DECREE OF SAN MARTIN. 



" ItwOj From this day forwards the supreme po- 

 litical and military command of the free depart- 

 ments of Peru shall be united in me, under the title 

 of Protector. 



" 2do, The Minister of Foreign Affairs shall be 

 Don Juan Garcia del Rio, Secretary of State."" 



(And so on with the other officers of govern- 

 ment.) 



" Given in Lima, 3d August 1821, Second 

 Year of the Liberty of Peru.* 



(Signed) " Jose de San Martin.'' 



I am tempted to insert another proclamation 

 which appeared on the following day , and which 

 is characteristic not only of the writer, but of 

 those distracted times. It gave the poor Span- 

 iards a shock from which they never recovered : 

 indeed, from the hour it was published, they dated 

 the death of their hopes, and one and all seriously 

 prepared to quit the country. Such an effect. 



* The Era of the Liberty of Peru commences with 

 1820 ; as it was in that year the Patriots first landed and 

 proclaimed the Independence. 



VOL. I. S 



