In August the ministers resigned; "the chief offices of state were begging in the streets," wrote the correspondent of the London _Times;_ and the men who finally took them, while personally well enough, had little strength and less prestige. By September the government stood in hourly fear of a revolution; but so little booty could be seen, that although the plots thickened, they were lazily developed, and amounted to nothing. Paredes, the Santannistas and the Federalists became constantly more threatening, however, and the administration more and more afraid to take any step whatever, good or bad. Nobody could guess what it would do to-day from what it did yesterday. The anarchy of weakness constituted the government. A triumvirate of Paredes, Tornel and Valencia was much talked of. Many prayed for some respectable despot, many for a foreign prince; and some of the more thoughtful suggested cautiously an American protectorate. "Sterile, deplorably sterile" has been the movement against Santa Anna, exclaimed the friendly _Siglo XIX_ in October, describing it as "a moment of happy illusion." By this time the administration was powerless even at the capital; and on November 30 _El Amigo del Pueblo_, an opposition sheet, announced, "There is no government in Mexico." This, however, was premature. Before the dénouement of this tragi-farce the United States was to enter upon the scene; and as this new phase of the drama requires to be prepared for, we must here leave Herrera, for a brief space, in the midst of his difficulties.[2.10] [DEPLORABLE STATE OF MEXICO]