Kane.] ^"° [Jan. 19. 



Republic of Iluexotzingo, and the stronger Republic of Tlascula, which 

 was lighting for its independence against overpowering odds, wlien Cortez 

 arrived barely in time to save it. Mr. Prescott has no authority for saying 

 tliat the more widely the Aztec Empire was extended, the weaker it be- 

 came. On the contrary, Mexico, under Montezuma II was as much a 

 homogeneous nation between the Atlantic and Pacific for ten degrees of 

 latitude, as Spain was then from the Mediterranean to the Pyrenees ; more 

 than England was from the Channel to the Highlands of Scotland. 



I like to use dates when I can. In Europe we have 1519 as the year of the 

 accession of Charles V in Germany. Three years before, the Fleming had 

 become King of Spain. Four years before, Francis the First had become 

 King of France. Ten years before, Henry the Eighth had ascended the 

 throne of England. But in the spring of 1519 Hernando Cortez wooed 

 his ^lalinche Marina in Tabasco and sailed with her to Vera Cruz. He 

 entered the City of Mexico a conqueror, August 13, 1521. 



With the effect of the European element introduced bj' Cortez j-ou are 

 familiar. The complete disintegration of all indigenous national com- 

 binations went with the extension over the Grand i\Iesa of the Spanish 

 arms, laws, religious and social usages. We may safely speak of the 

 Spanish rule as having continued absolute for more than two hundred 

 years. 



When, towards the close of the last century, the ethnological differences 

 prevailing in Spain asserted themselves anarchically there, surprise is ex- 

 pressed at the slowness which her colonists evinced in throwing off the 

 yoke. It was an uphill business in Mexico, and was managed there in the 

 old time Spanish way — by men almost exclusively of Spanish blood. 

 Their movement was not apprehended by themselves to be anarchical. 

 They, at least thought that their cause was that of order, union and re- 

 ligion. 



Hidalgo was a Spanish curate. Take his date as 1810 He was caught 

 (where I came near coming to grief myself) at Bajan, in Coahuila, March 

 the 21st, 1811, and shot the following 1st of August. 



Matamoros, the curate of Jantetclco, was shot August the 3d, 1814, 

 Curate Morelos, December 21st, 1815, and Mina, November 11, 1817. 

 Yturbide proclaimed the Plan of Iguala February 14, 1821, and concluded 

 the Tratados de Cordoba with Don Juan O'Donoju, September 27, 1821. 

 Everyone of these champions of independence except Morelos, was clear 

 Spanish, and the cry of the triumphant liberating army of the Three Guar- 

 antees I believe faithfully expressed the feeling of what was then still 

 subsisting a Mexican Nation. Tiie motto was Itorne on the tri-colored flag 

 •which the nation united in adopting. It was "Religion, Union and Inde- 

 pendence." 



Naturally we Ameriains have a prejudice against Yturbide because he 

 had himself crowned Emperor in a cathedral, and perhaps because his 

 family lived among us in their adversity, making themselves too 

 familiar with us, particularly here in Philadelphia. But there was prob- 



