POLICY OF SPAIN TO ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES. 252 



The policy was at once blind and revengeful. If it was produced 

 by the intrigue of France, the old hereditary foe and rival of Eng- 

 land, it was still less pardonable, for a fault or a crime when per- 

 petrated originally and boldly by a nation sometimes rises almost 

 into glory, if successful ; but a second-hand iniquity, conceived 

 in jealousy and vindictiveness, is as mean as it is short sighted. 

 England had no friends at that epoch. Her previous conduct had 

 been so selfishly grasping, that all Europe rejoiced when her colo- 

 nial power was broken by the American revolution. Portugal, Hol- 

 land, Russia, Morocco and Austria, all, secretly favored the course 

 of Spain and France, and the most discreet politicians of Europe 

 believed that the condition of Great Britain was hopeless. 



The declaration of this impolitic war was finally made in Mexico 

 on the 12th of August, 1779, before the arrival of Mayorga, the 

 new viceroy, who did not reach the capital till the 23d of the same 

 month. The Mexicans were not as well acquainted with the poli- 

 tics of the world as the Spanish cabinet, and did not appreciate 

 all the delicate and diplomatic motives which actuated Charles III. 

 They regarded a war with England as a direct invitation to the 

 British to ravage their coasts and harass their trade ; and, accord- 

 ingly as soon as the direful news was announced, prayers were so- 

 lemnly uttered in all the churches for the successful issue of the 

 contest. Nor did war alone strike the Mexicans with panic ; for 

 in this same period the small pox broke out in the capital ; and 

 in the ensuing months in the space of sixty-seven days, no less 

 than eight thousand eight hundred and twenty-one persons were 

 hurried by it to the grave. It was a sad season of pestilence and 

 anxiety. The streets were filled with dead bodies, while the 

 temples were crowded with the diseased and the healthy who 

 rushed promiscuously to the holy images, in order to implore 

 divine aid and compassion. This indiscriminate mixture of all 

 classes and conditions, — this stupid reunion of the sound and the 

 sick, whose superstitions led them to the altar instead of the hospi- 

 tal, soon spread the contagion far and wide, until all New Spain 

 suffered from its desolating ravages and scarcely a person was 

 found unmarked by its frightful ravages. 



An expedition had been ordered during the viceroyalty of 

 Bucareli to explore portions of the Pacific adjacent to the Mexi- 

 can coast, and in February of 1799, it reached a point 55° 17 

 minutes north. It continued its voyage, until on the 1st of July, 

 when it took possession of the land at 60° 13 minutes, in the name 

 of Charles III. It then proceeded onwards, in sight of the coast, 



