POPULARITY OF GALVEZ.

393

On the morning of the 29th of May 1785 a special messenger arrived in Mexico, announcing that the new viceroy had arrived in Vera Cruz, and on the 30th would start for the capital. On the 16th of June he arrived at the town of San Cristóbal,37 and received the command from the regente. During the day he was honored and magnificently entertained by the real consulado, the archbishop, courts, religious orders, corporations, and citizens. The next morning at ten he reached Guadalupe. After the religious ceremonies, and having been greeted by the audiencia and others, he pursued his way to the capital, entering amidst the greatest marks of respect and enthusiasm, and a salute of fifteen guns. The same salute had been given to the vicereine, who had gone in advance escorted by the police of the real acordada, four halberdiers at the steps of the carriage, and a squad of dragoons. The people manifested their joy in many ways.

33

the Galveztown, he was again wounded. The result of his campaigns was that he rid the Mexican gulf of the presence of the English. His services were rewarded without stint. It is true that his uncle, José de Galvez, was the king's minister for the Indies, but he had well deserved of his sovereign and country; promoted successively to mariscal de campo and lieutenant-general, a title of Castile was also given him with the privilege of adding on his coat of arms the motto 'yo solo,' for his prowess at Pensacola, and one of the fleurs de lis of Louisiana. It was also ordered that the bay of Pensacola should thereafter be named Santa María de Galvez. He was next granted knightly honors, and later appointed governor, captain-general of Cuba, and inspector of all Spanish troops in America. He was finally exalted to the position of viceroy, governor, president, and captain-general of New Spain. When the British fleet under Admiral Hood, conveying the royal duke of Lancaster, visited in April 1783 the port of Guarico, the duke, wishing to know the young hero, called at his head-quarters, and on the French general. Galvez being absent, the latter had to do the honors to the prince. But the former as a mark of respect sent to the duke, with a full pardon, the chief of the Natchez and his accomplices, who were under sentence of death for plotting in the interest of the English. The prince was much pleased at this, promising to report it to the British king. Gaz. de Méx. (1786-7), ii. pref.; Beleña, Recop., i. pref. 3; Barea, Oracion fúnebre, 1-40; Vargas, Carta de pésame, in Festiv. Div., i. no. 11, 1-16. Whilst he was governor in Habana he extended a kind treatment to some Americans who had been brought there as prisoners, for which the secretary of the American congress wrote the conde de Floridablanca to thank him in the name of congress for Galvez' generosity. Rivera, Gob. de Méx., i. 456.

37 He made what was called an 'entrada mista,' having on his way visited first Puebla, and Tlascala next. Panes, Vir., in Monum. Dom. Esp., MS., 54. 38 Both the viceroy and vicereine were loudly cheered. Rockets and flowers formed great features on the occasion. Gomez, Diario, 209-10; Gaz. de Mex., 1784-5, i. 326–7.

At the palace, his commissions being produced and read, he took the oath of office before the real acuerdo. The rest of that day and the two following were spent mostly in ceremonials and compliments. But he soon after devoted his attention seriously to public affairs. His short rule was marked by two great calamities, the loss of crops, consequent upon heavy and continuous frosts, and famine followed by an epidemic. To meet the latter he was foremost in liberality, not only contributing 12,000 pesos remaining from his father's estate, but borrowing $100,000 more for the same purpose. He formed a board of relief, and used every exertion to supply the city with the necessaries of life.

One day while transacting business with the board, information reached him that the alhóndiga, or public granary, was empty, and that poor people could get no maize for the morrow. Rushing into the streets without an escort, or even his hat, he walked to the alhóndiga, where he took steps to keep up the supply. When the people saw him, and learned what had brought him there, they were moved to tears, and escorted him back to the palace in the midst of acclamations. On another occasion, the Saturday preceding palm Sunday, April 8, 1786, as Galvez was riding from the country house called El Pensil to meet the audiencia for the general visit of prisons, either purposely or accidentally he encountered three prisoners on their way to the scaffold, followed by a rabble, who besought the viceroy to spare the condemned, which was done. Much obloquy was heaped upon Galvez for this act; he was charged not only with the deliberate intent of saving the criminals to win favor with the populace, but of misrepresenting the facts to the crown.41 He stated that under the cir

39 Bustamante, Suplem., in Cavo, Tres Siglos, iii. 58.

40 José Gomez, one of his guard of halberdiers, says in his Diario, 236, that it was the latter; 'sucedió la casualidad que en la estacion de la cárcel al suplicio,' are his own words.

Bustamante, Suplem., in Cavo, Tres Siglos, iii. 62-5. That author is very

INCREASING INFLUENCE.

395

cumstances it was his duty, as the agent of a benign sovereign, to heed the clamors of a people then stricken by famine, misery, and disease. Be it as it may, the crown confirmed the viceroy's act; but at the same time added to the approval a reproof; for he was directed in future to abstain when possible from going out of the palace at such hours as prisoners were usually taken to the place of execution.

A certain distance had been heretofore maintained, as a matter of etiquette, between the ruler and the ruled. Very few could approach the viceroy with any degree of intimacy. Galvez ignored that practice, and from the moment of assuming the vicegerency of his sovereign in New Spain, established close relations with the chief families, without in any manner lowering by undue familiarity the decorum of his high position. His countess' attractions aided to awaken enthusiasm and to win affection, at the same time exalting the office. He caused his little son and heir Miguel to be enrolled in October 1785 as a private in the grenadier company of the Corona regiment, on which occasion the boy was bandied from hand to hand among his new comrades. The same day the father gave a banquet in the throne-room to the officers of the regiment and the grenadier company, and also entertained civilians on the flat roof of the palace.12

Such acts at such a time, tending to unusual popularity, awakened at court suspicion of treasonable intent. Some authorities assert that the viceroy entertained the plan of setting up a throne for himself; that when certain of the affection of the Mexicans he began to feel his way, throwing out ambiguous remarks of double meaning, which could not compromise him. With his more intimate friends, they say, he would

severe in his strictures, and lays on Galvez the responsibility for future crimes committed by two of those reprieved men which finally carried them to the gibbet.

42 This is the version given by Gomez, Diario, 217-18. On the 20th of August, 1786, the sergeants of the Corona regiment came to the palace to place on the viceroy's son's shoulder the epaulet of a second sergeant. Id., 246.

discuss the present superiority of affairs over those of Montezuma's time, referring to the elements possessed by the country to become an independent monarchy. At other times he spoke of the difficulties there might be to keep up uninterrupted relations with the mother country in future wars with England or France, now that their navies were becoming so much more powerful than Spain's. Then he would expatiate on the need the Mexicans had of erecting strong fortifications at certain points in the interior, and of making other preparations, so that they could rely on their own resources in the event of a foreign invasion when Spain could afford them no aid. Thus he would hint, his accusers said, that Mexico received no benefits, but on the contrary much injury from maritime wars, and all because of a useless, indefensible, and damaging connection with Spain. The frequent social gatherings at the palace and at private houses are said to have afforded him opportunities for quietly promulgating such ideas.43 Another charge advanced against the count is that, to further gain the good-will of the people, he invited the ayuntamiento of the capital to stand sponsor of a child soon to be born, and which, if a girl, was to be named Guadalupe after the worshipped patroness of the city. The reconstruction of Chapultepec, and the peculiar form and strength given it, likewise aroused suspicion. It was not, they said, a palace for the viceroy's pleasure, but a masked fortress, or a citadel

44

43 Alaman seems to give credence to the charges. Disert., iii. app. 74-6. Others say that letters were written to Spain blaming Galvez for his democratic demeanor, and foretelling a revolution like that of the United States. Bustamante, Suplem., in Cavo, Tres Siglos, iii. 65; Rivera, Gob. Méx., i. 457, and others. Humboldt, speaking on the subject, is loath to give credence to the charge. Essai Polit., 203.

The person first invited to be godfather was Fernando Mangino, superintendent of the mint, who courteously gave way to the ayuntamiento; this was after the city council expressed the wish, the father being already dead. But more anon. El Indicador de la Fed. Mex., iii. 170, in an article either contributed to or copied from, and also appearing in Mora, Revol. Mex., iii. 289-90, would indicate that the infant in question was born in the viceroy's lifetime, when there is evidence beyond doubt that it was a posthumous

CHARGES OF TREASON.

397

to command the city. The expense incurred was large and disapproved by the crown, but the order came out when it could not annoy Galvez. If, as charged, the viceroy was plotting independence, his rule was too short for his ambition.

Others scouted the imputation of treason, and said that he who, like his father, and his uncles the marqués de Sonora, and Miguel de Galvez, ambassador at Berlin, had been so exceptionally favored by their sovereign, would never lend himself to treasonable schemes; and further, if gratitude would not deter him, fear of the consequences would. And again, if, as the count's accusers say, his ambiguous behavior gave rise to suspicion, how is it that neither the sovereign, nor his ministers, nor the audiencia or other authorities in New Spain, gave information of it?45

I am inclined to doubt the truth of any charge of treason, and for the following reasons. On the 22d of May 1786, the audiencia sent a petition to the king that the count might be retained at the head of the government in New Spain, recounting his merits. and services to the crown. Speaking for the people of Mexico the oidores praise his benevolence; the wisdom of his measures in government; in the subjugation of hostile Indians; in the arrangement and division of the provincias internas; and generally, in everything he had done, all which they declare as conducive to the public welfare and happiness. To that petition the king answered on the 18th of August promising to retain Galvez as viceroy in Mexico, so long as he might not be more urgently needed for other duties. The idea of treason seems not to have occurred to any one at the time, and what follows

46

45 It is stated that he received severe rebukes from the crown that so preyed upon his mind, as to break down his health; that he became melancholy, and seriously ill, which much alarmed the people, and prayers were daily uttered in almost every household for their idolized ruler and friend. Bustamante, Suplem., in Cavo, Tres Siglos, iii. 65.

46 Para satisfaccion y consuelo de sus Vasallos de N. E.' Beleña, Recop., i. pref. 3-4.