TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE FATE OF MEXICO.
?Tunis did a mail bring intelligence more ominous for Mexico than that which has arrived this week. Not that Paredes has proved a leader equal to the emergency ; nor that Santa Anna is a worse commander. The reputation of the recalled exile indeed is tainted with the worst suspicions for the ruler of a republic: he is said to share with his countrymen that gambling mania which so often obliterates every sense of honour ; and he is re-. ported even to have offered his country for sale to the United States ! But a knavish leader is better for Mexico just now than a weak one : it would be worse for the country to surrender, under conquest, at discretion than to be sold on advantageous terms. Yet it would be well the Mexicans were to reflect on the pro- bable and practical consequences of their subjugation by the re- publicans of the Union. History is not bare of cogent instances. The Dutch of New York started on tolerably equal terms as re- spects personal and local privileges, and though they were over- borne by the numerical proportion of the British race collec- tively, they have not suffered by the amalgamation ; but their cou- sins the Germans, under the name of Redemptioners were slaves to the shrewd and unscrupulous colonists of the Anglo-American race. What has become of the French in Florida and Louisiana ? The French Canadians have watched, and could tell how they would dread national extinction as the consequence of annexation. Observe even at this day the " Native American" spirit, and its tendency to trample on the Irish Celt. What Spaniards remain in Texas—how many still hold land there? And if they do, What is their condition? What is now passing in California ? If they open their eyes, the Mexicans will find no difficulty in discerning the immediate practical consequences to them of an- nexation, whether partial or entire, whether by defeat and con- quest, or by bargain and sale. However fair-spoken the terms of the treaty of cession, whatever the territorial privileges granted to the newly-annexed State, the Mexican race would sink to a level only above that of the Negro. The "Native American" spirit, already unbounded by the Rio del Norte, would soon oust the Mexicans from political ascendancy. But the race would not suffer only in its collective capacity : the law would be made to favour the ascendant law-makers; and in one way or another the process of confiscation' begun in California even before it is absorbed, would be carried on vigorously and steadily against the individuals of the Mexican blood. The period of transition would be a melancholy one : while the Anglo-American race was grow- in g in numbers and ascendancy, the Mexicans would be gradually losing their civil power and their individual property. National degradation would be accompanied by personal beggary. It might take a generation to complete the process: but what would be the feelings of the dispossessed Mexicans while thus cuckooed and driven, like the "wild Irish" before the Anglo-Normans, from their homes and property ? what the feelings of the sons of those Mexicans,—a dwindling race of gipsies warned off the lands of their fathers ?
Be Mexico conquered by the United States or sold, such is the fate that hangs over Mexicans, so long as their weakness tempts incursion.
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