"Very sensibly reasoned; but what can I do in all this?"
"You shall see."
"I ask nothing better."
"The Government wishes, then, to concentrate all its forces to strike a great blow. Emissaries have already been dispatched in all directions to inform the generals; but while we attack the enemy in front, it is important, in order to assure their defeat, to place them between two fires."
"That is to reason strategically, like Napoleon."
"Now, our general only is in a position to operate on the rear of the enemy, and to cut off his retreat This general is San Martin, who is now in Chili, at the head of an army of 10,000 men. Unhappily, it is excessively difficult to traverse the Spanish lines; but I have suggested to the council an infallible means of doing so."
"You are full of schemes."
"This means consists in dispatching you to St. Martin. You are a foreigner; they will not distrust you; you will pass in safety, and you will remit to the general the orders of which you will be the bearer—"
"Or I shall be arrested and hanged."
"Oh! That is not probable."