head to fit him for personal popularity, and enable him to succeed in such an enterprise as founding an empire on the ruins of a republic.
Queretaro is situated on the north-eastern edge of a wide plain, around which, on the north-east, north, and west, runs a range of low hills commanding the city. In April, and the early part of May, 1867, the position of the contending armies was about as follows: Gen. Escobedo, the Commander-in-Chief of the Republican forces, had his head-quarters on the heights east of the city, and held undisturbed possession of the northeast and south-east, and debated with the Imperialists the possession of the lower part of the city nearest his head-quarters. The Imperialists held the west, south-west, and south-east, and the main portion of the city; while Gen. Corona on the south, and Regules and the American Legion on the west, hemmed them in, and prevented their escape toward the Pacific.
The old Convent and Church of Las Cruces, is an immense structure, with walls of great strength, and is situated on a hill sufficiently high to command the city, but is commanded in turn by the heights beyond the town occupied by General Escobedo. The Alameda is on low ground, overlooked by the heights occupied by Corona, but is surrounded by a stout, stone wall, and was well defended by artillery and the Casa Blanca. Between it and the Cerro de Las Campanas is an old hacienda, with immense walls, invulnerable to everything but the fire of the heaviest ordnance. From Las Cruces to the Cerro, in a direct line, is a mile and a half, and the line of defences was nearly two miles—twice too long for the force that held it, or rather, tried to hold it.
