Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/312

296 the performance of that ceremony to an army chaplain. Like Hidalgo, he has been charged with cruelty; but reiterated accusations of this kind seem silly as brought against one who makes it his business to kill and damage his fellow-creatures for the time as much as possible. The difference drawn between the kind man-killer and the cruel one is little else than conventional subterfuge. Here in particular it was the exterminating system of warfare pursued which imposed upon revolutionary leaders severity and a rigorous system of death-sentences. The devotion of Morelos to the cause was unbounded, and his firmness of soul held him to whatsoever course his judgment marked out as the best. He was thoroughly consistent; for the attainment of independence he spared neither himself nor his enemies. Serene withal and impassive, alike in prosperity and disaster, he neither gave way to arrogant self-assertion nor yielded to dejection. But conspicuous among all his great qualities was his perfect disinterestedness. No personal motive influenced him in his valiant struggle for liberty. His own aggrandizement was what he least thought of. To decorations and titles earned by his victories he was wholly indifferent; he preferred the simple appellation of 'Servant of the Nation.'

When Hidalgo moved toward Valladolid after his capture of Guanajuato, Morelos, whom the news of the insurrection had already reached, hastened thither to learn what it all really meant. Hidalgo, however, had left the city; Morelos followed the army toward the capital, and overtook Hidalgo at the town of Charo. Thence he accompanied him to Indaparapeo.