QUINTERO. 397 
long ere their states may be settled ; the forms of their government 
may long fluctuate, and perhaps much blood may yet be shed in the 
cause, —for, alas! what human good is there which has not been 
purchased by some evil? But never again will the iron sceptre of 
the mother-country be stretched out over these lands. 
Tuesday, December 3d.— The earth, which seemed to have re- 
sumed its stillness, has this day been violently convulsed. At half 
past three a. M.; at nine; at noon, a long and very severe shock with 
much noise ; at two o’clock another; and at midnight a fifth, not in- 
ferior to those of the three first days, always excepting the first 
great one. 
Wednesday, 4th. — Four severe shocks before eight o’clock this 
morning seemed to threaten a renewal of the first days after the 
19th November ; but since we have had only two slight ones to-day. 
The tidings of Freire’s march from Conception is now public, as 
well as the news of the meeting of the provincial convention, and its 
censure of that of Santiago, first, for declaring itself the first repre- 
sentative assembly ; secondly, for receiving the Director’s resignation 
and re-electing him: each of which acts is considered as illegal. It 
is whispered, that the Director talks of resigning. He is much hurt 
at what he calls, and perhaps feels, the ingratitude of Freire, to whom 
he was attached as one brave man to another, and whom he had 
always favoured. But Freire and his soldiers have carried on suc- 
cessfully a long and harassing war. They have not been paid; and 
it is said that Freire has another cause for resentment against the 
Director’s family, if not against himself. General Freire was, it 
appears, passionately attached to a young lady, an orphan, who 
became so by the event of the battle of Maypu; and his regard was 
returned, and he hoped to marry her ;—when, as the lady was, by her 
orphan state, a ward of government, her hand was bestowed upon 
another ; and thus, with her rich possessions, she was taken from 
her lover to reward, it was said, a deserving officer. But who could 
deserve more than Freire? He said nothing — but can he have 
forgotten this? Besides, another marriage was offered to him from 
