The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1877-07-14
r--p ,rryrCaN WAR CLOUD.

| THE MEXICAN WAX CLouD'
Tho little war cloud on our southwestern
border is vlsibly darkening, ii 1t has not real
w broken. Dispatches from the RIO Gran'e
s.a,a ma, an invasion of the sacred SOIL oil
Mexico, under the presidential ordcr 10 zen
Ord has actually taken place. About the
OOH Of June marauding band of Lipan In
dams frosl Mexico, crossed the Rio Grande
into Gillespie county, Texas, and stealing a
lot of horses and cattle, fled back across inc
river into Mexico. Lieut.. Balls, Of the gath
mounted L. s. infantry, with detachment Oh
lrty men, got on their trail, and following
them across the Rio Grande, after chase oil
three days overlook them, attacked, ana strip
ped them of their plumber, killing and wound
ing some OF them and driving the rest to the
mountains.
Now this exactly meets the condition which
President Diaz directed Senior Mata, his rep,
repre- sentative al Washington, TO inform our
government would be regarded by the MeXl'
can government as an act of war, and Senior
Mariseal, now in New York, minister at
Washington of the government of Mexico
that preceded Diaz, publishes letter IN
which, IN behalf of the party he represents,
he declars that by the act of Lieut.. Bulls
"war IS begun" 50 that whether our gov
eminent knows it or not, this country is real
ly now at war with Mexico. |, is true, ii
generally takes two to make fight, aud our
government may say it won't fight; but let
another Lieut.. Bulls cross the border and
meet band of Trevino's soldiers, and fight
will be inevitable whether the powers at
Washington will or no.
The powers al Washington may make light
of it, but there is not civilized nation on the
globe which would not put upon the order to
Gen. Ord and the act of Lieut.. Bulls under
il, exactly the Interpretation Mexico gives it.
The only ground upon which oar own gov
can deny such result is, that MeXi'
co is not civilized nation, or, at least, that,
she has no such government as civilized ma
tions are bound to respect. To Justify this
view, our government says, these depredaions
along the Rio Grande have continued for
wears; Mexico has been appealed to and
warned repeatedly to put stop to them, but
her weak, unstable, utterly anarchical gov
if such it may be called, contesses
its inability to do so. There is, then, moth
ing left for our government than to take the
chastisement of these Rio GranGe marauders
into rs own hands. Mexico admitting It's in,
ability by mere high sounding proclamations
to deter its people from maraudlng over the
territory Vi neighboring states, those states
must necessarily protect themselves in the
only effective way, which is TO pursue the
until they can be caught and pun
ished, no matter how many borders they cross
or on whose territory they may be found.
Mexico may say this is war, but our govern
ment may refuse to 60 10 war. Mexico may
even with hostile intent invade our soil, and
we can drive her greasers back and stop
there. The stalwari vigorous athlete loses
nothing in reputation by refusing an encoun-
ter with u dwarf or cripple.
Clearly the people of the L. S. want no war
with Mexico, and would regard such con.
Gct, if forced upon them, as a grave calamity,
No orc questions what the result would be;
but after having thoroughly thrashed her
greaaers and again 'reyelcd in the Halls Of
the Montezumus," what would be gained
She has no money with which to indemnify
US, and the only thing left would be another
slice of territory. But we don't want her ter
ritory, especially with the Incumbrance of
such population as it would bring. The
evils of carpet Dagger rule in tae south would
be nothing comparable to the calamilics that
must attend The Incorporation into our system
of such restless, lawless, ignorant and hrut-
ish population as the less than half civilized
grcasers of Mexico.
All In all the business may be annoyingly
unpleasant, bat the course Of the Washington
government may be detensible if it keeps
within the limits above indicated. The only
suspicious part about il is, the singular time
hit upon TO adopt these vigorous measures
towards Mexico. II has been abundantly
proved that the depredatons along the MeXi-
can border, which used to be quite frequent,
had so entirely ceased, that none had occur
red since over a year and half ago. Why,
then, issue this war provoking order now?
After ali, may not Blame be correct in his
Woodstock surmise, that the order was issued
"in the hope Of divertlng attention from the
wrong TO southern republicans involved in
the violent unseating of Chamberlain and
Nichols" and so on?
II is doubtless very senseless in the Orange.
men at this day to get up an anniversary cele-
hr.iirr, in nnI,r Of tho hntiln ilnn Rn,rn