among us." Then, addressing himself to his cortege, "You know well, Señores," said he, "that the pleasure I feel in finding myself once more among you has caused me to forget my own safety; but the time is not far distant, I hope, when I shall come again, and find there," pointing to Mexico, "none but brothers and friends."
After this speech he wheeled his horse half round, and I could see that it was a wooden leg which rested in the right stirrup. A general hurrah followed his last words. The torches were hurled far into the lake, and went out with a hiss, and all again was dark, but not before I had recognized in the cavalier who was conversing with Don Blas the man who for twenty-five years had been the evil genius of Mexico, the cause and fomenter of all its revolutions in one word, General Don Antonio Lopez Santa Anna.
CHAPTER II.
The Colonel Inn-keeper. — Sharp Fighting in the Streets of Mexico. — General Bustamente, President of the Republic.
The lieutenant and I remained alone. I asked him to give me some explanation regarding the scenes of which I had been a witness. He very eagerly gave me some account of the discontent that prevailed among all classes, caused by the import duty of fifteen per cent. It was, in fact, the bad feeling which arose from this that had furnished the pretext for the new pronunciamento. The numerous pedestrians we had met on the way to Mexico were part of a regiment of cavalry in garrison near the city. Don Blas had been urged to entice them into the service of Santa Anna,
