. Europe is at the present moment overcrowded
with people who lack employment: any enterprise will be welcome to them;
and a leader in any part of the world needs only to speak the word for
crowds to enrol themselves under his banner."

As he said this, Don Estevan paced the room, agitated by the grandeur of
his thoughts. His dark eyes flashed with excitement, and his soul
seemed inspired with a warlike ardour that caused him for a while to
forget the presence of the Senator. It was only after some minutes
spent in this wild enthusiasm that he remembered an important fact--that
in all projects such as he was engaged in, _intrigue_ should be the
precursor of open action; and as this was to be the peculiar _role_
which the Senator was expected to play, he again turned to address
himself to this individual.

"Meanwhile," said he, "your tactics will be of a more pacific character.
I take charge of the open fighting--while you manage the secret
diplomacy of the affair. Your fortune, restored to you by this opulent
alliance, will enable you to get back the influence you have lost. You
will receive with the daughter of Don Augustin, at least two hundred
thousand dollars of dowry. Half of this you are to employ in making
partisans in the Senate, and in what you are pleased to call _your
army_. This sum you will not lose: it will be repaid to you, and with
usurious interest; or if it never should, you still make a good thing of
it. The end you will keep in view, is to detach the Senate of Sonora
from the Federal alliance. You will find no lack of reasons for this
policy. For instance, your State has now scarcely the privileges of a
simple territory; your interests differ entirely from those of the
central States of the Republic. Every day your laws are becoming more
centralised. The President, who deals with your finances, resides at a
distance of seven hundred leagues from your capital--it is ridiculous!
Besides, the funds of the treasury are misappropriated--the army badly
paid, although you have to do your duty in raising the tax that is to
pay it--a thousand grievances can be cited. Well, this will enable you
to get up a _pronunciamento_, and before the news of your _grito_ can
reach the city of Mexico, and the Executive power there can send a force
against you--ay, before the government troops could get half-way to
Sonora, more than two-thirds of them would desert. The others would
come upon the ground, only