the capital but a single company of infantry, of less than one hundred men, who did duty as palace guard, and even these were indifferently armed and equipped. There was no artillery, no store of small arms and ammunition, and no organized militia. The better class of Spaniards for the most part possessed weapons of their own, but as subsequent events showed, they would not act together in time of need. Without the city the nearest available troops were the distant garrisons of Acapulco and Vera Cruz. Not even an organized police force existed which could be made available in quelling an incipient outbreak.
The palace, as shown by the accompanying plan, was provided with loopholes for infantry and embrasures for cannon, but in the disturbance which followed there was nothing to indicate that artillery was placed there. In the construction of the other buildings of the capital there was no provision made for their defence save that afforded by the thick walls, heavy barred doors, and strong shutters and iron bars of the windows;[1] but these were common to most
- ↑ Sigüenza y Góngora, Carta, MS., 49, summarizes this condition of affairs as the 'culpabilisimo descuido con que vivimos entre tanta pleue al mismo tiempo que presumimos de formidables.'
