Secondly: That it was feared if the capital was entered by force of arms and the government dispersed, a spirit of national desperation would be engendered, and the hope of accommodation indefinitely postponed.

Thirdly: A humane desire to shield the Mexicans from the crowning dishonour of beholding a victorious enemy in possession of the chief city of their republic.

The argument of others is, that the severe marches and battles of the 19th and 20th left the Americans too much shaken by losses and fatigue to advance immediately; but, as they subsequently took possession of the city with only six thousand men, after storming the formidable heights of Chapultepec, and forcing the well defended Garitas of San Cosmé and Belen, it cannot be questioned that the same result could have been at least as readily achieved at a time when the effective force of the army numbered eight thousand men, and while the causeway of San Antonio lay comparatively open to their advance, the few troops at that Garita being already terribly shaken by the victory of Churubusco.

But, as the General-in-chief admits the ease with which the capital might have been taken on the evening of the 20th, it may not be amiss to examine how far his own reasons justified either the proposal or the acceptance of an armistice, taking into consideration the commanding position he occupied, with the capital avowedly within his grasp.

There is no doubt that the American residents and intelligent neutrals who cautioned General Scott against precipitancy, sincerely believed the Mexicans at length desired peace; but, as the interior line of defences surrounding the city still afforded the latter a further means of resistance, were time allowed them to reunite their shattered forces, the sincerity of their seeming readiness to treat-taking in view their characteristic pride and obstinacy-might well have been doubted.

Every hour's delay was of eminent service to them, by reviving

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their drooping courage, and by infusing, with increase of numbers, new hopes of eventual success.

To the Americans the pause was pregnant with danger, not only by closing the avenues easily accessible at present, but by threatening their future safety.

A large body of the enemy was known to be in their rear, and their reinforcements were too far back to be available in the event of an emergency; while in their front it was soon to be shown how little regard was paid by the enemy to the solemnly ratified articles of the armistice, by the Mexican population being seen openly engaged in the erection of breastworks, and in still further obstructing, in various ways, the approaches to the city.

The forcible entrance into the capital, the effect of which it was supposed would jeopard the prospects of peace, was also subsequently made; and the absolute quiet that ensued was sufficient evidence that the possession of the city and the dispersion of the government, so far from rousing the people to a more clamorous outcry in favour of the further prosecution of the war, was the first event which brought home to them the reality of their condition, and seriously inclined them to listen to terms of accommodation.

But, though the armistice may have been impolitic, there is not the slightest reason to suppose that General Scott, in granting it, was actuated by any other feeling than that of the most exalted humanity. The forlorn situation of the Mexican people, proud, obstinate, and unreasoning as they had proved themselves, could not have been witnessed by him without a chivalric desire to spare them the last and bitterest scene of degradation-the sight of a victorious enemy within the very walls of a capital which the valour of their ancestors had surrounded with so many heroic associations. Nor could his frank nature have easily imagined them so lost to all sense of moral obligation, as to seek to take advantage of the humane forbearance of the conqueror, by using

the respite allowed them, not for the stipulated purpose of terminating existing difficulties by an honourable peace, but with the treacherous view of improving the interval in strengthening themselves for a continuance of the war.

A sterner soldier would have pushed on, regardless of the pitiable condition of the enemy; a humane one would have paused, as Scott did, and, in trusting to the honour of such an enemy, would have found himself in like manner deceived. Although, perhaps, by a wiser policy, war with Mexico might have been avoided, it will redound to the eternal honour of our country, that we conducted it agreeably to the dictates of an exalted humanity; and that we were ready at all times to terminate a contest which was prolonged by the indomitable obstinacy of the Mexican people.

The armistice, however, being ratified, the American troops were quartered in different villages, within supporting distance of each other, leaving Mr. Trist, on the part of the United States, to open negotiations for peace with the Mexican government.

Accordingly, on the 25th of August, that gentleman wrote to Mr. Pacheco, the Mexican Minister for Foreign Affairs, informing him of his readiness to treat, and on the succeeding day received answer that the Mexican commissioners, then in the act of being appointed, would meet at the village of Atzcopozalco, on the morning of the 27th; and, in accordance therewith, Generals Herrera, Conto, and Villamil, Don Miguel Atristain, and Don Jose Miguel Arroyo, were accredited on the part of the Mexican government, to confer with Mr. Trist, at the place designated.

Negotiation now commenced, but from the lofty attitude assumed by the Mexican commissioners, under the instruction of their government, it soon became apparent that the peace which America so earnestly sought, could only be obtained by sacrifices incompatible with her honour.

The preliminary condition insisted upon by the Mexicans, that

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the treaty should be made upon the basis that they had triumphed and were yet in a situation to successfully prosecute the war, might have been accorded by the United States with a smile of contempt for the weakness that dictated an assumption so well known to be utterly at variance with the facts; but when Mexico refused to recognise the Rio Grande, which had been claimed by the United States government as the boundary of the two republics, and pertinaciously insisted upon the line of the Nueces, though professing herself willing to stipulate that the interval between the two rivers should remain uninhabited, the impression soon became general, that President Santa Anna had hailed the armistice rather as a means of delaying the advance of General Scott until he was again prepared to oppose him, than as affording an opening for the ratification of a permanent peace.

It is true that the "project of a treaty," of which Mr. Trist was the bearer from his government, was discussed by the Mexican commissioners, and it is equally true that they offered in return a counter-project; but, as Mr. Trist was clothed with no powers to treat for peace upon any other terms than those stipulated in the instrument he had been delegated to present, it could hardly have been supposed that he would assume the responsibility of altering boundaries already strictly defined by his government.

The question of boundaries involved a cession of territory by Mexico to the United States, for which the latter offered an equivalent in money.

These boundaries, as proposed by the fourth article of the project submitted by Mr. Trist, were as follows: That the boundary line of the two republics should commence at the mouth of the Rio Grande; follow the middle of that river until it reached the southern boundary of New Mexico; thence west with that line to the western boundary; thence north with the river Gila, and through the mouth of that river down the middle of the Gulf of California into the Pacific.

By this article it will be seen that the United States demanded the acknowledgment of the Rio Grande as her true boundary, and required the cession by purchase of about ten degrees of thinly inhabited territory, including within its limits the department of New Mexico and Upper and Lower California. In addition to this, a free right of way for ever across the isthmus of Tehuantepec was demanded by a subsequent article.

In their counter-project the Mexican commissioners proposed to commence the boundary line of the two republics in the bay of Corpus Christi, thence to the mouth of the Nueces, thence with the middle of the latter river to its source, thence west to the eastern boundary of New Mexico, thence north with that boundary to the 37th degree of latitude, thence west to the Pacific.

In other words, they claimed the disputed territory between the Nueces and the Rio Grande, and declined ceding the greater part of New Mexico, the southern portion of Upper California, or any of Lower California.

The commissioners also declared their inability to grant a free right of way across the isthmus of Tehuantepec, on the plea that the Mexican government had, some years before, divested itself of the power to do so, by granting a privilege with reference to this object to a private contractor, by whom it had been transferred, with the authority of the Mexican government, into the hands of English subjects, of whose rights Mexico could not dispose.

In an effort to adjust these differences, and finding the Mexican commissioners resolute in adhering to the boundary of the Nueces, as the condition "sine qua non" of peace, Mr. Trist did eventually so far depart from the letter of his instructions, as to offer to refer the question of that boundary to his government, and to abandon the claim to Lower California altogether; but at the same time he insisted upon the cession of New Mexico, and upon this latter point neither party being willing to yield to the other, the negotiations fell through.