CHAPTER XVI.
1794–1808.
BRANCIFORTE VICEROY—HIS GRASPING AND AVARICIOUS CHARACTER—CORRUPTION TOLERATED.—PERSECUTION OF FRENCHMEN—ENCAMPMENTS.—BRANCIFORTE'S CHARACTER.—AZANZA VICEROY.—EFFECT OF EUROPEAN WARS ON COLONIAL TRADE AND MANUFACTURES.—THREATENED REVOLT.—MARQUINA VICEROY—REVOLT IN JALISCO.—ITURRIGARAY VICEROY.—GODOY'S CORRUPTION—WAR.—DEFENCES AGAINST THE UNITED STATES—MIRANDA—HUMBOLDT.—MEXICO TAXED FOR EUROPEAN WARS—FERDINAND VII.—NAPOLEON IN SPAIN—KING JOSEPH BONAPARTE.—ITURRIGARAY ARRESTED.—GARIBAY VICEROY.
The Marques de Branciforte,
LIII. Viceroy of New Spain.
1794–1798.
The Marques Branciforte, who reached Mexico on the 11th of July, 1794, contrasts unfavorably, in history, with his illustrious predecessor Revilla-Gigedo. Partaking of the avaricious qualities of this personage's father, he seems to have possessed but few of his virtues, and probably accepted the viceroyalty of New Spain with no purpose but that of plunder.
Scarcely had he begun to reign, when his rapacity was signally exhibited. It is said that his first essay in extortion, was the sale of the sub-delegation of Villa-Alta to a certain Don Francisco Ruiz de Conejares, for the sum of forty thousand dollars, and the bestowal of the office of apoderado on the Count de Contramina, the offices of whose subordinates were bought and sold in the political market like ordinary merchandise.
At this epoch the warlike hostility to France was excessive, and orders had been received to exercise the strictest vigilance over the subjects of that nation who resided in Mexico. Their number, however, was small, for Spanish America was almost as closely sealed as China against the entrance of strangers. Nevertheless Branciforte encouraged a most disgraceful persecution against these unfortunate persons, by arresting them on the slightest pretexts, throwing them into prison, and seizing their possessions. He found, in his assessor general, Don Pedro Jacinto Valenzuela, and in his criminal prosecutor, Francisco Xavier de Borbon, fitting instruments to carry out his inexorable determinations. Upon one occasion he even demanded of the Sala de Audiencia that certain Frenchmen, after execution, should have their tongues impaled upon iron spikes at the city gates, because they had spoken slightingly of the virtue of the queen Maria Louisa! Fortunately, however, for the wretched culprits, the Sala was composed of virtuous magistrates who refused to sanction the cruel demand, and the victims were alone despoiled of their valuable property. These acts, it may well be supposed, covered the name of Branciforte with infamy even in Mexico.
In 1796, on the 7th of October, war was declared by Spain against England, in consequence of which the viceroy immediately distributed the colonial army, consisting of not less than eight thousand men, in Orizaba, Cordova, Jalapa, and Peroté; and, in the beginning of the following year, he left the capital to command the forces from his headquarters near the eastern coast. This circumstance enabled him to leave, with an air of triumph, a city in which he was profoundly hated. The people manifested their contempt of so despicable an extortioner and flatterer of royalty, not only by words, but by caricatures. When the sovereign sent him the order of the golden fleece, they depicted Branciforte with a collar of the noble order, but in lieu of the lamb, which terminates the insignia, they placed the figure of a cat! At his departure, the civil and financial government of the capital was entrusted to the regency of the audiencia, while its military affairs were conducted by the Brigadier Davalos. In Orizaba the conduct of Branciforte was that of an absolute monarch. All his troops were placed under the best discipline, but none of them were permitted to descend to Vera Cruz; yet, scarcely had he been established in this new military command, when it was known that Don Miguel José de Azanza was named as his viceroyal successor. Nevertheless Branciforte continued in control, with the same domineering demeanor, as in the first days of his government, relying for justification and defence in Spain upon the support of his relative, the Prince of Peace. In Orizaba he was surrounded by flatterers and his court was a scene of disgraceful orgies; yet the day of his fall was at hand. The ship Monarch anchored at Vera Cruz, on the 17th of May, 1798, and, on the 31st of the same month, Azanza, the new viceroy who reached America in her, received the viceroyal baton from Branciforte. This supercilious peculator departed from New Spain with five millions of dollars, a large portion of which was his private property, in the vessel that had brought his successor, and arrived at Ferol, after a narrow escape from the English in the waters of Cadiz. But he returned to Spain loaded with wealth and curses, for never had the Mexicans complained so bitterly against any Spaniard who was commissioned to rule them. The respectable and wealthy inhabitants of the colony were loudest in their denunciations of an "Italian adventurer," who enriched himself at the expense of their unfortunate country, nor was his conduct less hateful because he had been the immediate successor of so just and upright a viceroy as Revilla-Gigedo.
The character of Branciforte was keen and hypocritical. He tried, at times, but vainly, to conceal his avarice, while his pretended love for the "Virgin of Guadalupe" and for the royal family, was incessantly reiterated in familiar conversation. Every Saturday during his government, and on the twelfth of every month, he made pious pilgrimages to the sanctuary of the Mexican protectress. He placed a large image of the virgin on the balcony of the palace, and ordered a salute to be fired at daybreak in honor of the saint on the twelfth of every December. With these cheap ceremonials, however, he satisfied his hypocritical piety and absorbing avarice, but he never bestowed a farthing upon the collegiate church of the Virgin. Whenever he spoke in his court of the sovereign of Spain it was with an humble mien, a reverential voice, and all the external manifestations of subserviency for the royal personages who conferred such unmerited honors upon him. Such is the picture which has been left by Mexican annalists of one of their worst rulers.