118 



CHARACTER OF MEXICAN SOLDIERS. 



blood. Cities have been besieged and bombarded ; magnificent 

 arrays of forces have been made on adjacent fields ; large camps 

 have been formed and held in readiness ; cannons, loaded with 

 cannister and grape, have been discharged along the crowded high- 

 ways of towns ; marksmen have been placed in towers, steeples, 

 and azoteas, to pick off unwary passengers ; divisions have been 

 reviewed and manoeuvred in sight of each other, but, in all these 

 revolts or pronunciamie?itos, no pitched battles were fought which 

 actually terminated the contest by the gun and sword. The aspi- 

 rant chief, or the hero he designed to displace, managed to secure 

 the majority of the neighboring military forces, and as soon as the 

 fact was unequivocally ascertained, the one who was in the mi- 

 nority fled from the scene without provoking a trial by battle. In 

 1840, 1841, and 1844, during the administrations of Bustamante 

 and Santa Anna, there were various exhibitions of these sham con- 

 tests ; but, in all of them, we have reason to believe that the inno- 

 cent non-combatant people were the greatest sufferers, and that the 

 army escaped comparatively unscathed. 



These observations are not designed to impugn the military 

 nerve or spirit of the Mexicans, for the war with the United States 

 and the war of their revolution, demonstrated that they unite 

 both in quite an eminent degree. Our officers believe that the 

 Mexican possesses the elements of a good soldier, but that he is 

 neither trained, disciplined, nor led, so as to make him a dangerous 

 foe. This is demonstrated by the result of the recent war and of 

 every action fought during it. A brave show and a bold assault 

 were not stubbornly followed up with pertinacious resolution, in 

 spite of all resistance. The Mexicans were fighting on their own 

 soil, for their own country, against a hated foe, yet they failed in 

 every conflict, and with every conceivable disparity of numbers. 



The great body of the army is of course composed either of In- 

 dians or mixed breeds, and the idea of nationality in its high love 

 of a loveable country, does not in all probability, animate or inspire 

 these classes in the hour of danger. They did not fight with a 

 common or an understood purpose. They were rather forced mer- 

 cenaries than patriots. It was not a war of enthusiasm. Every 

 effort was made by grandiloquent proclamations and false allega- 

 tions to rally and nerve them; but whenever they crossed arms with 

 our forces, if they failed in the onset, like lions foiled in their 

 spring, they retreated to their lair. Nevertheless, throughout the 

 contest, there were repeated instances of courage, constancy, endu- 

 rance, and persistence which satisfied our officers that under a differ- 



