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lessons, which were thrice repeated afterwards, in the fort of Chapultepec, the suburbs of Belen and San Cosmé, and finally in the Citadel. But the valour of many of our soldiers of the guard and of the army was not always supported, yet it was only by fire and sword that the enemy, in a day most fatal to the nation, made himself master of the capital. I have anxiously sought death in all parts, because a loss so great has occasioned me the most profound despair. In Chapultepec I received a contusion, in Belen my clothes were pierced by the balls of the enemy, and around me disappeared the best soldiers of the republic.

"What remains to me, then, in the midst of the woe and anguish which assail me? The unprofitable consciousness that I have personally sustained the combat to the very last extremity, and that I have sold dearly to the enemy his astonishing victory. He has seen me in the front at Angostura, Cerro Gordo, Churubusco, Chapultepec, Belen, San Cosmé, and the Citadel, and he shall find me, I swear to you, wherever it shall be useful and glorious for me to combat.

"I ought also to announce to you that I have spontaneously resigned the Presidency of the Republic, calling to assume it, according to the Constitution, the President of the Supreme Court of justice, with the associates, who will be the depositaries of power until the National Congress can decide who is he to whose guidance shall be intrusted its future destinies.

"When power was intrusted to me under the most trying circumstances, I accepted it in order that I might combine the elements of resistance existing in the country; and, upon the enemy's advance towards the capital, I resumed military command, that I might oppose to him a force of considerable strength, and concentrate all our resources for its defence. But after the fall of the capital, circumstances have been altered, and now a division of the command is requisite to promote the same object

to attack the enemy in his line of communication from Vera

SANTA ANNA'S LETTER TO THE MEXICAN PEOPLE.

479

Cruz to the capital is imperiously urgent, and I alone must take upon myself that responsibility, because I feel it incumbent on me ever to place myself in that quarter in which there is the most peril. The supreme magistracy cannot be exposed to the hazard of war, and it is necessary to locate it amid population and wealth, in order that it be not given over to anarchy, and in order that it may again arise with power and with glory.

"For this reason have I surrendered an authority, to me so laborious and so bitter, and in whose reception and laying down I have aspired to nothing more than the welfare of my beloved country. I may have committed some errors in the discharge of my civil obligations, but be assured that my desires and my hopes have known no other stimulus than the noble one of sustaining the rank of the nation in which I first saw the light, and which has laden me with honours and with favours.

"I have said it before, and I here repeat it, that I never despair of the fate of my country. If faction be silent and will listen to the sovereign voice; if we be unanimous in our desires and in our yearnings, there is yet time to hurl the enemy from the soil which he pollutes by his presence.

"It is known to you that I rejected a peace which would reduce the republic to a nullity the most absurd and complete. The nation has desired and still desires war. Let us continue it, then, with the greatest intrepidity, and my example shall be a most ardent one.

"Factions cannot now dispute with me concerning the power which with pleasure I abandon. If they would dispute with me, let them come to the field of battle. There they will find me serene, and firmly consecrated as ever, to the most generous and holy of causes. What do we care for misfortunes? Misfortune is the crucible of nations, and never is the Mexican nation grander than when she strives to force from destiny the victory which God and justice promise us.

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"Mexicans! Thirty years have passed over since you proclaimed your independence amid perils and privations. Sustain it for ever!

ANTONIO LOPEZ DE SANTA ANNA.

GUADALOUPE HIDALGO, Sept. 16, 1847."

In the above well written, but occasionally overstrained appeal, General Santa Anna made use of the same arguments which he had so often heretofore found available in moving and moulding the Mexican mind; but the ears which had so frequently listened favourably, were now deaf to the voice of the charmer.

This appeal was followed up, on the 18th, by a circular under the signature of Señor Pacheco, Secretary of State, and addressed to the governors of the different states.

In this document, the secretary enters into an elaborate defence of the policy by which General Santa Anna had been guided in the conduct of the war.

The disasters which attended the Mexican army in the various conflicts around, and immediately before, the capital, he likewise attributes mainly to the insubordination of General Valencia and to his subsequent loss of the important position of Contreras. In regard to the evacuation of the capital, he avers that it was decided at a meeting of the generals held in the Citadel on the night of the 13th, that a continued resistance would only expose the city to pillage and to all the acts of immorality to which a savage enemy abandons himself. It was this latter misfortune, he avers, which General Santa Anna sought at all hazards to avoid, by causing, at the commencement, all his fortifications to be made at advanced points.

The result at which the generals arrived in their midnight conference was, that, in order to retain all their armament and the means to continue the war, it was necessary to abandon the city that very night; that the whole army should retire to Guadaloupe

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Hidalgo, ready to take the road to Puebla, the next day, for the purpose of redeeming that city out of the hands of the Americans, and cutting off all communication with the coast.

This intent being, however, frustrated by the want of means, it was finally resolved to divide the army into sections, under the command of tried officers who were directed to make their way into the states of the interior, where each division might serve as a nucleus to be increased or shaped as subsequent circumstances might prove most beneficial.

The partition of the army accordingly took place, General Santa Anna retaining about his own person a portion of the cavalry only, proposing to unite these with the troops already before Puebla under General Rea, and carry out, as far as possible, his original design.

The exposition of Secretary Pacheco is valuable in two things; as explaining the reasons which led to the desertion of the capital, and elucidating the events which followed soon after. We therefore give it entire :—

"TOLUCA, Sept. 18, 1847.

Circular by Dr. Jose Ramon Pacheco, Secretary of State, to the Governors of the different States.

"YOUR EXCELLENCY: After having sent to your Excellency from the city of Guadaloupe Hidalgo the manuscript decree issued from that city under yesterday's date, by his Excellency the President ad interim, I have now the honour of sending you (blank) copies printed in this city, in order that your Excellency may circulate them in the state which you so worthily govern, and that the nation may be informed that it is not left without a head, as his Excellency, General Don Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana, previous to his march to commence his military movements against the base of the enemy's operations, has devolved the • government upon the authority designed by the constitution.

His Excellency, by virtue of the extraordinary powers conferred on him, took the responsibility of ordering some details, which, from the force of circumstances, could not be done in conformity with the tenor of the constitution, none of the bodies in whom these attributes are vested being in existence. On this account he has dispensed with one of the necessary qualifications in one of the colleagues of the Executive, in order to give this additional guarantee to the nation. It is also desirable that the place fixed upon as the residence of the Supreme Government should be generally known, in order that all the functionaries and servants. of the General Government should regulate their actions according to our political system as provided by the laws.

Impartial history will some day record, whatever fate Providence may have decreed, the causes which brought about the events which have just occurred in the capital, in consequence of which it is now, to our astonishment, indignation, and grief, in the power of the enemy. These causes are known to thousands of witnesses, and well understood by those only who truly feel its immense loss to their country. The fact is that one of the points which defended the entries to the city having been abandoned without any orders, and another point having been taken at the end of the day on the 13th, after a combat of fifteen hours, it was decided by a meeting of the generals, held that night in the citadel, that a continued resistance would only expose the city to pillage, and to all the acts of immorality to which a savage enemy abandons himself. This latter was a misfortune which his Excellency wished to avoid at all hazards, and with a view to which he had at the very commencement caused the fortifications to be made at far advanced points. In order to retain on the other hand all his armament and the necessary means to continue the war, without owing them to a humiliating capitulation, it was resolved to evacuate the city that very night, conducting the whole army to the city of Guadaloupe de Hidalgo, in order to

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