Page:The rise and fall of the Emperor Maximilian.djvu/265

Rh the requisite steps that all parties should combine in an arrangement on this basis.

Consequently, Mexicans, reckoning upon all of you, without excluding any shade of politics, I shall endeavour to follow out with courage and constancy the work of regeneration which you have confided to your fellow countryman,

Two days after, the president of the council announced in the emperor's name, to the French authorities, that Maximilian had resolved for the future to depend only on his own forces. Nevertheless, it was settled that the expeditionary corps was to continue its protection to the monarchy during its stay in Mexico, now limited to the spring of 1867, and that it should defend all the points which it occupied, without undertaking any distant expeditions.

2em The undersigned being appointed by the Emperor Maximilian to settle the measures which are rendered necessary by the mission of General Castelnau, a mission which the latter states he is fulfilling in conjunction with the Minister Plenipotentiary Dano and Marshal Bazaine, we now have the honour of acquainting you that, having communicated to his majesty the note of the 7th of last month, which was signed by Marshal Bazaine and General Castelnau, in reply to that which we had the honour of sending them on the 4th of the same month, his majesty, after long and serious consideration, by the advice of his ministers and of his council of state, has decided that, relying upon the authority conferred upon him by the nation, he will prolong and maintain his government with the resources of the country only; since the Emperor of the French has declared that it is no longer possible for him to support the empire either with his troops or his money, and perseveres in the resolution which he formed to withdraw the former in the beginning of 1867.