136 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



was more powerful with the Indians themselves while 

 supported by the priests and the aristocracy than at 

 the head of the Indians only ; but all knew that, in the 

 moment of passion, he forgot entirely the little of plan 

 or policy that ever governed him ; and when he return- 

 ed from Quezaltenango, his hands red with blood, and 

 preceded by the fearful rumour that he intended to 

 bring out two or three hundred prisoners and shoot 

 them, the citizens of Guatimala felt that they stood 

 on the brink of a fearful gulf. A leading member of 

 the government, whom I wished to call with me upon 

 him and ask him for his passport, declined doing so, 

 lest, as he said, Carrera should think the government 

 was trying to lead him. Others paid him formal visits 

 of ceremony and congratulation upon his return, and 

 compared notes with each other as to the manner in 

 which they were received. Carrera made no report, 

 official or verbal, of what he had done ; and though all 

 were full of it, no one of them dared ask him any ques- 

 tions, or refer to it. They will perhaps pronounce me 

 a calumniator, but even at the hazard of wounding 

 their feelings, I cannot withhold what I believe to be 

 a true picture of the state of the country as it was at 

 that time. 



Unable to induce any of the persons I wished to call 

 with me upon Carrera ; afraid, after such a long interval 

 and such exciting scenes as he had been engaged in, 

 that he might not recognise me, and feeling that it was 

 all important not to fail in my application to him, I re- 

 membered that in my first interview he had spoken 

 warmly of a doctor who had extracted a ball from his 

 side. This doctor I did not know, but I called upon 

 him, and asked him to accompany me, to which, with 

 great civility, he immediately assented. 



