Azanza's administration was, for a while, disturbed by a threatened outbreak among the lower classes, whose chief conspirators assembled in an obscure house in the capital, and designed, at a suitable moment, rising in great numbers and murdering, without discrimination, all the wealthiest or most distinguished Spaniards. This treasonable project was discovered to the viceroy, who went in person, with a guard, to the quarters of the leaguers, and arrested them on the spot. They were speedily brought to trial; but the cause hung in the courts until after the departure of Azanza, when powerful and touching intercessions were made with his successor to save the lives of the culprits. The project of a pardon was maturely considered by the proper authorities, and it was resolved not to execute the guilty chiefs, inasmuch as it was believed that their appearance upon a scaffold would be the signal for a general revolt of the people against the dominion of the parent country. The sounds of the approaching storm were already heard in the distance, and justice yielded to policy.
Azanza, with all his