of the
Military Order of the Sword.

But in 1850, and thenceforward, until 1858, Jose Antonio Paez trod the
streets of New York as an exile from his native land.

General Jose T. Monagas was elected President of Venezuela in 1848, and
created dissatisfaction by his course of action. Paez placed himself
at the head of an insurrectionary movement against him, and, being
defeated, was imprisoned in the city of Valencia. General Monagas,
influenced, it is probable, by feelings of ancient friendship, and
remembering the pardon extended to himself on a former similar occasion,
contented himself with a decree of exile against the captive veteran,
and Paez embarked for St. Thomas on the 24th of May, 1850. He passed
from St. Thomas to the United States.

All, whose memories extend so far back as the year 1850, remember the
ovation received in New York by the exiled chief. New York grants an
ovation to every one; and Monagas would, doubtless, have been received
with the same demonstration, had the breath of adverse fortune blown him
hither, instead of his antagonist.

After the first effervescence produced by the dropping of a notability
into the caldron of New York, the Llanero general was permitted to enjoy
his placid domesticity without molestation; and in a pleasant street,
far up-town among the Twenties, he lived in the midst of us for eight
quiet years. A curious serenity of evening, for a life so turbulent and
incarnadined in its beginning! How many of the thousands who were
wont to pass the stout old soldier, with his seamed forehead and gray
moustache, as he enjoyed his quiet stroll down Broadway, thought of him
as the lad of Araure, the horseman of Barinas, terror of the Spaniard,
victor of Carabobo, and President of Venezuela? But though retired and
unpretending in his exile, Paez was not neglected in New York; and the
procession which followed him, but a few weeks since, to the steamer
destined to bear him back to his native land,--a procession saddened, it
is true, by the feeble condition to which an accident had temporarily
reduced the chieftain,--showed that his solid worth was recognized and
honored.

Not yet, however, is it time for the summing-up of his history. The
exile of 1850 has been solicited to return to his country, and the
ninth anniversary of banishment may find him occupying once more the
Presidential chair. General Monagas having been deposed in March, 1858,
repeated invitations were dispatche