294 



SPANISH MOTIVES. 



of the guard : ' Que los Ueva, mientras ' respira.'' 

 — ^ Let him wear them while he breathes." — In 

 a few hours this victim of Spanish barbarity 

 died;"* 



Sometimes the intruders were sent to Spain, 

 after being long confined in the colonial prisons, 

 and from thence were remitted to Ceuta, in Afri- 

 ca, after which they were seldom heard of more. 

 Sometimes they were sent as convicts to Malaga, 

 and other Spanish ports, where they were forced 

 to work in chains. By these and other means, 

 the spirit of the laws of the Indies was most ri- 

 gorously enforced, and it required an extraordina- 

 ry combination of favourable circumstances, and 

 the stimulus of the most powerful motives of in- 

 terest and patriotism, to free the country from 

 their baneful influence. 



It may naturally be asked, what possible mo- 

 tive could give birth and permanence to so unwise 

 and so wicked a system as this ? It was no other, 

 than that Spain alone, and her sons, should de- 



* Robinson's Memoirs of the Mexican Revolution, 

 Vol. I. page 313. 



