the French and English commanders at a place
called La Soledad.

England and Spain, when the agreement was sent to Europe for
ratification, considered it satisfactory. France, having ulterior
designs, repudiated it altogether. The Spaniards and the English
therefore withdrew their forces, and the French remained to fight
out the quarrel with Juarez alone.

Up to this time no allusion had been made as to any change in the
Mexican government; but now French agents began to intrigue in
favor of an empire and Maximilian. A small assembly of Mexican
notables was with great difficulty convened in the city of Mexico,
from which Juarez was absent, being engaged in carrying on the
war. The only persons concerned in this assembly who took any real
interest in its objects were the clergy, who believed that a prince
of the House of Austria would be likely to restore to them all
their property and privileges.

There can be no doubt that such a government as Maximilian would
have established in Mexico would have been a happy thing for that
country and for civilization; but it is equally certain that the
Mexicans (meaning by that term the great mass of the people) did
not want such a government. Above all, they did not want for their
ruler a foreigner, backed by a foreign potentate. The only _raison
d'etre_ for Maximilian's government in any Mexican's mind was not
that it would bring order and peace into the country, but that
it might bring money from the coffers of the new emperor's ally.
But when, after a while, the reverse of peace and order was the
result of this new government, and when the French emperor declined
to advance any more funds, nothing kept any man true to Maximilian
but the dread of what the party of Juarez might do to him when
the cause of the emperor should be overthrown.

With this explanation we will go back to Miramar, where Maximilian
and Carlotta, unquestionably deceived by the political manipulations
of the French emperor, believed, with joy and pride, that they
were the choice of the Mexican people, and that they had nothing
to do but to go forth and take possession of the promised land.

On April 13, 1864, almost the darkest date during our war for the
cause of the Federal Union, the Archduke Maximilian and his wife
quitted the soil of Austria.

Early in the morning, in the port of Trieste and on the road to
Miramar, all were astir. Friends from all parts of the Austrian
Empire were hastening to b