bellion, conduced even more directly to the advancement of the intriguers' designs.
Thus led bv the craft and machinations which were brought to bear upon his adviser, Alfaro, he entered upon a system of opposition to the Yermo party and the stanchest loyalists. Their dissatisfaction at his official action was so marked that the intriguers had no difficulty in persuading the guileless archbishop that a plot was hatching among the gachupines to capture or assassinate him; whereupon he fortified the viceregal palace with artillery and increased the guard. He placed all that portion of the city under martial law. The patrol force was augmented, and detachments were stationed at all important points. Orders were issued that the patrols should arrest after eleven o'clock at night all persons on whom arms were found; and should more than six men in one party be met, they were all to be arrested. [1] Military officials of unquestionable loyalty to the mother country were removed. Aguirre and other prominent Spaniards were threatened with banishment, [2] and Lizana, abhorring the Yermo party, and hoodwinked by the racionales caballeros, who about that time were loud in their protestations of loyalty, identified himself with the creole faction, which so eagerly had advocated the convocation of a national congress. He could not see
- ↑ Ib. A copy of this brilliant órden de la plaza, dated November 3, 1809, is supplied by Martiñena and Hernandez y Dávalos, Col. Doc., i. 715-16. I copy the instructions given to the palace guard as indicating the extent to which the fears of Lizana had been worked upon. 'La guardia del arzobispado y casa de Moneda, no abrirán las puertas principales de la calle aun cuando oigan tiros de fusil ó cañon durante la noche, á menos que no vaya mandarlo personalmente uno do los ayudantes de S. E. I.' Rev., Verdadero Origen, no. 1, 78-9. Consult Guerra, Hist. Rev. N. Esp., i. 254. Mora, however, states that a formal plot against his government and person actually existed, the conspirators being of the Yermo faction, with Aguirre at their head. Mej. y sus Rev., iii. 364-5.
- ↑ Aguirre was ordered to Puebla, and it was rumored that he would be sent to Spain. The excitement was so great that Lizana recalled him, and Aguirre returned to the capital in triumph, 'con gran discrédito del arzobispo, quien con esta facilidad en dictar providencias contrarias, daba a conocer que ó no meditaba debidamente lo que hacia, ó que despues de hecho no tenia firmeza para sostenerlo.' Alaman, Hist. Mej., i. 312; Bustamante, in Cavo, Tres Siglos, iii. 268-9.
