The vigor displayed in these orders by " General Head Quarters" was far surpassed hy one of his subalterns.
Colonel Hughes, civil and military Governor of Jalapa, on the 10th December, 1847, issued the following order, viz: ' All persons Who may in any loay atternidt to prevent . supphes from reaching this port, will be sent to a military Commission for trial, and if convicted of that offence, will be SHOT." Here we find a capital offence which is not alleged to be either robbery or murder. Any Mexican, priest or layman, who by persuasion or force, or in any other way, attempts to prevent his countrymen from com- mitting the Clime of furnishing supphes to the enemy, is to be SHOT—to be put to death in cool blood by American soldiers, at the command of an American officer ! We greatly doubt whether the history of modern warfare re- cords an order so utterly at variance with the plainest dic- tates of patriotism, justice, and humanity.
We now turn to another melancholy but forcible illus- tration of the remarks in the commencement of this chap- ter. A laro^e number of Irish emifyrants to the United States bore arms in the invading army. These men were, of course, mere mercenaiies. They fought, as others of their countrymen have labored on our canals and rail- roads, for money. They knew and cared nothing about the claims of " our much-injured citizens," nor did they trouble themselves about " our western boundary." On reaching I^Iexico, they discovered that they had been hired by heretics to slaughter brethren of their own church. The Mexicans, moreover, published appeals addressed directly to their consciences, in which was set forth, in strong language, the sin they were committing in fighting against men who had never injured them, and who were united with them in a common faith ; and liberal offers were made of land and money, if they vrould abandon the American standard. A portion of the emigrants accepted the invitation ; and it is* reasonable to suppose that they ivere influenced both by religious and by pecuniary mo- tives. Upwards of fifty of these men were taken prisoners m battle. They had unquestionably