fought them well when you got them there; and should our country again need our services in the field, it would be our proudest wish to again meet the enemy under the immediate command of o in whose energy, watchfulness, and courage, we and the whole army have the most unlimited confidence."

Such a testimonial as this, unsought and disinterested as it is, speaks volumes in behalf of this able, experienced, humane, and courageous commander.

T

HE last few chapters have been devoted principally to the movements of the American forces. Meanwhile important operations had been transpiring in Mexico, at which a glance is necessary in order to have a full and correct view of the great strug. gle at Buena Vista.

General Paredes, who, as we have seen, succeeded Herrera in the government of Mexico, soon evinced his utter inability to maintain the popularity to which he owed his position. He came into office as a military ruler; and both his foreign and his domestic policy were but a code of martial

and tyrannical laws. After evincing a desire to prosecute the war with the United States, he adopted no measures to meet so heavy a responsibility; but, on the contrary, altered materially the constitu

respected by his predecessors, deprived the masses of the elective franchise, abridged other liberties, and imprisoned or banished the editors of such papers as opposed him.

In a country like Mexico, such conduct could not long be displayed before being submitted to the ordeal of a political revolution. Yucatan speedily revolted, and has since remained independent; the citizens of Vera Cruz opposed the act depriving them of the elective franchise, while ambitious politicians, military aspirants, and other similar characters, united with the injured populace, and fanned the flame of insurrection. Some of these being detected and imprisoned, the movement broke out in open revolt. News of Arista's discomfiture on the Rio Grande added to the tumult. The vengeance of an injured people concentrated itself, that it might descend as an avalanche on the author of national misrule and calamity. Paredes quailed before the storm, and implored help and money from the clergy. The latter met in council, and, after mature deliberation, decided that the funds of the church could not be appropriated .o any other than ecclesiastical purposes. The revolutionists, elated by this declaration, issued a proclamation against his government, and elected a provisional one on the basis of the constitution of 1824. This body immediately invited the return of all persons banished on account of politics, especially "his excellency, General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, who is from this time recognized as generalin-chief of all the forces engaged." The nomination of this popular eader gave an impulse to the revolutionary movement, which Paedes was utterly unable to quell; so that, after a feeble resistance, ae abandoned the capital, and fled towards the interior. He was ⚫oon arrested and thrown into prison. General Salas was named proisional president, and immediately declared for Santa Anna, affirmng the constitution of 1824 to be in force, and calling upon Congress .o meet on the 6th of December, under its rules and restrictions.

All this had transpired during the time that General Taylor remained on the Rio Grande, preparing for a march against Monterey. Santa Anna was then at Havana. On receiving the above-mentioned invitation he immediately embarked for Vera Cruz, and after passing through the American gulf squadron, by permission of President Polk, landed at that city on the 16th of August, 1846. On the same day he placed himself at the head of the movement in that district, and issued a proclamation, stating the causes of Arista's defeat, the unmilitary conduct of the war, and his designs as to its future progress. His health being somewhat impaired, he retired to his hacienda near Vera Cruz, where he remained until the early part of September, when he advanced to Ayotla. On the 15th he entered