genteel [230] officer came up and offered his services to us. He ordered the room to be policed, and desired to be useful to us. We could not fail to inquire the name of an officer capable of such unexpected and unsolicited kindness, and learned that he was Lieutenant Velarde, and was much pleased to find that he spoke English. He apologized in a handsome manner for the want of civility of some of their officers, and said that "they had never travelled out of Mexico, and knew little of the customs of other countries."

March 22d, we were placed under charge of a lieutenant and troop of cavalry. This officer was the most perfect savage we have before or since met. He was of middle size, and apparently about thirty-five years of age, with a sombre countenance, shrill, cracked voice, and eyes red with the dreams of his bloody deeds. His name I failed to procure, but understood that he was the sergeant who commanded the firing-party that shot the brave and lamented General Mexier, and for which act Santa Anna had promoted him to his present commission. His very gait and look bespoke assassination; he was the very impersonation of a murderer. Soon after daylight we were ordered by him to pack up and start. He refused to let us hire even a pack-mule, and we had, consequently, to leave some of our luggage. We were marched through the city, and attracted as much attention as if we had been a caravan of monkeys. One of our prisoners, Daniel D. Henrie, was exceedingly ill, and he was thrown [231] upon a mule with as little ceremony as if he had been a package of goods. With great difficulty he made out to hold on to the mane of the animal for two miles, and in the act of falling was caught and laid upon the ground. I told the officer it was impossible to carry him in that condition, when he replied, "Let him die, then!" The word die had no pleasant sound to our friend Dan, who was not so far gone but that he knew its meaning, and after giving him water, we lifted him upon the mule, and one walking on each side to hold him on, we proceeded on our march.

At three leagues this officer stopped with his woman, who was accompanying him in a coach drawn by eight mules, to breakfast. He refused for us even to have pulque; "for," said he, "it will get in your heads, and then the devil will be to pay." At this place we hired some miserable poor burros; and Captain Reese, being mounted upon the most indifferent, was pricking it up with a sharp stick, when the owner came up, and attempted forcibly to take the stick from him. The captain drew back and threatened to give it to him, when our red-eyed brute of an officer rode up, and threatened to run Reese through with his sword if he struck him. Our only satisfaction was to curse him in the best of our poor Spanish. This night we reached the small town of Acahita,6 at nine leagues, where Santa Anna defeated and shot the brave General Mexier.

We cannot pass over a spot so sacred to liberty [232] without paying some small tribute to the memory of this deceased patriot.