Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/399

Rh the ever faithful Tlascala, and even this city was seriously threatened. Communication was so much interrupted that for several months Mexico knew not what occurred in Jalapa and Vera Cruz. Nevertheless, Rosains and his party had no faith in their ability to withstand an attack from the royalists at Puebla; and upon news of danger reaching them, the priest José Rafael Tarelo, who had prevailed on Rosains to join the revolution, wrote to Bishop Campillo that he and his companions would accept the royal amnesty if they were not required to perform humiliating acts. The bishop returned a letter of acceptance, and Tarelo with another priest, Amador, began their preparations, when, the affair reaching Rosains, he had the latter arrested and summoned a meeting, before which he laid the bishop's letter and signified his intention, now more confirmed than ever, of fighting for the national independence. On the same day came Rafael Argüelles, a lawyer from Orizaba, commissioned by a meeting called a few days before by the curate Montezuma, at Zongolica, to arrange coöperation with Rosains and Osorno. Tarelo's negotiations with Bishop Campillo caused much trouble, and almost brought about the destruction of himself, Rosains, Argüelles, and others.

During the same period revolution raged in the provinces of its birth, left scantily garrisoned when Calleja abandoned Guanajuato. The chief towns were fortified, but had no available troops for distant