VALPARAISO. 177 
“ Till in the scowl of heav’n each face 
Grew dark as he was speaking.” 
So at length we bore up for Valparaiso, and landed there at two 
o’clock to-day. , 
A great pleasure awaited us, and almost consoled us for the failure 
of our expedition ; that is, if ever public news consoles one for pri- 
vate disappointment. Mr. Hogan met me on the beach with the 
joyful intelligence that the Congress of the United States had 
acknowledged the independence of the Spanish American colonies 
of Mexico, Columbia, Buenos Ayres, Peru, and Chile. This is indeed 
a step gained, and so naturally too, as to be worth twenty, where 
there could have been a suspicion of intrigue: but the United States, 
themselves so lately emancipated from the thraldom of the mother- 
country, are the natural assertors of the independence of their Ameri- 
can brethren ; and the moral of the political history of the times would 
have been less striking had any other state set the example. * 
I dined at Mr. - ’s, and in the evening Lord Cochrane joined 
our party, and we shortly after had a scene that I at least shall never 
forget. His Lordship’s secretary, Mr. Bennet, arrived from Santiago, 
whither he had been on business, and brought with him Col. Don 
Fausto del Hoyo. This gentleman had been taken prisoner by 
Lord Cochrane at Valdivia; and His Lordship had obtained from 
the government a promise of generous treatment for the Colonel. 
However, after the Admiral sailed, the same unjust and cruel restric- 
tions were laid on him, as on all the other prisoners of war of every 
rank. He was thrust into a dark dungeon, and there detained with- 
out fire, without light, without books, as if the cruel treatment of 
individual prisoners could have forced Old Spain to acknowledge the 
independence of Chile !_ He had now been liberated on parole by Lord 
Cochrane’s intervention ; and never, never, shall I forget the fervent 
expression of acknowledgment, not in words indeed, with which he 
* It was not until the 10th of August that we received the direct intelligence of the 
vote of Congress for the acknowledgment of the independence of Chile, which was passed 
by a majority of 191, against only one dissentient voice; in the Senate, 37 ayes, 17 noes. 
AA 
