But a crisis was now at hand.  The insult offered to General Freire, by sending Santa Cruz to supersede him, will be fresh in the reader’s recollection.  Soon after this the Provincial Convention of Conception met, and passed a vote of censure upon the Council of Government at Santiago, for re-electing General O’Higgins as Supreme Director after his resignation—­an act which it considered illegal, as no such power was vested in the Ministry—­and it became known that General Freire was about to march with the troops under his command to enforce these views.  On the 17th, General Freire had advanced his troops as far as Talca, and a division of the army at Santiago was ordered to be in readiness to meet him.  The marines belonging to the squadron, under the command of Major Hind, were also ordered to reinforce the Director’s troops.

I was at this time at my country residence at Quintero, but learning what was going on, I immediately went to Valparaiso and resumed the command of the squadron, to which I found that orders had been issued at variance with the arrangements which had been entered into in regard to the prize-money due to the officers and men—­the Galvarino, which was pledged to be sold for that purpose, being under orders for sea, to convey San Martin to some place of safety, for, not anticipating the disorganisation which he found in Chili, he was afraid of falling into the hands of General Freire, from whom he would doubtless have experienced the full amount of justice which his conduct deserved.  The squadron in my absence had, however, taken the matter into its own hands, by placing the Lautaro, with her guns loaded, in a position to sink the Galvarino if she attempted to move.  The forts on shore had also loaded their guns for retaliation, though of these the squadron would have made short work.

No sooner had I restored order, by resuming the command, than I received from General Freire the subjoined letter, which no longer left me in doubt of his intentions:—­

   Conception, Dec. 18th, 1822.

   MY LORD,

The province under my command being tired of suffering the effects of a corrupted administration, which has reduced the Republic to a state of greater degradation than that under which it was labouring when it made the first struggle to obtain its liberty; and when, by means of an illegitimately-created convention, without the will of the people, they have traced the plans of enslaving them, by constituting them as the patrimony of an ambitious despot, whilst, in order to ensure him the command, they have trodden under foot the imprescriptible right of the citizens, exiling them in the most arbitrary manner from their native country.

Nothing now remains for us but heroically to resolve that we will place the fruit of eleven years of painful sacrifices in the way of saving it; to which effect I have deposited in the hands of