Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/281

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DINNER WITH MATIAS ROMERO.
269

mero, Minister of Finance—a most onerous, thankless, and unprofitable office—and formerly Minister Plenipotentiary to

MATIAS ROMERO.

Washington, gave a delightful private dinner to Mr. Seward and the members of his party, with a few friends. Among the ladies present were Mrs. Romero—formerly Miss Lulu B. Allen of Washington—her mother—Mrs. Allen—Señorita, Luz Romero, Señorita Dolores Mejia, the beautiful and accomplished daughter of General Mejia, Minister of War and Marine, who was also present. The reunion was social, and of the most intimately friendly character.

Mr. Seward paid a high and well-deserved tribute to Señor Romero, for the services rendered by him to the cause of liberty and Mexico during his residence at Washington, and the latter replied in feeling and affecting terms, acknowledging that the policy marked out by Mr. Seward, though strongly opposed by himself and General Grant—both of whom were at the time in favor of armed intervention by the United States, and the expulsion of the French from Mexican soil by force—was the best in the end, and accomplished its object without entailing on Mexico the curse which usually falls on nations who call in a more powerful neighbor to relieve them from a present danger, creating thereby a danger still greater, and harder to meet and overcome.