Salazar, with Villagomez and
Felix Diaz, who were ignorant of the existence of any such order or
determination, were all shot at Uruapam, October 21, 1865. When
Maximilian was himself taken prisoner, the like summary punishment
became his just award. In the state legislative palace of Queretaro we
were shown the table on which the death sentence was signed by the
members of the court-martial, the coffin in which Maximilian's body was
brought from the place of execution, and a fine oil painting
representing the late would-be emperor.

All strangers who visit the city are taken out to the grounds where the
execution took place. One naturally regards the spot with considerable
interest. It is marked by three rude stones within an iron-railed
inclosure, each stone bearing the name of one of the victims, in the
order in which they stood before the firing party on the Cerro de los
Campanas, two miles from the city proper. It seemed serene and peaceful
enough as we looked upon the locality, surrounded by highly cultivated
fields, dotted here and there by sheep and cattle quietly grazing in the
calm, genial sunshine.

The whole of the Archduke's Mexican purpose and career was a great and
absurd political blunder. Personally he was a pure and honest man,
though a very weak one. He never possessed mental power equal to that of
his wife, who won from the Mexicans unbounded and deserved praise by her
devotion to her husband and to the public good. Carlotta freely expended
her private fortune for the relief of the poor of the national capital,
and in the founding of a much needed and grand free hospital for women.
When Maximilian received notice that Napoleon III. was about to desert
him and his cause, he was absolutely discouraged, and would have
resigned at once and returned to Europe; but his courageous wife
dissuaded him. She started the very next day for Vera Cruz, on her way
to induce the French emperor to keep his word and hold sacred the treaty
of Miramar. In vain did she plead with Napoleon, being only insulted for
her trouble; nor was she received much better by the Pope, Pius IX.
Disappointment met her everywhere. The physical and mental strain
proved too much for Carlotta. Brain fever ensued, and upon her partial
recovery it was found that she was bereft of reason. More than twenty
years have passed since the faithful wife was thus stricken, nor has
reason yet dawned upon her benighted brain.

After three years of ce