to supply that defect by our energy and our courage; we are sufficient to oppose effectually the delivery of this money, of which our country threatened with invasion has need." This bold protest decided the question in the negative.

The Liberals afterwards proposed the appointment of an Executive of three; one for each of the three territorial divisions of the country, the North, the South, and the Centre. The Moderates accepted the idea but put off the election. The Liberals then attempted to intimidate Congress by popular tumults, sadly compromising their leader by these sinister manoeuvres. Congress showed more firmness than could have been expected from its composition, and the defeated minority seceded from the Assembly. The majority then named three of their own party as the Junta, and Rozas, looking upon his cause as lost, retired to Concepcion, where he was received in triumph, and set up an opposition Junta, the South recalling its members from Congress.

Congress then drew up a constitution, so unworkable that it only served to show their utter lack of all political knowledge. It never came into operation.