Page:The History of San Martin (1893).djvu/260

 CHAPTER XXVI.

THE EXPEDITION TO PERU.

1820.

Valparaiso, on the 22nd July, 1820, when on the eve of sailing on his daring enterprise, San Martin addressed a proclamation to his fellow-countrymen in justification of his refusal to enter into their civil discords, showing how the intervention of his army could only have added to their miseries, prophesying that when tired of anarchy they would seek refuge in oppression, and concluding:— "Whatever be my lot in the campaign of Peru, I shall prove that ever since I returned to my native land her independence has occupied my every thought, and that I have never had other ambition than to merit the hatred of the ungrateful and the esteem of the virtuous."

Later on he wrote to the Cabildo of Buenos Ayres, announcing the departure of the expedition, and declaring that:— "From the moment a central authority is established the Army of the Andes will hold itself subject to its orders."

The expedition took the name of "The Liberating Army of Peru." It consisted of six battalions of infantry and two regiments of cavalry, in all 4,430 officers and men, of which more than half belonged to the Army of the Andes, with thirty-one guns, two howitzers, and two mortars,