( 343 ) 



despotic as have been all the chiefs sent by the court of Spain to these territories, 

 Liniers exceeded them all by his iniquitous proceedings in gaining partisans. 

 These disorders, and the multiplied grievances of the public, at length produced 

 a great number of malcontents in Buenos Ayres itself, and the authority of the 

 Viceroy was combated not only in Monte- Video, but also at home. 



In this interval, arrived from Spain, Don Joseph Manuel de Goyeneche, who 

 had been appointed brigadier by the Provisional Junta of Seville, anterior to the 

 formation of the Central Junta, and was sent as their Commissioner to promote 

 unity and conformity of sentiment between the colonies and the metropolis. 

 This man, whom America will ever blush to number among her sons, is a native 

 of Arequipa, and a member of a rich family, in whose commercial concerns 

 he had gone, some years before, to the Peninsula, where having dissipated 

 the money intrusted to him by his father, he assumed the uniform of a captain 

 of militia, and became one of the numerous class of loungers in Madrid. At 

 the entrance of the French into that city, he obtained from Murat, a commis- 

 sion to go to America to support the French cause j but on his journey into 

 Andalusia, he changed his mind, and obtained from the government of that 

 province, the charge of Royal Commissioner for South America. On his arrival, 

 he thought of nothing but making his fortune ; and, adhering to the interests of 

 those who had raised him to the rank of brigadier, recommended, that at all 

 events the colonies should preserve their union with the provinces of Spain, 

 which had now begun to raise their voice against France. In Monte- Video, he 

 professed his assent to the views of its Majesty the Provincial Junta just then 

 established, and stated, that his commission directed him to form others in all the 

 cities of that continent. On his arrival at Buenos Ayres, and at his first confe- 

 rence with Liniers and the magistrates, he entirely changed his language, and de- 

 clared, that the Monte- Videans deserved to be called refractory, for having consti- 

 tuted themselves in a manner not at all legitimate or proper in America. By this 

 concession, however, he was enabled to procure a solemn adjuration of the capital 

 to Ferdinand VII., which ceremony had been hitherto postponed, as well as a 

 recognition of the Junta of Seville, as the legal representative and depository of 

 of the powers of the sovereign. 



The commissioner assumed as many characters as the scene required. Seeing 

 that the opponents of the Administration were headed by men respectable for their 

 wealth and reputation, he was unwilling to leave means untried to conciliate them ; 

 and he therefore insinuated, that the precedent of Monte- Video was proper to be 

 followed. The Cabildo, which was the centre of opposition to Liniers, gave the 



