blind their eyes and to distort their
judgment. This was the land of Cortes and Montezuma. Here it was that
the Spaniard, fresh from the conquest of fair Granada, found in the
depths of the New World a barbarian civilization which mocked the pomp
and luxury of the Moor. Here, on these plains, beneath these mountains,
on the bosom of these tranquil lakes, was transacted that marvellous
episode in history, which, on the pages of Prescott, looks like the
creations of the fabled Genii. Here an aboriginal race rose to more than
aboriginal splendor; and here, beneath the conqueror's heel, they sank
to unsounded depths of misery and servitude. He must have a prosaic
nature to whom the memories and associations of such a land do not come
glowing with the warm flush of sentiment and romance.

There was much, too, in the long and bitter struggle by which this
people were winning their independence, which appealed to the sympathy
of men who had just achieved their own freedom. Very likely, as we read
now the history of that struggle,--as we see how little of any broad and
generous patriotism entered into it,--as we mark how every step was
stained with blood and darkened by cruel passions,--as we behold on
every field the selfish ambition of petty men taking the place of the
self-devotion of great souls, it will not look heroic. But it did once.
Men saw it from afar off. They beheld in it the ancient conflict between
liberty and oppression. It was the time-worn story, of men in poverty,
of men in exile, of men dying for freedom.

Thus, from one cause or another, from reasons of utility or from reasons
of sentiment and imagination, it is certain that many cherished the
highest hopes for Mexico, and saw before her a long future of rare
prosperity and honor. "It is to Mexico," writes a glowing admirer, "that
we turn and turn again with fond delight. We invoke the reader to ponder
her present position, her capacity for future greatness, the career she
has yet to commence and run. We look toward her, and we see the
day-spring of a glorious national existence arising within her bounds."

When we look at this picture, drawn by hope and fancy, and then turn to
the reality,--when we see Mexico as she is, the blankest failure of the
century,--when we run over her forty years of anarchy, with its four
constitutions and twenty-seven plans of government, with its bewildering
array of presidents and dictators that come and go until the eye is