Maximilian was accompanied by a crowd of followers,--his escort,
household servants, and retinue; and brought with him all the material
for establishing in a new country a throne of the "right divine."
Quantities of these things, for want of lumber-room, are now stored at
the National Museum at Mexico, where one may see in glass cases much
heavy silver plate with the imperial arms, destined for the feasts of
this descendant of Charles V.; the decorations of the Emperor; and below
in the courtway stands the great glass coach in which he sat with the
Empress, as once sat Cinderella in a similar one. All these insignia of
royalty they brought to impose upon their new thralls.
[Illustration: SAN LUIS DE POTOSI.]
And so the young sovereigns set about organizing their ideal court. All
society was at their feet, and the society in Mexico at that time, if
more provincial than that of Paris or Vienna, yet had for Maximilian and
Carlotta the merit of being their own domain. They were monarchs of all
they surveyed. It was indeed a romance. All their debts paid by a
generous Napoleon in the background, a French army full-fledged to
protect them, a throne, a court, a people ready-made to order,--all they
had to do was to enter in and enjoy them.
Marshal Bazaine, at the head of military affairs, set about the
restoration of the arsenal, and repairing the damages made by the United
States war. On his arrival he found the service of artillery entirely
disorganized. Molino del Rey he restored to its functions of a foundry,
so that it could furnish arms and munitions for the country.
Napoleon had promised that the French troops should remain about
Maximilian for six years, or until his own national army should be on
such a footing as to be a proper protection to its Emperor. Bazaine was
therefore occupied with the reconstruction of the army, with an eye to
the distant day when he and his force might be recalled.
[Illustration: CHAPULTEPEC IN THE TIME OF MAXIMILIAN.]
Meanwhile, Maximilian began to govern, according to his lights, which
were liberal as far as the limit of absolute monarchy allowed. He sought
to gain the friendship of the party allied to Juarez, holding the idea
that this native chief of a half-civilized people had been driven off
the field for good, and that it was to be an easy task to replace his
crude government with one based on loftier planes. He paid no attention
to the new code of the reform, but began to impose his own regulations,
and to legislate on all matters as if Mexico were still in its natural
and primitive state. He readily listened to all sorts of plans for the
construction of telegraphs, railways, and other enterprises for the
improvement of the country, with little heed to their vast expense.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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