Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/81

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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL.
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    or to imprisonment for two months. Ho later addressed the archbishop, then viceroy, in such discourteous and unmeasured terms that he was arrested and tried before the junta de seguridad y buen órden. Numerous persons brought against him charges of insults and grievances, and his fractious and turbulent tendencies being well known, the junta condemned him to banishment to Spain. Guerra, Hist. Rev. N. Esp., i. xix.-xxiv. There he occupied himself in writing on the political affairs of New Spain, displaying therein a vicious enmity toward the Creole and revolutionary party. In 1811 he published in Cádiz La Verdad Sabida y Buena Fé Guardada, in which he maintains that the revolution which broke out in Mexico in 1810 originated in Iturrigaray and his treasonable designs. He asserts that a revolutionary tendency did not exist at the time when Humboldt was in New Spain, as affirmed by 'el Español escritor en Londres,' and said that Humboldt's travels in Mexico were too limited to admit of his understanding the spirit of the people. The Verdad Sabida gave great offence to the ayuntamiento of Mexico, and the regidores petitioned the supreme council of the Spanish regency to order his arrest on the charge of abominable libels principally directed against that municipality. Hernandez y Dávalos, Col. Doc., i. 725. In Mexico Cancelada for some years followed the avocation of a pedler. He was of a quarrelsome and rancorous disposition, and is described by the ayuntamiento of Mexico as 'hombre bien conocido en este reyno por su cavilosidad, estupidez y audacia.' Id. Of low origin and uneducated, it is a matter of surprise that he obtained the position as editor of the Gazeta de Mexico, the official organ of the government, which was under his direction for some years. Fernando, on his return to Spain, caused him to be placed in a convent, from which, however, he was liberated in 1820. He died a few years afterward. Besides the Verdad Sabida, he was the author of many other works, among which may be mentioned Ruina de la Nuera España si se declara el comercio libre con los extrangeros, Cádiz, 1811, 4to, pp. 84; Conducta. del Excelentisimo Señor Don José Iturrigaray, Cádiz, 1812, 4to, 2 1. pp. 135; and the Telégrafo Americano, a periodical which he published in Spain, and which was opposed in the Censor by Alcocer of Tlascala. In reply to the Verdad Sabida, appeared in the same year the Discurso que Publica Don Facundo de Lizarza Vindicando. . .Iturrigaray. It handles Cancelada with great severity, and frequently gives him the lie direct. Lizarza, who was Iturrigaray 's lawyer, was not the author of the Discurso, but José Beye de Cisneros, the brother of the abbot of Guadalupe, who was imprisoned on the downfall of the viceroy and at that time Mexican deputy to the córtes at Cádiz. Alaman, Hist. Mej., i. 268. The work displays considerable acumen in the refutation of Cancelada, and supplies many facts favorable to Iturrigaray purposely ignored in the Verdad Sabida. Although Cisneros is not sparing in severe animadversions upon the dissertation, describing it as a texture of lies, falsifications, and fiction, he has the good taste to retrain from the gross vituperation so noticeable in the writings of that time. Cancelada in reply published his Conducta del Exmo. Señor. . .Iturrigaray, Cádiz, 1812, which is valuable as being composed mainly of transcripts of official documents bearing upon Iturrigaray's fall and trial. Among these appear the report of his administration and conduct from the time of his arrival to his deposal, drawn up by the real acuerdo of Mexico, November 9, 1808; official accounts of the four memorable juntas convoked by him on the 9th and 31st of August, and the 1st and 9th of September, 1808; the royal orders issued by the regency of the isla de Leon; and other official papers quoted in this chapter. With regard to the report of the real acuerdo, to which Cancelada triumphantly appeals as conclusive evidence of Iturrigaray's aspirations to the sovereignty of New Spain, I have only to remark that the members of that court were bitterly hostile to the viceroy, and that their representations cannot be accepted as impartial. Historia de la Revolucion de Nueva España, etc., Escribia la Dn José Guerra, Londres, 1813, 2 vols, 8vo. This work was first undertaken by José" Servando de Mier y Guerra, with the object of defending Iturrigaray against the defamatory attacks of Cancelada, but the author, being supplied
    HIST. MEX., VOL. IV. 5