Chapter III: Part 3

Morelos then wrote to the viceroy, Vanegas, offering the surrender of eight hundred prisoners, mostly Spanish, as the price of Leonardo Bravo’s life. The viceroyal government, in turn, refused this proposition and on September 13, 1812, General Bravo and his fellow prisoners, Piedras and Pérez, suffered, in Mexico, the penalty of the garrote, the former displaying, in his last moments, that calm and valor, of which he had given so many proofs in battle. In communicating this sad news to Nicolás Bravo, Morelos ordered him to put all the Spanish prisoners he held--some three hundred in number--to the knife. Let us hear the hero himself narrate his noble action, with the simplicity of one of Plutarch’s characters:

“In effect, he said to me in the proposition made to me in Cuernavaca, that the Viceroy Vanegas offered me amnesty and the life of my father, if I would yield myself.... When Morelos was in Tehuacan he appointed me General-in-chief of the forces, which were operating in the province of Vera Cruz.... I commenced to fight him (Labaqui) and, after an action lasting forty-eight hours, gained a complete victory, making two hundred prisoners, whom I sent under escort to the province of Vera Cruz, and returned with all my wounded to Tehuacan to give account of the action of arms confided to me. In the interview which I had with Morelos, he told me that he was about to send a communication to the viceroy, Vanegas, offering him, for my father’s life, eight hundred Spanish prisoners, and that he would inform me of the result. I immediately returned to the Province of Vera Cruz, where, five days after leaving Tehuacan, I had another favorable action near Puente Nacional, attacking a convoy, which was proceeding to Jalapa with supplies; I took ninety prisoners and betook myself to Medellin, where I established my headquarters and from where I threatened the city of Vera Cruz, with the three thousand men who were under my command. After a few days Morelos notified me that the proposition which he had made to the viceroy had not been accepted and that he (the viceroy) had, on the contrary, commanded that my father be put to the garrote and that he was already dead; he commanded me at the same time to order that all the Spanish prisoners in my power be put to the knife, and informed me that he had ordered the same to be done with the four hundred, who were in Zacatula and other points; I received this notice at four in the afternoon and it moved me so much that I commanded the nearly three hundred that I had at Medellin to prepare for death and ordered the chaplain (a monk named Sotomayor) to aid them; but during the night, not being able to sleep, I reflected, that the reprisals I was about to practice would greatly diminish the credit of the cause which I defended, and that by adopting a conduct contrary to the viceroy’s I would secure better results, an idea which pleased me far more than my first resolution; then there presented itself the difficulty of palliating my disobedience to the order I had received, if I carried my resolve into effect; with these thoughts, I occupied myself the whole night until four o’clock in the morning, when I resolved to pardon them in a public manner, which should produce the desired effects in favor of the cause of independence; with this end in view, I withheld my decision until eight in the morning, when I ordered my troops to draw up in the form usual in cases of execution; the prisoners were brought out and placed in the centre, where I informed them that the viceroy, Vanegas, had exposed them to death that day, in not having accepted the proposition made in their favor for the life of my father, whom he had given to the garrote in the Capital; that I, not caring to parallel such conduct, had determined, not only to spare their lives for the moment, but to give them entire freedom to go where they pleased. To this, filled with joy they replied, that no one desired to leave, that all remained at the service of my division, which they did, with the exception of five merchants of Vera Cruz, who on account of business interests were given passports for that city; among these was a Senor Madariaga who, afterward, in union with his companions, sent me, in appreciation, the gift of sufficient cloth to make clothing for a full battalion.”

Never, in past times nor in modern ages, could history record in its pages so noble an action; and never has human magnanimity expressed its lofty deeds with more sublime simplicity than that of the Mexican hero in the document, which we have just copied. In the midst of that war of extermination, Bravo displays the noble sentiment of forgiveness as a supreme protest of humanity whose laws were being disregarded and trampled under foot; he condemns the barbarous system of reprisals; he teaches the conquerors, who immolated without exception so many prisoners as fell into their hands, to respect the life of the conquered; in contrast to Venegas, Calleja, Cruz (Alaman’s hero), Trujillo, Llano, Porlier, Castillo Bustamente, and so many others, stained with Mexican blood and thirsting for vengeance, he presents the spotless figure of the patriot giving life and liberty to the prisoners in his power; and, he does this when he knows that his noble father, after a prolonged captivity, has succumbed under a punishment reserved for thieves and assassins; and he forgives, when his feared and respected leader orders him to punish. He restrains his great grief and in the reflections to which he yields himself, on the receipt of that order, he does not think of the blood of his father, yet warm; he thinks only of his country’s interests, _he believes that the reprisals which he is ordered to practice will greatly diminish the credit of the cause of independence and that, by observing a conduct contrary to that of the viceroy, he would secure better results_; he encounters but the one difficulty _that he cannot palliate his responsibility in disobeying the order which he has received_; and, after meditating all night, he resolves to pardon the prisoners _in a public manner, in order that the pardon may secure all the good results desirable in favor of the cause of independence_. Bravo, on that day, conquered, for his country, titles of universal respect and rehabilitated human dignity in that period of unbridled cruelty.

JOSÉ MARÍA VIGIL.

José María Vigil was born October 11, 1829, at Guadalajara. Early left an orphan, during the period of his education he was in straitened circumstances. He attended the seminario in Guadalajara and studied law in the university of that city, but failed to secure his degree, on account of his Liberal views. He began literary work in 1849, and in 1851 his drama, _Dolores ó una pasion_ (Dolores, or a passion), was well received at the _Teatro Principal_, at Guadalajara. In 1857 he published a collection of his poems, under the title _Realidades y Quimeras_ (Realities and Chimeras). In 1866 he published two volumes of verse and drama--_Flores de Anahuac_ (Flowers of Anahuac). These writings were varied in style, and included original compositions and translations from Latin, French, English, Portuguese, Italian, and German. Through this period, Vigil also edited literary periodicals--_La Aurora Poetica_ (The Poetic Dawn), and _La Mariposa_ (The Butterfly).

Señor Vigil’s political career began in 1855, when Comonfort occupied the Plaza of Guadalajara. With other youths, Vigil then began the publication of _La Revolucion_ (The Revolution), in which were expounded the ideas of the later Constitution of the Reform. From then, on through the period of the Intervention, he led an active public life, writing and editing, and in other ways of fearlessly working for democratic principles. On December 31, 1863, he retired as the French entered Guadalajara, and sought a refuge in San Francisco, California, where he edited _El Nuevo Mundo_ (The New World), devoted to the cause he loved. In 1865 poverty compelled him to return to Guadalajara. There he might have received desirable public appointments, had he been willing to receive aught from the Imperial government. He conducted an opposition and patriotic publication, which was more than once suppressed.

Since the Restoration, Vigil has filled many and important public posts. Passing to the City of Mexico, about 1870, he has been, repeatedly, a member of the House of Deputies, always standing for radical democratic ideas. He has done much journalistic work; has pronounced discourses, served in judicial capacities, has edited important works, and has served many years as an educator. He founded _La Biblioteca Mexicana_ (The Mexican Library) in which appear the important works of Las Casas, and Tezozomoc, and the Codice Ramirez. He has been Professor of Logic in the _Escuela Nacional Preparatoria_. For many years past, and at present, he is the Librarian of the National Library of Mexico. He is a member of all the important literary and scientific societies, among them the _Sociedad Mexicana de Geografia y Estadistica_ and the _Liceo Hidalgo_. When, in 1881, the Mexican Academy increased its membership to fifteen, by the addition of one new chair, Señor Vigil was the unanimous choice of the academicians. He is now the secretary of that organization.

Señor Vigil is the author of volume five of the great historical work, _México á traves de los Siglos_ (Mexico through the Centuries), treating of the period of _La Reforma_ (The Reform). Our selection is taken from this work.

THE DEATH OF MAXIMILIAN.

Meantime the trial of the prisoners followed its course in Queretaro and, on the 13th, at eight in the morning, the council of war met in the theatre of Iturbide, under the presidency of Lieutenant-Colonel Platón Sánchez, the judges being Commandant-Captain José Vicente Ramirez, Commandant-Captain Emilio Lojero, Captain Ignacio Jurado, Captain Juan Rueda y Auza, Captain José Verástegui and Captain Lucas Villagrán. Maximilian excused himself from attendance on account of illness; the whole of the defense was read and, at eight o’clock at night, the council adjourned to meet again the next day. On the 14th, at half-past-twelve the trial ended after the prosecutor had presented the rebuttal, in which death was demanded, and the defenders had replied. It was easy to guess what the sentence would be and the associate defenders, who were in San Luis Potosí, hastened to direct to the President a second statement begging the pardon, a petition which was repeated on the 16th, on learning that the sentence had been confirmed by the General-in-Chief. The following reply of the President, communicated through the Minister of War, took the last hope from the defenders: “Having examined this appeal for pardon and the others of a similar kind which have been presented to him with all the care which the gravity of the case demands, the President of the Republic has decided that he cannot accede to them, since the gravest considerations of justice and the necessity of safeguarding the peace of the nation oppose themselves to this act of clemency.” At the same time the Minister sent a telegram to General Escobedo, in which he told him that it had been decided that the execution should not take place until the morning of the 19th, in order that the sentenced might have time for the arrangement of their affairs. General Miramon’s wife arrived at San Luis, in these moments, to see if she could save the life of her husband; but Juarez refused to see her, saying to the lawyers of the defense: “Spare me this painful interview, which, considering the irrevocable nature of the decision, would but cause the lady much suffering.” Finally, when Señores Riva Palacios and Martinez de la Torre were parting from the President of the Republic, he said to them: “In fulfilling your duty as defenders, you have suffered much by the inflexibility of the government. Today you cannot understand the necessity of this nor the justice which supports it. The appreciation of this is reserved to the future. The law and the sentence are, at this time, inexorable, because the public welfare demands it. It also may counsel us to the least bloodshed, and this will be the greatest pleasure of my life.”

The legal resources exhausted, the plan of escape, devised by the Princess Salm-Salm, in collusion with the Ministers of Austria, Belgium, and Italy and the French Consul, frustrated; the prisoners waited, with resignation, until the terrible moment should arrive in which the sentence was to be executed. The last letters and dispositions written by Maximilian and Miramon show that their natural valor did not abandon them in those supreme moments. Mejia wrote nothing; but in the mental depression in which the disease from which he was suffering submerged him, he maintained that tranquil stoicism, which marked his temperament.

On the 19th, at six in the morning, a division of four thousand men under command of General Jesús Diaz de León formed at the foot of the Cerro de las Campanas, on the northeast slope. Maximilian, Miramon, and Mejia arrived at about a quarter past seven, brought in carriages, and each one accompanied by a priest. Maximilian descended first and said courteously to his companions in misfortune: “Let us go, gentlemen,” and the three directed themselves with firm step to the place of execution, where they gave each other a farewell embrace. Maximilian then advanced and distributed twenty-peso gold pieces among the soldiers, who were to shoot him, and then, raising his voice, said: “I am about to die for a just cause, the liberty and independence of Mexico. May my blood seal the unhappiness of my new country. Viva Mexico!” Miramon read the following in a loud voice: “Mexicans! in the council of war, my defenders attempted to save my life; here, soon to lose it, and about to appear before God, I protest against the stigma of traitor which they have tried to put upon me to palliate my sacrifice. I die innocent of that crime, and I forgive its authors, hoping that God may pardon me and that my compatriots will remove so foul a stigma from my sons, doing me justice. Viva Mexico!” Placing himself on the spot indicated, Maximilian, who had asked that his face might not be disfigured, separated his beard with his hands, to one side and the other, exposing his chest; Miramon said, “here,” indicating his heart and raising his head; and Mejia, who had given the soldiers charged with his execution an ounce of gold to divide between them, said never a word but merely laid by the crucifix, which he held in his hand, on seeing that they were aiming at him. The signal to fire was given and a discharge put an end to the bloody drama of the Empire in Mexico, which was so fatal for its authors and for its partisans.

PRIMO FELICIANO VELÁSQUEZ.

Primo Feliciano Velásquez was born at Santa María del Rio in the state of San Luis Potosí, June 6, 1860. Before he was nine years of age, on account of promise shown in the school-room, he was taken in hand by the village priest, who taught him Latin and later secured for him admittance to the _Seminario Conciliar_ at the capital city of San Luis Potosí. He was a diligent student and completed his study of law on October 23, 1880. Although his legal career opened auspiciously, he preferred to devote himself to journalism. In 1883 he founded, at San Luis Potosí, a publication intended to promote the celebration of the Iturbide centennial, through which he established a standing among the eminent literary men of Mexico. In 1885, in company with several others, he established _El Estandarte_ (The Standard), a periodical bitterly opposed to the State Government, which caused him many vexations and penalties. Velásquez has made a special study of local history and archæology. His _Descubrimiento y Conquista de San Luis Potosí_ (Discovery and Conquest of San Luis Potosí), received recognition from the Royal Spanish Academy. His _Instruccion pública en San Luis Potosí durante la Dominación española_ (Public Instruction in San Luis Potosí during the Spanish Domination) was published in the memoirs of the Mexican Academy, of which he has been a correspondent since 1886. His _Coleccion de Documentos para la historia de San Luis Potosí_ (Collection of documents for the History of San Luis Potosí) in four volumes, was published between 1897 and 1899. Senor Velásquez has during recent years returned to the practice of law.

THE TLAXCALAN SETTLEMENTS.

In this year of 1589, in which peace was arranged, Santa María del Rio was founded by Guachichiles and Otomis on lands of the Hacienda of Villela and at a place called San Diego de Atotonilco. Of the villages of our State, this one and Tierra Nueva count among their founders individuals of Otomi stock. The other colonies established were formed with Indians brought from Tlaxcala, either because that city was populous, or because of its relative culture, or--what is more probable--because of its unshakeable loyalty to the Spaniards. It is asserted that four hundred families set out from the ancient republic for these parts, by order of the Viceroy, Don Luis de Velasco II (1591), and with the aid of Friar Jerónimo Mendieta. Friars Ignacio de Cardenas and Jeronimo de Zárate brought them and distributed them in Tlaxcalilla--on the outskirts of this city of San Luis, close by the congregation of Santiago, which was of Guachichiles--in San Miguel, Mexquitic, Venado, San Andrés, Colotlan, and Saltillo. It can easily be believed that these colonists would not readily consent to abandon their soil and come to such a distance to serve as a protection against barbarians and as a guarantee of their obedience. Far from it; they stipulated that they should enjoy the same privileges as if they were noble-born Castillians; that they should go on horse and bear arms; and that their towns, in which no Spaniards were to live, should measure three leagues on each side.

ANDRES DE OLMOS.

God, who holds aloft with his right hand a torch to light the way of his creatures and to fructify, in the very field of death, the germs of life; behind the bearded divinities with dress of steel and armed with thunderbolts; from the region of light, the east, that they might anoint with the oil of charity, the victims of greed, and resuscitate for Heaven those dead for the world, sent the friars, shorn and shaven, unshod, clad in sackcloth, with no shield but their faith, with no weapon but the Gospel. Among these was that notable man, who wandered through the whole Huasteca, while the Guachichiles still obstinately fought their fierce battles; so wise was he that, besides his miracle-play of _The Last Judgment_ and Conversations, Sermons, and Tractates, all written in Aztec, he left grammars and vocabularies of that language and of the Totonaco and Huastec, as well as many other books for the instruction and admiration of missionaries, philologists and historians; so poor, that, when he died, there was nought but a rosary, some beads, a _disciplina_[7] and a _cilicio_,[8] left to his hosts in token of gratitude; so temperate, that he did not in the least seek those things which the appetite naturally desires, nor took pleasure in them, but ate whatever was placed before him, although bad in savor and smell; so strong that, after bearing a heavy weight of years, going on foot through wastes and wilds, in a trying climate, without any kind of comfort,--not only did he not choose to accept the rest and shelter which his brethren urged upon him, when they saw him old, asthmatic, insect-bitten to the degree that he looked like a leper, but, glorying in his natural strong constitution, again betook himself to the mountains where the warlike Chichimecs had their strongholds, to preach to them for the last time, in the name of the Crucified, a gospel of obedience and peace.

Already you know, gentlemen, that I speak of the friar, Andres de Olmos, companion of the venerable Zumárraga.

MARTYRS TO THE FAITH.

In the New, as in the Old World, in the deserts as in the cities, in the mountains as in the plains, the Gospel,--light and truth, refreshment, hope and delight at once,--has to subjugate all peoples, to soften the fierce and uncultured and to reduce to peace, order, and progress, whatever may be the language in which it be announced. By divine arrangement the doorposts must be marked with blood, with blood of innocent victims, gentle and pure, that the avenging angel may pass by and not wet his sword with the blood of the first-born. Thus, in the northeast, four leagues from Zacatecas, a little after the year 1556, kneeling and with the crucifix in his hand, Friar Juan de Tapia yielded his blood to the sharp arrows of the Guachichiles; thus, Friar Juan Cerrato shed his blood at the hands of the pagans, to whom he came from Jalisco, that he might raise them from their rude condition and bring them to a knowledge of their Creator and to the bosom of the Holy Catholic Church; thus, the friars, Francisco Doncel and Pedro de Burgos inundated with their red life-fluid the deep gorge of Chamacuero, where, fierce as tigers, the Chichimecs hurled themselves upon them.

Father Doncel was returning from Patzcuaro with Friar Pedro, carrying a crucifix which he had ordered made for the Villa of San Felipe, of the convent of which he was guardian. Looking to the security of the image, they came accompanied by soldiers; but, as these fled at the moment of attack by the Indians, they left the holy monks abandoned and helpless. As was his duty in such a crisis, Father Doncel knelt and, raising the crucifix aloft, lifted up his voice in prayer. Devoted to their sublime mission, both the friars suffered death from the furious rage of the savages, which, not content with blood and with stripping off the garments to deck itself in them, and to run races thus garbed, uttering beast cries, sawed off the heads, tore off the skull caps, and wore them, to make display of its triumph. That image of Jesus is still venerated in San Felipe, under the name of the _Señor de la Conquista_; and that gorge in which these monks perished is still called the _Arroyo de los Martires_ (Gorge of the Martyrs).

Near by, at four leagues distance from Colotlan, is the spot where Friar Luis de Villalobos sealed by a glorious death, in 1582, the doctrine which he taught the heathen; not far distant is where Friar Andrés de la Puebla was cruelly beaten, in 1586, and the skin was torn off his head, from the eyebrows upward, while he was denouncing idolatry and intoning the divine praises. Ours, is that land of Charcas, where also suffered martyrdom, the friar, Juan del Rio, brother of the general of that name, who made the final campaign against the Chichimecs. One day in 1586, when the Spaniards had sallied from the town, a body of Indians attacked it and stole the cattle. The only two soldiers, whom they had left on guard, started in pursuit; shortly after, the friar followed them on horse, believing the robbers would respect his presence. When he arrived where they were he saw that one soldier was dead and that the other was in imminent peril. He besought his enemies to calm themselves and hear him, and did not cease to speak even when a rain of arrows fell upon him, striking him in every part of the body. Reason enough was there for the astonishment of the assassins, for the arrows, though many and well directed, made no impression--he held himself well on his horse and continued speaking. The Indians then aimed at his head and, with three or four shots, brought him to the ground. What think you was the cause of his apparent invulnerability? To find out, the barbarians, running up to examine the body, despoiled it of clothing and found an immense _cilicio_, an iron network supplied with iron points inside, which constantly tore the flesh of the penitent friar.

DIEGO ORDOÑEZ.

What do you admire in the great navigator, whose fortunate discovery two hemispheres are now preparing to celebrate? His wisdom? his valor? his boldness? While he possessed all these in heroic grade, it is surely not these which, in him, captivate us, but his faith, his marvelous faith, which sustained him erect and firm in the midst of innumerable obstacles, betrayed by treachery, mocked and harassed by adverse fortune, and he held it against machinations and dangers, until he planted it securely in the land of his dreams. Well, of this same faith, which caused the inspired mariner to triumph over enemies and obstacles and the mysterious dangers of the sea, there are also found examples in these, our regions, which ought not to be held unworthy of esteem because they are buried in the humble chronicles of a Province; for even thus, in solitude, a diamond gleams more brightly. When the immortal Genoese entered the service of Spain, there had just (1483) taken the Franciscan habit in Salamanca, a youth of such precocity that, at thirteen years, he had already graduated in philosophy. At sixteen, dedicated to the study of theology, he made such progress in this science and in Greek and Hebrew, that, with no little credit to his order, he occupied--through many years--the professorship in his convent, where, as is well known, Columbus found a more friendly reception than among the proud professors of the famous university. From Guatemala, whither the learned teacher went in 1539 to occupy himself with the instruction of the wild Indians, he passed to Mexico, called to serve as _Consultor_ to the Holy Office. The snows of a hundred winters already whitened his head, but as the volcanoes which display a snowy crown to conceal the forge where are smithed their glowing thunderbolts, so the venerable centennarian priest. He scarcely tarried at the vice-regal court; like a flaming arrow he went to Michoacan, Zacatecas, and Durango, whose inhabitants enjoyed the last ministrations of the philosopher, theologian, humanist, and eminent preacher, whose name was Diego Ordoñez, and who, at one hundred and seventeen years of age, seated in a chair because he could not stand, died in Sombrerete, preaching to the Indians--he who had been the pride of the convent at Salamanca and the venerated oracle of theologians and inquisitors.

ANTONIO DE ROA.

Two methods were employed by him, or rather one only, in converting so untamed and rude a people. No one is ignorant, that in New Spain the worship of the Holy Cross has ever been general. Be the mountain beautiful or barren, lofty or low, the natives were accustomed to rear a cross upon it. Where roads forked they set it up, and also in the streets and plazas, that they might venerate it at every step and bow before it. With greater reason, therefore, believed Father Roa, ought the sacred emblem to be multiplied upon the rugged mountain trails, which, at first glance, had so much discouraged him.

But, not consenting to erect it in spots, where, before, the Indians had adored their idols, he taught them to honor it with great love and unheard-of penances. When he went forth from his convent, he had them throw about his neck a halter, dragged by two Indians; thus, with quick step, downcast eyes, in tears, with ardent groaning, he went, meditating on the passion of the Redeemer, until he reached the spot where stood a cross. Scarcely knelt before it, the Indians, who accompanied him and knew his orders, buffeted him, spat upon him, and cruelly beat him. This was repeated as many times as there were crosses on the way--and there were many.

When it is stated that this practice was constant and but the beginning of each day, one begins to have an idea of the examples, which he set to the new followers of Christ. One is stupefied to read that, arrived at the village he preached and administered the sacraments, then waited until night to make a general flagellation, which, finished, he sallied from the church, naked from the waist up and barefoot, with a halter around his neck, in order to walk around the churchyard, which was strewn with glowing brands. One can hardly believe that his strength allowed him to preach, on returning into the church, a sermon upon the torments of hell and, further, that after all this he endured the torture of boiling water, which his rough followers threw over his lacerated body.

Still the idea of the sufferings, which he added to those, today, as then, inseparable from a region so wild and remote, is not complete until we know that, in Lent, he was accustomed, thrice weekly, to bathe the Hermita of Molango with his blood. In his oratory he had painted the Prayer in the Garden; and there, after his long prayers, the Indians came to beat him, while they overwhelmed him with insults. They stripped him from the waist up and violently tore away the coarse and rasping cloth which was bound closely to his flesh; they threw a halter about his neck and, in this guise, dragged him to a second oratory where was painted a Magdalene anointing the Lord’s feet. Placing him there before an Indian who, seated in his tribunal, represented Divine Justice, they accused him of being a wicked man, an ingrate, proud, perverter, and false. He replied nothing on the matter to the questions of the judge, but, after a little time, confessed his sins, ingratitude, and faults, in a loud voice. He replied as little to a new accusation, made against him with false witnesses, of the truth of which the judge declared himself convinced, and ordered that they should beat him naked, which they did, thoroughly, until the blood ran down upon the ground from his raw and quivering body. Afterward they kindled splinters of fat pine, with the sizzling resin of which they scorched him from the shoulders to the soles of his feet, and lastly they laid upon him a heavy cross, which he bore in a procession around the enclosure over a bed of glowing coals.

JUAN F. MOLINA SOLIS.

Juan F. Molina Solis, representative of one of the oldest and most respected families of Yucatan, was born June 11, 1850, in the village of Hecelchacan. His father was Juan F. Molina Esquivel, his mother Cecilia Solis de Molina. In 1857, the family removed to Merida, where the boy’s education was carried on. He received the degree of Master of Arts from the _Seminario conciliar de San Ildefonso_, after which he studied law, graduating in 1874. He has ever occupied a prominent position in Merida as a successful lawyer, as teacher in the Seminario, as professor in the Law School, as journalist, and as author. In literature he has largely confined himself to history--especially the history of Yucatan. His _Historia del Descubrimiento y Conquista de Yucatan con una reseña de la Historia antiqua de esta Peninsula_ (History of the Discovery and Conquest of Yucatan with a Summary of the Ancient History of this Peninsula) is a standard authority. It is admirably written and is marked by a sober criticism and constant reference to original sources. Besides this, the largest and most important work that he has written, we may mention a collection of polemical historical articles and of miscellaneous editorials presented under the general title _El Primer Obispado de la Nacion Mejicana_ (The First Bishopric of the Mexican Nation) and an interesting historical sketch, _El Conde de Peñalva_ (The Count of Peñalva). In his editorials Señor Molina often discusses matters of transcendant importance to the nation. While extremely conservative, and hence often in the opposition, his writings on such themes are thoughtful, candid, just, and patriotic. Among such articles are some treating of Representative Government, The Election of Deputies and Senators to the Federal Congress, The Commercial Treaty Between Mexico and the United States, etc. The passage presented here, in translation, is a chapter from _El Conde de Peñalva_.

THE HORRORS OF 1648 IN YUCATAN.

The Count could not arrive at a more unfortunate moment nor amid conditions sadder than those among which fate decreed his coming to these shores. The situation of the Peninsula could not be more sorrowful or calamitous. An epidemic disease, whether cholera, or yellow fever, or the black plague, is uncertain, was just ceasing to devastate the community, and the misfortunes and ruin which it caused had not yet ended. That pest began in the year 1648, year unlucky for Yucatan. After the season of northers in February of that year, a drought set in, so rigorous as to sterilize the soil and to produce intense heat, which was increased by burning over the fields in preparation for the year’s sowing. This drought, these heats, the Peninsula suffers ordinarily, but for a short time only, from the month of March until the rains fall in May--and, it even happens often that, before the rains, showers refresh the air and moisten and fertilize the earth. The year 1648 was not, however, such; the heats, initiated in the month of February, augmented, more and more, until they reached the extreme degree which human nature can endure; the inhabitants of the country anxiously begged for rain to diminish the heat, in which they were burning; but heaven, deaf to their clamors, refused to open its stores, and time passed without a single drop of rain coming to refresh the thirsty earth. Sometimes, the rains delay until the end of June, but what was seen in 1648 has never been since repeated; June passed, July passed, August began, and the land was as dry as a fleshless skeleton, exposed to the quivering rays of a dog-days’ sun. The dust, fine and penetrating, was constantly raised in clouds, from March on, at the blast of the southeast wind, and shut out from view the barren fields which, when visible offered to the eye nothing but leafless trees and ground overgrown with briars and brambles without greenness. Nor was the afternoon breeze any relief from the extraordinary heat and drought, because that little current of air, blowing so softly and agreeably on summer afternoons, at that time came impregnated with an odor strong and pestiferous as if the whole Peninsula had been encircled by filthy and stinking cesspools. And this was because that period of drought coincided with an extraordinary infection of the fishes of the sea, which died in infinite numbers, and their bodies, tossed up by the sea onto the shores, formed gigantic heaps of putrefaction, which poisoned the air. How great must have been the number of those dead fish, since it is stated that the vessels that were navigating near our coasts were checked in their courses and journeyed slowly, as if they were running in the belt of calms or through spaces filled with drifting ice! In vain our police force, then in embryo, sent out daily, from all the towns near the coast, files of Indians led by a Spaniard, for the purpose of burning the dead fish. The very stench of the burning came to be unbearable, so that finally the expedient was abandoned, as harmful.

Suffering under these tribulations, the people intensified their affliction, by dire forebodings, which existed more in their imagination than in reality. As always happens, in time of social calamity, aged persons spoke of similar times, in remote epochs, which had preceded horrible disasters. The air appearing thick and heavy, they imagined that the sun did not shine as it was accustomed to do, but was as if eclipsed; and, in fine, the inner sadness of minds was reflected in external things, conspiring to exalt the fancy with dread of vague misfortunes, of coming and fatal ills.

And the fear became reality, since in the month of June a terrible and contagious disease made its frightful appearance in Campeche. Whether it was the Levantine plague, which a little before had ravaged Europe and was brought by some vessel to the port, whether it was occasioned by the putrefaction of the dead fishes, whether it was the cholera which visited us for the first time, or whether it was the yellow fever scourging with an iron hand, we cannot say. It is enough to know that it was a terrible disease, which converted Yucatan into an immense cemetery. Sometimes, without any warning, it showed itself in intense pains in the bones, accompanied by excessive fever and delirium; at other times with the fever was united vomiting of putrid blood; now it presented the diarrhœa of the cholera patient; now the putrid dysentery of pernicious fever. Some died in eight or ten hours; others lasted through three, four, or even seven days. Men more than women, and the youth, lively and vigorous, more than the feeble and infirm, were the field preferred by the epidemic. No one escaped its deleterious influence, and the Spaniard and Indian, the negro, the mulatto, and the mestizo all paid their tribute to the contagion, which showed no respect in its depredations. In its course, it sometimes skipped populations; and while it swooped pitilessly down upon some obscure and distant village, it neglected some town close by and exposed to its attack. Sometimes it seemed to spare the Indians, only to return later and make a clean sweep of them.

There were great sadness and horror in Merida when notice was brought of the rapid, frequent, and painful deaths, which were taking place in Campeche, and which suggested the existence of the plague; the more so as an effort was made to minimize the reports of conditions. The pest, the sombre and frightful pest, which brings death as a daily thought to the minds of all; and not sweet and peaceful death, but the most distressing of all, death in solitude and abandonment! The stupor, caused by the news, did not prevent some measures of sanitation to prevent the invasion of the contagion, the principal of which was isolation. The city completely separated itself, closed the highways, set numerous guards in the roads, and all the inhabitants turned their eyes to God, imploring pity; the temples were thronged and deeds of mercy were more frequent and general.

Nothing, however, sufficed to stay the advance of the disease; in turn, it attacked Merida, leaping over all the populations in the line of progress, and appearing in the city at the end of July. At first it attacked but few, here and there a person; although the number stricken did not cause a panic, the promptness with which they died struck terror. This, however, was but the beginning of the affliction; because, afterward, in the first days of August the disease increased above measure, and by the middle of the month almost all the inhabitants of the city were stretched upon the bed of pain by the contagion. Whole families were stricken and died in isolation, with no one to care for them or even to call a nurse, a physician, or a priest to give some aid. In the sad and deserted streets were only to be seen, passing like fugitive spectres, the secular clergy, the Jesuits, and the Franciscans in their long gowns, rapidly crossing from house to house to administer consolation to those dying who had the happiness to receive them; because, not infrequently, when the priests crossed the threshold of the house of death, they only encountered sepulchral stillness and corpses; at other times it happened that the priest, who bore the _viaticum_, was himself suddenly stricken with the disease and was obliged to lay himself down to die in the first doorway, while another priest came to take the holy elements from his hands, to continue the sacred task of abnegation and sacrifice. In the cathedral, in Santa Lucia, in San Cristobal, in Santiago, in San Sebastian, in Santa Catalina, the corpses were buried in the burying grounds near the churches; but so great was the crowd of the dead that the town government commanded new cemeteries to be opened and blessed in the fields; and, in order not to increase the panic, it ordered that the bodies should be carried to all these cemeteries at dawn, where a priest received them and repeated a prayer over them, and they were thrown into the common trench. That was a mournful spectacle, which those fields of death presented at that hour, with long files of corpses, badly clad or wrapped in serapes or in henequin mattings, laid out on boards, or stretchers.

The Governor, Don Esteban de Ascárraga did not escape the pest; he died August 8 and was buried quietly, not to augment the consternation of the city. A Franciscan friar, José de Orosco, mounted, hale and hearty, the pulpit in the church of San Francisco, to preach the sermon, and descended ill, and died. The regidors, in the town government, died; of eight Jesuits, who lived in the Colleges of San Javier and San Pedro, six sacrificed their lives on the altar of charity, succoring the sufferers day and night; twenty Franciscans perished in the same labors; clergy, seculars, canonigos, pensioners, royal employes, in short, the principal and choicest of the city went down to the tomb in the month of August, 1648.

Public consternation had reached its height; the city was completely overwhelmed. Without physicians, without adequate supplies of medicines, with no hospital except that of Nuestra Señora del Rosario, later known by the name San Juan de Dios, from the fact that it was in other times served by the mendicant friars; sustained with difficulty, without sanitary police, without hygienic arrangements, with the deaths increasing, the public spirit crushed. It was then, when deprived of every human succor, the inhabitants of Merida redoubled their appeals to heaven, and, recalling the great devotion of the Province to the Most Holy Virgin Mary, resolved to make a pilgrimage to the Sanctuary of Izamal and to bring the sacred image, there venerated, in public procession in order to attribute to it special worship during nine consecutive days. The Licenciate, Don Juan de Aguileta, Vice-Governor, was appointed by the city to represent it and bring the sacred image to Merida. In so great faith and mortal terror were all the people that the Licenciate Aguileta, himself ill with the pest, did not hesitate a moment to receive the commission, and without discussion started for Izamal. Whether for the faith with which he undertook the journey, the change of temperature, or some other reason, the fact is that the licenciate was cured before he reached Izamal. As soon as the Indians learned the object of his journey, they tenaciously opposed the removal of the sacred statue, fearing that it would not be returned to its traditional sanctuary. The persuasions, threats, and exhortations of the authorities availed nothing, nor did those of the friars themselves; the Indians distrusted all, and did not willingly lend themselves to permit the departure of the sacred image until the Provincial of the Franciscans agreed to remain in Izamal, as a hostage, until the venerated figure should be restored to its temple. And so seriously did the Indians take his proposal that they placed guards upon all the roads out from the town to prevent his escape.

These measures having been taken by the Indians, the holy image started from Izamal for Merida. It was not a procession; it was a grand popular festival; it was a triumphal march, with an enormous accompaniment of people, who poured forth from their homes, to see pass by on the highway, the statue of the venerated Patroness of Yucatan, whose aid was besought. Those who know the faith, the ardor, the effusion of soul with which the humble and common people devote themselves to religious practices, can imagine the enthusiasm, bordering on delirium, with which the inhabitants of the surrounding towns flocked together, anxious to render their homage of love to the Virgin Mary. Long and closely packed files of devotees, with lighted torches, formed the accompaniment, which stretched, as a broad, blazing strip, through the dry and arid wastes bordering the road. All on foot, all praying, all filled with remorse, and penitent, they arrived at the outskirts of Merida, where a numerous and select concourse awaited the procession. The Regidors, the Canonigos, the principal ladies, had gone, barefoot in sign of penitence, and, when the procession passed through the streets of the city, from the Cruz de la Villa to the Plaza Mayor, the sick had themselves brought to the doors and windows of their houses, to implore health. After a brief rest at the Cathedral, the procession went to the Church of San Francisco, where for nine days constantly the most solemn worship[9] was attributed to the Most Holy Virgin.

The nine days having passed, on the 23d of August, 1648, the Alcalde Governor, Don Juan de Salazar y Montejo, returned the sacred image to the Sanctuary of Izamal, with the same splendor, pomp, and accompaniment. The pest mitigated, in fact, in Merida at the end of August, and had almost disappeared before the middle of September, although merely changing the scene of its ravages.

As happens always, the gathering of people, the numerous concourse of inhabitants from other towns, scattered the seed of the contagion, which spread its devastation throughout the whole country. The first to be attacked were the Indians of Izamal, who, faithful and devoted, did not abandon the sacred image for a moment on its journey from its natal city to Merida. From Izamal the pest extended slowly to the east and south. The great procession took place in August, and already in September the District of Izamal was smitten; in October the epidemic had propagated itself to Ticul, Chapab, Bolonchen, Mani, Bolonchenticul; in December it had spread throughout the whole coast, and, thus, spreading from town to town, it fiercely struck its claws into the whole Peninsula during two long and weary years.

LUIS GONZALES OBREGÓN.

Luis Gonzales Obregón, one of the best known of living Mexican writers, was born in Guanajuato, August 25, 1865. After studying under private teachers at his home, he went to Mexico, where he completed his preparatory studies in the _Seminario_ and in the _Colegio de San Ildefonso_. Ill health interfered with his further education, but he had already developed a strong affection for literary, and particularly for historical, pursuits, which has motived his whole life work. He is a devoted student of the national history of his country and particularly delights in the investigation of obscure and curious incidents. So far as a feeble physical constitution has allowed, he has given himself up to such researches and to writing. In 1889 he published a useful little volume, entitled _Novelistas Mexicanos en el Siglo XIX_ (Mexican Novelists in the Nineteenth Century). In an introductory section he briefly characterizes the Mexican novel; he then presents a complete list of the novelists of the century, to the time of his writing, with the names of their novels and a few discriminating words regarding their place in the national literature. Our author’s best known work is certainly _México Viejo_ (Old Mexico), of which a “first series” was printed in 1891 and a “second series” in 1895. These have recently been republished, in a single volume, in Paris. The work consists of essays, each dealing with some special event in Mexican history, or sketching the life of some eminent person, or depicting some old custom or popular practice. Usually they contain information derived from unpublished manuscripts or rare and ancient works. Among the many other writings of our author, two biographical sketches demand particular mention, on account of the interest and prominence of the men who form the subjects. These are _Don José Joaquín Fernandez de Lizardi_ famous as a writer, early in the last century, under the _nom-de-plume_ of _El Pensador Mexicano_ (the Mexican thinker), and _Vida y Obras de Don José Fernando Ramirez_ (Life and Works of José Fernando Ramirez), the eminent literary man, historian, and statesman. The selections, which we here present, are from _México Viejo_. They do not as satisfactorily represent Señor Obregón’s style as longer passages would, as he is at his best when he narrates some ancient legend or describes some popular festival.

CHANGES IN MEXICO.

For some years past Mexico has been undergoing a slow, but evident, transformation. Everywhere the modern spirit modifies what is old. Customs, types, dress, monuments, and buildings are completely losing the long-fixed physiognomy of the colonial days.

The customs of our ancestors, half Spanish, half indigenous, are disappearing, replaced by a mixture of European practices, and now, in the same house, one prays in the old fashion, clothes one’s self after the French style, and eats after the Italian manner; one mounts his horse or enters his coach _a la_ English, and conducts his business _a la_ Yankee, in order to lose no time.

The fountains, those ancient fountains of the colonial epoch, have been replaced by hydrants and troughs at every corner, and the traditional type of the _aguador_ (water-carrier) is eclipsed and forced to betake himself to those sections where the deep shadows of the electric lights fall, and where the precious fluid does not flow of itself, except when it pleases heaven to inundate the streets and alleys.

The _china_[10] has died, to live only in the beautiful romances of the popular Fidel; the _chiera_[11] yields her gay and picturesque _puesto_ of refreshing waters, to the experienced _señorita_, who in high-heeled shoes and tightly-laced bodice serves us iced drink in vessels of fine crystal; the _sereno_,[12] with his shining, varnished hat, his ladder on his shoulder and his lantern in his right hand, withdraws shame-faced before the _gendarme_,[13] and thus with other types, whom the curious investigator now encounters only in the pictures of forgotten books.

Who now remembers the habits of the humble friars, who once traveled through the streets amid the respectful salutations of the faithful?

The coaches slung on straps, the gigs, the omnibuses--are all passing away, all are forgotten in the noisy whirl of English and American carriages and the confusion of the _tranvias_,[14] which rapidly slip over their steel rails.

Mexico changes, principally, in its material part. The old houses fall daily, façades change, the ancient wooden roofs give way to iron sheeting.

The streets are being lengthened, their names are expressed in cabalistic signs, and their historic and traditional associations are relegated to the verses of our poets.

The city, born amid the rubbish of the heroic Tenochtitlan, the capital city of the viceroyalty of New Spain, which had on every corner a chapel or temple--or, at least, a picture of a saint--pious evidences of the religion of the populace, now rejuvenates itself, appropriating those old buildings, consecrated to some special purpose, to some use far different, since the epoch of the Reform.

What was then a church is now a library; what was a convent, a barrack; what was a customs house, a departmental office; a corridor becomes a gallery; a _patio_, a warehouse; a refectory, a stable.

Before the special physiognomy of those times completely disappears, before the crowbar demolishes the last façades, before the scaffolding is raised against the bulging wall, before--finally--we hear the song or whistle of the indifferent stonecutter, as he mercilessly chisels the stone which will completely change the aspect of those things upon which our forebears gazed, we propose to conjure up the incidents, the times, and customs which have gone that future generations need not vainly excavate among forgotten ruins.

LUISA MARTINEZ.

The war of independence in Mexico had, also, its martyr heroines. The insurgents never executed a woman of the royalists; but that party stained its arms with the blood of the fair sex.

* * * * *

There was another heroine of humble origin whom we ought not to omit, because she, also, was a martyr of the independence. She was named Luisa Martínez, wife of Steven García Martínez (nicknamed ‘the reveler’), who kept a little shop in the pueblo of Erongaricuaro, about the years 1815 and 1816. In that pueblo all were _chaquetas_, that is to say, partisans of the royalists. She, however, was devoted to the other flag. She courageously aided the insurgent warriors, she gave them timely information, victuals, resources, and communicated to them messages from their superior officers, with whom she kept in constant touch. One day her messenger, bearing letters directed to the insurgent leader, Tomás Pacheco, was surprised by Pedro Celestino Negrete. Luisa Martínez fled; but, pursued, captured, and tried, she was compelled to pay two thousand pesos and to promise to communicate no farther with the patriots, in order to regain her liberty. But she was not warned by her experience. Thrice again was she pursued, imprisoned, and fined, until, at last, she could not pay the sum, four thousand pesos, which Negrete demanded, and was shot by his order in the year 1817, in a corner of the cemetery of the parish church at Erongaricuaro.

Just before her execution, turning to Negrete, she said to him:

“Why such persistent persecution of me? I have the right to do what I can to help my country, because I am a Mexican. I do not believe that I have committed any crime, but simply have fulfilled my duty.”

Negrete remained inflexible, and Luisa Martínez _fell, pierced by royalist bullets_.