seizing, at Iguala, a million of dollars belonging to the Manilla Company, on its way to Acapulco. He made another like seizure at Perote; but these high-handed measures, while they proved but a drop in the bucket toward sustaining his government, increased his embarrassments, by destroying all confidence; so that his new authority had stamped upon it the unmistakable marks of dissolution. He was an emperor without traditional associations; he had an empire without a revenue; a large standing army without pay. The fickle multitude, who supposed that independence was to prove an antidote for every evil, began to murmur; while a host of demagogues, who envied the good fortune of Iturbide, were all beginning to clamor for a republic. The blow, however, came from an unexpected quarter. Santa Anna had quarreled with a superior officer, General Echevarri, and Iturbide had recalled him from his command. But Santa Anna thought it most advisable to disobey the Emperor; and in the Plaza of Vera Cruz, surrounded by the garrison, he proclaimed a republic, on the 2d of December, 1822. He joined in his insurrection the name and the influence of Victoria, yet both were insufficient to save him from a complete route at the hands of Echevarri. At the critical moment in the affairs of Santa Anna, the Grand Lodge of the Ecoscés decreed the overthrow of Iturbide, and sent orders to General Echevarri, who was a member of the order, to unite his forces to those of Santa Anna in overturning the empire. This was a bitter pill for that general to swallow, but he swallowed it; and the two leaders together swallowed the empire.
Iturbide, being unable to stem the torrent of insurrection, had abdicated; a Republic had been established upon the ruins of the empire, and Victoria, the "wild man of the woods," was elected first President. He served out his time; but the last year of his government was disturbed by