300 POLITICAL HISTORY OF PERU. 



authority, he had only about two hundred men at his command, yet in 

 less than three months the whole country had recognised his authority 

 and government. In his short public career he certainly displayed violent 

 passions, and he evinced cruelty in many of his acts ; but he seems at 

 time^ to have had impulses of generosity, though they may have been but 

 feeble. When he assumed the command, and declared himself Supreme 

 Chief, he banished General Nieto, a superior officer. The captain of 

 the vessel in which he went was induced to land him in the north of 

 Peru, where he collected some troops, and made war upon Salaverry, 

 who immediately marched against him, vowing vengeance for what 

 he termed his ungrateful conduct, in return for his lenity. On 

 Salaverry's approach, one of Nieto's followers betrayed him, and he 

 was surprised and captured. Salaverry immediately invited him to 

 his tent; they supped and slept together on the same hide, but he after- 

 wards banished him from Peru. 



Another act, which does not show him in quite so amiable a light, 

 was his ordering General Valle Reistra, an old companion, an estima- 

 ble and good officer, to be torn from his wife at midnight, and within 

 her hearing shot in cold blood, for no alleged crime, but it is supposed 

 merely for the purpose of striking terror into his opponents. Salaverry 

 was full of energy, both to determine and execute his plans, and evinced 

 talents which, had they been controlled by judgment and guided by 

 moral principle, might have consolidated his power and saved his 

 country from the anarchy which has since existed. He possessed the 

 true spirit to rule the Peruvians, so far as energy was concerned ; and 

 before Peru becomes settled, she will need some military despotism, in 

 order to break down the small and numerous contending chiefs, who 

 prove, as each gains the ascendency, the worst of tyrants. The mode 

 of his death has already been spoken of. 



Santa Cruz was in the Spanish service at the commencement of the 

 revolution, and being captured by the patriots, was for some time a 

 prisoner in Buenos Ayres. On his liberation he espoused the popular 

 cause, and was for a short time at the head of the government in 

 Peru, where he had been placed by Bolivar, and continued until the 

 setting aside of that chieftain's authority, and the election of La Mar 

 as President. Santa Cruz was expelled by the intrigues of his enemies, 

 but was afterwards employed as minister to Chili. His subsequent 

 elevation to the presidency of Bolivia has led to the suspicion that he 

 participated in the assassination of the former President, Blanco ; and 

 his patronage of the known actors in that affair, gave strong grounds 

 for believing the truth of the report. 



