nment
by many a lukewarm conservative. Inexorably the patriot armies closed
around him until in May, 1867, he was captured at Queretaro, where he
had sought refuge. Denied the privilege of leaving the country on a
promise never to return, he asked Escobedo, his captor, to treat him
as a prisoner of war. "That's my business," was the grim reply. On the
pretext that Maximilian had refused to recognize the competence of the
military court chosen to try him, Juarez gave the order to shoot him.
On the 19th of June the Austrian archduke paid for a fleeting glory
with his life. Thus failed the second attempt at erecting an empire in
Mexico. For thirty-four years diplomatic relations between that country
and Austria-Hungary were severed. The clerical-military combination had
been overthrown, and the Mexican people had rearmed their independence.
As Juarez declared: "Peace means respect for the rights of others."

Even if foreign dreams of empire in Mexico had vanished so abruptly, it
could hardly be expected that a land torn for many years by convulsions
could become suddenly tranquil. With Diaz and other aspirants to
presidential power, or with chieftains who aimed at setting up little
republics of their own in the several states, Juarez had to contend for
some time before he could establish a fair amount of order. Under his
successor, who also was a civilian, an era of effective reform began. In
1873 amendments to the constitution declared Church and State absolutely
separate and provided for the abolition of peonage--a provision which
was more honored in, the breach than in the observance.

CHAPTER VII. GREATER STATES AND LESSER

During the half century that had elapsed since 1826, the nations of
Hispanic America had passed through dark ages. Their evolution had
always been accompanied by growing pains and had at times been arrested
altogether or unduly hastened by harsh injections of radicalism. It was
not an orderly development through gradual modifications in the social
and economic structure, but rather a fitful progress now assisted and
now retarded by the arbitrary deeds of men of action, good and bad, who
had seized power. Dictators, however, steadily decreased in number and
gave place often to presidential autocrats who were continued in office
by constant reelection and who were imbued with modern ideas. In 1876
these Hispanic nations stood on the threshold of a new era. Some were
destined to advance rapidly b