Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/649

Rh and North Mexico, to act till a regularly elected congress might be installed. Victoria and Osorno took no notice of the project, and so it was abandoned, nor did the dissolved assembly attempt to form anew. With it vanished the representative government started by Hidalgo's followers and reorganized by Morelos, leaving the insurgents adrift, at least for a while, and giving the royalists greater reason for treating them as rebels and bandits; yet this applied rather to the east, for in the home of the original junta rose another to influence the destinies of the cause.

Rid of the burdensome assembly, and with forces swelled to nearly fifteen hundred men from its late escort and other sources, Teran felt himself strong enough to take the offensive against the royalists, and so break in upon the plans forming against him. He succeeded, in fact, in giving so effectual a check to a column under Barradas, which was advancing against Tepeji, that it had to abandon the expedition. As a further measure, he sought to strengthen his