“Why, if you had been ordered to enter the enemy’s lines, did you return about two o’clock with a republican officer of high rank and bring him into La Cruz, the Emperor’s headquarters? Why did you, contrary to the Emperor’s wishes, and without my knowledge, order the Hungarian hussars to unsaddle, when I had already given them the Emperor’s commands to remain saddled all night? Why, at such a dangerous time, did you remove from the Emperor’s headquarters the guard upon whom the safety of La Cruz depended? Why were the eight guns which stood on the square in front of the convent turned with their muzzles toward the city? Why, at two o’clock in the morning, did you take this republican general, dressed as a civilian and armed with a revolver, all through our fortifications? Why did you leave our lines before four o’clock that morning, still with this same officer, and return in a quarter of an hour at the head of two of the enemy’s battalions and lead them into the inner court of La Cruz, where you were met by your accomplice, Lieutenant Jablonski? How did it happen that you and Jablonski, both supposedly prisoners, should have informed the Emperor of the enemy’s presence in La Cruz? How do you explain the fact that when His Majesty, with General Castillo and myself, were about to leave the convent, then already surrounded by the enemy, we were allowed at a word from you to pass as civilians, although the Emperor must have been already recognized and General Castillo and I were in full uniform? How was it that after our capture some of the republican officers named you as the traitor? How did it happen that you, a prisoner, were always at liberty? And, finally, how were you able to possess yourself of the imperial papers and various articles belonging to His Majesty, such as his silver toilet service, which, by the way, have never appeared again? “To all of this, Señor Miguel Lopez, you cannot honestly and honorably reply; the facts speak for themselves and proclaim you both traitor and murderer. Why did you betray your Emperor and benefactor? Because, in the first place, you wished to be revenged on him for withholding from you the General’s commission which he had already signed. In case you should not know his reason for this, then learn now that it was because a brave man, whose blood is also on your hands and whose name I will not mention, lest you take revenge on those he has left behind, had presented to His Majesty a private document dismissing you from the army for infamous conduct during Santa Anna’s presidency and forbidding your ever holding a government office again.