Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/448

432 best excuse and secure him both forgiveness for the past and his country's gratitude. Still, he had but little hope that the father or son, or other insubordinates, could be brought to accept proper discipline.

As Rayon was anxious to procure resources for sustaining his troops, and the merchants in Mexico being on the other hand interested in obtaining a free passage for their merchandise, relations were opened between some of the most prominent and the president. The latter wrote Morelos manifesting his wish that the rich cargo of the China ship lying at Acapulco should be permitted a pass into the interior, as the merchants needed the goods and were willing to pay quite a respectable sum of money. He also consulted the officer who was besieging that town by land on the propriety of acceding to their proposal. Morelos answered in the negative, and the Rey Fernando then went to San Blas where she landed her cargo. Rayon made an arrangement with the marqués de San Miguel de Aguayo, commanding a royalist battalion in Mexico, and whose son, the conde de San Pedro del Álamo, was serving at Valladolid under Trujillo, by which the marqués was allowed to pass into Mexico a large flock of sheep upon paying $20,000, part in clothing and arms for the independent troops and the rest in specie.

Venegas, it has been said, either to render Rayon suspicious in the eyes of his troops or to divert his attention from military operations, or from some other motive, manifested a disposition to enter into negotiations with him. To this effect instructions were given, under solemn guarantees, to a lawyer