Page:Mexico (1829) Volumes 1 and 2.djvu/159

MEXICO. 123 several of the principal Creoles of Guanajuato, connected by marriage with the Spanish residents, and apprehensive, no doubt, that their property would not be respected in the general pillage, which was to be expected on Hidalgo's entry, determined to share the fate of the Europeans, and shut themselves up with them in the Alhondiga. The slaughter is allowed to have been very considerable : indeed, I am acquainted with one family which lost seventeen of its members on that fatal day. Nothing could exceed the acharnement of the Indians, after the action was over ; they put to death all the Europeans who fell into their hands, and seemed to seize with delight the opportunity, which was at length afforded them, of avenging the evils which Spanish ambition had brought upon their ancestors and themselves. This ferocity was the more extraordinary, from having lain dormant so long. During three centuries, the Indian race had appeared to be in a state of the most abject submission to their conquerors ; nor was it suspected, until the Revolu- tion broke out, that they entertained so deeply rooted a feeHng of former wrongs. As all the Europeans had transported to the Fort their most valuable effects, the amount of the money, and other pre- cious commodities, found in it was enormous : it is usually estimated at five millions of dollars, the possession of which entirely changed the aspect of Hidalgo's affairs, and induced the public to watch, with the most anxious interest, the pro- gress of an insurrection, which many had at first considered as an ill-judged, and desperate attempt. The property of the old Spaniards at Guanajuato was given up to Hidalgo's troops ; and such was the diligejoce of the Indians upon this occasion, that, although the action did not terminate till five in the afternoon on Friday, not a single house belonging to an European was found standing on the Saturday morning. Indeed, the greatest excesses were com- mitted during the whole time that the army remained in the