is one of the most
troublesome political elements at work in the Republic. The political
agitators are mostly among them; and it is they, more than any other
class, who are continually stirring up factions and making
pronunciamientos (what a pleasant thing it is that we have never had to
make an English word for "pronunciamiento"). Several times, efforts
have been made to reduce the Army List to decent proportions, but a
fresh crop always springs up.

In the "lowest depth" of mismanagement to which Mexican military
affairs have sunk, the newspapers still triumphantly refer to countries
which surpass them in this respect, and, at the time of our arrival,
were citing the statistics of the Peruvian Republic, where there are a
general and twenty officers to every sixty soldiers, and as many naval
officers as seamen.

These officers are not subject to the civil administration at all,
whatever they may do. They have their _fuero_, their private charter,
and are only amenable to their own tribunals, just as the clergy are to
theirs. To the ill effects of the presence of such armies and such
officers in the country, we must add the continual interruptions to
commerce arising from the distracted state of the republic, and the
uncertain tenure by which every one holds his property, not to say his
life; and this, in its effect on the morale of the whole country, is
worse than the positive suffering they inflict. So much for soldiering,
for the present. We leave the President trying, with the aid of his
Congress, to organize the government, and set things straight
generally. This August assembly is selected from the people by
universal suffrage, in the most approved manner, and ought to be a very
important and useful body, but unfortunately can do nothing but talk
and issue decrees, which no one else cares about.

In consequence of the alarming increase of highway-robbery, steps are
taken to diminish the evil. It is made lawful to punish such offenders
on the spot, by Lynch law. This is all. You may do justice on him when
caught, but really you must catch him yourself. Sober citizens are even
regretting the days of Santa Ana (recollect, I speak now of 1856, and
they might regret him still more in 1860.) He was a great scoundrel, it
is true; but he sent down detachments of soldiery to where the robbers
practised their profession, and garotted them in pairs, till the roads
were as safe as ours are in England. A President who sell