18 INTRODUCTION. 
Figaroa took refuge in the convent of San Domingo, where he was 
discovered the next day and brought out and shot in the plaga. * 
Meantime the business of election proceeded, and in June the 
congress met. Don Bernardo O’Higgins, who was afterwards to act 
so conspicuous a part in the Revolution, being the deputy from 
Chillan. The first act of the representative body was to depose the 
junta, and constitute itself a legislative assembly, confiding the 
executive power to the commission of three men, Rosas, the pre- 
sident of the former junta, Don Martin de Incarada, and Don 
Mackenna. But Rosas was, at this time, absent at Conception, called 
thither by a species of civil discord which had nearly ruined the 
patriot cause. Conception having had some former claims to being 
considered the capital of Chile, being in fact nearly in the centre of 
its provinces, and situated on a harbour the most advantageous for 
commerce, had also been the most forward in furthering the cause 
of independence. Its inhabitants, therefore, insisted that the seat of 
government should be there placed, and particularly that the con- 
gress should sit there. The people of Santiago, however, who had 
long enjoyed the advantages attendant on having the metropolis fixed 
in their city, were not disposed to give them.up. They pleaded also 
the safety of their situation, equally removed from the Indians and 
the sea; whereas Conception, so near the Araucanian Indians, who 
might easily be prevailed on to invade and waste their lands, (as 
indeed they have done since,) was too much exposed to be proper for 
the assembly of the legislative body. The prudence of Rosas for 
the time quieted the clamour of the people of Conception; and, as 
he still remained among them, Don Juan Miguel Benevente was 
_ appointed his proxy as one of the executive triumvirate. 
The first act of the legislative assembly was to abolish slavery. 
All children of slaves were from that moment born free, and all 
* May 5th, 1810. The viceroy, Cisneros, unable to resist the public voice at Buenos 
Ayres, had called together the first junta of government to resist the French claims on 
that province, and to establish a provisional government. In 1811, Artigas began to dis- 
tinguish himself; — there has been scarcely a three months’ cessation of civil war in that 
wide province since. 
