Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/668

652 Teran's persuasion and example, and the renewed pardon issued from Mexico, enabled Llano, commanding the Puebla region, to report by the middle of February that peace was restored throughout the section. This left the royalists free to enter with greater force into Vera Cruz. Armiñan retook Nautla on February 24th, and with it the roadsteads of Palmar and Barra Nueva, after which he overran the adjoining districts northward, and succeeded within a short time in restoring order throughout nearly all of Huasteca, whereof he had been made comandante general. Donallo continued his work southward by driving Victoria from Misantla, and clearing the whole district as far as the Vera Cruz road. Below this Colonel Ruiz expelled Couto from the fortress Maltrata, whence he had been raiding the neighborhood of Orizaba. Hevia followed up the success in February by taking Huatusco and the bridges Atoyac and Chiquihuite, while his subordinates cut short the career of Calzada, and crowned the campaign with the capture of the strong barranca fortress of Palmillas, the last refuge of Couto, who became a prisoner. Applications for pardon had meanwhile been flowing in from every quarter, and before the close of the spring a few fugitive bands, one of them headed by Victoria, were all that remained of the lately imposing insurgent forces along the gulf coast.