Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/539

Rh lacked the power, or the inclination—perhaps both—to enforce it to any considerable extent. Nor did they themselves, as a rule, possess the experience or ability to organize troops. They were little better than the raw recruits who swelled their continually broken and dispersed ranks, wherein the wide gaps were filled with the first material that came to hand. Eager for military rank, which depended largely on the number of men enlisted, the value of the force was of less immediate consideration with them; and so the insurgents remained in altogether too great proportions a mere rabble, who did further injury to their cause by reckless disregard for property, even where retaliation or other outrages were uncalled for.

Ramon Rayon's triumph was of short duration, for at Zacapo a third of his small force was taken with fever, and while thus crippled, a royalist body under Landázuri came suddenly upon him on September 19th. He had barely time to post a handful of men with which to occupy the enemy, while the dragoons carried the sick beyond reach, each horseman taking an invalid on his saddle. He thereupon hastened to place the skirmishers in safety, with the royalists close on their heels—so close, indeed, that his brother, the president, with whom he came up, had to save himself by shooting at the pressing horsemen. Fortunately for them they reached the bridge at the hacienda Zpimiéo slightly in advance of the pursuers, and by destroying it the latter were checked. The Rayons now took different directions, Ignacio going to Uruapan, and Ramon leading his reunited force toward lake Cuitzeo, thence to operate along the course of the Lerma. Sotarriba being soon after called away, the energetic