Page:The History of San Martin (1893).djvu/300

 CHAPTER XXXII.

PERU INDEPENDENT.

1821.

the 6th July, 1821, the Patriots entered Lima; on the 24th June was fought the battle of Carabobo, the Waterloo of the Royalists of Columbia. San Martin's plan of a continental campaign was on the point of realization; he from the south, and Bolívar from the north, converged to a common centre. The only troops which now upheld the standard of the King, were those which still held the Highlands of Peru, the province of Quito, and one isolated fortress, soon about to surrender. On the ocean, only three vessels, the remnant of the naval power of Spain, crushed by Cochrane on the Pacific, wandered to and fro like phantom ships. The definitive triumph was but a question of time. Never before was plan on so vast a scale carried out with such mathematical precision—a plan, nevertheless, sketched out in accordance with the designs of inevitable fate.

As was said by the first captain of the age and as was recorded by an American thinker, "All the great captains who have undertaken great emprises have carried them out in conformity with the rules of art, adapting the force employed to the obstacle to be overcome, knowing that events are not the work of chance, but obey those laws which rule the destinies of men."

When the two liberators of South America violated these laws, one straying from the path, the other blinded